Page 10 of The Phantom's Vice

I can hardly believe my luck—though, I’m not sure yet how useful this “Reaper” will be. According to Maverick, Reapers aren’t as knowledgeable about the inner workings of the Sanctum—not like Phantoms anyway.

I’m meeting the Reaper at a bar tonight (maybe “bar” is too kind of a word for the greasy hole-in-the-wall he’s taking me to), and he’s agreed to talk to me about the Sanctum.

Maybe I’m cynical—this job will do that to you—but I can’t help but feel like this is a trap. Like I’m getting too close to the mouth of the beast, and those terrible teeth are waiting to snap. To swallow me whole.

I pray I’ll have more entries to add after tonight.

A heavy sighbrushes my lips as I pinch the bridge of my nose, desperately trying to stave off the headache that’s been pulsing behind my lids since our visit to Martha Gore. In the end, her story checked out. Thirty years ago, some strange men knocked on her door, asking if she would be interested in giving up her son for a large sum of money and a supply to support her rampant drug habit. But that’s all she knows about the people she gave her son to. No names, no identifiers we can actually use in our investigation.We’re right back to square fucking one.My veins light with rage, and I take a deep breath to get my emotions in check.

“You okay, Brett?”

Dropping my hand, I whip my head up to face Jim, an embarrassed smile tugging on my lips. “All good. Just a bitch of a headache.”

“Tell me about it,” Jim sighs, shoving a cup of coffee into my hand before pulling up a chair and plopping down. “Seriously. What kind of person sells their own kid?”

“Her kind,” I murmur, trying not to think of the terrified little boy being carted away by those awful men in masks. He must have been so scared. So confused.I wonder what happened to him. Whathorrors a person has to go through to make them do the things he does.

“She didn’t even give him aname.I mean, that’s enough to fuck anyone up in the head,” Jim scoffs, shaking his head.

“I guess so,” I murmur, shaking my head. “What do you think about those guys who took him—the ones in the masks? You think she was lying?”

“Maybe.” Jim shrugs, scratching his day-old stubble. “It’s not a stretch to imagine a pair of traffickers coming to her door and taking the kid, like she said. But, as for the guys being in tuxedos and white masks? And—what did she call them—Reapers?” Jim puts dramatic air quotations around the last word. “Who the fuck knows? She was high as shit when it happened. Maybe she thinks she’s really telling us what she saw that day. It wouldn’t hold up for shit in court, but…”

I nod, mulling over what little Martha was able to tell us about the men she sold her son to all those years ago. The way she lowered her voice to barely a whisper as she talked about the mysterious crime syndicate the men hailed from.The Sanctum.

Only I’ve never heard of such an organization, nor has anyone in the bureau. Maybe Jim is right. Surely, if there were any merit to what Martha Goretold us, it would align withsomethingin our files. Maybe she was just high that day, and her deluded brain conjured images of masked men in suits hauling her son away after loading her with cash and drugs.

I think I need some of what Martha was smoking.

I groan, dropping my head back against the chair back as my head pounds. Out of the corner of my eye, I notice Jim leaning forward, taking a sip of the bitter black drink, seemingly inspecting my computer screen.

“Who’s that?”

I jump, having forgotten about the article I was looking at before he sat down.Shit, shit, shit.

“Nothing. Just some personal research,” I say, a little too quickly.

Jim places his warm hand over mine that’s holding the mouse, and I freeze at the sudden contact, not realizing this gives him time to see what I was searching. My skin crawls, as it always does when someone touches me, and I quickly pull my hand out from under it.

Jim frowns and tries to hide his disappointment. When I don’t say anything else, he clears his throat. “You’re doing personal research on a cold case from thirteen years ago?”

I nod, my throat suddenly too tight to speak.

“Why?”

My chest feels tight as I try to come up with a response. I don’t want to tell Jim, but what other choice do I have? I’ve been caught red-handed, and he won’t let this go.

I sigh, holding my hand to my chest protectively. “That woman is—wasmy mother.”

Jim frowns, leaning his face closer to the screen. “What happened?”

“She was… murdered. Well, they assume she was. There was never a body to confirm it.” No need to sugar-coat it. Jim’s seen much, much worse in his time at the bureau.

Jim balks, his brows shooting to his hairline as he stares, open-mouthed. “I had no idea, Brett. I’m so—I’m so sorry.”

I shrug, unable to meet his gaze as I close out of the tabs. “I was young, so I don’t really remember her. Rather, she wasn’t around enoughtoremember—being a big-shot journalist forMoriton Timeskept her busy.” I don’t know why I’m telling Jim my life story, but for some reason, it just pours out of me. Like the dam has finally broken—and all it took was someone asking a simple question about my mother. “At the time of her disappearance, she waschasing a lead—something about this secret society called the Sanctum—a nasty organization, if her notes are anything to go by. She went out one night and never came back.” I sigh, closing out of the last tab and leaning back in my chair. “I was just seeing if there were any new breaks in the case. I check pretty much every week. I know it’s stupid, but I just?—”

“Hey, hey,” Jim murmurs, scooching slightly closer to me. “It’s okay. I get it. I mean, I don’tgetit, but… shit, I’m really bad at this,” he grumbles, rubbing the back of his neck as his cheeks brighten. “What I mean to say is it makes sense why you still check. If something like that happened to me…” His voice falls off again. “I’m just really sorry, Brett.”

---