The Damon Black Mysteries

by

Devon Richards

            Damon Black is a Queen St Elder Goth who fell into the profession of private investigation. Through his grim world view, we navigate a downtown Toronto clinging to its former glory and the seedy underbelly it can never shake.

* * *

NEW BLOOD

            I really wish Detective Don Davis would give me some kind of heads of up before he knocks on my door. He doesn't have to if he's conducting a check on my gun locker, of course, but for this other stuff... All he said was they had a body and they need my help.

            Didn't even have time for coffee, a sin by any stretch, so I dipped my fingers in hair wax, mussed it through my hair, donned my trench coat and boots. Not quite Robert Smith, but close enough. Enough to get some serious sidelong looks from Davis' fellow officers. Why his consultant looks like a retirement age rock star is beyond them. They're mostly small town gomer cops who came to TO to get into the action, and don't know squat about the underworld history of “Toronto, the good”. And that's why Don calls on me – I do.

            I met Detective Don through my former boss, Nick Lacey – Private Investigator. I was floundering about in the world of acting, getting nowhere at a glacial speed and responded to an ad for a photographer. Turns out PI Nick needed someone well versed in photography to take the evidenciary pics of husbands and wives fucking around on each other, his stock in trade. He knew nothing about digital photography or the computers that made it all happen, so I became his tech guy. We ended up working together for seven years. Over that time I met a lot of cops and lawyers and insurance biz honchos – the law abiding side of what we do. I went back to school to qualify for my PI license, and got a license to own a pistol. Own, not carry. That's a whole bunch more headache inducing hoops to jump through. There's a Beretta PX4 Storm sub-compact in a government approved gun locker above my fridge. Since I don't have a carrier's permit, I only take it out of my apartment when I know somebody needs to be seriousy intimidated. Rare occasions, but in my line of work they do happen.

            It's a wet spring day as we drive from my tiny Parkdale apartment up Dufferin street. Don said body, and that was all. It could be a kid, and him being a father of three, doesn't want to talk about it. 

            Pulling up I can see the scene is chaos. Police and emergency vehicles are on either side of Dufferin street, which is choking up traffic and the rubber-neckers are making it worse. We cross the street  and that's where the first of the looks happen. Uniformed cops, already unhappy being pelted by the rain despite their plastic ponchos and hat covers – all of them with raised eyebrows and distinct “Who the fuck is this weirdo?” looks on their faces. I'm used to it. Many a time over the years I thought about my age and my appearance and about “retiring the black”. It was my mentor Nick who told me not to change a thing. Someone sees a car parked across the street with some straight-laced square inside, they know they are being watched. They see a weird-looking guy, they just figure he's weird and don't give it another thought. Besides, I lurk in the bars on Queen and up in the market. The world might have changed but there are enough little pockets of dark '80's left that tell me I don't have to.

            On the porch, Don and I put on elastic booties – his over rubber-soled brogues, mine over pointed toe “James”-style Doc Martens. As we head inside he hands me a pair of blue latex gloves. Passing the door, I clock an oval, stained glass window hanger depicting a cross on cavalry with a rainbow of light radiating out of it. Owners of this rooming house are likely Catholics or some such. On the first floor, in a common room that would be the living room in a normal family home but for the chest next to the stairs covered in religious flyers, police are interviewing the visibly upset tenants – some because a death has occurred in their residence, others because their Sunday was interrupted. We head upstairs, the stairs issuing heavy wooden complaints as we go. Place must be a nightmare for night owl to live in. Even the slightest movement would set this old house groaning. I heard the sounds of the creaking floor upstairs before we even came inside. You'd have to live like a monk just to keep the other tenants from screaming at you.

            We turn left at the top of the stairs, head all the way down the hall, uniformed officers and evidence gathering techs clinging to the walls to let us pass. At the end of the hall a uniform stands vigilantly by an open door on the right. She nods to Davis and gives me the usual stink-eye. Too bad – she's cute. Turning to look inside I immediately see why Don wanted my help. The renter of this room is a Goth.

            “Take a look around. Let me know what you think” Says Don, hanging back, if you could call it that. This room is small, even by rooming house standards. There's a uniform near the closet and if he spread his arms out he might be able to touch the walls. He nods to me, seen him around on cases but I don't know his name. I cock my chin toward the closet, and he gathers my meaning and stands aside to reveal the partially opened space. Then I take a good look at the rest.

            Unlike the rest of this house, with its walls of egg shell white and floral wallpapered, this room is painted a deep purple with black trim. The closet is covered over with black velvet drapes instead of a door. Dresser has a silver candelabra on it, red wax melted all the way down, pooling on the dresser. Like inside the closet, all the clothes on the floor are black. There are CD liner foldout posters for obscure bands whose music you can only acquire online. The bookends on the shelf are shaped like gargoyles. The books fairly standard for a dark scenester – Neil Gaiman, Terry Pratchet, Poppy Z Brite, Tolkien, Warren Ellis, the early Anne Rice books. I catch all these details and then look down at the bed.

            There's a body under a sheet – male. There's a sigh of relief in the back of my mind. It's par for the course in my trade, but all the same I hate seeing dead women.  And yes, I have soft spots.

            Kneeling next to the bed, making notes on a clipboard is Bonnie Chu, a plump Asian woman presently wrapped from head to toe in a white plastic body suit. She looks up from her notes and nods to Davis and myself. This isn't the first time I've identified bodies of alternative types for them before. Hell, when the rave drugs were killing kids in swaths a while back, I'd see her in the morgue a good once a week.

            “Damon”. She says dryly, returning to her notes.

            “Bonnie” I return in a similar tone. Not quite a happy reunion.

            Don steps forward and points at the bed. “Can we get a look?” Bonnie grimaces as she stands.

            “It's not pretty.” She says eyeing me in a cautionary way.  I just shake my head, and say, “It's   not my first slaughterhouse.”

            Both Don and Bonnie cringe a this, Bonnie saying, “Don't say that.”

            “Just did. Oops.” I shrug, point at the bed. “Let's see.”

            Bonnie rolls her eyes, and carefully pulls back the plastic sheet. She's right, it's a mess.

            The guy on the bed is perhaps edging towards his mid-twenties, but no older. Black hair, no surprise, shaved to the skin all the way to the crown and giving way to metalhead length of hair in mohawk configuration. It's splayed out all over the place, but I can see from the kinks at the back he normally wore it tied up. Despite being dead I can see he would have been pale, near- hairless skin but for the bottom of his stomach. The wound in his chest is nasty. He had to have been stabbed multiple times by someone who knows the basic anatomy of where the heart is but has no training in the use of a knife as a weapon. The skin is ripped aside where the knife glanced off the ribs. There's a lot of blood, but not a wide pool of it. Likely the heart stopped pumping after the third or forth stab, leaving most of his life's blood inside him.

            I set those details aside and look at his face. Yes, he's familiar but I don't know him. I don't think this guy went to the bars to be a star on the dance floor or with the ladies. He's a lurker, like me. Cling to the wall, drink your beer, watch the girls, let the speakers shake you. Wait til next weekend, repeat.

            Don steps close, trying to be sensitive, “You know him?”

            “Yeah.”

            “I'm sorry, man”

            “I meant I know him to see him. Around the clubs. He's not a friend.” I say, then turn to Bonnie.

“Can I see his hands?”

            Bonnie pulls the plastic sheeting a little lower to reveal both of his hands. All ten fingernails are immaculately painted black. No flaking, no chips. He was planning on going out last night. There's something else – small healed cuts all over the hands, little purple burn marks.

            “Bonnie, can you turn his right hand over ?” I say in a tone that lets her know that I know she'd be disturbing the body, but that I think it's important. She grabs the right wrist gently and slowly turns the hand over. And I see what I was after.

            “He's a cook.”

            “What's that?” says Don, stepping closer to the body to examine the hand.

            “He's got cuts and burns on his hands. And under his right forefinger there's a callous. You get that from knife work in a kitchen. He cooks for a living. Also explains why I only saw him in the clubs sporadically. Cooks get stuck working weekends, a lot.” I explain to Don as he whips out his note pad and scribbles a few notes.

            “That'll help. Employers with missing employees. If the landlords don't have them on file.” He says. “Rule out co-workers.” Bonnie nods at this.

            “I'll check over the hands in case. You're likely right, but you never know.” 

            Suddenly everyone hears it. A shuffling from inside the closet. Startled, both Don and the Uniform put their hands to their guns. Don urges the uniform back towards him. As the Uniform steps, crowding all of us toward the door of the room, more shuffling is heard, something drops of the shelf. Has our killer been in there the whole time? Don pulls his weapon, keeps his line of fire clear of the Uniform in front of him. The Uni gives him some more space, and unclips the safety holster for his Gloch, readying to draw. Just as Don had reached out to Bonnie to pull her out of the room, it appeared.

            A medium-sized female tabby with green eyes and predominant black stripes emerged from the top shelf of the closet with a loud meow – a tiny tiger. I'm stunned that no one screamed, because it was the last thing anyone expected to see. The cat let out another loud meow, the kind that asked what was going on.

            Don and the Uniform snickered to themselves as Don put his gun back and the Uni reclipped his holster. The two of the them were just one micro-second decision away from being the laughing stock of the force with spiraling careers.

            I shrugged off the tension too, “I'm pretty sure she didn't do it. Need a smoke after that. Be outside.”

            Passing the front door I handed over my booties and gloves to a Uni who was collecting them from all parties leaving the house. I headed to an empty section of sidewalk, away from the milling uniforms and coroner techs to light a cigarette.

            I mulled it over. The victim was a young man, into Goth culture who was new to Toronto and cooked for a living. I figured new to the city because nobody would live in that cupboard of a room for long. Long enough to paint his room, but that's it. I don't care how shitty their former hometown life was. You don't sub one prison for another without planning for things to get better. I also figured recent arrival because young men need to fuck, and that house wasn't going to let that happen. Hell, sex in that ancient barn would sound like the lower decks of a sea-going man o' war, enough creaks and groans to keep his neighbours up all night. No, he took whatever room he could get. The cat likely hid in the closet because he trained her to. To keep her hidden from landlords who forbade pets.

            Poor thing – I often wondered about how pets could even comprehend the death of their human companions. We humans made up all kinds of magical shit to deal with it, and as far as I know making shit up isn't an animal thing.

            After a few minutes Don stepped off the porch and walked over to me. “Found some ID. Brian Froeder. Sound familiar?”

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            “Nope. But I'll ask around. Might be new to the scene, might be a lurker but he had to have one or two friends. “

            “Good. Keep me posted. I'll have a uniform drive you home.”

            Just then the Female Uniform from the hallway came out to the porch, called over to Don. “Detective? What should we do about the cat? Landlord says it can't stay. Should I call the Humane Society?”

            As Don was thinking it over, I came to a decision.

            “I'll take her.”

* * *

            I spent the next couple of weeks working my end of the case, trading notes with Detective Don and getting ready to be a cat dad. I called her Thrall. It was that or Lackey. Either would have been funny, but she perked up and came to me when I called her Thrall, so it stuck. The vets at Queen west animal hospital didn't think it was funny at all. Her entire check-up they gave me sidelong glances, like I was making sure this cat had a clean bill of health so my coven could sacrifice her or something. Same with the Pet Valu staff. “What's your kitty's name?” “Thrall”. Blank stare.

            Norms – No sense of humor.

            All that time zipping back and forth to do the check-ups, buy supplies – litter box, cat food etc, gave me plenty of time to think about the dead kid in the Dufferin St rooming house. Killed at home before going out on the town in a house so creaky nobody was ever sneaking in or out. A few neighbours downstairs, non-threatening lost soul types – wasn't betting on any of them to have wielded the knife. No... something else. Had to be.

            Over a cross section of nights on the town I traveled to different places that had regular Goth nights – Nocturne, Coalition, Stop Drop and Roll, the monthly “Dracula's Daughter” night – and quietly asked around if anyone knew Brian Froeder. Don agreed it had better be me that asked these initial questions. Most peeps in the Goth community have careers, kids etc, but they still clam up when Johnny-fuckin-Law comes around. Hangover from our teen years. I posed the questions like, “Have you seen him around? We were supposed to hang.” and wasn't surprised to find most people didn't know him. He was a lurker, like me. Cling to the dark spot on the wall, soak it in, don't commit.

            One guy, an older Graver named Drizzit – lame – was stoked to know someone else knew “Frodo”. Froeder – Frodo. Cute. He said he hadn't seen him in a couple of weeks. Then he started talking about a new World of Warcraft patch and I walked away. Got what I needed. Brian had very few friends, some bar acquaintances and no one he knew well enough on the scene to want to kill him.

            I got a call from Don. Forensics was done with the kid's clothes and such and we could take a look at them. By now his body had been sent back to Meaford for his family to bury. Irony of him escaping his hometown nightmare just to be returned there for burial didn't go over my head. Actually it struck right the fuck home. As a kid in my early twenties that would have been the worst afterlife slap in the face. Now older, my opinion of my hometown has has now softened. No idea where I'd want to be buried though. Something to ponder in my dangerous profession.

            I met with Don outside the morgue. I make it a point to get to these meetings early so I can have cigarette. No point in making people wait and watch me smoke. Inside, we met up with Bonnie Chu, who was doing chain of custody work on the wide table of bagged evidence.

            Spread out across a 20 feet wide stainless steel table was the kid's whole life, rows of marker labeled sealed evidence bags and cover boxes. Don and I looked at each other and shrugged, then moved to opposite ends of the table. Bonnie filled out the log papers and waited to see if we needed any of the bags or envelopes in the boxes opened. Starting on my end I eyeballed the contents of the bags, keeping my hands to myself. This kid deserved more than to have his killer go free because of an evidence snafu.

            I didn't notice anything unusual. I guess the bloody clothes and bedding was on the other end because all I got were Brian's regular clothes. Sure, a lot of spikes and rivets, dangly suspenders, what have you. But no blood and nothing to indicate who came into his boarding house room that night. Then some papers and things from his dresser top – mostly club fliers, a rent receipt, leather bracelets, a few rings.

            Don stopped and had pulled out his pen light out to examine one bag more closely. “Damon, what's this? That a band or something?”

            I stepped over to the bag he was scrutinizing and immediately froze. Instantly I thought of something my mentor, Nick Lacey PI, had said, “ It might look like the light at the end of the tunnel,  or you could actually be looking up from the bottom of a very deep rabbit hole.”

            Don's light was shining onto a black, circular pin inside the evidence bag. In white on the black surface was the spider web-like multi-gram symbol of the Order of the Nine Angles. The O9A is a luciferean sect that has been associated with sacrifice, child abuse, murder and, according to some, the modern resurgence of Nazism.  I looked at the pin with furrowed brow, knowing my life had just gotten a thousand times more difficult, and said,“Fuck.”

* * *

            I'd never met many satanists in the Queen street scene. Truthfully there were more of them back home, in the non-bustling burg of K-W. In the 80's of my teens, a lot of youths responded to the “satantic panic” of the adult world by throwing fuel on the fire. By becoming Satanists and carrying out rituals. This perplexed the police because the only difference between a bush party and an outdoor Satanic rite was the robes.

            I did have a girlfriend who was an actual card carrying member of Ordo Templar Orientis back in the day. She wouldn't tell me shit about it. When I did my own research, I found that it was a continuing offshoot of Crowley's brand of occultism. Great – more rock and roll bullshit.

            Ever since the days of Robert Johnson and the first bar chord riffs there has been an attempt to connect the new blues to the devil, long before anyone had coined the term rock and roll. For me that rates an eye roll. You first learn about Satan the same way you learn about Jesus – Sitting next to your mommy in church. Satanism has more to do with wanting to piss your parents off than any religious aspirations. Worshiping Satan is kind of like being a Toronto Maple Leafs fan – seems pretty cool in the beginning, but by the time you reach the end, he always loses. You are literally throwing away any chances of having a normalized familial relationship, uprightly mobile employment, social connections that lead to positive credit etc, solely for the sake of sticking it to your mom. Lame.

            Most of the Goth community agrees on this. Despite all the dark trappings, most Goths are nature worshipers, practitioners of modern paganism. That has more to do with knowing you need to swallow oil of oregano when you feel a cold coming on instead buying pills from the pharmacy than anything else. And those who don't have any religious feelings in the Goth world usually worship at the alter of geekdom. I'd be more likely to start a conversation about Rick and Morty that lasted for hours in one of the goth clubs, rather than Mr Pitchfork.

            Which is the reason why I got so many funny looks as I asked over the next couple of weeks. People knew I was a shamus who worked for various insurance companies, and occasionally consulted with the police. Their assumption that I was recruiting for the O9A left folks a little stunned. The situation was sort of tough to explain, especially with a few beers under your belt.

            It did lead to a breakthrough though. I was at Nocturne when I saw a younger guy wearing an O9A pin like Bryan's. I bellied up to the bar next to him, pretended to notice his pin as I waited to be served, and said “Order of the Nine angles. Cool!”

            The kid literally scrunched up his whole face in that way that says you're pathetic, then said, “That's Sons of Arius, grandpa.” He walked away with his beer, casting a disapproving glare my way. I immediately Googled it on my phone – Sons of Arius had no religious significance. It was a band.

            The Norwegian band that skated between synth and metal used the angular symbol of the O9A on the cover of their first EP without knowing what it was. This drew hard criticism from people far removed from the band's desired audience, Christian types. Over time, as the band's sound softened, fans began wearing the symbol to show they were into the original sound and message of the group. They also liked the fact that it pissed religious people off from both extremes – Christian and Satanist.

            Kid was right, I am a total grandpa. I knew none of this. Bound to happen to the best of us, losing touch with the underground music world in favor of things that actually have something to do with the lives we are leading. Doesn't feel good to realize it, but there it is.

            It also meant something else – The best clue we had in the case, however ominous the implications, was a dead end. It was a red herring that had cost us weeks.

            And whoever had brutally stabbed Bryan Froeder to death on his own bed was still out there.

* * *

            I can't help but feel that we'd screwed up. As I wait for Detective Don to arrive at Cardinal Rule, Kate is keeping my coffee full and leaving me alone to stew over the details of the case. Finding the pin among the late Bryan Froeder's belongings dragged us in the wrong direction for weeks. I thought it was for the Order of the Nine Angles – a Luciferian cult – when it was just an adopted symbol of a band who thought it looked cool. Now, we got nothing.

            Still, something didn't add up.

            That thought set off an alarm in my head. What was it about numbers that was demanding my attention? I started to internally tick off all the pieces we had so far...

            Don came in just then and ordered a coffee from Kate. He could see I was mulling things over. “What is it?”

            “Something. Clearly we got sidetracked, but I think our minds were in the right place.”

            Taking a sip of his coffee, Don said, “What do you mean?”

            “I'm kinda stuck on Bryan's things. Did he have any money or a datebook or something?”

            “No. What does a kid from your crowd need with a datebook? It's 2017, not 1965.”

            And then it struck me – The date. “The rent receipt. The one with his belongings.”

            Intrigued, Don leaned forward and asked, “What about it? We actually found three more in his sock drawer.”

            “We only need the date of the lone one, the one from the top of his dresser.”

            “Why?”

            “Because I think it was dated the day he was killed.”

            At this, Don sat back stunned. I'd blithely passed over the receipt when we examined his possessions and we both got fixated on that damned Sons of Arius pin. Tackling any investigation is all about the details and missing this one was a straight-up kick in the nuts.

            Much later that day, in an examination room just off of the main Police evidence holding of 51 division downtown, we saw it. All four rent receipts were there in separate bags, mixed in amongst all of Bryan's other possessions. Once you laid the four on the stainless steel table together, it was painfully obvious .

            The last receipt, the one I remembered too late was filled out the day of Bryan's murder, was written in a completely different hand than that of the others.  Bryan's murder had nothing to do with his Goth nightlife, his job as a cook or even the strange religious underpinnings of his favorite band.

            Whoever killed Bryan was somehow in charge of the rooming house he was murdered in.

* * *

            As we pulled up to the house, the sun was setting darkly red on the horizon. Don and I approached the door. I let him stand in front of me to knock. Better a police official with a badge making the initial queries than a guy who looks like a member of Echo and the Bunnymen. People like their officials official-looking.

            The man who answered was a couple of make-up touches away from being set ready for a Walking Dead zombie crowd scene. Greasy strands of thinning hair, sagging jowls, liver spots like the stars. A skin care routine had never been a part of his lengthy life. Topping it off was the fact that he was shirtless and in pajama bottoms. And drunk. Don identified himself and asked if we could come in and ask a couple of questions. His response was something about how he “ didn't give a fuck”, and turned a saggy, mole-covered back on us.

            We walked into the smell of booze and weed. It suddenly dawned on me – it had been five weeks since the murder. The beginning of a new month meant it was welfare week. As a Parkdale resident, I could attest to the fact that my hood got distinctly noisy for the days that followed social services deposits. Rent in my building is cheap for a reason. Don and I stepped into the foyer to find the residents of the house – including a new one to replace Bryan – draped around the living room in various states of dress and inebriation.

            As Don began to pry for info about the house, and who was responsible for collecting their rents, I stood by the side-table in the foyer and looked at the various Christian pamphlets neatly organized atop it. Typical street corner fare – The kind of thing the screamers at Yonge and Dundas square would hand out. There were also some flyers regarding addiction treatment centers, all church affiliated. And a couple of others that caught my eye... Ones for re-programming retreats. Places you send your kid if they are showing less than hetero-normative tendencies. Because they don't call it brain-washing if Jesus is involved, right? Parents treating their kids like toys, action figures for their manipulation instead of human beings, really raises my hackles. When I discovered punk as a newly minted teenager in the '80's, my folks gave me no end of grief about it, as though this new style had something to do with them. During these arguments, I always brought up the fact that their teen pictures looked like a couple of scruffy vagabonds hitchhiking to Woodstock.

            The tenants told Don that there was actually one more person in the house, in a basement apartment out back. Don turned to me and I gave him a nod, moving toward the front door.  We would find out later that the basement tenant was the son of the rooming house owners, a kind of defacto superintendent. And, it was he who collected the rents on the day Bryan was killed.

            Still completely unaware of what I was getting into, I stepped down to the semi-subterranean entrance to the basement apartment and knocked on the door.

***            

            The thing to remember about being in a knife fight is not to lose your head. Clenching up and brain-freezing into “Jesus save me!” mode will do just the opposite – it will get you killed.

            Moments earlier, when the door opened, I knew this guy was trouble. The alternative, letting him get away, however was completely unacceptable. The young man in front of me was tall, slim, pale and dirty blond. His expression was unreadably blank and I gathered he looked that way all the time. His eyes telegraphed “ No one at home”.

            I told him who I was, a detective assisting in the murder that took place up stairs and could I come in and talk to him. After a protracted, expressionless pause, he opened the door. He said he was Terry, Terry Malvern, son of the owners of the rooming house. He mentioned the police had questioned him already.

            I looked around his one room basement apartment. Spartan to the point that it looked un-lived in. Neat, and lacking in personal items. The walls had some posters – Sports guys doing sports guy stuff. A lifetime of Goth gallows humor made me want to make a cross with my forefingers and hiss at the images, but I held back. The posters, and their Adonis figures gave me momentary pause.

            “Did you know Bryan well?”

            “Nope. Just to see him.”

            “Didn't exchange pleasantries, say when you collected his rent?”

Terry froze – His blank facade resetting, as though something misfired in his head. I smiled and shrugged, signaling to him I didn't think it was important. I thumbed towards the posters –

            “You a big sports guy?

            “You better believe it.”

            “Outdoors type?”

            “Sure, maybe. What does this have to do with Bryan?”

            “You ever go camping? Like to that place in the flyers upstairs?”

            Terry started to redden, “I been there.”  I nodded – that was the whole case in a nutshell. The flyers upstairs were for Christian sexual re-orientation programming camps. Likely Bryan's effeminate side, what little of it there was as a Metal-styled Goth guy, had set off something in Terry that existed in him long before he went away to be brainwashed. Terry came around to collect rents just as a half-stripped Bryan was getting ready for a club night. It fried something in Terry's brain and he grabbed the ceremonial knife on Bryan's dresser.

            In the time I processed that, Terry had quickly grabbed his own knife from a hidey spot in his room and was lunging towards me. Four belts in Shinshin Toitsu Aikido and the fact he held the knife wrong for a fight saved my life.  As the tip of the blade roared towards my gut  I spun on heal, grabbing Terry's knife-holding wrist, locking his arm against my gut. As the spin continued, Terry was pulled off-balance, his feet taking to the air, smashing noisily through the contents atop his dresser. Both of us now facing the opposite direction we'd started, I dropped to one knee, heaving his body hard to the ground and driving my closest knee into his armpit. Face down, he struggled what little he could with me controlling his arm. I bent his wrist inwards and the knife feel away. He began to wriggle and let out a kind of growl.

            “Stop!” I said, turning his arm further from his body, his pain receptors telling him to maybe he should listen. With a crack of wood, Don burst in the door, hand on his holstered gun. Seeing I had Terry pinned, Detective Davis took his hand off his gun and reached for his handcuffs.

            Later that night, after helping Don fill in the blanks, then home for a shower and to feed Thrall, I sat in my lurking spot at Nocturne. I listened to Osaze spin and contemplated the fucked up ways people interfere with how they love each other as I drank. Drank lots. Terry's parents sent him to that camp hoping to “fix” him, only to create a monster. Would anyone have died if they'd just let him be himself? Not fucking likely.

            Taking a pull on my beer, I noticed a girl stepping out of the crowd – pretty, doing the casual dolly thing from a while back. As she approached my table, she held out a fresh beer in my direction.

            “I hear you help people.” She said over the music, familiar desperation in her eyes.

            I took the offered beer and gestured for her to sit.

THE END … But Damon Black will return.   

© Devon Richards 2018