“Hey, kiddies, I’m home,” I called—not as a greeting, but as a warning.

Lately, I had taken to sounding the horn before pulling into home port, just in case. This time, the harbor appeared deserted. Thank God. There was no sign of my father or Ashley, his wife of six months.

I finally let my guard down and made a beeline for the refrigerator. I had been thinking about fruit for the entire drive home.

“Oh, it’s you. Home so soon?” Ashley called from the shadows, hissing like something out of The Lord of the Rings.

She startled me. I flicked on the lights—and found her deliberately sprawled across the kitchen counter, wearing nothing but a thong.

“School was good,” I replied, doing everything possible to look anywhere but at her.

The banana I had been anticipating all the way home instantly lost its appeal. It sat in the bowl beside Satan’s playmate, and I had no intention of going anywhere near that fruit.

“I find clothes tho confining thometimes, don’t you, Eva? Ethpecially in this heat.”

Her fake lisp had returned. It was unsettlingly strange.

My new stepmother slipped off the counter and opened the freezer, placing herself directly in front of the ice maker—and squarely in my line of sight.

“You know what your problem is, Eva?” Ashley said. “You have body shame.”

“Your mom probably had it, too, didn’t she?”

My mother had died only 15 months earlier. That remark pushed me past my limit.

I bolted for the stairs and the safety of my bedroom, whose door locked from the inside.

A few months later, I was upstairs watching a movie when Ashley and my father moved in, like a summer storm appearing from a cloudless sky. Their arrival was completely unexpected, inexplicable and unwelcome.

They were clearly hiding some sinister secret they seemed eager to spring on me. Whatever had them giggling and blushing like that, I was certain it had to be appalling.

“God hath truly blessed us,” Ashley announced. “It’th a miracle. God hath anthered our prayers.”

“You are going to have a little thister, Eva,” Ashley said, dimpling and scrunching her nose like an evil cherub.

I immediately broke into tears. I was having a full-blown panic attack right in the middle of their gender reveal. I mean, what the hell? They hadn’t even been married a year. My dad had only had his vasectomy reversed like, what, five seconds ago?

After Ashley got pregnant, she became completely unpredictable and often morose. You never knew which Barbie you were going to get.

I could handle moody Barbie; she was quieter. But over-the-top chipper and happy Barbie really freaked me out. Like the Barbie who came in chirping like a bluebird right at the beginning of my junior year.

‘You know your dad and I have been working so hard with the dancers arriving soon,’ she warbled.

I did not want to hear anything more about the damn ballet company they were starting. It was triggering. And super toxic.

‘Your dad understands how important this work is, to create an inclusive ballet,’ she continued. ‘I mean, obviously he does. He’s earmarked two and a half million of his own personal dollars to launch this project.’

I was like, wait, WHAT? Did she just say two and a half million of my dad’s personal dollars?

My dad did not have two and a half million dollars. My dad didn’t have 22 dollars last week when I needed money for lunch.

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And in case anybody might have forgotten, there was now a baby on board. My little half-sister who did not know how to take care of herself while Ashley and my dad uberized ballet.

Later that week, he came walking in the back door unzipping a duffel bag full of cash slung over his shoulder. There must have been like 50, 60 grand in there minimum, all in small bills.

‘What’s up, Dad? Did you get a second job as a mule for the cartel?’ I snickered. It was nervous laughter. Dark humor is my mac and cheese.

Dad normally would have thought my joke was funny. Not that day. I don’t think he even heard me. He was focused on whatever petty larceny he may or may not have been committing.

‘The dancers are flying in tomorrow. I don’t have my checks from the bank yet on our new account, so I have to pay them all in cash, no big deal. I got this. Always a little bumpy in the beginning of these big, new ventures. Everything’s gonna be just fine,’ my dad said with seriously delulu-level confidence.

I stood there watching him count out his cash and stuff it into envelopes and I wondered if there was a specific day or hour when he stopped being a normal guy who went to work, came home, ate dinner, went to the beach with us on the weekends, cracked dumb dad jokes and showed up at my lacrosse games to cheer me on or yell at the ref for making a bad call.

He had been replaced with this guy with eyes in the back of his head and a duffel bag full of Benjamins slung over his shoulder.

My dad was running himself into a wall trying to make Ashley happy. But Ashley was never happy. In her eyes, he always came up short.

I still have the texts I sent to him that day in September 2020. I look at them sometimes.

It’s me telling him over and over that I’m freaking out and he needs to call me right away because I have anxiety disorder and am on the verge of a major panic attack.

I can see the rolling waves of fear roaring toward shore in my text bubbles.

By the time my uncle called me at work about 11am that same morning, I knew what had happened to my dad.

‘Eva,’ he said, his voice sounding all shaky and thick as sludge, ‘I have some really bad news to tell you.’

‘He’s dead, right?’ I said flatly. ‘She killed him, didn’t she? That’s what happened? She shot him?’

‘Yes, I’m so sorry, honey. Your dad died last night.

‘She’s claiming your dad attacked her and that she shot him in self-defense. Of course, we know that’s not true,’ said Uncle Dave.

It took four long years to bring Ashley to trial. And there were so many interminable delays and legal traffic jams along the way.

But on July 30, 2024, she was found guilty of manslaughter with a firearm, a lesser included offense, which was fine by me. It wasn’t murder 2 like we had hoped and felt was justified, but justice can be a crapshoot.

She was sentenced to 20 years in prison, and ten years’ probation, which felt like justice to me.

My half-sister will be 26 years old by the time her mom gets out, older than I am now. I wish her all the best in life, and I hope that one day, I get the chance to know her. She deserves to know she had a great dad who loved her so much, wanted to be a part of her life, and died fighting for her.

Excerpted from GHOST GIRL: SURVIVING THE BLACK SWAN MURDER – A MEMOIR by Eva Benefield. Copyright © 2026 Reprinted by permission of Gallery Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, LCC.

A two-story house being towed across San Pablo Bay transformed a routine day on the water into a scene that even a seasoned Bay Area fisherman found hard to believe.

Zach Medinas, 57, was fishing with his crew Wednesday morning when he noticed a full-size home being pulled across the bay by a small recreational boat.

“I saw him coming and I had the reaction of everybody else — what the hell is that?” Medinas told the San Francisco Chronicle.

Video shared on social media showed the yellowish, two-story structure—with an upper-floor porch—secured to a barge while a motorboat towed it through the water.

The unusual convoy was apparently bound for Oakland.

A Concord resident, Medinas owns Gatecrasher Fishing Adventures and spends much of his time navigating local waters.

Medinas said he and his crewmates heard the U.S. Coast Guard broadcast a warning to mariners about the house being towed through the northeastern section of San Pablo Bay.

Strong winds and rough currents quickly raised questions about whether the home could complete the trip safely.

“It looked incredibly dangerous and just totally bizarre,” Medinas told the SF Chronicle.

His footage soon drew widespread online attention, reaching nearly 140,000 Instagram views by Friday evening—far more than his usual posts featuring fishing and marine life.

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Some viewers also wondered whether towing an entire house across the bay was legal.

The Coast Guard said it was.

Lt. John Thompson, a public affairs officer with Coast Guard Sector San Francisco, told the SF Chronicle that a crew from Station Vallejo encountered the boater and verified that he had the required safety equipment.

The house had no engine and was fastened to a barge, Thompson said.

The person towing the structure was also not operating a commercial service; he was transporting it as a favor for a friend. Thompson said a commercial operation would have required a license the boater did not possess.

The journey started on the Napa River and concluded at Jack London Square in the Oakland-Alameda Estuary, where the Coast Guard said the home was safely anchored.

The floating house was not the first residence to travel across Bay Area waterways.

In April 2024, another two-story home was moved by water from Redwood City to San Rafael, according to the San Francisco Standard.

Batman’s arch-enemy the Joker has defeated Hannibal Lecter, Darth Vader and Freddy Krueger to be named Britain’s favourite movie villain.

Film fans chose Heath Ledger’s acclaimed performance as the Joker in The Dark Knight as the greatest movie villain of all time, earning 22 per cent of the vote in a poll commissioned by Freeview channel Great Action.

Darth Vader took second place with 21 per cent, missing out on the top spot by just one percentage point. The heavy-breathing Sith lord appeared in the original Star Wars films, with his voice provided by US star James Earl Jones and his on-screen performance delivered by Green Cross Code legend David Prowse.

In third place was the chilling cannibal Hannibal Lecter, portrayed by Anthony Hopkins in the 1991 hit The Silence Of The Lambs, which secured 17 per cent of the vote.

Although Hopkins appeared on screen for only 16 minutes, his understated menace made an enduring impression and left audiences wanting more.

The Welsh actor later reprised the role in the follow-up films Red Dragon and Hannibal.

The poll comes as cinemas prepare for the release of Clayface, a new DC comic book adventure centred on Batman’s shape-shifting foe. The Gotham-set film premieres on October 23, continuing the growing trend of exploring the back stories of supervillains such as the Joker and Kraven the Hunter.

The findings suggest that film lovers are increasingly drawn to the dark side. Research for Great TV found that seven in ten film fans, or 70 per cent, believe villains are more memorable than the supposed heroes and make stronger central characters.

Ledger’s performance as the winning villain was tragically his final role before his death on January 22, 2008.

The Dark Knight was released around six months later, and Ledger received a posthumous Academy Award, Golden Globe and Bafta for his portrayal.

The Terminator claimed fourth place with 15 per cent, a fitting result as the world continues to debate the rapid development of artificial intelligence. The cyborg assassin was played by Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Schwarzenegger first portrayed the machine in the franchise’s 1984 debut, famously declaring, “I’ll be back.” He kept that promise in Terminator 2: Judgment Day and a series of subsequent films. The survey also pointed to growing frustration among many Britons with the volume of superhero movies.

Two in five respondents, or 40 per cent, said stories about heroes feel “too similar or predictable”, while 32 per cent said there are “too many superhero films being released”.

Appealing to the nation’s enthusiasm for morally complex characters, Great Action will also screen the 2018 Marvel film Venom. The anti-hero story follows investigative journalist Eddie Brock, played by Tom Hardy, after he becomes host to an alien symbiote that wreaks havoc through his body.

The film will air at 9pm on Tuesday, October 27, on Great Action, available on Freeview channel 42.

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Great Action will also show Punisher: War Zone at 9pm on Friday, October 2. The film follows another Marvel anti-hero, Frank Castle, better known as the Punisher, a former FBI agent who becomes a ruthless vigilante waging a one-man war against organised crime through violence and any means necessary.

Based on the Marvel comics, the film stars the late Ray Stevenson in the lead role. Stevenson died in May 2023 after recently appearing in the Star Wars series Ahsoka.

Kate Gartland, Marketing Director at Great TV, said: ‘Great action films are all about the good guy-bad guy battles – and while the heroes have traditionally taken centre stage, our research shows film fans are drawn to the dark side.

‘At Great Action, we’re committed to giving action fans the films they love, from iconic villains to more complex anti-heroes.

‘From classic movie baddies to unforgettable characters like Venom, we’re bringing audiences plenty of action-packed stories where we’re sometimes rooting for the villain.’

Costco shoppers are getting into the Halloween spirit by smashing open a candy-filled chocolate Frankenstein.

The warehouse retailer is offering a life-size Frankenstein head weighing 5.5 pounds and made entirely from Belgian chocolate. Each oversized confection comes with a wooden mallet, allowing customers to break through the chocolate shell and discover the gummy candy hidden inside.

The Halloween treat is priced at $54.99 in Costco warehouses, while online shoppers pay more than $60. Supplies have already disappeared from Costco’s website and some stores, sending eager buyers to eBay, where resale listings have climbed as high as $100.

Once the chocolate head is cracked open, shoppers find roughly one pound of gummy candies shaped like body parts inside the edible skull.

The giant confection delivers a serious sugar rush. A serving of the chocolate shell contains 17 grams of sugar, with 71 servings listed in total, while the gummies contain 6 grams of sugar per serving across 64 servings. The product label lists the complete treat at 150 calories per serving, with 25 servings overall.

The novelty dessert has divided Costco shoppers. Some see it as an entertaining Halloween centerpiece and an interactive party activity, while others say the price is difficult to justify.

“Right now people are just trying to put food on the table and those prices have gone up, plus the cost of the gas to get to the store. Sorry kids maybe when things get better,” one Instagram user commented.

“That looks awesome but $50? You’re outta your frankenmind,” another person joked.

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“55 bucks!!! Lil crazy they really know how to squeeze money outta ya for the kids geez,” a third shopper wrote.

Other chocolate fans, however, argued that the price may be reasonable considering how much candy and premium chocolate cost right now.

“Everyone saying $55 is crazy, but a 5lb bag of decent chocolate used for tempering chocolate to make things like this currently costs $50-70 right now depending on the brand and what state you’re in,” one Instagram defender said. “$55 is actually not that bad.”

“Its Belgium chocolate WAY better more legit and cld U fly over to Belgium for $50? NO and its cool so ppl complaining just move on,” another commenter added.

The Costco Halloween craze arrives as the retailer grows its delivery options through DoorDash and Uber Eats, making it easier for customers to order everything from bulk groceries to seasonal treats.

Costco’s loyal following remains strong, with high-demand products continuing to sell out and the retailer’s popular food court earning fresh praise after bringing back its long-missed churro.

A nonpublic Russian government document obtained and reviewed by News Media details Moscow’s ambition to expand ties with Iran well beyond conventional trade. Its proposals include alternative financial networks, nuclear cooperation, Iranian manufacturing of Russian aircraft components, major energy ventures and transportation corridors extending toward the Persian Gulf.

Titled “Plan for Cooperation Between the Russian Federation and the Islamic Republic of Iran for 2024-2026,” the 44-page document is written in Russian and marked “For official use.” Russia approved it on Sept. 2, 2024. The plan assigns ministries, government agencies and state-owned companies to specific projects, with deadlines running through the end of 2026.

The document was drafted more than a year before the current war involving Iran and the United States. It therefore does not show which projects remain active or how the conflict may have changed Moscow’s priorities.

Still, an independent review of the Russian-language plan, together with subsequent public reporting, indicates that several of the initiatives it outlined later moved forward or came to fruition.

Keti Korkiya, a research analyst in the Russia program at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, reviewed the document for News Media. She said its importance lies not in any individual project, but in the broader framework Moscow was seeking to construct with Tehran.

“The roadmap is not revelatory: people paying close attention to the relationship between Russia and Iran will see many collaborations between the two countries that have been public for years,” Korkiya said in a written analysis provided to News Media.

“What is more revealing is the architecture of the relationship Moscow is trying to build,” she said, citing financial arrangements, transportation links, energy investment and aviation cooperation as mechanisms for reducing vulnerabilities created by sanctions and Western economic pressure.

“These are nonpublic high-level documents that illustrate the comprehensive cooperation between Russia and Iran,” a European intelligence source who reviewed the material told News Media.

The source described the cooperation as “strategic, sensitive and highly politicized,” with a focus on nuclear programs, energy trade and financial transactions intended to evade U.S. sanctions.

A U.S. official, speaking on background in response to News Media’s questions about the financial provisions, said American sanctions have “severely isolated Russia and Iran from the international financial system.” Efforts by both countries to establish alternative financial channels and other sanctions-evasion mechanisms were therefore “not surprising,” the official said.

Washington closely monitors attempts by sanctioned jurisdictions to create alternative cross-border payment systems, the official added, and would work to disrupt mechanisms that support sanctions evasion or illicit finance.

The Russian plan does not use the term “sanctions evasion.” Instead, it repeatedly advocates greater use of national currencies, independent financial channels and measures to counter what Moscow calls “unilateral restrictive measures.”

BUILDING FINANCIAL CHANNELS OUTSIDE WESTERN SYSTEMS

The plan’s most specific provisions address how Russia and Iran would transfer money between them.

It sets a goal of raising the share of bilateral trade conducted in national currencies from 68% in 2024 to 71% by 2026, while also expanding correspondent accounts denominated in those currencies.

More significantly, the roadmap directs the Bank of Russia and the Central Bank of Iran to explore using central bank digital currencies for cross-border settlements.

It also calls for “ensuring the use of independent systems for transmitting financial messages,” including the connection of financial institutions to independent channels for exchanging financial information.

The document does not specify which messaging system would be used, nor does it explicitly say that the objective was to bypass SWIFT or U.S. financial controls.

But some of that financial integration later became public.

In February 2025, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Overchuk said Russia and Iran had “practically completely” shifted bilateral settlements into national currencies using their own systems for transmitting financial and banking messages. Interfax, a Russian news agency, reported that the effort was part of a broader push toward independent payment infrastructure between the two countries.

Iran’s ambassador to Russia also said in February 2025 that Tehran and Moscow no longer needed SWIFT for bilateral banking relations and were using their own confidential bank-messaging systems. He said the initial phase of linking Iran’s Shetab payment network with Russia’s Mir system had begun the previous year.

Korkiya said the significance of those measures is cumulative.

“Individually, none of these initiatives is transformative,” she wrote. “Collectively, however, they amount to an attempt to remove single points of vulnerability and build redundancy into the Russia-Iran economic relationship.”

The financial effort is paired with a political one.

The roadmap calls for Russia and Iran to coordinate through BRICS and other international institutions against “unilateral trade restrictions,” while another provision proposes studying ways to counter “unilateral restrictive measures” and their impact on global markets.

Korkiya said that goes beyond simply finding workarounds.

“Especially interesting is that the roadmap also goes beyond practical sanctions workarounds and includes an effort to build an intellectual and diplomatic campaign against sanctions themselves,” she wrote, citing plans for expert communities, discussion platforms and an international forum focused on unilateral restrictions.

A U.S. official told News Media that financial institutions and intermediaries enabling sanctions evasion expose themselves to “significant sanctions risks,” adding that Washington would continue working with partners to “identify, expose and disrupt these networks wherever they emerge.”

The official also pushed back on the idea that alternative Russia-Iran systems could displace Western financial infrastructure.

“Russia and Iran can try to build alternative financial channels, but they cannot replicate the reach, liquidity or trust of the U.S. dollar and the international financial system,” the official said. “Their efforts will not weaken the effectiveness of U.S. sanctions.”

ROSATOM AND IRAN’S NUCLEAR SECTOR

The financial architecture sits alongside another strategically sensitive pillar of the relationship: civilian nuclear energy.

The plan assigns Russia’s state nuclear corporation Rosatom continued responsibility at Iran’s Bushehr nuclear power plant, including fuel and maintenance support for Unit 1 and continuing construction work associated with Units 2 and 3.

The cooperation did not remain solely on paper.

On Sept. 2, 2026, Rosatom said Russian specialists had begun returning to Bushehr, that Unit 1 was preparing for scheduled maintenance and partial fuel replacement, and that nuclear fuel had already been delivered to the site. Rosatom also said work was continuing on the plant and that additional Russian specialists were expected to arrive.

Korkiya noted that the Bushehr Units 2 and 3 project predates the 2024 roadmap, meaning the document did not originate that cooperation but rather incorporated an existing strategic project into the broader Russia-Iran framework.

“Such strategies and protocols confirm that Russia and Iran are closely aligned countries, and Russia almost certainly continues and aims to increase its current cooperation with Iran also in 2026,” the European intelligence source said.

News Media sought comment from Rosatom on the document and the current status of its work in Iran.

ENERGY PROJECTS — WITH SOME FINANCING KEPT CONFIDENTIAL

The roadmap also identifies specific Iranian oil and gas fields where Moscow sought a role.

It names Shadegan, Kish and North Pars, assigning Russia’s Energy Ministry and unspecified “interested Russian companies” responsibility for advancing the projects.

Those companies are not named in the roadmap. For several projects, the financing column is marked “Confidential.”

There is evidence that at least one of the named projects advanced.

Interfax reported on Feb. 13, 2026, that Russian state-owned ZN-Vostok was developing Iran’s Shadegan oil field, while Iranian officials said Tehran hoped to expand Russian investment across additional oil and gas projects.

The roadmap sets milestones for Shadegan through the end of 2025, while work involving Kish and North Pars runs into 2026 and includes legal, commercial and project-analysis work.

That pattern appears repeatedly through the document: ministries, deadlines and strategic objectives are spelled out, while some of the participating companies or financing arrangements remain undisclosed.

RUSSIAN AIRCRAFT PARTS — MADE IN IRAN?

One of the more unusual provisions goes beyond ordinary trade.

The roadmap calls for Russia to help establish production in Iran of individual parts and assemblies for Russian aircraft.

Russian authorities were instructed to determine which aircraft parts could be repaired or manufactured in Iran, identify Iranian companies capable of producing them, certify selected sites through Russia’s aviation regulator Rosaviatsiya and conclude a localization agreement.

The roadmap set a March 31, 2026, deadline for an agreement on localized production and a Dec. 31, 2026, target for launching prototype production.

Public evidence does show that aviation cooperation advanced in the related area of aircraft maintenance.

In February 2025, Rosaviatsiya’s chief said three Iranian companies had been approved to perform maintenance and airworthiness work on Russian-operated aircraft after an Aeroflot Airbus A330 underwent maintenance in Tehran.

The Russian government also publicly discussed deeper aviation-industrial cooperation with Iran that month, including aircraft manufacturing and joint work on jet engines for passenger aircraft.

But News Media has not independently verified that the more ambitious provision in the roadmap — manufacturing Russian aircraft components inside Iran — was implemented.

A TRADE ROUTE SOUTH

The document also lays out an effort to strengthen the physical transportation network linking Russia and Iran.

It calls for work on a proposed railway built to Russia’s 1,520-millimeter track gauge, stretching from Iran’s border with Azerbaijan toward Iranian ports on the Persian Gulf.

The proposal remained in the planning and negotiation stage in the roadmap.

Separately, Moscow sought to advance the Rasht-Astara railway, a roughly 162-kilometer missing link in the International North-South Transport Corridor.

That project subsequently moved beyond the purely conceptual stage.

Russia and Iran formally launched engineering surveys for the railway in May 2025, according to Russia’s Transport Ministry.

Korkiya said the project had still not reached full construction by late summer 2026, with Russian and Iranian officials continuing to work on the implementation and construction arrangements. She also identified another provision: Iranian investment in port infrastructure in Astrakhan, Russia.

The roadmap calls for a terminal there using Iranian investment, along with warehouses, a logistics park and grain and vegetable-oil facilities. Korkiya found that an Iranian-owned company later operated a terminal in Astrakhan with a railway spur and was building grain and vegetable-oil storage facilities that closely tracked the roadmap’s description, although the document does not identify that company by name and the match cannot be definitively established.

Taken together, the transport provisions point to an effort to build physical trade routes that are less dependent on traditional European corridors.

MEDIA, TECHNOLOGY AND “INFORMATION SECURITY”

The roadmap reaches well beyond finance and heavy industry.

It calls for content exchange, journalist training and joint media production, including at least two joint projects and ‘professional training’ for Iranian journalists.

It also calls for Russian technology companies to secure at least two contracts in Iran involving information and communications technology, including “information security,” telecommunications and the video-game industry.

A PUTIN FAMILY CONNECTION AT THE TOP

The official overseeing the Russian side of the relationship also has a direct connection to President Vladimir Putin’s extended family.

Russian Energy Minister Sergei Tsivilev chairs the Russian side of the Permanent Russian-Iranian Commission on Trade and Economic Cooperation.

Tsivilev is married to Anna Tsivileva, a Russian deputy defense minister and the daughter of Putin’s late cousin, Reuters reported when Putin appointed her to the Defense Ministry in June 2024.

The European intelligence source argued that the connection reflects the political importance Moscow attaches to Iran.

“It should be emphasized that on Russia’s part, the economic cooperation with Iran is coordinated and managed by a representative of Vladimir Putin’s extended family,” the source said.

“This indicates that the Iranian matter is not just one of many bureaucratic issues in the agenda of the Russian government. But it holds significant value for the interest of the Vladimir Putin regime.”

“What is also notable is the degree of state coordination and institutionalization behind this effort,” she said, pointing to the involvement of central banks, ministries, regulators and state companies, as well as formal deadlines and confidential financing in some projects.

“That suggests Moscow is trying to turn what could otherwise remain a politically convenient partnership into something more durable and bureaucratically embedded,” Korkiya said.

Russian and Iranian officials did not respond to multiple requests for comment from News Media. News Media also sought comment from Rosatom and from Russian officials responsible for Moscow’s participation in BRICS.