Strangers' Kingdom
by Brandon Barrows
Genre: Mystery
The tall bag of bones swung a vicious right that seemed to whistle in the stillness of the thin night air, scraping through the empty space between my chin and throat, just barely avoiding contact with flesh. Seemingly in the same motion, as if using the momentum from his swinging fist, he turned and dashed off into the dim recesses of the alley he’d been hanging around the mouth of – for hours, if Rosalie Stompanato was to be believed. I had no reason to doubt her.
“Police! Get back here!”
Shouting was pointless, but I had to try. I gave chase to the already-vanished
figure, plunging after him into the deeper darkness between two aging apartment
houses. My fist, which I only then realized I was making, unclenched and I
reached for the holster under my left shoulder, muttering, “God damn it.”
It was pushing midnight
and in just over nine hours, both Rosalie Stompanato and I were due in court
for the attempted murder trial of her mid-level racketeer husband, Thomas
“Tommy Stomper” Stompanato. Stompanato, loosely connected to the much larger
Castella crime organization, had been on a lot of people’s radars for years,
for everything from small-time protection rackets to credit card scams and
money laundering for bigger outfits. Major investigations by Albany city
police, New York state police and even federal authorities produced charges and
convictions against numerous Stompanato pawns, and even a couple of lieutenants,
but Tommy Stomper himself somehow always remained clean enough to skate away.
It took a domestic situation, a middle of the night, literal
knock-down-drag-out in which he pulled Mrs. Stompanato out of their lavish home
in suburban Malta and, according to witnesses and Rosalie herself, tried to
remove her teeth with the aid of a conveniently placed curb. “Stomper” wasn’t
just a clever play on his family name.
When I got the tip about
a disturbance at the Stompanato residence from a state-trooper friend, I
couldn’t help being just a bit grateful for this bit of rage-fueled stupidity.
The man had been so clever for so long that it looked like he’d never fuck up,
that we’d never find the crack that would pull open his operation and let us
drag him out into the light. For Rosalie Stompanato, it was a nightmare, but a
lot of us who were after her husband felt gratitude and guilt in equal
measures. One woman’s nightmare was a godsend for multiple agencies.
After the incident,
Rosalie Stompanato moved out of her stylish home in nearby Malta to a small
apartment in the area where she grew up, inside the city proper. Family and
friends she knew there were long gone, but the return to a familiar place
apparently brought a measure of comfort. It was understandable and it made both
the county prosecutor’s work in prepping her for the trial, and my department’s
in protecting her, that much easier. Despite the charges against him, not to
mention his associations, Stompanato made bail and his organization worked on.
With a trial looming over his head, but no date set, the mobster seemed to keep
his nose relatively clean, knowing the state’s attorney would be more than
happy to tack additional charges onto the list he was already facing. That and
time, as weeks became months, allowed Rosalie Stompanato to make a life for
herself unmolested.
“At least the kids are
already grown and out on their own,” Rosalie told me once, in a private moment.
“If this happened ten years ago…” She broke down without finishing, but I knew
what she was thinking.
I kept in regular touch
with her after that, partially because I felt she needed the support, but also
hoping to pick up something that would further widen the chink in Tommy
Stomper’s armor. She seemed to be doing as well as could be expected. She was
even starting to feel safe again, she told me – until the night before the
trial finally began.
It was past eleven
o’clock when I received the woman’s call; I’d given her my home number and told
her to call any time, for any reason. She noticed a figure, she said – a tall,
gangly man she didn’t remember ever seeing in the neighborhood before, who
spent hours standing in the mouth of the alley directly across from her
apartment.
“It’s probably nothing,”
I told her, as much to convince myself. Tommy Stomper proved he wasn’t stupid,
but with so much riding on the events of the next day, maybe he was becoming
desperate. “But I’m happy to check it out.”
When I arrived on
Rosalie’s street, fifteen minutes after her call, I saw exactly who she was
worried about and exactly why. He stood just outside the circle of light cast
by a streetlamp, hanging around the mouth of an alley. I watched for a few
minutes and he did nothing at all – not so much as light a cigarette, shuffle
his feet or cough. He wasn’t worried about seen.
I exited the vehicle and
approached.
Closer up, I could see he
was a sickly thin young man, skin so pale it almost seemed to glow in the
dimness. He wore a faded blue hooded sweatshirt that hung from him like laundry
on a line and his hair was short, mussed and unwashed, making it look like
blond barbed wire. I’d have bet his diet consisted largely of amphetamines.
The guy’s eyes, watchful
and wary, scanned me as I approached. I flashed my badge and said, “Evening.”
That was all it took. Those animal-alert eyes went wide and his fist swung out
in an arc and then he was gone, rabbiting towards the nearest hole.
My feet pounded the
pavement, echoing sharply in the narrow, trash-strewn space, all senses
searching for signs of the danger I was rushing headlong into. Light beckoned
from a short distance and after a moment, I burst out into the next street.
Even the soft yellow glow of sodium lamps seemed brilliant after the pitch-dark
of the alley and, as my eyes adjusted, I turned left then right, spotting a
figure disappearing around the corner. I followed, telling myself I was being
stupid, telling myself I should go back to Rosalie Stompanato’s, make sure she
was all right, call it in, ask for additional officers, all while my feet took
me closer to where I saw that retreating form.
I turned the corner, saw
a flash duck around yet another corner. At the mouth of the alley, I allowed
myself an instant’s rest before entering. Even from the street, it was clear
this was a dead-end. There was nothing but darkness down this brick corridor –
the alley was blocked up midway down.
I drew my weapon, fumbled
in my coat pocket for my penlight, flicked it on, then aimed it and the weapon
down the length of the alley, sweeping the narrow width of the space.
“C’mon out. There’s
nowhere left to go.”
My heart pounded in my
chest and there was a stitch in my side, but I felt good all the same.
Stompanato’s intimidation failed, and I caught his crony in the act. Witness
tampering charges would be a bonus year or two on Stompanato’s sentence.
There was a rustle behind
a pile of discarded cardboard boxes. “Let’s go,” I commanded. “Now.”
The figure rose like a
scarecrow in a concrete field, arms lifted in a half-hearted pose of surrender.
I flicked the flashlight’s beam upwards; he shied away, blinded by the
brilliance, his head turning and one arm flying up to protect his eyes. I
shifted the light so I could hold both it and my weapon in my right hand then
started forward, plucking a pair of handcuffs from my pocket. With my left
hand, I reached for the man’s wrist. Up close, I could see he was barely more
than a kid.
“You’re under arrest for
disobeying a lawful command, resisting an officer and—“
I never got to finish.
The fist I’d narrowly
avoided before thrust out again, catching me hard in the right shoulder, a wave
of pain and shock jolting down the length of my arm. He was a lot stronger than
his frailness suggested. He followed up with a two-handed push that sent me
spinning off to one side, banging my other shoulder off of the rough stone wall
of the alley, before rushing past, trying again to escape.
I threw out a hand,
grabbing a fistful of his sweatshirt. It stopped him, but only long enough for
him to half-turn and chop an open-handed blow down onto my elbow. Fresh pain
skittered along my nerves, but I didn’t let go, instead raising my right hand,
only to discover it was empty. Somewhere in those chaotic two or three seconds,
I dropped my gun.
I cursed and struggled
for a better grip on the kid’s clothing. He was thrashing wildly, yelling, “Let
go! Let go!” his voice shrill and his mind going into panic mode. The decision
between fight or flight was no longer his to make, but it seemed as if he was
trying to choose both options simultaneously.
“Settle down! Cut it out,
God damn it!” I snarled, freeing one hand to cuff him alongside the back of the
neck, trying to startle him into a semblance of calm. “Nobody’s going to hurt
you, but you’re digging yourself one hell of a hole!”
He ignored the words and
continued to flail around. I tried to tackle him around the waist and ended up
dragging both of us down to the filthy floor of the alley, where we rolled
around for a few seconds, trading a punch a two. We were making enough noise
that lights in the surrounding buildings came on. I hoped someone would have
the sense to call 911, but even if they did, I knew nobody would arrive soon
enough to help me get out of this. I was on my own.
Just as the thought flew
through my head, the kid stopped moving. I allowed myself to hope he was coming
to his senses at last. Then his hand shot out, straining to reach beyond my
head, and when it came back into view, his fingers were wrapped around a chunk
of brick the size of a small loaf of bread. He reared up, holding the thing
above his head, prepared to end things between us. In the scant light of the
nearly forgotten flashlight, his eyes looked huge and empty.
My own eyes flew all
around, frantic, searching for a way out. The other man was straddling my chest
and his knees kept me effectively pinned to the ground, but my arms were free
and my fingers scrabbled across the rough, cold ground, searching for
something, anything, to break this deadlock. They closed around something even
colder, something metallic and familiar.
As the brick came down,
my fist came up, and the explosion of noise and light only inches from my face
all but knocked me senseless.
Brandon Barrows is the award-nominated authors of the novels Burn Me Out and This Rough Old World as well as over fifty published stories, selected of which have been collected into the books The Altar in the Hills and The Castle-Town Tragedy.
He is also the writer of nearly one-hundred individual comic book issues.
He is an active member of both the Private Eye Writers of America and International Thriller Writers.
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This sounds like an interesting book.
ReplyDeleteI love a good mystery and this sounds like a great read!
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