Read Children of Paranoia Online
Authors: Trevor Shane
Children of Paranoia (2 page)
There we were then, face to face. For one brief moment she would get a clear look at my face in the light. This would confirm only one thing in her mind. She did not know me. I pushed her back into the shadows next to the stairs. As we moved, I slipped the keys from her hand and dropped them into the soft soil next to the entrance to the garden apartment. Her place was a typical Brooklyn brownstone, where the garden apartment door was slightly inset below the stairs to the main entrance. I continued to push her backward until her back was pressed hard against the door. We were quickly swallowed by shadows. No one could see us. No one would see her die. Each step of my plan had gone off without a hitch.
In one quick, coordinated motion, I took both my hands holding her wrist and my hand covering her mouth and wrapped them around her neck. Wasting no time I squeezed. I worked quickly enough that, even if she developed the courage to scream, no sound would come. I watched her face as I cut the air off between her lungs and her brain. She stared into my eyes as I clenched my gloved hands around her throat. Her face began to slowly turn color as her mouth opened and closed, trying in vain to capture one last breath of air. She didn't fight much. No kicking, no punching, just gasping. A few tears began to roll down her cheeks as her face turned from a reddish color to the initial shades of blue. Even through my gloves, I could now feel her pulse in my hands, as her heart began its furious work to try to get oxygen to her brain. I could feel her pulse in my thumbs and my pinkies. I felt no pulse beyond that. My index fingers could only feel the tightening muscles in her neck. Now her thoughts, if she could still piece together a coherent thought, were surely of her sons, wondering if they were okay, wondering if she could hear them one last time, hear their little voices, hear their laughter. No luck. The only sound from the apartment was the television.
A small stream of blood began to flow from her left nostril as her eyes began to glaze over. First, the blood balled up inside her nose, and then, when the force of gravity became too much, it trickled quickly down to her lips. The last thing she would taste would be her own blood. Not once did she take her eyes off mine. Her eyes were not questioning. She didn't know me, but she knew why I had to kill her. Seconds later, she was gone.
I eased her body down to the ground and stood back up. She was slumped against the door in the shadows, her knees bent under her, the blood already beginning to dry on her face. Her eyes were open but were lifeless. I felt almost nothing. I was numb. I felt no pleasure in doing what I'd done. I had gone through stages in the past. We all go through stagesâdifferent feelings. Power. Pride. Guilt. But I didn't feel any of that. All I felt was satisfaction in a job well done. This one was supposed to be easy. I guess it was.
I backed away from the body, stepped back into the light, turned, and began walking casually away. They would find the body in a few hours. The babysitter would soon wonder why the kids' mother was so late coming home from work. She would call her parents, who would call the wine shop. Eventually the parents would come over and call the police, who would find the body. As I walked away my pulse returned to normal. I took my gloves off and placed them back in my bag. I would leave town tomorrow and this crime would remain unsolved. The neighborhood would go into a minor panic for a few weeks. Then things would settle down again. To all but her family, the events of this night would merely become a tale children tell to each other, like a ghost story around a campfire, real death coopted into urban legend. Her family, like her, wouldn't question why she was killed. The same way I didn't question why I killed her. It's simple, really. I killed her because I am good and she was evil. At least that's what they told me, Maria.
I'd be lying if I didn't admit that sometimes I still believe it.
Two
I woke up the next morning and went through my normal routine. Exercise. Two hundred push-ups, four hundred sit-ups. Breakfast and then an eight-mile run. I was up early enough that the streets were barren. I had gotten back to my host's apartment in Jersey City at about one-thirty in the morning. I got four hours of sleep, woke up, and started my day. It was a travel day. I wanted to get started as early as my body could handle. I had a flight to catch out of Philadelphia in the early afternoon and was anxious to leave. I was always anxious to leave after a job. Maybe there was something in me that regretted doing what I did. I don't know. The plan was for me to take a bus from Jersey City to the parking lot of a shopping mall in the New Jersey suburbs. Once there, my friends would pick me up and drive me to the airport.
The early morning air was crisp. I found myself running through a light fog that had settled in around the four-story brownstones that lined the Jersey City streets. I ran hard, trying to drive all thoughts from my mind. As I ran, I kept an eye out for anything suspicious, gazing to my left and my right as I took each step, looking for anything odd or out of place, trying to make eye contact with the vendors opening up their stores to see if there was even the slightest hint of recognition. It wouldn't be long before they realized what had happened. “They” could be anywhere. The night before had been a concerted effort. Three hits in the same night all around the same city. All told, we were leaving five corpses in our wake. I had the easy kill. At this point, I could only assume that my friends had been able to complete their jobs too. If not, I could be waiting for my ride for a long time.
I turned a corner and began running up a steep hill. Ahead of me was a man in front of a dry cleaner unloading a truckful of cleanly pressed shirts and suits. Our eyes met and his face turned sour. I quickly turned down another side street and kept running. I doubted that he recognized me but you can never be too safe. After another block, I turned and looked back, but there was nothing. Paranoia. It was a helpful tool in my profession. I was taught early on that only the paranoid survive. Let your guard down for even a moment and that moment could be your last.
If Jared and Michael's marks went down without much fanfare, they might not realize what had happened until later today. Knowing Jared and Michael, however, their marks probably didn't go down quietly. If their jobs weren't clean, then there was likely already a team of people out looking for us. Three jobs and five bodies in one night was sure to stir up trouble. I guess stirring up trouble was the point.
The police didn't worry me. Sure, the cops were going to be investigating, and New York cops were some of the best, but the cops had a protocol to follow. They had a system. Seemingly mindless, senseless killings by perpetrators who come into town for a night or two and leave without a trace were not their forte. Motive? What motive? Anyone who could piece the motive together for these killings already knew why each person was killed. Those people were already on a side. Did we have any guys on the inside in New York? I don't know. Probably. Did they? It's just as likely. We are everywhereâso are they.
I turned another corner and started to run back to my host's apartment. I pumped my arms and lifted my knees, kicking it into a higher gear and pushing the last two miles hard.
My host was a nice guy. Roughly thirty years old, he was single and lived in a two-bedroom apartment in Jersey City. He was a computer programmer at some insurance company in downtown Manhattan. He took me out for drinks my first night in town and peppered me with questions. I answered a few and left a lot more unanswered. He knew the drill. He also knew that the more information he could pry from me, the more dangerous it became for him.
I finished my run at a slower pace than normal. I blamed the lack of sleep.
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It was nearly noon by the time Jared and Michael pulled up in their rental car. We would have to move pretty quickly for me to make my flight. Jared was driving, so speed wasn't going to be a problem. Jared swung the car around as Michael hung himself out of the passenger-side window. “Joe,” he called out to me as the car slowed to a stop, “your chariot has arrived.” He spread his arms out wide, welcoming me. “Come here and give me a hug, you ugly bastard.”
I picked up my bag and headed toward the car. I had spent the last hour or so people-watching on the sidewalk in front of Macy's. I watched the people as they strolled into the mall, destined to spend their day trying to decide which pair of jeans made their ass look smallest or which television set would best fit in their living rooms. There were moments when I was jealous, but my life, our life, is never going to be normal like that. “You guys are late,” I said as I stepped toward Michael's outstretched arms.
“Better late than never,” Michael whispered to me as he grabbed me into a big bear hug. “Get in the car. We've got to get moving.”
I threw my bag across the backseat and climbed in.
“Jared,” I acknowledged my old friend with a quick nod, making eye contact with him in the rearview mirror.
“How're things, Joey? I assume everything went well.” He showed me a wide grin.
“Easiest job yet. No hitches. How about you guys?”
“You don't have to assume,” Michael said. He threw an edition of the
New York Post
in my lap. “Your lazy ass didn't even make the paper.” I looked down at the front page. There, in bold print over a picture of two bloody bodies covered by formerly white blankets, was the headline “Bloodbath in the Bronx.” Beneath the picture, in smaller print, were the words “Mets Take Two from the Phillies to Pull within One.”
New York Post
in my lap. “Your lazy ass didn't even make the paper.” I looked down at the front page. There, in bold print over a picture of two bloody bodies covered by formerly white blankets, was the headline “Bloodbath in the Bronx.” Beneath the picture, in smaller print, were the words “Mets Take Two from the Phillies to Pull within One.”
“Holy shit,” I said as I flipped to page three to read the story. “You guys are going to get yourselves killed.” I looked at the picture and the headline again. “And you're going to get me killed with you.”
“They told me and Michael that they wanted us to stir things up. Well, Michael might have gone a little overboard.” Jared eyed me in the rearview mirror again. His smile didn't fade. He was proud, proud of Michael, proud of the job we'd just done, proud of all of us. I began to read.
Last night at 12:35, two men were stabbed to death in front of Yankee Tavern, a crowded bar near Yankee Stadium. Joseph Delenato and Andrew Braxton were walking out of the bar where they had stopped for drinks after attending the Yankee game when they were assaulted. The assailant approached Joseph first, stabbing him twice in the chest, before turning to Andrew and stabbing him in the throat. Both men died within minutes of the attack. Witnesses say that the assailant, a white male about twenty-five years old, moved quickly. He did not stop to rob the victims, nor does there seem to be any other motive for the incident. “I was with Joe and Andy all night,” said their friend Steven Marcomi. “We just stopped in for a drink or two. I'd never seen the [assailant] in my life. I've never seen anything like that in my life. It's not like we got into any fights or anything. I can't imagine why this happened.” While motive remains unclear, police say that this was likely the work of an experienced killer. “Whoever did this,” Lt. John Gallow said to reporters early this morning, “knew exactly what he was doing. He was efficient and precise.” Andrew bled to death on the scene. Joseph's lungs were punctured when he was stabbed. “Technically, Joseph drowned in his own blood,” said the coroner's office. “Each stab wound punctured a separate lung. They quickly filled with blood. The poor kid eventually drowned.” Joseph's mother told this reporter, “I don't know who could have done such a thing. My boy was such a sweet boy. He didn't deserve this.” Andrew's family was not available for comment.
Next to a picture of the bar was an artist's sketch of the perpetrator. “Nice picture, Michael. I'm sure your mother's going to be real proud.”
“That shit doesn't even look anything like me.” Michael grabbed the paper away from me to look at his sketch again. It really didn't look anything like him. It was typical. All artists' sketches did was build up general suspicion. No matter what the sketch looked like, everyone knew someone who looked a little bit like it.
“And the quote from his mother. Real fucking precious. Like she doesn't know why her son was killed.” Michael paused for a second, going over the story in his head again. “But did you see the quote from the cop? Precise and efficient. I'd like to get that quote on my business cards.”
“Did you really have to make things this messy?” I looked again at the bloody picture on the front page and then up at Michael.
“Maybe not, but it was my best move. I had to take both of them out and I had to do it before one A.M. or else I risked them finding out about your guys' jobs and getting all defensive. When I saw them go into the bar, I knew that my best chance was to hit them right when they came out. I figured they'd be buzzed and their reflexes would be numbed.”
“That's how you were able to stab the first guy twice before even turning on the second?” Michael was good at what he did. I had to give him that.
“Yeah. That and the fact that the second guy half knew what was going on. An innocent would have run. Instead, this guy stands there frozen. He knows what's happening but can't remember how he's supposed to respond. He's got this dumb look on his face, like âAm I supposed to run? To fight? To take a shit?' Pffft.” Michael made the sound of a deflating balloon. “Too late.”
“And then what'd you do?” I asked Michael.
“Slipped away into the cool Bronx night. That's one scary borough, man. I'm telling you, I was the least dangerous looking guy on the street.”
I began flipping further through the paper. “Jared's is on page fourteen,” Michael said. I turned to the page. There, tucked onto the far right-hand side of the page, was a story about an affluent Westchester couple that left their car running in their garage and died of carbon monoxide poisoning. He was a litigation partner at some big law firm in Manhattan. She had been an advertising executive who gave up her career to take care of the children. The strange part of the story was how both children were found sleeping on the porch in the morning, wrapped in blankets, safe from the fumes. Officials surmised that the parents put their children outside before taking their own lives. No one could fathom why such a seemingly happy couple would want to kill themselves.
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