**NB. This story is as it comes – straight out of my head and may contain typos**
CHAPTER 5 – BLANE
If I ever returned to Plane Three, I had a great idea for a new game. Who in hell invented parallel parking, anyway? The idea of trying to wedge my Bentley into a space barely a foot longer than the hood… How did people do this?
“Do I have space on that side?” I asked Joseph.
“Uh…” The crunch of alloy on concrete made me cringe. “No.”
Great. Another scratch to go with the dozen I already had.
Plane Three’s earthly equivalent would be a home without sufficient off-street parking. Fortunately, I didn’t live in one—Club Dead had a generously sized parking lot to the rear—but Kayden Gilmore did. According to the next-of-kin records in Wren’s HR file, he inhabited a narrow duplex in the south of Mesquite, not too far from the golf club he worked at.
“Why don’t you try parking farther along the street?” Joseph suggested.
Firstly, because there were cars as far as the eye could see, and secondly because that would mean admitting defeat.
“It’ll fit in here.”
At least the camera in the rear bumper would tell me if I was about to hit the ugly SUV parked there. Why did cars have to be so big? My next vehicle would be a two-seater sports car, something small and fast. Or a motorbike. Although, hmm… If I had to dump another body, where would I put it? How big was the trunk on a Ferrari?
“I thought you were going to practise reversing?” Joseph said.
“I didn’t get time, okay?”
“If you added up all the time you spend trying to park, I bet you’ve wasted a month of your life.”
“I’m immortal. Time is irrelevant.”
“Fine, a month of your pretend human life.”
“I hate this damn car, and it’s not my fault Plane Three doesn’t have on-street parking, so—”
“Hey, the front door just opened.”
I stomped on the brakes, and sure enough, Kayden Gilmore was standing in the entryway, his arm around a slender brunette. A slender female brunette. Joseph’s sigh of disappointment as Kayden kissed her settled heavily over the custom-tailored suit he’d instead on changing into for our visit.
Oh dear.
“I’m sorry you had to see that. But at least now you know, huh? When we get back to Vegas, why don’t you try one of those dating apps?”
“I did. The guy said he was a successful businessman who liked dirty weekends, and it turned out he owned a sewage cleanup company. Right after dinner, he got an emergency call and had to go clear contaminated water out of someone’s bathroom.”
“Ouch.”
The brunette was jogging in our direction now, and as she came closer, she waved. Her lips moved. I rolled down the window to hear what she was saying.
“Don’t worry; I’m just leaving.”
What did she want me to do? Offer congratulations for her escape?
“I wasn’t worrying.”
She gave a nervous laugh and held up a key. “That’s my car behind you. Give me a second, and I’ll get out of your way.” A pause. “You didn’t scratch it, did you?”
I expected a snarky comment from Joseph, but he was still sulking.
“No, just the kerb.”
Perhaps I should have taken driving lessons before I obtained my first car, but it had been so much easier to just buy the licence from a slightly shady guy I met in a bar and take to the road. I’d spent plenty of time trundling around in my father’s golf cart in Plane Two, so it wasn’t as if I had no experience of driving whatsoever, but parking had turned out to be more challenging than I expected. Were parking lessons a thing? When Joseph got over his snit, I’d ask him to look into that.
After the brunette had left, I abandoned the Bentley in the vicinity of the kerb and climbed out, stretching my arms over my head. It had been a long couple of days. Luckily, I didn’t need much sleep—immortality did have its plus points—but I’d tweaked a muscle entertaining a pair of pretty blonde dancers last week, and sitting around for long periods left me uncomfortable. Decima could fix the problem in an instant—healing was her superpower—but that would mean swallowing my pride and asking her for help. No, I’d try a masseuse first.
“Do you want to wait in the car?” I asked Joseph.
“No, I’ll come with you.”
Kayden Gilmore opened the door a second after I knocked, almost as if he’d been waiting. Or maybe he’d just been watching TV? The door opened directly into a living room, and a soccer game was playing on a giant flat-screen opposite. Did people play soccer at this time in the morning? Or was it pre-recorded? Several years ago, I’d started a soccer league in Plane Three, but I heard Decima has discontinued it. Even though the games were played with flaming skulls rather than regular balls, she’d still considered that the guests were having too much fun.
“Babe, what did you forg—” Kayden trailed off. “Do I know you?”
“Not exactly, but Wren works in my poker club. We’ve met once or twice.”
Kayden gave me a harder look. “Right, yeah. Dane?”
“Blane, and do you remember Joseph?”
“Uh, maybe? Why are you here?”
“Call it a welfare check. Wren didn’t show up for work last night, which wasn’t like her.”
Kayden fidgeted, but instead of the worry I’d have expected from a man who’d just found out his sister was missing, I got a flash of alarm followed by an indifferent shrug.
“She probably ate something bad,” he said.
“That’s possible, but she’s not in her apartment, so I thought she might have come here. Did she?”
“I haven’t seen her since last week.”
“Have you spoken to her?”
“No, man.” But he was lying. He was nervous, but of us rather than the fact that his sister had gone AWOL. “Maybe she’s staying with a friend?”
“Any idea who?”
Again, Kayden shifted from foot to foot. “We didn’t really talk about that stuff.”
He knew more than he was letting on, but it was also clear he wasn’t going to spill the beans to us. Which meant that either Wren’s predicament was something to do with work, or it was serious enough to keep secret from everyone. Serious enough that she’d walk out of her job because of it.
Could there be a problem at Tilt? I didn’t think so, but more importantly, Vee hadn’t mentioned any issues, and she was closer to the employees than I was. They thought she was one of them. Which technically she was, but she also wasn’t. Vee and I had grown close over the past few months, and if she had any concerns about the poker club, she would have mentioned them before we dispatched the bodybuilder last night.
The bodybuilder… Why had he been sent to kidnap Wren? Yes, his presence meant that the problem was elsewhere.
And Kayden was covering for his sister.
I couldn’t force the truth out of him, not with Joseph present anyway, and Wren wouldn’t be too pleased if I strong-armed her brother either. No, we’d have to back off temporarily. But I wouldn’t give up. I’d already lost one colleague recently—okay, so Serenity had been a freelancer rather than an employee—and I’d experienced a little of the pain mortals felt. It wasn’t a feeling I enjoyed.
“If you see her, could you ask her to call me?” I held out a business card. “I just want to know that she’s okay.”
“Sure, I’ll tell her.” His eyes widened. “Uh, I mean, if I see her, I’ll pass the message on.”
Oh, he definitely knew where she was.
“Thanks, I appreciate it.”
Would Kayden call his sister? Joseph had enhanced hearing, and if he hid in the yard, he’d be able to eavesdrop on the conversation. Or perhaps Kayden would pay Wren a visit? If we stuck around in Mesquite, maybe we’d be able to pick up a clue.
Or we could head back to Vegas and pay Zion a visit—we knew he was involved somehow.
Decisions, decisions… Running Plane Three had been so much more straightforward than life here on earth.
**********************
What should Blane do next?
Option 1: Stick around in Mesquite to see what Kayden does next
Option 2: Head back to Vegas to visit Zion.
Decision made – Blane will stick around to see what Kayden does 🙂
**********************
Go to Chapter 6
**********************
Back to Contents
I always love to hear from readers 🙂 If you have any comments, you can message via the form below or chat to me in the Team Blackwood Facebook Group.