Ghost Mortem (Bordertown Chronicle Book 1)

by Gavin Masters

  “What do we do?” I asked.

  “For one thing, I need out of these cuffs. And where the hell is my uniform? I’m not going home in my bra and panties, with my hands cuffed behind my back! This is a small town. People will talk.”

  “Right,” I said, nodding. “Wait, is that so bad?”

  “For you, no. You don’t have much of a reputation anyway.”

  “Oh gee, thanks.”

  “That's not what I mean. It’s different for me, Gavin. I’m a woman. You’ve no idea what it’s like here—how hard it is to get respect as an authority figure in a small town like this. And a lot of the ghosts here are a lot more old-fashioned than the people you’re used to in metropolitan places like Regina. Just think of how little respect for me the ghosts at the Heaven-Eleven had to begin with. And they were born in this century!”

  “Oh, come on. Everyone hates those kids. Even Ashley Pyle kinda hates them, and they’re probably his only friends.”

  “It's not just them, Gavin,” she said. “I mean…it's work too.”

  I recalled what Sheriff Porter had said when he'd caught me checking Vikki out at the precinct. I realized Vikki was standing beneath the proverbial glass ceiling. I wasn't even sure she knew to what extent. Her boss already didn't respect her. At least, within the few interactions I'd had with him, that was the impression I was getting.

  “Things could get strained with my partner,” she continued, “shit, Gavin, how do I face Jack now? I could lose my job.”

  “Wait…why would you lose your job?”

  “Gavin,” she said softly, perhaps not wanted her voice to carry beyond the room, “remember that talk about only letting humans on the force?”

  “Yeah,” I said. Then I lowered my own voice. “Wait, you're not human?”

  Vikki looked like she was on the verge of tears. Her green and blue eyes were all glassy.

  “Sorry, I didn't mean…that wasn't supposed to be derogatory. I just really meant…what are you?”

  “I don't know,” she sobbed.

  I just wanted to hold her. To tell her it would all be okay.

  “You can't tell anyone,” she said. “God, please don't tell anyone.”

  “Vikki, god, why in the world would I…Vikki, I'd never do that to you.”

  “Okay,” she sniffled.

  She seemed to calm a little.

  “Does my dad know?” I asked.

  “He might now. God…he might have to report me.”

  “My dad wouldn't do that.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because he trusts you. I mean it's not like…it's not like you ever used your powers to hurt anyone. Right?”

  “Of course not!”

  “Well…?”

  “Ugh! Gavin, I need my uniform. And I need to get these cuffs off.”

  I nodded. I remembered the kissing in the town square, and then back at the front door. Then I remembered her shredding her uniform like the she-hulk.

  “Oh, man, Vikki, I think your uniform has seen better days.”

  “Whatever. Just put something on and go get it.”

  “All right, all right.”

  I pulled on a fresh pair of underwear and then pants from my dresser.

  I tiptoed down the stairs to find Vikki’s discarded articles of clothing. I started collecting them when a light came on in the kitchen. I looked back at my father, feeling like a thief, caught with his hand in a monkey-trap.

  Dad just looked at me wearily and crossed his arms.

  “I’m in a lot of trouble now, aren’t I?” I said.

  “Well…you pissed Raven off.”

  “I did what?”

  “She was home during your little gallivant with oh…I don’t know…my partner. Of all people, Gavin.”

  “Raven was home?”

  “Yeah. So, nice going. Look, she even left you a note.”

  I picked up the note and read it.

  'Gavin—I don’t care what you do on your own time, but for the love of god, don’t bring your sluts back to our house, especially not while I’m home, because I have to live here. You, on the other hand, don’t.'

  I think it was just about one of the most offensive messages anyone had ever left me.

  “Jesus. Well, that puts me in my place, I guess, doesn’t it?” I said bitterly.

  I put down the note, and went back upstairs.

  “Gavin…” my father started.

  I spun around. “You know what? I’ve heard enough opinions for one day. Quite frankly, I don’t care whether you or Raven approve or not.” I turned to go, then turned again. “Anyway, it wasn’t entirely our fault. Apparently it was the succubus.”

  “I know,” said dad. “I was there. I saw it.”

  I turned back around.

  “You did?”

  “Uh-huh. As did most of the town.”

  “Really?”

  “Like, half the town saw it. You kind of did it right in front of us.”

  “Oh, god,” I said. “Does Vikki know?”

  “I think she does now,” he said, looking up behind him. Up on the landing, at the top of the stairs stood Vikki, almost statuesque in her bra, panties and handcuffs, if it weren’t for the fact that she looked so sad. We weren’t exactly the image of the clever crime fighting duo I’d hoped we’d be. I imagined we were quite the spectacle, me at the bottom the stairs, in nothing but a pair of pants and holding a bunched-up, bottomless police uniform which I realized Vikki couldn’t well wear home.

  “Are we all right?” Vikki asked, from the top of the stairs.

  “I’m not one to judge either of you, under the circumstances. But Gavin, you need to talk to Raven and make this right. As for the rest of the town, I'm new here too, so I just don’t know.”

  I nodded. I ascended the stairs. I unlocked Vikki's wrists from behind her, then handed Vikki her tattered uniform. She examined it, and evidently noted the lack of buttons.

  “I can’t wear this home,” she said.

  “You can borrow one of mine,” said dad. “It’ll be a bit big, but, I guess beggars can’t be choosers.”

  Dad got a uniform for her.

  Vikki got dressed and headed for the door.

  I was right behind her, trying to think of something to say.

  She turned to me instead.

  “This probably shouldn’t happen again,” she said.

  My heart sank. But I knew she was right. There was something wrong about the whole thing. She was a cop. She needed to be respected as a cop. I’m the press, and so far, I haven’t really done much to boost her image. But then there was the boy in me. The boy who just wanted the girl. I knew I wanted Vikki Valliant from the moment I first laid eyes on her. I didn’t just want to fuck her. I wanted to be there for her. Always. I didn’t know what to say.

  “I guess it was all the succubus…touching…thing,” I said.

  “Yeah, I guess so. I’m sorry. I should have had more control.”

  “I know,” I said. “Me too.”

  “No, Gavin, this wasn’t your fault. At all. You couldn’t have controlled yourself even if you wanted to.”

  “Gee, thanks for the vote of confidence!” I said.

  But she was probably right. Even now, just looking at her Aphroditeous curves—I kind of wanted to pull her in to me and start kissing her. Maybe that would make her feel better—

  “No, that's not what I meant. Men can't control it. They literally can't. Not after contact with a succubus like that. But me…Gavin, I tackled that succubus without thinking. Yeah, they can drive you crazy via touch, but it’s only supposed to work if the genders that match your interest.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Like, a succubus affects heterosexual men or homosexual women. An incubus affects homosexual men and heterosexual women.”

  “Oh,” I said. “So you’re saying…you’re actually a lesbian?”

  “Really Gavin? That’s what you’re taking from this? After everything we
did last night?”

  “Well…I don’t know…Geez!”

  “Of course I’m not a lesbian, you dimwit, I’m…I'm trying to say I don't know what came over me. It's…it's some power I've never felt before. It doesn't make sense.”

  I wanted to say something, but the words didn't come.

  Vikki sighed heavily. “I should go.”

  I didn't want her to leave.

  “All right,” I said. “Listen, are we still…can I still do the ride along thing with you guys? I mean this is seriously the most fun job I’ve had in…in, well, like, ever.”

  “I don’t think so,” she said. “I don’t think that’s a good idea. At least…at least not until I can figure out why…why this happened.”

  I didn’t know what to say. I just hung my head.

  “I know, right?” she added. “Fuck.”

  Vikki turned without another word and ran out into the night.

  “I’ve never seen one of your dates end before,” said dad. “Are you always this smooth?”

  “Not now, dad! Just…”

  I stormed back to my room and slammed my door.

  I crawled into my bed and then I most definitely did not sob myself to sleep. Because I'm a grown-ass man, and I would never do that. I certainly didn't cry for two whole hours. So if you ever heard my dad claim different, it's a lie!

  Chapter 31

  The next morning—proper morning, I should say, where the sun was actually up—I crawled out of the hidey-hole I call a bedroom and came down to the breakfast table. I was expecting a lot of awkward silence from the family. Or maybe mockery from my dad, or a lecture from my sister. But at least I'd have a chance to say something in my defense. And in Vikki's. Raven's note was pretty rude, and my inner feminist was particularly angry about her calling Vikki a 'slut'. I mean, I thought Vikki and Raven liked one another. Under the circumstances, I thought maybe I could chalk that up to being an anger-induced lapse in judgment. When we're mad, we often say things we don't really mean, don't we? If I could just explain that I wasn’t really me at the time, maybe things between Raven and me could be good again. But honestly, I still couldn’t figure out why she’d be so pissed off to begin with. I mean…I'm an adult. Vikki's an adult. We can make our own choices, right? What business was that of Raven's? It's not like she's my mom.

  When I got downstairs though, there was no one there. My sister was gone. She was nowhere in the house. There was no indication of when she was coming back, either. Dad was also gone, presumably off on patrol with Vikki. Unless they were being forced to switch partners or something. I hoped not. The two of them had a great rapport together, I thought. I’d hate it if what we'd done had gotten in the way of that.

  I took a well-needed hot shower, smoked five cigarettes and brooded for a while.

  When that got boring, I decided to go to work.

  When I got there, and walked into the giant glass menagerie, I got a wave of applause and catcalls from the other journalists.

  “How was she?” asked one of the other weasel-like reporters. And I don't mean he was metaphorically acting like a weasel in asking me that, though surely he also was that. He was also just an honest-to-god, actual man-weasel with a potbelly threatening to burst through the button-up shirt he wore.

  “Yeah, does she do it like a porn star?” said another.

  “Or does she just lie back and think of Bordertown?” said a third.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said.

  “Oh come on, don’t play coy,” said Man-Weasel. “We all know it. The whole town saw it. Give us the inside scoop!”

  “I may well scoop out your insides if you don’t take a step back from me, right now,” I said.

  Man-Weasel put his hands up in deference and backed away, contempt written all over his smug, musteline face. I was so pissed off I just wanted to punch it. But he was only four feet tall and a weasel, so that didn't exactly seem fair.

  “Masters,” called a voice from the head office. It was unmistakably Chuck Wood’s voice, to be sure. “Please. Step into my office.”

  I ascended to Chuck's office and shut the door, wondering what good that would do for the sake of privacy, since, considering the layout of the place, if you can look out at everyone, everyone can conversely look in. And they most definitely were looking in, while nudging and whispering, like they were watching some kind of god-damned reality show. Which I was beginning to suspect this was.

  “So tell me,” Chuck said, “what’s happening with the story? You got a story for me now, or what?”

  “I don’t know if I’m going to be able to finish that story, Chuck,” I said. “I’m off the case. I can’t do a ride along with Jack and Vikki anymore, in case you haven’t already heard.”

  “Yeah, yeah. I heard. Listen, kid, don’t worry about it. You’re the talk of the town now. You’ve got a great opportunity here.”

  “Opportunity?” I said. “To do what, exactly?”

  “To do an exposé on your sexual conquest. I can already see the headline. One Night Only, with the Vigorous, Voluptuous, Vikki Valliant!”

  I stared at him for a moment, astonished at his audacity.

  “Are you insane? I can’t write that!”

  “Of course you can! Who else is going to write it? I mean, some of the other reporters saw it from the street, but you were there. Kid, do you have any idea how many guys in this town, myself included, have thought about bumping uglies with that hot little blonde cop-cake?”

  I wanted to answer him. But I couldn’t. Strangely, my jaw just sort of hung there. Now I was just trying to get the image out of my mind of Chuck Wood's fat, naked, furry body “bumping uglies” with Vikki Valliant. I may well have nearly vomited in my mouth a little.

  “You're a man-beaver,” was all I could say.

  “My point exactly. Everyone wants to be you right now. Young, handsome, human. Mostly human I assume, anyway. I’ve already had twenty people just this morning say they’d buy an exclusive from us if it just featured your exposé on your one night stand with Vikki Valliant. And I’ll pay you double my normal rate.”

  “I don’t think so,” I said.

  “Triple. Triple my normal rate.”

  “I don’t even know what your normal rate is, Chuck.”

  “Two dollars a word. Triple that would be six dollars, and were talking like a feature story kid, like a two-thousand word story. That’s… shit, I don’t know what that is.

  “That’s twelve thousand dollars,” I said, feeling a little hypnotized. “Wait, how do you even make money here? The population is 66,000.”

  “Kid, do you know nothing?”

  “Yes,” I snapped. “That's what I keep trying to tell everyone. I know literally nothing about this town.”

  “Officially, yeah, we have about 66,000 registered fully human people. But really, well, there’s a lot more people here who can't register for various reasons. If the feds looked at my picture on my driver's license, you can imagine they might ask some awkward questions. And besides, we sell papers on news stands and supermarkets all over the country. We just market the stories a little differently. See here, it’s the news, but out there, it’s entertainment. Regular jack-offs in America don’t believe this place is real. They think it’s funny. They think it’s a soap opera. And Deputy Vikki Valliant is one of our hottest stars. She's already refused to do a centerfold. Twice. Even though there was huge demand for it. Big bucks. And you, well, if you wrote this story, you’d be…well…you’d be a legend.”

  “I see,” I said, and turned to leave.

  “I’ll pay quadruple the normal rate if you write me this story,” he said. “And…you didn't happen to snap any candid photos, did you?”

  “Ugh,” I said.

  I stopped only for a moment, thinking of things I wanted say, like orifices I could think of where he might shove this story, but thought better of it and walked on out.

  “Just think about it,” he call
ed. “Let me know if you change your mind.”

  Chapter 32

  Unsure where anyone else was, and unable to deal with the idea of writing an unconscionable story about a woman I respect and adore, I walked around the town for a while, feeling almost like a spirit in purgatory.

  I was so mad I was just waiting to flip out on someone. I needed to get rid of my anger.

  'Slut.' That's the word Raven had used in that shitty note of hers to describe Vikki. Why did that bother me so much? I've been called a slut before. By her no less. Somehow I'd been able to laugh that off. But that was high school. Now? I just don't know. Why is that word even still in circulation? I mean, why does it still carry so much weight? And why does it carry so much more stigma on women than men? That doesn’t seem fair to me. And why in the hell, by that reasoning, would women be resorting to using that word on one another like that? If you live in a world where the notion of slut comes as a kind of unfair double standard, then would it not, at least, make sense not to perpetuate that repressive double standard?

  And what’s wrong with slutting about anyway? It’s just sex. Was Vikki and me sleeping together really so shameful? I wanted to brag about it to the world, if only I thought they'd really understand. I think everything about Vikki Valliant is wonderful. The only thing stopping me is that I know how damaging that would be for her reputation. God knows why. It’s not like it means she’d be any less good at her job. I mean…don’t we all fuck at some point, sooner or later? Women and men alike? We’d have no kids if we didn’t. So what’s the big deal? It all just pissed me off, and I couldn’t form a clear thought about it.

  I got home even more wound-up than I'd left. Thankfully, Raven wasn’t around, so I didn't have to suppress the urge scream at and shake the ever-loving shit out of her.

  I decided instead to focus on the project I’d first set out to. My dad’s reputation was shot. So too, was Vikki’s now, apparently. But what if I could get it back for both of them? What if I could still help them solve this case? No one would have to know. I could do some digging on my own. That’s what journalists do after all, right? And if I was going to do an exposé on Vikki Valliant, it wasn’t going to be about what fucking her was like. Because really, fucking her wasn’t worth a damn if we couldn't treasure it together afterwards. If I couldn’t hold her afterwards and tell her all the things I wanted to say…Well, it’s different, I guess, when you love someone, and you can’t tell her. If I was going to do an exposé on Vikki Valliant, it was going to be the story about how she finally blew open the Nefarious Darius copycat murders. With the help of my dear old dad, of course. The legendary Jack Masters. The Mountie who took down Nefarious Darius Danko in the first place, and was later disgraced. But that's not how his story ends. He later redeems himself, by taking down the Nefarious Darius phantom, this time once and for all. That was the story I wanted to write. That was the story I wanted to make happen. And if I couldn’t ride along with them, hell, I’d just have to run my own investigation from home and send them anonymous tips.