“No fucking way,” he muttered. “It’s bad enough to have all this crap penetrate my nightmares. It’s another thing to have it get in the way of my working world.”
He admitted a lot of the background emotion from his nightmares centered on fear, seeping into Simon too. He’d spent a long time not being a victim. A long time standing up straight and daring anybody to look down on him for whatever reason. He was well respected within his industry. He earned millions on a yearly basis, and, by now, it was actually every quarter. The money flowed quite nicely, as he worked to fix up the lower-end areas of the city.
He’d been asked by several people why he chose these buildings, and he couldn’t say anything, except that they had heart and that the rest of the world had forgotten about them. It was foolish and even a bad business deal at times, since he was a philosopher, looking to reclaim lost souls and buildings. It was just BS, the whole lot of it. And yet, every time another one came up for sale, he found himself completely unable to do anything but buy it and then immediately turn around to fix it up again.
Speaking of which, he had an ongoing tag problem with a certain realtor. She had a property he wanted, and she knew it. But she was asking way too much money for it, so they were stuck at an impasse.
Periodically, once a week or so, she would reach out, asking if he’d thought more about that property. So far, he’d been ignoring her, but, yeah, he was considering it still. It was on his list to take another walk by it, just to see if he felt the same about the place. It was one of four that he had thought about getting. If he could get all four, he could just drop them and put up something nice. Something to help rejuvenate that part of town. But what she wanted for that one property was what he should pay for two, and agreeing to her price would set a dangerous precedent for the others on the block.
And, although money flowed through his fingers with regularity, he didn’t get there by being a fool. So, when it came to actual money landing in his pockets, he knew that the more he had there, the more he could do. Only people, like this realtor, were intent on trying to take out every penny they could. He knew this was business, an industry on its own, but he now had less respect for these types who were greedier in this area than in most industries.
It was tough enough to deal with the various building trades. They promised they’d show up on a Monday, and, when they finally appeared on Wednesday, looking completely innocent, they would look you square in the face and say that you’re the one who made the mistake. It was enough to make you want to rip out their hearts and toss them off the damn building. But Simon had been in this business for way too long and had a short list of contractors he would work with, and a secondary list of contractors he would consider trying again, providing they actually showed up as promised.
The problem was, he had so many buildings in progress right now—whether rehabs or tear-downs—that it was hard to find enough good workers. At that, he checked his phone and found a couple texts sitting there from his contractors, waiting to be read. He perused them, noting nothing was major. One was just an update, and the other one promised completion of a new section today. Simon wouldn’t even say that he’d be there at the end of the day because, at this point in time, he wasn’t sure he was going anywhere.
Then he looked down at the scratchpad. Once again, he’d drawn a woman’s wrist, tied to a table. He felt the fear jolt into his heart. “I don’t need this,” he said in a very low and threatening voice. He almost heard his grandmother’s voice in the background, saying,Tough shit. Deal with it.
He got up, with a hard shake of his head, then ripped off the second piece of paper, scrunched it up, and threw it across the living room. That wasn’t enough, so he grabbed both pieces of paper, stormed out to the recycling and garbage chute, and dumped them in. At least then they’d be gone, maybe not forever, but gone for the moment. He came in and sat back down, but, yet again, his hand immediately picked up the pencil and started sketching the same image. He looked at it and glared.
“What is it you’re trying to tell me?”
And, at that moment, almost like he’d opened a damn door, a scream ripped through his mind.
Chapter 4
Kate reached forthe phone and called the parole officer and identified herself when he answered. “I’m looking into case file 127264D.”
“Hang on,” he muttered, as he brought it up on his computer. “Oh, right. Lord.”
“Yeah, was the first name, Richard?”
“Yes, but he goes by Rick,” he confirmed.
“Did he complete everything required?”
“He did actually. When he got out of prison, he came every week, and he never did anything wrong,” he stated. “Why?”
“Just checking to make sure he’s not a suspect in a current case.”
“Well, I wouldn’t have thought it of him,” the parole officer replied. “He was a model inmate. He got his education and even earned a degree.”
“In what?” she interrupted.
He checked through his notes. “English Literature.”
She snorted at that.
“Hey, I think he intends to become a teacher, you know?”
“Is that even possible?”
“It is if he can get some job experience. They might hire him, if they don’t do a record check.”
“Doesn’t he have to state that he has a criminal record?”
“He was charged as a juvenile, so that would have been expunged from his record.”
“How is that even a thing?” she asked hotly.