The Man With The Ghost Novels & Stories

The torch in her hand was quickly extinguished, and she stared at the front. "Are you a human or a ghost? If you don't come out, don't blame me for being rude to you." As soon as he finished speaking, a skinny middle-aged man with only skin and bones walked out of the passage. If the man hadn't seen his shadow, Nannan would have thought that they had really met a ghost. "Who are you?" Nannan pointed the gun at him and asked vigilantly. However, the man's eyes were fixed on Nannan as he walked toward her step by step.

“I called dibs.” What a predicament for the madam! Agitated, she went into her thoughts for a peaceful solution. The ghostly man allowed the camera to finally spot him on the mezzanine, leaning against a column. Only his two eyes were visible. The rest of him was covered in black attire, gloves, and a balaclava mask, which unsettled the crowd. Tension rose higher than the Great Wall of China. “Lady, the last thing you want to do is to anger my boss,” he warned.

The crowd was rumbling around us and watching his every move. "I don't know who he is!" he repeated angrily. "What do you know?!" I yelled. "He's like a ghost," the man said tensely. The look in his eye told me that he was telling the truth. He looked disturbed by what he was saying to me. "He has no scent–none whatsoever. It's not that he masks it; it just isn't there. He moves over the ground like a phantom. I've never heard so much as a twig snap beneath his step. There are days I think he's a delusion, that my mind has invented him."

When both sides grow desperate, then deliver the true location. But fate rarely follows plans. As the ghost scribbled his scheme on a napkin, a voice interrupted him. “You look like a man thinking too hard,” said the stranger. The ghost looked up. His heart froze. It was one of Marquez’s men. The man’s eyes were smart, his smile real. He sat across the table without invitation. “You’ve been busy, ghost. Too busy. Watching houses that aren’t yours. Whispering things that don’t belong to your tongue.”

A man. Leah froze, her heart stopping mid-beat. Her eyes widened, her lips parted in disbelief. “No…” she whispered. Jason turned, surprise flickering across his face for the first time in years. The man stepped forward, slow, steady. His frame was thinner than before, his movements deliberate, as though every step was stitched together by sheer will. His eyes—dark, unyielding—burned with something different now. Something harder. Ghost. Leah’s hand flew to her mouth. Tears pooled instantly, blurring her sight. “It can’t be…”

And I’m damn good at it. Then, the sound of a chair scraping against the marble tiles catches my attention. I turn my head slightly, expecting to be met with the face of just another stranger, but instead, I do a double take as I lock eyes with a beautiful ghost. A wave of dizziness washes over me as my face blanches. Yet, even in my current state, there are three things I know about this man: One, even as he stands in the shadows, his energy takes up all the space in the room.

I just sat there, watching the shadows. A few minutes later, a black sedan pulled in and parked two spots away. A man stepped out, his movements quick and efficient. He was middle-aged, wearing a nondescript windbreaker and a baseball cap pulled low over his eyes. This was Miller, the man Adrian called The Ghost. He was one of the best in the business—until he ran into me. I stepped out of my car, the sound of my shoes on the concrete echoing in the stillness. He didn't look surprised to see me. In his line of work, surprises were usually fatal.

We exchanged glances for a second, but I was quick to avert my gaze and I didn't even know why. They've got tattoos on their faces and arms down to their shoulders. It was in the middle of the road, the sides surrounded by a lake. The one with a bird tattoo stepped forward, his smirk wider than the rest. “Look who we have here. It's Ghost” he laughed. “The soulless dead man who is here to haunt us today. Oh, I'm getting scared” another said. They laughed, and I let them hold their peace before they ended up in misery.

The door to my cell hissed open, but it wasn't Silas who stepped through. It was a man I had never seen—pale, with eyes that looked like they had seen the end of the world, and a scar that ran from his ear to his collarbone. He was wearing a guard’s uniform, but it was covered in fresh blood. "Iris?" the man asked, his voice a low, haunted whisper. "Who are you?" "The ghost," he said, reaching out a hand. "And we have thirty seconds before the floor becomes a furnace. Move."

“Young man, are you alright? Can I help you to the infirmary?” Ghost lifts our head slowly. The man’s eyes widen. He sees the burnt skin, the chains still half-hanging on my legs, the feral glow that won’t fade from my eyes. Ghost lets out a low growl that rumbles deep. The man flinches, mumbles something, and walks away fast. Good. The less he sees, the better. It takes a few tries before Ghost lets me move. My legs tremble as I stand and my chest burns with every breath.