Oliver Stark: 88 Killer

The roar faded and Harper was left with the silence, the bare red brick of the locker room and the ingrained smell of male sweat. He shifted on the bench. He needed to feel ready for the fight, was waiting for the trigger — anger or a sense of injustice — but all he felt was the cold air, the hard bench and the fear trickling slowly through his veins.

He tried to imagine his glove landing on his opponent’s jaw, tried to imagine hitting someone into submission, but the image faded as fast as it appeared. If you couldn’t imagine beating someone, then how the hell could you go out and do it?

There was a loud smacking sound as Dylan, the all-in-one corner man, manager and trainer, chewed his gum. Harper looked down at the man taping up his fists. ‘Can’t you cut that out?’ he said.

Dylan looked up, his unshaven face pockmarked. ‘The champ feeling a little tetchy tonight?’

‘Just trying to focus here,’ said Harper. He exhaled slowly. Ahead of him, a boxer in red satins stared out from a torn poster, his shining gloves held high, his body tense and ready. Harper tapped his booted feet on the floor. ‘Let’s just get this done.’

Three years ago, Harper had made NYPD Cruiserweight Champion. He’d beaten an opponent who was bigger and heavier. Harper had had reserves that night, and he’d wanted it bad. Now he didn’t know what he was doing here. Rusty and tired even before he stepped into the ring. Maybe that was the problem — three years of rust was making his muscles feel dull and heavy.

From somewhere beyond the small room, both men heard another roar echoing down the corridor. Harper’s muscles twitched. He imagined the referee lifting the winner’s arm, the loser standing beaten. Avoiding failure used to be Harper’s main motivation. It’d been three months since the end of his last big case. A tough case. And three months since he’d seen Denise Levene. And that hurt too.

Guilt still kept him from sleeping. He’d brought Levene on to the case — she’d impressed him, she was smart and eager. She knew things about criminal behavior that no one else seemed to understand. They’d worked well together. Then it all went wrong. The killer targeted Denise Levene and kept her for two terrible days. For three months since, Harper had been unable to put the monster to rest inside his own head and Denise Levene wouldn’t speak to him or see him. And without forgiveness you can’t go forward, you can only keep punishing yourself.

Out at ringside, the first bout was cleared. The ring was mopped of sweat and blood as more cops poured in from the street for the main event. They were there to see the ex-champ Harper take on the new boy Castiglione. Harper had retired as champ, had never been beaten and word was, he wanted his title back. People of all ages, from the old vets to the fresh-faced rookies, began opening beers and jostling for space on the battered wooden benches.

In the locker room, Harper thought about the weeks of preparation and training. He’d pushed himself hard, working long shifts at North Manhattan Homicide and then carrying on with lengthy sessions at the gym.

Cops weren’t supposed to be affected by what happened to them, they were supposed to move on to the next case, the next body. The reality was different. The cops Harper knew hid their weaknesses. The hardening of the heart was the price you paid for being in the game, but every cop knew that underneath, every damn thing stuck in deep and clawed away at you. Awake, you could control your fears, but asleep, there was nothing at all between you and the abyss.

Harper stood up, his gloves on and laced. He was in good physical shape — six two with broad shoulders and toned muscles. His age showed only in the gray flecks in his hair.

Pushing his mouth guard in, he gritted his teeth and let himself be led out of the room into the darkness beyond. They walked slowly up the narrow corridor as the noise of the crowd grew louder and louder, the heavy beat of stamping feet rising to meet them.

The door to the gym opened up, the noise doubled in a moment and hit them like a wave. There was no fancy music, no fancy name. Just Tom Harper who had demons to face and had decided he’d try to face them in the place he knew he could fight best. The ring.

He looked across at Marco Castiglione pacing his territory. He was a short, bullish patrol cop with a mean and hungry look in his eye, who was out to prove himself. Once upon a time, Harper had been that guy.

As Harper walked towards the ring, the cops started shouting his name, rising from their seats and patting his back as he passed. He pushed the top rope high and stepped through on to the canvas, standing opposite the young Italian, who was shadow boxing in his corner.

The referee walked up and stood between the two men. The fighters came together. Harper held up his gloves, but stared right through Marco Castiglione’s direct gaze. Denise Levene was still in his head, back in the dungeon, the face of the killer behind her. Fragments of his nightmares kept breaking in.

From ringside, Harper’s partner Eddie Kasper slurped on a beer and leaned back, his arm curling around the shoulder of the cop next to him. ‘My man is going to slay this guy,’ Eddie boasted. ‘It’s going to be brutal. I’ve got a hundred dollars here that says so.’

In the ring, Tom Harper felt a wall of fear rise up like never before. It was like a sudden freeze, turning his muscles to waste and leaving his mind in flashes of white-frosted panic.

But time had run out. The bell rang three times and, from across the ring, Castiglione approached like a beast from the shadows.

Upper East Side

March 6, 11.28 p.m.

He sat in his car opposite the building, waiting. He had been watching for three hours, his focus on the door of the club. His hands were cold now. He held them out in front of his face and looked at them closely. Thin and elegant, like a pianist’s, his nails were cut and filed. He liked all aspects of his life to be neat, ordered and clean.

He was a hunter. He was supreme. He could wait and wait. Sometimes for days, until the opportunity was right. The point was to be on duty at all times. Always vigilant. The hunt he could control. Not like everything else in his life.

Love hadn’t worked out for him at all. For six months she’d made him happy, then she had cut herself free. She had rejected him and what he believed in.

He had never really understood her problem and he didn’t believe she did either. She was part of the world — the world that was corrupt and out of order. He had to put it all back into shape. Frighten when necessary, hurt when necessary, and kill when necessary. But it had to start changing.

The man stared across at the black railings and stone steps that led down to a red basement door. He knew they were inside: him and her. He had planned this for a long time, had lived it in his mind and waited patiently for the right time. He had his kit on the seat beside him: the barbed wire, duct tape, knife, gloves, flashlight, pistol, needle and ink. There was going to be pain first, then resolution, and then freedom.

Orders were orders, whatever you thought about them and however you played it. People had to understand — there was no morality, no absolute, in battle and war. God’s will was self-assertion and evolution — the drive to secure the future for your own kind. He’d read more than he could remember about it. The science was unmistakable. People were just a genetic code seeking its own silent future. They were just incubators for God’s code. Bodies were nothing. But people had forgotten what God’s chosen code was and what the inferior code was doing to the world.

His purpose had been sharpened over the years. He understood who he was now; finally understood that it was possible to be alive in both the present and the past. When he had absorbed that simple truth, the whole of his life fell into place. Time was not linear, time was all-present. It didn’t matter if you weren’t part of the original purpose, you were part of the eternal struggle which happened outside time and space. And anyone you killed was killed throughout eternity.