Ghost of a Chance

As she filled the cup, Alex turned over the paper. It was thin and square instead of the regular newspaper shape, and its masthead bore the title, The Midnight Sun. A massive headline took up almost the top third of the paper, declaring; Ghost Killer Strikes Again.

Alex resisted the urge to groan. The Midnight Sun was a tabloid, devoid of any actual journalism, and full of salacious rumors and celebrity stories that appealed to the gossip-hungry masses. Still, Alex knew Iggy would want to discuss the news of the day over dinner and it had been a while since Alex had read anything Iggy didn’t already know.

As he drank his coffee, Alex scanned the article. According to the author, one Billy Tasker, the suicide of an elderly man in a fashionable Inner-Ring home matched a pair of suicides in the last few weeks. In all three cases, the victims were found alone in a locked room. Tasker claimed that he had inside knowledge of the coroner’s report, saying that each victim was stabbed twice in the chest by a long, thin blade. The mysterious part was that no weapon was found at any of the crime scenes.

Of course, Tasker’s conclusion was that this was the work of a vengeful spirit, murdering people who had undoubtedly slighted it in life. Alex tossed the paper away in disgust, reminding himself that the last time he saw a copy of The Midnight Sun, it had claimed that runewright magic was actually the language of Atlantis.

“There you are,” a familiar voice said from behind him.

Alex turned to find Police Detective Danny Pak standing just inside the door. He was in his late twenties, only a few years younger than Alex’s thirty-two, with black hair, olive skin, and dark eyes. His features reflected his Japanese heritage and were made more prominent by the fact that he always had an infectious grin. He was also one of Alex’s only close friends.

“What are you doing here?” Alex asked, picking up his hat up from the neighboring stool so Danny could sit down.

“Danny comes here all the time,” Doris said, setting a coffee cup in front of the detective. “You want the usual, hon?”

“Yes, please,” Danny said as he sat.

Alex raised an eyebrow. He’d been to Danny’s apartment and it was on the other side of Central Park from The Lunch Box. There wasn’t any reason for him to go this far out of his way for dinner.

He shifted his gaze to the kitchen. About a year ago Alex had met Mary, a pretty girl working a lunch counter who wanted to be a full-fledged cook. Alex sent her here and she’d been working at The Lunch Box ever since.

“It’s not like that,” Danny said, reading Alex’s expression. To his credit, he didn’t blush at all.

“Then you must have come to see me,” Alex said. “Lucky you caught me, since I don’t usually eat dinner here.”

“I did want to see you,” Danny said, ignoring Alex’s innuendo. “I need your help.”

“What’s the trouble?”

“You heard about the rash of thefts we’ve been having?”

Alex shrugged. New York was a big city with over a million people; someone was always getting robbed somewhere.

“A bunch of deliveries have been hit,” Danny added.

“Any pattern?”

Danny shook his head and sighed.

“No,” he said. “That’s the frustrating thing. The stuff that got taken is random. Some of it makes sense to steal, but the rest is just junk. A whole truckload of dungarees went missing, along with a load of paper napkins bound for Delaware.”

Doris set a pastrami on rye in front of him and he paused to take a bite.

“People are pretty desperate these days,” Alex said while Danny chewed. “Maybe they’re just stealing whatever they can get their hands on.”

“Maybe,” he said. “I just can’t seem to catch a break on this. I figured if you could use one of your finding runes to locate any of the stolen property, that might be the only shot I’ve got.”

“I’d need something that links to any of the missing items.”

Danny nodded and took another bite of his sandwich.

“I thought of that,” he said with his mouth full. “I’ve got some leather from the machine that made a missing crate of work boots.”

Alex shook his head.

“That’s not going to do it,” he said. “They probably made a dozen pairs of boots from that one piece. The rune will only have something to lock on to if the boots are still together in the same place, and that’s assuming they all were in that one missing shipment.”

“That’s not likely,” Danny admitted.

“Alex,” a new voice said.

He looked up to see Mary emerge from the kitchen. She was a slim girl with brown hair and freckles on her nose. When she saw him, her face lit up in a smile.

“You haven’t been by in a long time,” she chided him. “Why didn’t you tell Doris to say hello?”

“Sorry, Mary,” Alex said, feeling a bit guilty. “Too busy with my own problems, I guess. How’s the work?”

Mary beamed.

“I love it,” she said. “Max says business has tripled since I started. He gave me a raise.”

“That’s great,” Alex averred.

She turned to Danny and slipped her apron off, over her head.