HIS OTHER SON
Authors: MAYNARD SIMS
HIS OTHER SON
MAYNARD SIMS
Copyright
Maynard Sims Limited 2013
07801
472554
First
publication Enigmatic Press 2013
3 Cutlers
Close, Bishops Stortford, Herts, CM23 4FW England
This is a
work entirely of fiction and all the names, characters, events and places
portrayed are either fictitious or are represented entirely fictitiously.
Typesetting
and design by L H Maynard & M P N Sims
Cover
photograph by
Bev
Manders
OTHER
BOOKS BY THESE AUTHORS
Maynard
Sims
L H
Maynard & M P N Sims
Thriller novels
Shelter
Demon Eyes
Nightmare City
Dark
Of
The Sun
Stronghold
Stillwater
The Department 18 series of novels
Black Cathedral
Night Souls
The Eighth Witch
A Plague
Of
Echoes
Story Collections
Shadows
At
Midnight
Echoes
Of
Darkness
Selling Dark Miracles
The Secret Geography
Of
Nightmare
Incantations
Falling Into Heaven
Flame
And
Other Enigmatic
Tales
A Haunting Of Ghosts
Novellas
Moths
The Hidden Language
Of
Demons
The Seminar
Double Act
As Editors
Enigmatic Tales 1-10
Enigmatic Novellas 1-6
Enigmatic Variations 1-5
Enigmatic Electronic
F2 1-2
Darkness Rising 1-7
Darkness Rising 2003
Darkness Rising 2005
HIS OTHER
SON
MAYNARD
SIMS
Ray Stock stood naked at the hotel window looking out
at the dancing lights in the harbour.
Fishing boats coming
back with their catch of tuna and cod, private yachts with all their lights
burning.
A police launch cruising by, sweeping the
wharf with a single piercing spotlight, keeping watch.
Along to the
right the shingled roof and striped awning of Angie’s Bar and Grill, the best
fish restaurant on this stretch of the west coast.
Ray knew that if he opened
the window just a fraction the tantalizing aromas of clam chowder and lobster
bisque would enter the hotel room, washing away the smell of cigarette smoke
and futile sex. He glanced guiltily back at the bed. The girl was still
sleeping, one arm raised above her head, her slender fingers tangling in her
long fair hair. She was a tourist. There were a lot of them here; cheap casual labour
in the harbour, cheap impartial sex in the hotels. He couldn’t even remember
her name. Guilt surfaced again, but he was well practiced at avoidance.
He
lit another cigarette and angled his watch so he could read it by the harbour
lights. Ten thirty. He walked across to the bed and picked up his Levis from
the crumpled heap of clothing on the floor. As he dressed he smoked, and wondered
how long it was going to take him to drive to the party. He reached in his hip
pocket and pulled out the dog-eared, grease-stained invitation. It was gilt
edged, the lettering raised and black; very formal, with RSVP in the bottom
left hand corner. He hadn’t bothered. Caroline knew he’d be there. He didn’t
have a choice. Not anymore.
He
finished dressing, took a handful of dollar bills from his wallet and laid them
down on the nightstand. The blonde girl had insisted that she wasn’t a
hooker, that
she wanted to go with him because she genuinely
liked him, but he left the money anyway. At least she’d have something to
remember him by.
Out
on the street the smells from Angie’s hung in the air, an appetizing lure for
hungry customers. He wondered if he had time to grab something to eat. His
stomach was empty and starting to complain, but he checked his watch again and
headed off in the opposite direction to Angie’s, to where he’d left his car
three hours earlier.
As he approached the wharf
he saw Oscar Hernandez, and his son Rudy, unloading their catch, the old man
cursing his son good naturedly, Rudy responding with a few well-chosen
expletives.
Oscar waved and called out
to Ray as he drew level with the boat.
“Hey, Ray, you not
working tonight?
What’s the matter, the water too cold for you, eh?”
“No
customers,” Ray replied. “Butt end of the tourist season. Who the hell wants a
pleasure cruise this time of night anyway?”
Oscar
Hernandez grinned at him, his one good eye twinkling in the rays of the mast light.
He’d lost the other in a fight with a six-foot marlin he’d landed thirty years
ago, just off Carrion Reef.
Rudy skipped ashore from the
boat and ran towards him. “Hey, Ray,” he said, his voice a light imitation of
his father’s. “Elsa wants to know when you are coming round to dinner. She
wants to see you again.”
Ray
smiled at the boy. He was just seventeen with clear olive skin and a wild shock
of curly black hair. He looked a lot like his sister Elsa, both of them having
inherited their looks from their mother and not from Oscar. Thank God, Ray
thought.
“Tell
your sister I’ll try to make it next week,” he said to the boy.
“Is
that a promise?” Rudy said eagerly.
“Listen
to him, Ray,” Oscar called from the boat. “He takes after his mother.
Romantic, just like my Margarita, always trying to play cupid.
Leave Ray alone, boy. He’s too much of a man for that sweet little sister of
yours. Let her meet a boy her own age.”
“Tell
Elsa next Wednesday, okay?” Ray insisted.
“You
got it,” Rudy said and winked.
Ray
reached out and ruffled the boy’s hair. “And take good care of that old wino
who calls himself your father,” he said, loud enough for Oscar to hear.
Rudy
laughed loudly and ran back to the boat. Oscar launched into a tirade of
Hispanic invective, and cuffed the boy around the head as soon as his
sneakered
feet hit the deck.
Ray
raised an arm in a gesture of farewell and carried on walking. It pained him
sometimes to think that no matter how well he got on with people like the
Hernandez’ he could never be as one with them. Too many clinging ghosts from
the past made sure of that. Oscar Hernandez and his family made a meagre living
from the sea. And while Ray earned money taking tourists for joy rides round
the bay and ferrying the occasional fishing parties to the reefs, he wasn’t
dependent on it for his livelihood.
The
interest
on the money in the trust fund set up by his father decreed that, if he wanted
to, Ray could sell his small launch and retire
, needing never to work
again. Not that it was an option that attracted him. He’d fought a long hard
battle against the pressures of a privileged life style, and despite the heavy
handed attempts by his family to persuade him to conform, and accept the silver
spoon they so desperately wanted to ram into his
mouth,
he was determined to remain true to his feelings.
The party tonight, at the
Stock family mansion, he guessed, was just another of those filial ambushes.
But this time he had to go, no matter how unpleasant the outcome would be,
because along with the invitation was a note written in his sister Caroline’s
distinctive flowing script. The note was terse and to the point. “Please come.
Mother has cancer. She’s dying.”
He
reached his car, a battered old Chevrolet convertible, with rusting gold
paintwork and leather seats split and flaking with age. A small group of
Mexican boys in regulation jeans and leather jackets stood close by it, one of
them leaning on the hood, cleaning his fingernails with a switchblade knife.
Ray stopped walking and stood a yard away from them. The boy leaning on the
hood looked up at him disinterestedly then went back to cleaning his nails.
“Would
you mind doing that somewhere else,” Stock said, his voice soft, polite.
“What’s
it to you?” the boy said. The others in the group started to take an interest,
all turning to face Stock, threatening, insolent expressions on their swarthy
immature faces.
Ray
smiled pleasantly, bent forward and whispered into the ear of the boy who was
leaning on his car. “If you don’t move your ass, I’m going to take that knife
and geld you.”
“What’s
that mean?” the boy said.
“It
means you’ll be singing soprano for the rest of your life,” Ray said, with a
smile. “Clear now?” Ray cupped the boy’s balls hard and twisted. “Or is that
any clearer?”
The
boy swivelled his head around and looked hard into Ray Stock’s eyes. What he
saw there belied the smile on Stock’s face. They were very dark brown; almost
black in the dim street lighting and the boy could read the message there loud
and clear.
Don’t fuck with me, boy, because I mean what I say.
The
young Mexican grinned, despite his obvious discomfort. “Cool, man, I mean, no
problem.” He pushed himself upright, wiping sweaty fingerprints from the
paintwork with the sleeve of his jacket. “Nice wheels.”
Ray
opened the driver’s door and climbed inside. The Mexicans had formed a group
again and were questioning the boy to find out what Stock had said to him. Ray
started the engine and wound down the window. “Thanks for minding the car for
me boys,” he said as he eased away from the curb. “I’d give you a tip but I’m
fresh out of change.” Then he gunned the engine and sped off down the street.
Forty-five minutes later he was swinging the car
through the gates of the Stock mansion. As he drove up the long gravelled
drive, the smells of jasmine and magnolia filtered in through the Chevrolet’s
air conditioning. Familiar fragrances that always meant home to him, or rather
the home he had left years ago without a backward glance. It was now over five
years since he’d been back here but at his first sight of the house it appeared
nothing much had changed.
The house was a huge white
colonial mansion that would have been better situated in the Deep South rather
than here on the western seaboard. An ancient ivy clung to the eastside of the
house like the beard of a half shaved man, and a wild rambling rose clung
tenaciously to the west side, defying years of pruning. The oaken front door
stood open and he could glimpse the inside, well lit by the crystal chandelier
that hung in the hall.
Two men flanked the doorway.
They wore business suits and hard expressions; his father’s security men. He
recognized one of them; Phil
Ryker
, an ex-cop with a
short iron-grey crew cut and a face like sculpted granite. The other man was a
new face to him, younger than
Ryker
but of the same
breed.
Ray
slid his Chevrolet into a narrow space between a Rolls Royce
Corniche
and a large black Mercedes. There wasn’t enough
room to open the door of the Chevrolet so he slid back the roof and climbed
out. The security men watched his entrance with unconcealed interest and were
now lumbering down the steps of the mansion to intercept him.
“Private
party, buddy,” the one who wasn’t
Ryker
said. As he
spoke his eyes absorbed the details of Ray Stock’s unkempt appearance. Check
shirt, Levis, engineer’s boots. Hair long and uncombed, curling down over the
collar of his shirt, a day’s beard stubble on his chin, a gold earring in the
lobe of his right ear.
A big man, six two, lean and well muscled.
A nose that looked as if it had once been broken, a mouth
whose corners wrinkled up in a sardonic smile, mocking the world.
The security man who wasn’t
Ryker
was Carl Anders, and he didn’t like the look of Ray
Stock. Trouble, he decided.
Trouble with a capital T.
He smoothed his right hand over the bulge of the magnum nestling in the
shoulder holster under his jacket, to reassure himself it was still there and
easy to get to; also to warn Ray Stock.
I’ve got a gun here, mister, so
watch your step, and your tongue.
Anders
walked until he was six feet away from Stock. “You hear me, buddy?”
Ryker
came up behind him and laid his hand on his arm.
“Easy, Carl.
Hello, Ray. It’s been a long time.”
“Not
long enough, Phil.
How you keeping?”
Carl Anders’ face took on an
expression of puzzlement, mixed with disappointment. It had been a long boring
evening, welcoming in the stuffed shirts and the dog’s dinners they supported
on their arms and called “honey,” and “darling”.
Society men
and their wives.
He’d counted three senators, two congressmen, half a
dozen film actors and one prominent
Beverley Hills
cosmetic surgeon.
As well as countless other less stellar
personalities.
He’d hoped with Ray Stock’s arrival the evening might
lighten up a little. He was just in the mood to kick ass.
“This
is Ray Stock, Carl. Mr. Stock’s other son.”
The
phrase “other son” needled Stock, as it always had. His elder brother Frank had
been dead nearly twenty years but his parents kept his memory alive, and for as
long as he could remember Ray had always been described as “Randolph Stock’s
other son.”
“The
one that got away, that’s me, Phil.”
“It’s
good to see you. Miss Caroline warned me you might be coming,” Phil
Ryker
smiled, and the granite softened, making him look
older, more wrinkled; almost like somebody’s grandfather.
Almost
but not quite.
With
Ryker
and Anders flanking him, Ray walked across the
forecourt to the front door.
“How
long have you been with the family now, Phil?” Ray asked as they walked.
“Twenty five years, almost.
Joined your father’s company
when I left the force, and been with him ever since.” Phil
Ryker
was a master of understatement. He’d left the police force because a New York
street gang had cornered him in Central Park and beat him close to death with
metal-sheathed baseball bats. If
Ryker
had been a
lesser man he wouldn’t be alive now to enjoy his police pension in the
California sunshine.