Roger was making his way back to his car and as he got close he saw the figure of someone standing next to the car. He stopped. Then he felt the sharp tip of a knife in his back. The man by the car came walking over so they could all be in the shadows. “Menton sent us,” said John, “he made a slight mistake with your order.” “No, it is all here,” he said somewhat nervously.

“That is just it, he gave you too much,” said John, “the price has gone up, so we need to take some back.” “What? The price went up last month,” he said with surprise, “I cannot keep charging more, people will go elsewhere.” “That is your problem,” said John, “but the risks are higher now, so the price is higher.” “Charlie will not like this, nor will Painter,” said Roger.

“It was Charlie’s idea,” said John, “he and Menton are taking over around here. Painter is finished. Now that Menton has supplied those sub machine guns to the Lightning, they will be removing Painter soon.” “He told Painter he could not get those machine guns!” exclaimed Roger. “Naturally, he sold them all to the Lightning,” laughed John. Then they took a third of the drugs from Roger and left. Roger quickly got in his car and drove away…directly to Painter.

“Place is closing Roger,” said the guard. “But I need to talk with Painter,” he said somewhat out of breath, “he will want to hear this!” “Who is it Merle?” asked Painter. “It is Roger, says it is very important and you will want to hear it right now,” said Merle. “Okay, send him in,” he said with a sigh. “Thanks Painter, I know it is late,” said Roger, “but this is explosive.”

“If it was anyone else I would have had you tied up until a more decent hour of the day,” said Painter, “now, what is this all about?” So Roger told him what had happened and the sale of the sub machine guns to the Lightning, which is a rival group to Painter and his outfit. That part is true, he has been arming the Lightning for a big war with Painter. They want to take over his territory.

“Hard to believe that Charlie would be involved in this,” said Roger. “Well, it is true,” said Painter, “I had someone watching Menton’s house and he saw Charlie go in there, would be after you were there. Menton is not smart enough to think this up for himself, but Charlie is. He likely made a deal of some kind with the Lightning to get rid of me. Well, they will find out it will not be so easy now that I know about it.” “Should we go pick up Menton and his sons?” asked one of the men in the room with Painter.

“No, not yet,” he said, “I want to wait and see what our visitors from Italy have to say. They might have more information about all of this.” “You got friends in Italy too?” asked Roger. “Yeah, some guy named the Lieutenant, he works for the Major. You know about him.” “Yeah, he is someone you do not want to cross,” said Roger. “Yep, and he told me this other guy has some interesting info for me,” said Painter, “so we wait.”

Now, back to us. Painter was right, in a sense, Charlie did stop by to see Menton, but it was our Charlie. Benson had arrived earlier with the kittens and Saranna had made him look just like Charlie. She is good with things like that we have discovered. We had to use the kittens since Menton had already seen our cats. So, here is what happened.

There was a knock on the front door and Menton opened it. “Charlie, come in, good to see you,” he said, “I tried to call you earlier, guess you were not home.” “I was home,” he said, “never got any phone calls.” “Oh, guess it was a wrong number I dialed,” he said. “What is the problem?” asked Charlie. “Hey, look, kittens,” said Kenny, as he and Willie each picked up one.

“Those are mine,” said Charlie, “I plan to breed cats. Lots of money in that and it is good to have a legal business as a front.” “Yeah, that is true,” said Menton. “How come you 3 are sweating?” asked Charlie, “I do not find it hot in here.” “It is from the ghosts!” exclaimed Kenny, “this place is haunted!” “I told you 2 to shut up!!” Menton bellowed loudly, “No more talk about those ghosts!”

“You guys seeing ghosts?” asked Charlie, “You sure everything is okay?” “Yeah, yeah, it is just those 2,” said Menton, “they have been having weird dreams or something.” He then tried a fake laugh. They boys were enjoying the cats, until that point.

Meowy=Me believe you, ghosts real you know, especially ghosts of your moms. Meowi=Yep, me say so too, me think your moms come to haunt you. The boys stared, then dropped the cats. They ran back to Charlie. “Th, those cats, they talked, they knew our mom had come back to haunt us, they said so,” said Willie…

To Be Continued.

©2023 Steve McLeod.