Oliver Stark: 88 Killer

She turned around again, trying to see into the darkness, opening her eyes wide as though that might help. She felt as if someone was watching her. Maybe it was the two guys from the truck? The thought made her panic. Maybe they had turned and parked up, tracked her and now were waiting ahead of her. She was so far from help. If she screamed, no one would hear. She edged towards a tree. Her hand reached into her canvas bag. She pulled out her pepper spray and flipped back the lid. With the other hand, she held her rape alarm.

She couldn’t hear much outside the beating of her pulse loud in her ear. A sound again, somewhere behind her now. Circling? Was it a man, two men, more?

A high wind brushed through the leaves and Abby thought she heard a voice. It seemed to say her name. Was it just the wind? She stood again, pepper spray ready.

She was finding it hard to concentrate properly. Then a voice cried out, ‘Abby!’ high in the trees. Was she losing her mind? Was it her father? Had he started to look for her for some unknown reason? It was possible, wasn’t it?

‘Daddy!’ she shouted. ‘Daddy!’

She heard bushes move to her left, then to her right came another sound. No one replied. Please. Please let it be Daddy.

She remained still for what seemed like several minutes, but nothing happened and she started to think she had made the whole thing up. The voices had stopped. She tried to pull herself together. Reasoned it out. ‘Nothing’s happened, Abby. Nothing. You’ve just frightened yourself half to death.’ She smiled as best she could. ‘Come on. It’s animals and the wind, nothing more.’

She stepped out on to the path, telling herself, ‘Just keep walking.’ Shadows from the canopy above flickered dark under the moon, making the path ahead appear to shift. ‘It’s just the wind and the moon. Guilt — that’s what it is. This is your punishment for deceiving Daddy.’

She walked a little faster, and then up ahead saw the street lights of Myrtle Avenue appear through the trees.

‘Thank you!’ she said, lifting her head to the heavens. ‘Thank you.’

She almost ran towards the gate ahead, pushing the cap closed on her pepper spray and ramming her rape alarm back into her bag. As she approached the last row of trees, beyond them she could see the wooden posts that marked the exit. She’d never been so delighted to hear the rumble of traffic.

Two trees ahead, a flashlight appeared from nowhere and danced in her eyes. She froze and called out, ‘Who’s there?’

Suddenly, the world seemed to tighten around her. A large shadow loomed behind the beam of the flashlight. The light darted across her face then down over her body and on to her legs. ‘Daddy.’ It was a prayer, not a question.

‘Abby,’ said a low, deep voice, closer now. A hand reached out and unfamiliar skin touched her shoulder.

She screamed and turned, and in a moment, she was running back into the woods, twisting through thick undergrowth. She ran until she fell and lay, cut, bruised and sobbing on the wet earth. Beside her was a thicket. She crawled into the center of it, her arms and face scratched and bleeding. She picked out her cell with shaking hands. It fumbled out of her fingers into the dirt. She felt around in the dark and found it. She was panting and sniffing and shaking. The phone lit up. It was so bright in the darkness. She looked up, afraid, and tried to hide her phone while attempting to make a call. But she couldn’t find the right keys. She tried again.

A beam from a flashlight swept across the bushes and crossed her legs. She shrank away as if from physical pain. The light came back across and hit her again, right through the thicket and into her eyes. It remained trained on her face.

She couldn’t see what it was, but she could hear something pushing through the bushes. She retreated further into the thicket.

She felt a hand on her leg. It grabbed and tightened around her ankle. She screamed, held on to a branch as her body was dragged out. She kicked at his hand, but he jerked hard and her hands slipped off the branch, her body sliding over wet leaves and sharp twigs. She was crying out but her voice no longer made any noise.

He dragged her to her feet. She felt his palms circle her neck, his two thumbs hard on her throat. He was strong and not even breathing heavily. Her eyes remained open. She didn’t fight him; instead she was fumbling in her canvas bag. Her hand found the pepper spray and flipped back the lip. She tried to see his face. She wanted to have something to tell the cops.

Her right hand rose out of the darkness and she sprayed the pepper directly at his face. The hiss of the spray was followed by an angry cry of pain. He yelled and let her go momentarily, but he lashed out hard with his arm, catching her full on the cheek. She crumpled to the ground and the pepper spray flew from her hand. She tried to get to her feet to run, but he grabbed her and held her. He coughed and spluttered to his knees, but he didn’t let go of her. He let himself recover with her body beneath his.

He finally stopped coughing and his hands returned to her neck and tightened. The blood beat hard in her temples. The pressure just kept building. Then her mind went white, her eyes misted over and she faded out of consciousness. The last thing she remembered was his cologne. There was something about it. It smelled familiar.

Jules Gym, Lower Manhattan

March 6, 8.12 p.m.

A tattooed arm swung in fast from the right and connected with a thud of leather. The guy in the red shorts took the full force of the blow on the point of his chin; his head jerked up and he staggered three steps backwards on to the ropes, then tucked his head between his gloves. The attacker strode across and started to pummel his body repeatedly.

In the faded ring, the boxers had been going two rounds, fighting toe-to-toe, trading uppercuts, right and left hooks, and body blows. Under their head guards, each guy’s face was bubbling up with bright red bruises.

The audience whooped at every big punch that landed. It was not difficult to imagine that the head guards didn’t so much protect as prolong the time in which each man was getting his brain pounded. But it was a precinct grudge match, honor was at stake and neither boxer was going to stand down. The big crowd roared their approval, jumping, shouting, spitting and drinking like a bunch of out-of-control rioters.

The NYPD’s fight night was in full swing and it was brutal.

Through the double doors into the locker rooms, the narrow, airless corridor was tiled in blue and black. Inside the third locker room the next fighter prepared, listening to the excited bloodlust of the crowd. The air was coarse with the smell of sweat, and the striplight above, twenty years’ deep with dead insects and dust, shed a clouded yellowing light on the fighter below.

Detective Tom Harper of the NYPD’s Homicide Division tried to focus. He caught the image of the majestic peregrine falcon in his mind’s eye. He’d spotted the raptor earlier in the day, perched imperiously on one of the pylons of the Brooklyn Bridge. The peregrine was a skilled hunter. It flew way up high and watched the world below, unnoticed and unseen until it sighted its prey.

The fight was ten minutes away. On the white clock-face ahead, the seconds ticked past, but Harper could only see the raptor.

There was a great roar from the gym; it rattled the doors, which hung loose on their hinges. Someone had gone down. The crowd loved a knockout — they loved to see someone hit so hard that the brain would momentarily lose motor control and the body twist and sink like a bag of cement.