Part 42

Part 42
There was no doorman for this building and he stood outside waiting for someone to either come out or go in. He waited for an hour before an old lady opened the door and he held it for her smiling.

“Thank you, young man.” The old lady smiled gratefully at him. He smiled back at her and then slipped inside. He walked up the stairs to the first floor and knocked on the first door. He pulled his cap low over his face as the door opened up.

“Yes? Can I help you?” The man was probably in his seventies, thinning gray hair, and a slight stoop to his shoulder.

“Morning, Sir, I have a package for a James Thomas, but there’s no apartment number on it. Can you perhaps help me?” Adrian asked, and smiled.

“Sure, such a nice young man, very helpful. They live in apartment 4D, right at the end of the hall,” he informed Adrian.

“Thank you very much, Sir.” Adrian nodded his head, and turned towards the stairs.

“You won’t find him there. They’ve already left for school. They’ll be back at about three this afternoon when he brings my groceries,” the old man said, and Adrian smiled.

“Thank you, I’ll come back at three.” Adrian walked slowly to the stairs as the old man closed his door, then went up the stairs to the fourth floor. He walked down the hall to the last door. He got out his multitool and started to work on the lock.

The door swung open quietly and he stepped inside their apartment and closed the door behind him. He walked through the living room and opened the large window all the way. He didn’t want his smell to linger here giving them advance warning of his presence.

The apartment was nicely furnished and very neat. Nothing was out of place. There were no dishes in the sink and everything stood straight. No dust marred any of the surfaces. He walked into the bathroom and opened the medicine cabinet. It was quite bare except for tampons, roll on and deodorant.

He opened the cupboard under the washbasin. It held toilet paper, cleaning products, extra shampoo and conditioner and razors, the normal bathroom stuff. There was a bathtub and a shower and he guessed the shower was used more. Nothing lined the bathtub and there was no soap in the dish.

He walked into their bedroom and the bed was neatly made. He opened a chest of drawers and even the socks and underwear were neatly folded, each had its own space. The next drawer held t-shirts. The third drawer held towels, all the same color and folded perfectly. The last drawer had photo albums.

He took one out and thumbed through it. It held pictures of Shoran as a child with her parents, Adrian assumed. It started with baby photos all the way up to her graduation. The next album was of James and his parents, now dead. Kiran featured in many of the photos, together with Malachi and his dead wife.

On the top of the chest stood pictures in frames of James and Shoran, Kiran and Adara, the two sets of parents, and the four kids together. He picked up a photo of James and Kiran together, they were young there, maybe ten or eleven, holding fishing rods, moments captured in photographs. He put it back down.

He opened the built-in closet and the clothes inside hung neatly on hangers. The folded clothes were precise. He wondered which one of the two was the neat freak and laughed. He caught himself as it sounded creepy in the quiet apartment.

He went to the living room and on the one wall was a framed photograph of their wedding day. All smiles and happiness. Flanked on either side were smaller portraits of the guests. He sat down on the couch and opened a small drawer that was almost hidden on the side of the coffee table.

He took out the newspaper articles. They were articles about the explosion from a Seward newspaper; articles about the three other deaths of the pack members. He smiled at this as he read the articles. He put them back and closed the drawer. There wasn’t really much of interest there. He didn’t really know what he expected to find.

The two desks in the dining room area had books and pens. A normal desk for normal students studying late into the night. They each had their own space in here and both desks were identically neat.

He opened the fridge and looked inside. Water, beer, fruit; nothing weird, and he smiled at himself again. What else would they have in their fridge? The freezer was full of meat, pies, pastry rolls, and pizza bases. Nothing odd here either. He slammed it shut.

He heard footsteps in the hallway and froze. The door across the hall opened and shut and he breathed again. It was time to go, he had already spent an hour inside. He decided to leave the window open and quietly left the apartment.

He walked down the hall and down the stairs, out of the front door, and to his car. He had other things to do right now. He had already spent too much time in Fairbanks. As he got into his car and drove away, he remembered the box he had left by their front door. Idiot! He couldn’t risk going in a second time. He hit the steering wheel and cursed at himself.

He spent the next four days watching their routine, he had to wait four days for the delivery of Mr. Unmentionable’s package, and he filled numerous notebooks with copious amounts of information about James and Shoran; their daily routines, going to class, coming home, eating out, jogging and so forth filled the pages.

On Friday morning, he woke up and an envelope had been placed under his door. He opened it carefully and found a passport, new identification card, new driver’s license, birth certificate; everything he had paid for. He wondered briefly how Mr. Unmentionable knew where he was staying, and that concerned him a bit.

He sat in his car waiting for James and Shoran to emerge. When it was 10 am, he realized something wasn’t right. He phoned JJ and waited as it rang.

“I was just about to call you,” JJ said, as he picked up the other line.

“About?”

“Malachi and Kiran Sinclair flew to Ireland yesterday. I just received the information,” JJ said.

“Check the manifest and see if Shoran and James Thomas accompanied them.” Adrian disconnected the call and drove back to his room and waited for JJ to call him back. The phone’s buzzing woke him three hours later.

“They boarded a plane to Ireland at 3 a.m. this morning.” Adrian kicked the chair in front of him in frustration; the phone hit the wall opposite him, and broke into pieces. Adrian pulled on his hair in anger, slamming the car door shut as he left to buy another phone.

The line rang once as Adrian called JJ back. “I’m sorry, I’m just frustrated.”

“About the other two names you gave me; there’s no sign of the man. He’s disappeared; but the woman is living in an apartment in Sterling.” Adrian smiled at JJ’s words and he wrote the address down.

“Thanks, JJ. I’ll transfer your money right now.” He went back to the room and packed his clothes. He would be driving to Sterling tonight. It was always good to have a backup plan to your back up plan.