“Preposterous!”

“Yes, Mr. Trist.”

“Poltergeists? These vermin are trying to squeeze me out of the money they owe me.”

“Obviously, Mr. Trist.”

“It doesn’t help my own architect is claiming we cut corners on his design. How dare he violate his NDA?”

“I have already filed the injunction, Mr. Trist. If he continues, he shall be homeless by the time you are through with him.”

“Good! Stop payments to him immediately.”

“Not to worry, Mr. Trist. He hasn’t received a check in six months. How dare he turn on you and break his NDA.”

“Good! Where would I be without you, Matthew? How are things going on the other front?

“We are making progress, Mr. Trist. The Bellinis on 14 both are having affairs. Farahani on 32 is under investigation for embezzlement thanks to those docs we, I mean, I leaked to city hall. I did find some new dirt on Volkov, but I’m guessing we leave that alone. But should he turn on you, we have a mountain of juice.”

“Good! Right!” He was noticeably shook by just hearing the name, Volkov, but only to his fixer. No one else got this close or had the balls to look him in the eye. “Those uppity uptown snoots cry about Ghosts. If they had any clue what to truly fear in that monstrous tower…” 

Dmitry Trist had built some of the biggest buildings in Manhattan, redefining the skyline for a generation. While the whole city focused on rebuilding downtown, Trist used his investor’s capital to seize up and demolish midtown dinosaurs, only to erect new monuments to his name. “I took the rest of the apple while those fools wanted just the tip,” Matthew Coogan had heard this vulgar jab more times than he cared to admit, usually told to Trist’s latest pageant queen affair or potential future ex baby mama.

After a decade of disgust, he learned to live with himself. He was there to clean up the mess on every private island. He was less of a lawyer now, and more the corporate henchman to a Bond villain. He had his own fair share of ladies, parties with celebs and was paid well to do the dirty work. After every tete-a-tete with a playboy model, it got easier and easier, especially after those weekends in Tyumen. Everyone talks about Moscow and St. Petersburg, but you really want to party with a vulgar oligarch… Let’s just say, Siberia is not all bad if you know where to go and have a lot of cash to waste.

Coogan was one of the few outside the family that knew the truth about Dmitry Trist. He was a leech on the world’s most wealthy, developing properties in every major city of the world. Technically he owned nothing, his investors were the real owners, but he put his name and kept an apartment in every one. Every building except Central Park South.

He could see it from this office. Matthew felt like a spy, eyeing Trist’s properties, hearing his scheming to skim a few pennies here and there from every deal. He was good at putting deals together. 

That was his real talent, bringing money to projects, taking his cut, and getting rich no matter if the project succeeded or failed. 

Central Park South spooked Trist. Trist was superstitious but not in this way. He wore certain socks, certain ties and only ate foods from certain restaurants. His greed overwhelmed his fear.

New York’s murder hotel – every city has one – was priced to steal without their usual machinations. The previous owners died, living in the penthouse of their historic hotel. Decades of eerie sounds, elevator malfunctions, mysterious fires and rumors of a satanic cult bolstered the ghost stories. 

Charles and Margaret Billingsworth were old money that thought Central Park South was their castle, and Central Park itself, their kingdom. The luscious lounge was the cabaret to the rich and famous, with everyone from Ella Fitzgerald to Frank Sinatra dropping by while Steven Waters tickled the keys. 

The pianist was found dead just a few days after the Billingsworths. They say his heart was broken. Staff claimed they heard the sounds of a jazz piano the final years before the grandchildren closed the hotel doors.  

Central Park South sat vacant for seventeen summers. Matthew bribed a banker’s driver to get some documents revealing what Trist needed to grab it for almost free. Trist called his Russian friends, bullied city hall into a few tax breaks, and less than two years later, the tallest residential building in the world screamed “TRIST BUILT THIS” to the heavens. 

But Trist never set foot inside. He refused a forty million dollar view of the park. He never even stood on the property. He let Matthew do the ceremonial groundbreaking, pretending to be stuck overseas on business.

Matthew had a five million dollar studio on one of the lower floors. He thought all the stories were nonsense. Even with what Trist paid him, Matthew could never afford this Manhattan real-estate. Where else could he take his conquests?

Matthew was all but married to Trist, leaving no time for relationships. From time to time, Trist would joke, “whatever happened to that six you used to date?” Women were nothing but objects to Trist. Dmitry thought he was being generous, calling her a six, especially compared to the tail Coogan enjoys now. 

“Look at the life you lead now, thanks to me,” Trist would gloat. 

Jessica made him choose, “It’s me or him!” Matthew did not take the threat seriously until it was too late.

Tonight he was alone in his Central Park South flat when banging at the door interrupted his Cardhu 1974.

“Coogan, you bastard,” screeched Matthew’s favorite tenant association president. Evangeline Stavros was a force. Matthew’s one mistake was letting her in after the Christmas party. They hated each other, but for one drunk lonely night he and the rich widow were a pair. If Trist found out Matthew would be out on the streets.

“Never mix business with pleasure. Never give them leverage over you.” Trist warned.

So far the embarrassment was too great – Evangeline had similar rules for her boy toys – but Stavros had a chit to play someday. Push come to shove a little indiscretion would not harm her long term, not with her reputation for financing careers for more than a few young Broadway stars. She loved young leading men, and a few hapless ingenue looking for attention and a career break. 

“The elevators are down? The lights in the halls and the units keep blinking. Someone upstairs is blasting music.” Flanked by a number of tenants, Stavros was the only one living beneath the vacant penthouse mansion. 

Named New York’s Mount Olympus, everytime Matthew gave some oil tycoon a tour, a bird would smash into the massive windows, the building would shake, strange music would play, or so the potential clients claimed. Matthew never heard or saw anything.  

The Central Park South penthouse was a monument to greed and power. The lofty mansion in the clouds was surrounded by twenty foot glass giving a near uninterrupted 360 view of the tristate area. Trist claimed he could see Washington DC, Boston and even Toronto in a clear day. He couldn’t, but few knew he had never actually been in the building or his latest ignorant rants supporting flat earth theory. 

“Everyone go to bed. Stop harassing Mr. Trist and pay your management fees. These lies will do you no favors in court.” Matthew retorted. He was losing patience with the most spoiled garbage of Manhattan.

“We spent millions to get a ghetto slumlord. We are not leaving until you come upstairs.” Stavros and her minions gave Matthew little choice. Her real fox neck wrap seemed to snarl at him. Matthew was sweating bullets and she was wrapped in dead woodland creatures. 

He took them up the freight elevator usually reserved for new grand pianos and oversized art installations. Not as quick as the high speed lifts only found in Dubai, this was a slow painful ride to inner space. Matthew hated this ride in every mode, imagining the fools designing elevators to space with disdain. He usually was not fazed by heights, but this building just did not look right. Almost as tall as the Freedom Tower, but a fraction of the footprint, Matthew thought Central Park South was always one strong wind away from collapse. 

The doors opened. It was quiet and dark. On a clear day the city’s hustle and bustle lit up the urban observatory 24/7, but on a cloudy stormy night, you could be alone on a mountain peak and hear more evidence of life. 

“You see? Nothing! No one lives here. No one has keys. No one has ever lived up here.” Matthew was done. Exhausted and pissed, he ordered them back to the freight.

The group formed a circle and started chanting. Lightning flashed. Thunder rumbled. The low murder grew to a shouting mantra in a language Matthew could not understand.

“WHAT THE F-” Matthew was cut off by two large men grabbing him by the arms. He struggled until one beast struck him across the face, knocking Matthew to the ground.

“Get off of me!” The two men silenced him with a few more blows and then dragged Matthew to the shaft of the broken elevator. 

Suddenly Matthew heard a piano. His eyes closed, partially blinded by a slow drip of blood, he imagined it was the 1930s in a jazz bar downtown. He barely registered Stavros shouting, “Now, deliver the sacrifice!” Matthew’s mind drifted to a surreal dream – a lounge filled with old movie stars and famous singers, a living collection of Hirschfelds laughing over exotic cocktails. He was mentally gone before he physically hit rock bottom, quite literally.

“Oh, dear, Charles, you know they will blame us for that one too.”

“Yes, Margaret, but that’s what they get for tearing down our hotel.”

They clinked martinis with a smirk.

“Charles, I do miss the charm of the old place. This tomb in the clouds is far too drab for my taste.”

“Yes, dear, charm is a rare commodity these days. But I do love this view. What do you say to a dance?”

“Why, Charles, that would be just lovely.”

“Oh, Steven, how about a little rag time to cheer up the place?”

“Of course, Mr. Billingsworth.”

As the Satanists piled back into the box to the ground, the sounds of yesteryear filled the air. 

“I don’t know if this is heaven, hell, purgatory, or whatever, but I expected so much worse.” Matthew was finally free of his soulless existence.