Ghost Writer (Raven Maxim Book 1) (4 page)

“That’s too easy. Maybe we’ll never know. I can tell ya this much though, no one wakes up and goes crazy.”

“Yeah, well, normal people don’t stop eating by choice, either.”

Both men nodded and scanned the room, neither seemingly sure what they were looking for anymore. The house had a bizarre feel to it, and the odor of death still loomed about in the place. They’d been sent over to do a final sweep of the property before it became contaminated by nosy visitors, incessant fans of the deceased, and long lost family members hoping to cash in on the millionaire’s estate. One thing was for certain though: this was no homicide. Renowned mystery and horror author Peter Jones was a revered celebrity who had been swallowed whole by his own self, disappearing into the arms of a hermit lifestyle that no one could make heads or tails of.

His bookshelves teemed with notebooks that had only one or two words written in them, while others had been well used to the last page. Those illustrious detailed stories could send the most unmoved spectator into a tailspin of the heebie jeebies. The man had an incredible imagination, shellacked with a love for the morbid and unusual. He blamed his bland childhood in Maxim for the sprouting of an overactive imagination. Regardless, the man was a legend… the legend was the man. Peter Jones left no true indication of his self-imposed fate. The only thing left behind was a short note detailing his plans for suicide that had been collected earlier in the week when his body was discovered. It read:

Today I will no longer eat another morsel. I will only drink one glass of water per day, just enough to get my affairs in order before my time runs out.

I will continue to write until I no longer have the energy or capability, and then, my final words will either be etched in Heaven or Hell, whichever place she may be. I believe that this is in fact the underworld, for no greater pain could be fathomed, even in my wildest fancy. Life no longer has meaning.

–Peter Jones

Officer Grant and Allen continued their search while a strange scent filled the air. Minutes graduated into hours. It felt like time had frozen, and an unnerving chill came upon him. He paused and looked about as the hairs on his arms stood at full attention. Was someone there with them, breathing, watching…? A sense of anger and urgency merged.

“Jesus!”

A book flew across the room and landed in the cold, dark fireplace.

“Did you throw that?!” Allen asked, pointing towards the thing.

“No! I swear to you, it just went over by itself.”

On a swallow, he crept steadily towards the hearth, his heart beating so damn fast. Fear grabbed him and begged him to stay put. But, he could not. Reaching inside the fireplace, he pulled the tossed book out of the collection of ashes. With a swipe of the hand, he dusted the debris away, and read the title printed on the front of the burgundy leather bound novel.

“White Roses”

Grant flipped the thing open to find all the pages blank, except the first one. In typewritten words, it simply read,

‘Secrets kill love. Love kills time. Time is cruel, so I will end mine.’

And that was all.

Nothing more. Nothing less…

The final nail in the coffin of wedded bliss

~Modern Day~

There once was a man who murdered his wife and hid her corpse in a large freezer. He went to work the next day, came home, and saw her sitting on the couch, watching a soap opera with an ashen gray complexion and dripping wet. Large puddles sat at her feet.

He could barely speak, but when he did manage, he simply asked,

“What’s for dinner?”

To which she replied with a crooked smile,

“A TV dinner… but it’s still defrosting…”

“Those are fragile,
man!” Sloan called out, his muscles buckling under the weight of a slightly sloped cardboard box marked, ‘
Kitchen: Aunt Helen – China dishes
’.

“Goddamn it!” A faint crash could be heard from another room.

“…Sorry,” came a feeble voice belonging to one of the hungover movers, a young, scruffy guy in his twenties just trying to earn enough cash for his next party. The youth’s apology danced over the scratch and crackle of the small battery operated, white paint splattered radio blasting 1960s oldies.

‘Haaaaang, on Sloopy, Sloopy hang on!’ by the McCoys crept into the air, stealing a dusty kiss or two.

“Hey! Mr. Big Shot! You gonna help here or just watch me do all the dirty work, huh?” Sloan’s best buddy, Mike, called out as he heaved a box into the foyer area and slammed it down onto the ground with a big bang.

“I’m just thinkin’ is all. The house looks much bigger than when I first came to see it.” Sloan ran his hand across his beard, curing an itch as his anxiety built up like a stack of Legos. “What am I going to do with all of this space, man? Jesus Christ… it’ll be a nightmare to keep clean.”

“Shoulda, woulda, coulda… Midlife crisis in full effect. No one gives a shit about your silly problems.” Mike chortled. “Get uh maid to do it…make sure she’s good lookin’ so you can fuck her, too.”

Sloan shook his head and sighed at the bastard’s comments.

“So how does it feel to be a three-time New York Times bestselling author, Mista Famous?” A smile stretched across Mike’s face as he posed the question.

Sloan slumped his broad shoulders as he rolled that notion over a bit inside his cobwebbed brain.

“Feels good, I suppose.”

“For the love of Wilma and fuckin’ Fred, Sloan! I need you to get outta this funk. Look.” He pointed at him, a stern expression on his rounded face. “You wanted to work on your new book, get a new lease on life, start fresh, so here you are, right?”

“Yes, here I am.” Sloan looked about himself as if someone had beamed his ass to Scotty. “In Maxim…”

“Yeah, Maxim. It’s not terribly far from Manhattan. It’s less than a five hour drive. You’re homesick, right? That’s what this is about, ain’t it, Mack?” Mike’s double chin became more pronounced as he lowered his head to his chest, glaring at the man in a judgmental sort of way.

“Stop calling me Mack.” Sloan grabbed two ice-cold bottles of water from a nearby cooler and tossed the man one. Mike caught the thing with one beefy hand, twisted the plastic blue cap fast and hard, and chugged half the thing down while sweat meandered down his plump, cherubic face.

“The damn exterminators said they had to reschedule,” Sloan moaned between gulps. “Bastards. Can’t get good help around here. They’re too laid back.”

“It’s gettin’ cold anyway; no sense in wasting money. Wait till the spring.” Mike nodded for extra measure, as if his word were bond.

“Rats don’t give a shit if it’s winter, spring, summer or fall, Mike. I’m not just talking about a spider or house fly. Nobody wants to take the trip out here. It’s in the middle of nowhere and a gated community but I wanted someone out here to treat the house before all of my stuff was moved in. Now it’s too late. Everything’s going to smell like industrial strength Raid.”

“What was their reason for not coming?”

“It’s a family business.”

“So? Why’s that a problem?” The big man leaned against the faded cream and raspberry swirl wallpaper, much of which was torn and chipped away, exposing another color and pattern altogether beneath.

“ ’Cause family owned businesses sometimes let subpar work continue so they don’t have to fire cousin Herbie!” He laughed as he screwed the cap back on his bottle. “I’ve called them three times. They had the best prices and reviews, so I tried to stick it out, but now…” He shrugged his shoulders. “The hell with it.”

“You should tell ’em and get someone else then.”

“Yo, check this out, Mike.” He put his hand up as though vying to catch a basketball. “They’ve got some dimwit who’s afraid of bugs working for an extermination company!”

“What?!” Mike burst out laughing.

“Yeah! Who tha fuck does that? Who hires a guy to do a job when he is scared of the damn job? That’s like hirin’ someone to fix your roof but they’re afraid of heights, or me havin’ bibliophobia but trying to write.”

“What the hell is bibliophobia?”

“What do you mean? It’s the fear of books!”

“Fear of books?” Mike looked Sloan up and down as if his hairy butt was suddenly exposed and the crack was farting out the alphabet in Chinese. “You say that shit like it’s a given that I should know what it is.”

“But cha know all the major beer brands, categorized according to average price for a six pack.”

“That’s important information! Anyway, who tha fuck is afraid of books? What’s tha big deal? A paper cut from turnin’ the pages? One of ’em fallin’ on your head and giving you amnesia?”

“I don’t know, but it’s a real phobia. Seriously, look it up. It’s in the psych magazines and everything.” He took a hard chug from his bottle, which compressed as he sucked in air while downing the water.

“What kind of whack job psychology is that? Anything goes now, ya know? And they want to slap on a label and call it mental illness. Before ya know it, someone will be on trial for murder and blame it on bibliophobia…”

“Oh, come on now.” Sloan smirked. “You gotta broaden your horizons, Mike.”

“No, seriously! The world has gone crazy. They’d try sayin’ they felt their life was in danger because the teacher was wavin’ a goddamn book around! Nerve of that teacher! How
dare
she!” Sloan cracked up laughing and shook his head at his silly friend. “ ’Fraid of books? Get tha fuck outta here! Ahhhh!” Mike waved his hands in faux frenzy as he spun around in a circle. “Everybody run ’nd hide! There’s a goddamn library less than a hundred feet away! Save yourselves!”

Sloan’s gut revolved in merriment, though the recently sprung joy soon soured as he heard another clattering crash in the kitchen.

“Sorry!” came the same shaky voice from before.

“Mr. Steele, where’d you like this? It’s not labeled,” one of the movers asked, holding up a large evergreen plastic bin. His heart beat a bit faster as his eyes locked on the thing.

“You can uh, just put it right here.” The burly man obliged before heading back out the propped open front doors to retrieve more of his items. Sloan knelt before it, ran his hand across the lid, and took a hearty breath. He could hear Mike polishing off his drink before the man noisily crushed the thing in his big palm.

“I’m goin’ back out to the moving truck to make sure they’re not breaking any more of your shit. You should have paid for good movers. These fuckers are like the Three Stooges times two.” He tossed the thing into a heap of discarded newspapers and bubble wrap, and marched past him.

“Everyone else cost too much,” Sloan mumbled, his gaze still affixed to the bin. He gently lifted one corner up.

“Ya get what cha pay for, Mista Famous! Quit being cheap—that’s why you’ve got broken shit now and have no exterminator. Ratatouille with his 369 rabid rat kids will remain in your humble abode, rent-free, I might add.”

“He’s a great cook, right? Hell, if I become his landlord, it’s all good. He can afford it.”

“That’s all an act. He’s a mafia boss by night. Tomorrow you may wake up wit’ one of these stinkin’ creatures sitting on your chest, its beady little black eyes staring you down and asking if you wanna piece of him!”

“I still have my gun, Mike. I’ll ask him if he wants to meet my little friend!”

“You’re too cheap to have actually bought bullets…” The bastard cackled as he disappeared out the open double stained glass front doors.

Sloan grabbed the other corner and lifted, then let the cover slide off to the floor. He coughed into a closed fist when a cloud of dust formed from the impact. Waving the fog away, he took note of the carefully wrapped photos of his children, Michelle and Joel, as well as his grandson, Jacob.

There were photographs of him at various literature award shows and a large snapshot of him and his ex-wife. On a gulp, he reached for the thing and delicately peeled back the clear protective layers. He scanned the worn, years-old image of the once happy couple floating along the Hudson River on a boating trip. His breath hitched, and he parted his dry lips, hoping to let in a bit of air, but it was no use.