Scrivenings of the King-Beyond-The-Wall

Western World #3

In the heart of the city, Cedar Street was rife with secrets. Private investigator Mark Evans had spent years tracing the subtle pulses beneath its surface—adulterers, absconders, and shadowy dealings were his bread and butter. His office, a cramped second-story room sandwiched between a failing bookstore and a neon-lit bar, was littered with the remnants of unsolved mysteries.

It was late on a Thursday evening when she walked in. The rain had started, casting shivering reflections on the walls. She paused at the door, her silhouette hesitating like a question mark against the dim light. Young, maybe mid-twenties, with eyes that carried a storm of their own.

“You Mark Evans?” Her voice was steady, a sharp contrast to her uncertain entrance.

“That’s right,” Mark replied, gesturing to the chair across his cluttered desk. “What can I do for you?”

She closed the umbrella and sat down, clutching a small, worn bag to her side. “I need you to find someone.”

Mark nodded, used to the plea. “Who are we looking for?”

“My father,” she said. The words seemed to cost her. “I’ve never met him. All I have is a name and an old address.”

Mark scribbled notes. “Name?”

“Daniel Harper. The address is from fifteen years ago, right here on Cedar Street.”

Mark raised an eyebrow. Cedar Street had seen its fair share of passersby, but some names stuck, tangled in the web of the neighborhood’s history. “I know the name. He used to run a small garage around the corner before it shut down. Any idea why he left, where he might have gone?”

“No.” She hesitated, then continued, "My mother never liked to talk about him. She passed away recently, and... finding him feels important now."

“I understand.” Mark leaned back, the chair creaking under his weight. “I’ll see what I can find out. It’ll cost you my standard rate for a trace job.”

She nodded, pulling out a wad of crumpled bills from her bag. “I can pay upfront.”

After she left, Mark dug through his archives, files of the street’s history he’d compiled over the years. Daniel Harper—a name linked to a slew of minor offenses and one major scandal involving illegal car parts. The trail had gone cold after the garage closed.

The next morning, Mark started at the old garage site. Now a graffiti-covered parking lot, it held only ghosts of its previous life. He chatted with old timers in the neighborhood, gathering threads of Daniel’s story. A man who liked to gamble, who’d racked up debts, who’d disappeared one night without a word.

His next stop was the city’s public records. Divorce papers, a change of name, a move out of state—the usual escape routes for men like Daniel. But Harper had vanished cleaner than that, no paper trail to follow. Mark’s instincts itched; something didn’t fit.

It was a visit to a former associate of Daniel, a grizzled mechanic named Joe, that turned the tide. “Danny? Yeah, he was in deep, man. Owed money to some nasty types. Heard he got a new identity, left everything behind.”

“Any idea who helped him with the new identity?”

Joe shook his head. “Some lawyer, maybe. Danny was desperate, talked about disappearing. Next thing, he’s gone.”

The mention of a lawyer rang a bell. Mark contacted an old informant, a paralegal who dabbled in less-than-legal side jobs. A few favors later, he had a name: Michael Danvers, a lawyer with a sideline in creating new lives for the desperate.

Confronting Danvers was straightforward. The threat of exposing his side business was enough. “Alright, I helped him. New name, new city. He’s in Phoenix now, goes by the name Robert Dunn.”

Armed with this new identity, Mark arranged for a background check. Robert Dunn—single, no children listed, a quiet life in the suburbs.

When he called the young woman with the information, her response was a quiet sigh of relief. “Thank you. I can take it from here.”

She didn’t ask for the new name or address. Mark found himself wondering if the knowledge that her father was alive was enough to ease this young woman’s concerns... or if the young woman had just been using him to track down a man that a lot of unsavory people would be very interested in knowing the location of.


______________________________

(722 words)


Prompt: You are a private eye in the heart of the city who is often tasked with scoping out adulterers, people who skip out on their girlfriends, or shady business deals. When a young woman comes to you, teary eyed, and tells you her story, you...