by Gary Jonas
“I bought you a cell phone,” I said. “Why don't you call yourself?”
“You think I'll have my old number?”
“If not, you can call information. But yeah, try the dojo.”
She nodded. “That might be acceptable. I would know my own voice. But if it's me there, she would recognize my voice too.”
“So if she answers, hand the phone to me.”
“That might be worse. If she recognizes your voice, you're supposed to be dead.”
“Then get Rayna to take the phone when you make the call. Put it on speaker or something.”
“Rayna is out shopping.”
“Then wait until she gets back, or you can just hang up.”
“I will.”
The waitress brought the bill, and I signed it with my room number and added a generous tip. She topped off my coffee one last time and went to take care of her other customers.
“I should have spoken with you about all this sooner,” Kelly said when we were alone again.
“I understand. You lost a close friend, and seeing me is a constant reminder of what you lost.”
She nodded. “You feel it too.”
“Every time I see you.”
“So in your view, I need to earn your friendship too?”
I shook my head. “That's where we differ. I know you're Kelly Chan. I know you're the same woman I knew but without some common experiences. I'm already willing to accept you as you are and learn to be friends with who you are now. In my eyes, you have nothing to prove.”
“You saw your version of me die.”
“Twice,” I said. “I don't ever want to see that again.”
“You won't,” she said.
“I hope that's just confidence and not you saying you're leaving.”
“Either way, I just want you to know that my loyalty is now with me.”
“That's how it should be.”
“I'm a Sekutar. Without loyalty outside myself, I'm not complete. But I refuse to simply grant my loyalty to you because you look like the man I respected.”
“So you'll give me a chance?”
“For now, but you need to know that in my eyes, you are weak. My Jonathan would have cast Chronos into the void and would have taken his time device.”
“I've seen too much death in my life, Kelly.”
“Then you're in the wrong business.”
“I don't want to kill anyone.”
“That may be the deciding factor,” she said. “Some people deserve to die.”
“I've been down that road,” I said. “I tried being a cold-blooded killer. I killed a lot of people. Some of them deserved it; some probably didn't. It took its toll on me. I flat-out murdered Henry Winslow's father. I had to step back from that cliff.”
“To the point where you became a pacifist.” Kelly spit the words as if they were made of shit.
“I tried a different tactic,” I said.
“And got more people killed.”
“And I can pull up their faces in my dreams every single night.”
Kelly rolled her eyes. “Poor little haunted boy,” she said.
I shook my head. “They don't haunt me, Kelly. That's the problem.”
“I don't understand.”
“I'm dead inside. When it came down to it, I killed Winslow.”
“Yes, you did. Finally.”
“I needed him to be redeemed. Don't you see that?”
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
“He could have been a good man. My actions drove him to be a killer. Mine! I tried to set that right, but it didn't work. I don't even know where I went wrong. Did I trust too much in the goodness of men? Was I just grasping at straws because I didn't want to be a monster who plays judge, jury, and executioner? I've killed so many people, I'm afraid I've lost my own humanity. I've been trying to find it.”
“Wake up, Jonathan. We're not here to be regular people worried about our souls. We're the ones who make it possible for those regular people to exist. That's the job. We take out the trash. In order to protect people, we determine who the bad guys are, and we take them off the board. Permanently.”
“I'm not sure I'm qualified to make that kind of judgment,” I said.
“Then you're not the person to whom I should swear my allegiance.”
CHAPTER FIVE
The first time I saw Isabel Sanchez, she was standing in a tree. She balanced precariously between two branches, one hand on the trunk, while the other reached toward an orange-and-black tabby cat, which backed away from her along another tree limb. She wore cut-off blue jean shorts and a yellow tank top.
“Goddamn it, Sancho!” she said. “Get your sorry ass over here. I'll get you some 9 Lives.”
“Stick before carrot?” I asked from where I stood ten feet below. I'd switched to Levi's and a nice maroon button-up shirt. I wore brown shoes but nothing too expensive. I didn't want to stand out.
Isabel looked down at me. “Sancho hates carrots.”
I shielded my eyes from the sun as I watched her try to coax the cat closer. “But he does like 9 Lives,” I said and moved up the stairs to the brownstone. I scanned the names on the intercom system and pressed the button beside the name Sanchez. Then I stood back and waited for the buzzer, and while I waited, I watched Isabel advance toward the cat.
“Be careful up there,” I said.
“Mind your own damn business,” Isabel said and grabbed the cat's right forepaw.
The cat meowed and pulled back, but Isabel held on.
I pressed the button again, stepped back, and watched as Isabel pulled the cat to her chest. The cat put its paws on Isabel's shoulders and looked at me. If I didn't know better, I'd swear the cat was smiling.
Isabel looked to be in her early forties. She climbed down that tree like a true professional without a misstep. A few times I worried she might not have her balance, but she set foot on the ground safely then walked up to the door. She was a little fireplug of a woman standing four-foot-ten on her tiptoes.
“Nice climbing,” I said.
“Thank you,” she said. “But I didn't ask.”
“I was talking to the cat,” I said with a grin.
“Of course you were.”
Esther stepped through the brownstone door. “The Sanchez apartment is empty,” she said. “Cell phone is on the TV stand.”
I'd sent Esther ahead, as I often did, so she could scout the landscape and let me know if I needed to be aware of any danger or obvious lies, like someone refusing to answer the phone or their door when they were actually home.
“Before you go,” I said to Isabel, “do you happen to know the Sanchez family?”
“Who wants to know?”
“I do.”
“And you are?”
“The one asking.”
“You're a funny man. Go away or I'll call the comedy police.”
“Are you a member of the Sanchez family?”
“You think because I'm Latina, I must be named Sanchez? Hold my cat.”
She shoved the cat into my arms, and Sancho dug his claws into my shoulder. I petted him, trying to calm him down, while Isabel fumbled in her pocket for her keys.
“Just hoping you're named Sanchez,” I said.
She unlocked the door and reached for the cat, but the cat kept his claws in my shoulder, so I winced as she pulled him free.
“Oh,” she said. “That's going to leave some marks. You have a nice day.”
She moved into the building and went to close the door, but I blocked it with my foot.
“Your cat clawed me. You could at least tell me your name.”
“Isabel.”
“Isabel Sanchez? Sister of Pedro and Juanita Sanchez?”
She stared at me for a moment. “What is your name, and why are you asking about them after all these years?”
“My name is Jonathan Shade. I'm a private investigator, but I'm not licensed in New York. You're not obligated to talk
to me, but I hope you will because I think there was something . . . let's say . . . off about the way your siblings died.”
She studied me. “You have haunted eyes hiding an old soul. Let me put Sancho in the apartment, and I'll let you buy me a cup of coffee. We can talk. You wait here.”
I moved my foot, and she closed the door.
“Go with her,” I said to Esther.
“On it.” Esther walked through the door.
I wasn't worried that Isabel might come back with a gun or anything. I just didn't want to waste my time waiting at the door if she decided to blow me off to watch Judge Judy rather than go for coffee.
Esther popped back to me a minute later. “She's putting on some glad rags. I think you've got a date.”
I leaned against the rail beside the stairs and nodded. “I've still got it.”
“Or she wants a free cup of joe.”
“Who doesn't?”
“Me. I can't drink. I miss the smell of coffee.”
“You now have a choice,” I said. “You can hang with me and Isabel, or you can go explore, or if you're feeling really generous and useful, you can go see what Kelly is up to.”
“You want some alone time with Ms. Sanchez?”
“What I really want is for you to make sure Kelly isn't trying to find the Men of Anubis.”
“And you're not used to me popping in all unexpected.”
“I need to adjust, yes. I went twenty-nine years without you popping in out of nowhere, so it's still throwing me off my game a bit.”
“Then maybe I should pop in more often. Help you get used to me again.”
“I missed you, Esther. And yes, I do want you to pop in more often,” I said and meant it.
“I'll check on Kelly for you.”
“Thanks.”
She popped away and I spent close to ten minutes watching children play hopscotch on the sidewalk.
About the time I thought she'd decided to stand me up, the door opened and Isabel Sanchez stepped out wearing tight blue jeans, brown leather boots, and a white button-up shirt. She had an easy smile and beautiful brown eyes with a number of laugh lines that made her face seem welcoming. She'd overdone it on the perfume, and it seemed to be covering another aroma, but I couldn't put my finger on it.
“All right, big spender,” she said. “Take me out on the town.”
“Out on the town” turned out to be the neighborhood Starbucks. She got an iced chai, and I opted for an iced tea. It was too hot outside to get regular coffee. We took a seat at a small round table.
“How did my family come to your attention, Mr. Magnum?”
“I don't look anything like Tom Selleck,” I said.
“And that's a shame,” she said. “I would love a ride in that Ferrari.”
“Me too,” I said. “Truth is, I've been working a case, and your brother and sister came up.”
“By name?”
“No. I had to track down their names, but they were the only Hispanic names I could find who died on the same night in that particular hospital in 1976. The next of kin was Geraldo Sanchez.”
“Dad. He passed away ten years back.”
“Sorry,” I said.
“It's been a decade,” she said. “I'm over it. My mother followed him a year later almost to the day.”
I started to say sorry again but caught myself. “But you still live at the address from the file.”
“Rent control. You don't let that go if you don't have to.”
“Good point.”
“I was ten when my brother and sister died.”
“I'd have guessed younger,” I said.
“And you'd be wrong. I earned every wrinkle on my face, sweetie.”
“You don't have any gray hair,” I said.
She laughed. “Only my hairdresser knows my natural color.”
“Well, there you go.”
“Yes, and the fucking bitch told me my natural color is gray.”
“Ouch.”
“She does a good job, so I forgive her.”
“It looks totally natural,” I said. And it did. Her hairdresser rocked.
“Okay, you're hotter than Tom Selleck.”
“Thank you.”
“Don't let that go to your head. My eyesight is starting to go, so I could be way off.”
“I'll keep that in mind.”
“But you want to talk about Pedro and Juanita. I've been thinking about them a lot lately. Started having weird dreams about them right after Hurricane Sandy, and those dreams now come back nearly every night.”
“Nearly every night?”
She leaned forward and whispered, “Except the nights I smoke some weed.” And she laughed, waving a hand in the air. “I'm kidding about that. Okay, I'm not kidding. Unless you're with the police, in which case I'm totally kidding.”
“Did you toke it up a bit before you came downstairs?” I asked.
She put a finger to her lips in a shh gesture then laughed again. “Only a little.”
That explained the extra perfume. “That's all right,” I said. “I moved out here from Colorado.”
“Why did you move?” she asked.
“Wasn't really my choice, but if we can get back to Pedro and Juanita, that would be great.”
“I was with them that night,” Isabel said. “When they woke it up.”
“Woke what up?” I asked.
“You're going to think I'm crazy, but I don't give a shit. I saw what I saw.”
“What did you see?”
“We took my uncle's boat out to the island.”
“Ellis Island?”
“Yeah. Pedro scored some good weed, and he and Juanita wanted to get high and go exploring. I got to go along because I said I'd tell Mom and Dad if they didn't take me. So we get to the island, and it's late at night, dark and spooky. Pedro starts telling us about how there are ghosts on the island. Ghosts of the people who didn't get into the country.”
“And you saw these ghosts?”
She shook her head. “Let me talk. You want to hear it, you have to hear it all. I told a reporter about it because he wanted to write a book about Haunted New York, but he never found a publisher. He gave me a copy of the manuscript, though. That was nice of him, but I think he just wanted to get in my pants. Anyway, back to the island.”
“I'm listening.”
She kept her voice low. “We wandered the grounds a bit, and I just liked the view of the harbor and the Statue of Liberty and the boats and ships lit up on the water. But Pedro wanted to get high and explore the hospital. He really wanted to see the infectious and contagious disease wards. All the talk of ghosts scared me, but I didn't want to be alone, so I followed them into the corridor. Pedro had a flashlight, and he kept shining it up under his chin and giving me a maniacal laugh, trying to scare me. It worked, but I didn't want him to call me a baby, so I bit my lip to keep from crying out, and I followed him and Juanita into the ward.”
She closed her eyes for a moment, allowing herself to drift back to that summer night so many years ago.
She met my gaze. “The ward had been abandoned for more than twenty years, and it was a dusty mess. Overturned skeletons of bed frames, pieces of wood, broken floor tiles, and off in the corner, a darkness darker than the shadows stood waiting. Wisps of fog swirled out from it, and as soon as I saw it, I stopped. But Pedro was wasted, and he thought it was cool, so since I backed away into the hall out of his reach, he grabbed Juanita and pushed her toward it, saying, 'Attack the ghost!' She stumbled forward and he pushed her again, taunting her until he shoved her right into the darkness and she screamed.”
“What happened?”
“She danced around the room, swiping at her hair, afraid a spider got in it. Pedro laughed and laughed, and I eased back into the room to see that darkness sweeping out of the corner. It loomed over Juanita, and Pedro stopped laughing when he saw it too.”
“And?” I asked, prompting her.
She sighed and l
ooked at her unfinished chai. “And I ran. I was afraid, so I ran down the corridor, out the door, and all the way back to the ferry slip where we had the boat tied up. Pedro was right behind me, saying the darkness ate Juanita. We fumbled to get the boat untied from the cleats, and I climbed inside, telling Pedro to push off so we could get away, but he straightened as if he'd had a sudden moment of clarity, and said, 'Not without Juanita.' I loved my brother in that moment. He was so brave. He started back toward the building, and Juanita stepped outside. She looked traumatized. He led her to the boat, and she kept saying, 'You left me. The demon is hungry, and it wants out.'”
“And you think it was a real demon?”
“I was ten. I told the writer guy that it was probably just shadows. Problem is that Juanita and Pedro believed it was a demon. I did too at that point, of course. I held my cross necklace and prayed to Jesus to save us. Pedro got Juanita into the boat and pushed off. We made it back to shore and started toward home, but Pedro and Juanita kept glancing over their shoulders, saying they were being followed.”
I knew that feeling only too well. “Did you feel it too?”
“I don't know. I thought I did. But I was an impressionable kid. I still believed in the bogeyman.”
“Go on.”
“You're not laughing at me, and you don't seem to be surprised by any of this.”
“I've seen stranger things.”
She nodded. “I wouldn't mind hearing about some of those things at some point.”
“What about Pedro and Juanita? What happened?”
“We went home. I went to bed, but Pedro and Juanita were older, so they stayed up, and according to my father, they raided his liquor cabinet. At some point, they went back outside, and that's the last any of us saw of them. They turned up in a psychiatric ward fifty miles away later that night, and both of them died there before morning.”
“And you think it was a demon.”
She touched the cross she wore around her neck. “I don't know what I think or believe anymore. I just know I miss my brother and sister.” She sipped her chai. “And I don't think anyone at that hospital gave a flying fuck about them. They were just two more crazy people.”
I nodded.
“Sorry,” she said. “It still bugs me.”
“It would bother me too. Did you see that darkness again at any point?”