Day 175 - Upside Down- Chapter 23 - (1390 words)

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UPSIDE DOWN, BACK TO FRONT

By Wayne Webb

CHAPTER 23

After

Ivan watched the driveway carefully. He was across the street and behind a tree casually waiting as if to be picked up near the corner. He could see the driveway that lead to James flat.
He had watched from a car he had in the shop for repairs. It was unknown and very plain to look at, not old or new or standing out in any way.
He felt like a spy. A man who knew more and saw more than everyone else in the room.
He waited for James to leave for work, and then waited another thirty minutes for the twilight to creep further in. The security contracts still had to be maintained, even though the drivers and hoppers were one by one being approached by rival companies who wanted to buy them, their knowledge and Greg’s remaining contracts from his widow who was managing the business with an efficient despair. She did not want this, the insurance would take a while to clear and until then it was all about keeping the money flowing. She already had talks with other companies to take the contracts, sell them out. She was not going lightly, she knew their worth from Greg’s books and his own estimations for his business. Those estimations paid for her house, her car and the private schooling for a daughter who was no longer talking to her.
Keep the contracts a few more days or weeks and then sell them out, sell them on at proper price and move on. The insurance money, substantial as expected and contract cashing in, the collapsing of the business and the final reckoning on it all would provide for them easily. She would never work, her daughter would be fine until adulthood. If she invested as wisely as Gail’s father was advising them too, property and holdings in commercial entities with solid tack records and futures. That was an income for life once Jennifer had decided what that life would be. She could choose, she could blossom and she could outgrow her fathers life. That’s what Gail had always wanted.
So no bargain basement sales on the contracts, and when negotiations slowed the vultures circled thinking that making her life hard, making her work to keep it running while they haggled and delayed would only work in their favour.
It didn’t. Greg’s customers stood behind her, when she wanted to sell they wanted to. Until then no one dared piss profits on a dead mans legacy. It was just wrong and too soon. It could not last forever, but it would last long enough for his widow and child to get what they needed, what they deserved.
James and Sam worked doubly hard, driven to do more and support Gail and Jennifer more and more. Gail saw this, misunderstood the motivation and exploited it regardless. It did not matter if she understood or did not. Either of them could have easily stepped up and repeatedly did for the sake of an orphan and a widow.
Ivan had seen them wracked and in pain over the death of their former boss. A man by their descriptions, Ivan had never met the man, was deserving of everything he got. Intentional or accidental, it made no difference now he was dead. It was pointless going back over old ground, it would lead you nowehere but back to where you are.
Pointless.
Ivan wanted his money. This self sacrificing act of theirs, they looked like saints but it would not do if they let that get carried away. There was real money at stake. More than that their safety was on the line, even if they did not recognise this and risked all with their over helpfulness. What if it went too far? What if they decide that time and effort is not enough? What if money is put in play.
They cannot give any money away. The cash is not in play. It can’t be.
They would not be so stupid as to dip into his third, he knew that – but it was their two thirds he was worried about. Two thirds was too much, they had not taken even risk and had not taken even action. They deserved a cut, yes. But two thirds? Why should they get twice what he did?
If they gave even a tiny portion away, what then? Who would come looking for the source of the money. Their behaviour risked them losing it all. It risked exposing the cause of the fire, it risked exposing Ivan and it risked exposing Manisha and their baby’s future. What would that do to the accidental death of Greg Nixon? What would it be then, would anyone know? His widow and his daughter, how would they feel if the cause of that fire was suddenly in a man’s hands. Not in fates and not in any god’s. How would that do them any good?
That cannot happen.
I need to take control of it away from them. For their own sake as much as mine. For the widow and the child, the baby on the way. Many, many reasons. More than a mere million reasons.
The sun had dipped far enough and the filtering half light cast enough of pervasive shadow to make him unrecognisable. He took care when walking down the driveway, staying close to the bushes and below the side window line of the neighbours facing that way. His baseball cap completed the look of a man avoiding being seen.
The front door was out of sight of the neighbours and the road. The path was strewn with stray pebbles from the rock garden in front of his flat, rented of course. It had a brick and tile look that said pensioner not single man with a shifting job.
Ivan turned slightly on a pebble, a rock bigger than the rest. The resulting jab through his thin and noiseless shoes annoyed and irritated him, he kicked at it in anger. The resulting clatter was much louder than he thought and he skipped quickly to the shelter of the door, hiding unecessarily from sight but driven by his own embarrassment.
No one was watching, no one heard.
He tried the door, locked of course.
He worked the lock for a few seconds with the tools of his trade, locks had been a barrier for maybe a week when he started doing jobs on the side. It came with practice an art more than a skill and one he was adept at.
The door handle free he set to work on the deadbolt above. Harder yes, impossible no. Within a minute he was in and he moved very, very slowly until he could see there was not an alarm system to worry about.
Dude works for a secured service and he does not secure his house?
Looking around he saw little to guard, the television and games console sure, but no china, not any art and nothing that said ‘steal me’ except of course the 1.1 million dollars.
It would not be small, so get to work.
He had hours, and he used them all. The place was a tip when he was done and he made no effort to conceal his tracks the angrier he got. The further the money was from his grasp, the more he took it out on Jame’s empty life.
He finally understood that they had guessed he would do this. The shame did not outweigh the indigation in his mind and it added more fuel to a fire inside him.
He closed the door carefully – with him on the inside.
Suddenly and brutally he slammed into the door, next to the jamb with the heel of his foot. The door handle lock popped like a cork. He had not been so stupid as to engage the deadlock.
The splintering wood around the door locked like a hollywood prop from a break in and it felt good to damage James in this way. He left the door ajar, turned off all the lights and waited for hours until he heard them coming down the driveway, laughing about something.
Motherfuckers.
You won’t be laughing soon.
Spy became assassin, lying in wait hands in pincer grip waiting for the throat to walk into it.