Page 6 of Ghost Town Boogie

He’d worked for investment companies early on, but was more comfortable on his own. Jack would find opportunities, wrangle investors, and in the end take a cut for his trouble. He loved numbers, and he really loved making money. He did a little day trading also, and seemed to do okay. He’d done well, or at least he claimed to. Knowing Jack it was possible he only mentioned the good deals, never the bad.

He could’ve done all that in Seawolf Beach, bought a house and set up an office here, but he never had. No, he’d come and gone like a vagabond, working in big cities all over the country for months at a time, then coming home for a few weeks to regroup before moving on. He wasn’t one to stay, but he always came back. Until he didn’t.

Anna had looked for her brother a few times over the past five years, but finding someone with the common name Jack Miller who moved around and worked at home wasn’t easy. The cops weren’t exactly interested in looking for a man who’d broken ties with his family and taken off of his own free will.

A few years ago she’d hired a private investigator to look for him. The PI hadn’t had much luck, though he’d managed to trace Jack’s phone from Seawolf Beach on the night he’d left, to Birmingham, Alabama, then to Nashville — her new home — and then to New York City, where eventually the phone went silent.

Her brother didn’t even want them to have a phone number for him. He really had severed all ties.

Eventually she’d given up. Why look for a person who doesn’t want to have anything to do with you? She’d let Jack go years ago. Her mom had not.

“It was just money,” Nina said softly. “Jack lost some of our savings, and your Dad was so mad. They both said horrible things, but when it comes to family…”

God, she didn’t want to have this conversation again.

“I saw Colt today,” Anna said, changing the subject.

“At his record store, I suppose,” Nina said.

“I went in for coffee. He looks good,” she added.

Nina pursed her lips and gave a little snort. “Coltrane is an odd duck. I mean, he seems intelligent enough, so why on earth is he wasting his time in that old record store? He could do better.”

Like Jack? Anna kept that thought to herself. “He seems to be doing fine.”

Nina placed the prized Elvis plate on the dining room table, not in Jack’s box. Maybe they needed a dumpster…

The plate, which had seemed to be solidly in place, moved. Just a little at first, but soon it spun, flipped, and crashed to the floor a couple of feet from the doorway to the kitchen.

“How in the hell…” Anna began.

Her mother waved off her concern. “I think the house must be settling, or else we’re having little earthquakes. That’s the fourth plate I’ve lost this week!”

Colt realized long before he reached the front door that his delinquent tenant had left, probably sneaking out in the middle of the night. Why was it that people who slipped away in the night never took their shit with them? There was a stained mattress on the porch, dirty clothing piled in both of the front porch rocking chairs, and a big black bag of trash on the front steps not a dozen steps from the garbage can.

Dammit, he’d just painted this house before the old guy moved in. White, with blue shutters. It was a small but nice cottage with a couple of old trees on the lot. The neighborhood was good. If the interior didn’t need much work he could rent it again. Maybe to someone who’d pay on time.

Colt had a key to the place on his keyring, but he didn’t need it. The front door was unlocked. The living room was filthy. There were food wrappers, crumbs, and beer cans scattered all around and actual dirt here and there, but he didn’t see any actual damage. What the hell was that smell? The odor wafted from yet another black plastic garbage bag that hadn’t made it to the front porch. He took care of that first, opening the door and dropping the bag outside. Yeah, that was the source.

The place stunk and needed a thorough cleaning, but there were no holes in the walls, no food stains on the ceiling. That was something.

Over the years he’d learned to temper his expectations.

Colt opened the kitchen window to let in the fresh air that was badly needed. That done he walked down the hallway to check the bedrooms. There were two, and one small bathroom. Halfway down the short hallway, he stopped.

It was quiet. Still. In the past the spirits of a child and a young woman who looked to have been here since the sixties had roamed the small house. He hated the ghosts of children most of all. They just seemed so wrong. Was it possible the Pine Street ghosts were gone? Had he actually found a ghost-free house?

It wouldn’t be this way long, he suspected, but maybe he could stay here while it was quiet. Maude was all over the depot, her new home. She was more active than most spirits he encountered. Maybe once she took revenge for her casserole dish and earrings she’d move on, but for now she was an annoyance.

Seeing her at work all day was one thing, but in spite of his requests she continued to show up in his personal space on the second floor.

Now and then while he was in the shower.

He needed peace. He needed a break from the damn ghosts.

Like Jack.

He’d intended to talk to Mrs. Miller and Anna about the records this evening, maybe look through and see if there was anything worth selling. Once he’d seen Jack, that had changed.