“R.J. Dark” is the crime-writing alter-ego of RJ Barker, best-selling fantasy author — and, in my opinion, one of the best SFF writers at the moment. When I first learned that he was writing crime/mystery novels as well, I was certainly intrigued. Datura Books recently published the first novel in the Mal & Jackie series, A Numbers Game, and have allowed us to share an excerpt.
All Malachite “Mal” Jones wants is a quiet life as the foremost (fake) psychic medium on the Blades Edge estate.
Enter his new client: Janine, the widow of a man who hid away a huge amount of money. Mal is drawn into a mystery he never asked for in an attempt to help Janine find the cash and escape the estate once and for all.
Problem is, Mal’s not the only one hoping to get his hands on the cash. The crime lord of the estate to other criminals are all on the hunt. Plus adding to his worries, there are some corrupt cops after Mal’s best and only friend, Jackie.
Aided by Jackie and Beryl, Mal’s nosy secretary, Mal sets out to find the cash and a solution that pleases everyone. If he can’t, he’ll have to pay the price. After all, it’s a numbers game…
*
2
HOW TO CONTACT THE DEAD
You will need:
Mood lighting
Scented candles
Heavy fabrics (velvet is always good)
Old furniture
Crystal
Phrenology head
A soft voice
An understanding of human nature
A willingness to listen
Patience
A good researcher
An earpiece
A good search engine
She was impatient. Not obviously so. In fact, I don’t think I’d ever met anyone as contained as Janine Stanbeck, and I wondered what her home life must have been like that she had to keep so much of herself hidden. There was no overflow from her. People usually gave something away but she sat in my client’s chair (Louis XV-style balloon-backed) and revealed nothing. Only stared at the desk. I waited for her to speak first.
‘I thought you’d have a crystal ball.’
‘That’s only really for theatre. I’m not running a con.’
‘I told you to get a crystal ball.’ Words in my ear; Beryl, sat in the back room at her computer, listening in. She was only meant to interject with useful information, but I’d given up trying to tell her that.
‘So, contact the other side or whatever and then tell me where my money is.’
‘What money?’
Thanks, Beryl.
‘It doesn’t work like that, Janine. I can’t just deliver an answer. The spirits talk in loops and riddles a lot of the time.’
She stared at me. Blue eyes, no make-up. The start of frown lines on her forehead.
‘Then how does it work?’
‘We need to establish contact, work up a rapport.’
‘Are you trying to chat me up?’
‘No.’
‘You would though.’
‘It sounds like you’re trying to chat me up.’
‘She knows you’re a fraud, Mal.’
‘This only works if you commit yourself to it, Janine.’
I try to use the client’s name a lot, to establish a connection, but she looked at me like she was channelling every resentment she had ever felt and was passing them on to me.
‘You can walk out, Janine, but you’ve already paid for an hour.’
She was still staring.
‘So maybe give it a go?’
And more staring.
‘Your husband was knocked off his bike, right? But I’m getting that it may not have been an accident.’
A small smile appeared on her face.
‘If you want me to believe you can help, Malachite’ – amusement in her voice at my name – ‘then tell me something that isn’t gossip on the estate.’
‘I don’t care if you believe me or not, Janine. That’s not why I am doing this. Jackie told me you need help but you don’t have to stay.’ Calling their bluff early is always good. Because if they do walk out, you basically get an hour off.
‘She did two months for selling weed when she was fifteen. Had her own little circle of dealers at her school, bloody posh one too. Sealed records, no one knows. That should impress her.’
And that is why I pay Beryl.
‘I’m wasting my time here.’ She was standing, going to leave. I needed to get her attention.
‘Have you ever been in prison?’
She froze. Something there on her face; not curiosity, almost anger, or maybe it was fear. People are funny about their secrets, that’s why they’re secret. Then she shook her head. Sat back down.
‘You’re fishing, saying that cos I’m from the Edge.’ She picked up her bag from the floor and put it on her lap. She had the biggest handbag I had ever seen, proper shoplifter’s bag, and it looked stuffed to the gills. ‘People think everyone from the Edge has been in prison, Mr Jones.’
‘You weren’t on the Edge then, though, were you?’
She sat a little straighter. Put her bag back on the floor. A shiver ran through her and she tapped the desk with her fingernail. It was very well manicured.
‘OK. You could have spoken to people that knew me back then.’ She stared. ‘But you’ve not had much time to do that.’ She sat back and crossed her legs. Crossed her arms. ‘So, I’ll listen.’
‘Have you brought anything belonging to the deceased, Janine?’
‘Here.’ She leaned over, and I heard the rustle of her massive handbag. Then she placed a black crash helmet on the desk. It had a lot of scratches down one side. ‘He was wearing that when he died. He loved that stupid bike – it’s even in his will that we cremate the bastard in his bloody helmet and leathers. That enough for you?’
‘Well, it’s a start.’ I laid my hands on the crash helmet. It was icy cold. I closed my eyes for a moment.
Saw a forest full of the dead.
Every reading is a journey along an unseen path; sometimes it takes strange twists and turns. You walk, you talk, ask questions, see a sign, a broken branch that leads you in a certain direction, follow it until you find the beautiful sun-filled clearing where the client is filling out all the information for you – but thinking you have done it. It’s a numbers game, really. Say enough and eventually you’ll hit something. Sometimes it’s easy. Especially with those who are keen to believe, who will do the work on your behalf without ever realizing it.
Sometimes it’s not.
Janine was the second type.
Love, career and money are the three big paths. If you wander far enough down those paths, then you will usually hit upon something that the client is looking for. Or you may not, but you might find out some interesting things on the way, branch off down those interesting paths, go the roundabout way to your destination. Sometimes I’m lucky and I hit something at the off, but I don’t like trusting to luck.
It might seem like she had done me a favour by saying it was money she wanted to know about, but she hadn’t. She’d closed off two paths, and there’s a lot to be found just nosing around. Though she didn’t look like a woman who had much time for curiosity.
‘It was a lot of money,’ I said.
‘Of course it was a lot. Otherwise I wouldn’t spend fifty quid I don’t have.’
‘His savings…’ I said.
She rolled her eyes. Usually people are more polite, they try to hide their disbelief, but she didn’t care. Not savings then.
‘You’ve always wanted savings, right?’
She stared at me. ‘Who doesn’t?’
‘And this money was your way out.’
She stared more.
‘But you need to know where it is.’ Sometimes you can feed people back things they have already told you and it impresses them because people forget what they’ve said surprisingly quickly.
‘I told you that.’ Not always though. ‘I really am wasting my time here, aren’t I?’
‘No, but sometimes contacting the spirits is a lottery.’
Wide eyes. Shock. And there it is. The wood among the trees. The needle in the haystack. I can be gentle now because I have something. I can be calmer cos I’m not flailing about hoping for a hit.
‘The spirits often drop hints, subtle hints.’
Her eyes narrowing, she picked up her bag. Reached for the crash helmet. Disappointment on her face. But’s that OK; disappointment is good. Because that means, really, she wants to believe. And if she wants to, then she will.
‘A lottery ticket.’
She took her hand off the crash helmet. Put her bag down. Cocked her head.
‘Yes.’
From there, it’s obvious.
‘But you don’t know where it is.’ I don’t let her speak, don’t let her get in a cynical comment. ‘Tell me the situation.’
‘Can’t he tell you that?’
‘I get more… impressions… from the spirits than actual stories. Quicker and clearer to hear it from you.’
She’s wavering. Wants to believe. Wants an answer. But she can’t trust. That odd look crosses her face again. She stands.
‘This is lies, innit? Jackie’s a grifter. You are too. It’s all lies.’
‘It’s a slow process, Janine.’ She shook her head.
‘If it were real, you could tell me something really impressive, like the numbers on the ticket.’
‘Zero-two…’
‘Zero-two.’
‘…thirty-eight…’
‘Thirty-eight.’
‘…nineteen…’
‘Nineteen.’
‘ …six and eleven.’
‘Six and eleven.’
Sometimes it happens like that; sometimes it feels like I’m saying the words before Beryl gives them to me, and it’s easy to believe that it is more than it is. Though I don’t let myself, because that’s the sort of thing people who get sectioned believe, and no one wants to be sectioned.
However, that little trick was impressive enough. She stopped in her tracks.
‘That’s the numbers – how did you know?’
‘How do you think?’
She stared. Not as confrontational. Tapped a well-manicured nail on the desk.
‘He won the Lotto,’ she said. ‘Eight million pounds, but he wouldn’t cash the ticket. He tried to hide it from me. Said it was insurance against me “misbehaving”. Bastard. We argued about it. I said he should cash the money straight away, cos he might lose it. He said that would never happen. Then he died. And now it’s lost.’
‘And you’ve checked everywhere that–’
‘Of course I have.’ A flash of temper. ‘I was sure it’d be in his lock-up – guarded that bloody place like it was full of gold – but when I got the key–’
‘Got the key?’
‘Police gave it to me. From his body when they brought me his leathers and that.’ She nodded at the helmet. ‘I said I needed it to get some stuff for the kid. Anyway, the lock-up was empty.’
‘Had someone been in it?’
‘I don’t think so.’ A pause. ‘Maybe. The family are bastards.’ She leaned forward, and I saw real need in her eyes, a desperation. ‘Look, I have a kid – he’s three. You know what it’s like on the Edge. That money will get me out of there, help get him out of there. A good school, somewhere nice to live. Decent people. If you are what you say you are, and you can find the ticket, I’ll give you a percentage, Mr Jones. Just help me get the money, help me get away.’
And just like that, she had me. I wanted to help. Of course I did.
Help a young mother and her child get off the Edge? I’d have killed for that to happen to me as a kid.
How could I refuse?
*
R.J. Dark’s A Numbers Game is out now, published by Datura Books. The next novel in the series, Incy Wincy, is due to be published by Datura on January 12th, 2027.
RJ Barker‘s latest novel, The Mortedant’s Peril, is out now published by Tor Books in North America and in the UK — it’s the first book in the Trials of Irody Hasp series.
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