Free Histories of the Void Garden, Book 1: Pyre of Dreams by Damian Huntley

Beach,
determined that she would not best him again. Having routed the
call through several voice over I.P. services, he heard the ring
tone and managed to confine his amusement to a smile when he heard
the girl’s well-rehearsed welcome message, “This is the Beach
residence, Stephanie speaking, how may I help you?”
    “Hi Stephanie,
I’m so glad I got through to the right person.” West affected the
most amiable tone of voice he could muster, “My name’s Tony Statham
and I’m delighted to inform you that you’ve won a very special
prize from Manermanam Games.” West offered a silent prayer, wishing
that the child would try and repeat the company name, but there was
nothing but the sound of slightly nasal breathing, then faint
whisper before Stephanie Beach finally responded excitedly, “I
have?”
    West winced a
little, disarmed by the sound of Stephanie’s unassuming excitement,
but he continued, “You have. You’ve been selected as the lucky
winner of our on-line supermarket sweep.” West listened calmly to
Stephanie’s gleeful exclamation, her hurried repetition of the
news, presumably to her father. West hoped that this wouldn’t blow
his window of opportunity, but then he heard her excited breath on
the other end of the line, and took his cue to talk again, “I just
need to talk to your father for a couple of minutes so we can give
him all the details you’ll need to claim your prize.”
    West leaned
against the wall and smiled inwardly, listening to the muffled pops
and clicks as Stephanie handed the phone to her father, “David
Beach speaking, and listen bud, before you even begin your spiel,
let me tell you, I’ve had it up to here with guys like you calling
at the most inappropriate times, preying on people’s good
nature,”
    “Mr Beach, it’s
important that you don’t hang up the phone.”
    “Oh sure it is,
we’ve won another fantastic grand prize that I never signed up for
huh? You should be ashamed of yourself, getting a little girl’s
hopes up like that. What do I have to do this time? Come down to
the Motel 6 and listen to you wax lyrical about a set of miracle
knives?”
    West closed his
eyes and he sighed, David’s tirade still brewing in his ear. He
thought he perceived a momentary lull, and was about to start
talking when Beach kicked off again, “Oh, please say it’s a time
share in the middle of some uninhabitable hell hole, I was just
saying how much I needed one of those. Honest to God man, you’re
all I fucking need today, you know that? I’m at my whit’s end with
shits, and backstabbing…” The sound became muffled, “Honestly Han,
I’m just sick of it … I left the room…” West could hear a woman’s
voice on the other end of the line, calm, patient, then David’s
response, “Okay, I’m sorry, I’ll take it out back.”
    Again, West
tried to seize this opportunity, “Mr Beach, I really must speak to
you, it’s about…”
    “Screw you
buddy. You guys just don’t know when to let the fuck up do you? You
don’t know when the button’s been pushed do you? Well you pushed it
man. Is that what you were waiting to hear? You pushed the button
and it’s not going to be un-pushed. You want to talk to me? Man up
and come to the fucking house if my daughter’s won this grand
prize, okay? Just pick up your sorry ass and make the effort
instead of butting in to my evening, prick.”
    The line went
dead.
    West slumped
into the comfort of his leather sofa and lay back. It wasn’t as if
he had any real time invested in David Beach, but the FBI were
putting all of their eggs into that basket case. He got up from the
sofa and sat at the desk, glaring at the dejected phone, wishing it
all manner of ill will. He shook his head in disgust, allowing his
eyes to drift to the screen of his tablet. He knew David Beach
wasn’t being held for questioning and he also knew that things
weren’t likely to change by the morning. Even over an encrypted
line, what had he