CHAPTER 1 - OYER AND TERMINER

And now Nineteen persons having been hang'd, and one prest to death, and Eight more condemned, in all Twenty and Eight, of which above a third part were Members of some of the Churches of N. England, and more than half of them of a good Conversation in general, and not one clear'd; about Fifty having confest themselves to be Witches, of which not one Executed; above an Hundred and Fifty in Prison, and Two Hundred more accused; the Special Commision of Oyer and Terminer comes to a period.

-Robert Calef 1692

CHAPTER 1

Oyer and Terminer

18:40 Hours

"Central to all units. Report of shots fired at East Coast Green, 108 Fifth Avenue. Multiple reports, gang-related, handle code three."

Johnny Keegan reached down and switched on the toggles. The lights and sirens blared. The Hemi V8 Dodge Charger Pursuit erupted as I pressed the accelerator to the ground. The incident was three blocks away.

"Here we go," said Keegs as the back end of my radio mobile patrol car fishtailed.

Keegs emptied the chewing tobacco from his mouth into his spit cup. When I regained control of the RMP, he handed it to me. We hit the straightaway on Fifth Avenue. I took the cup and did the same.

"Kill the lights," I said to Keegs. Everything went silent. Then, taking the mic from the cradle, I depressed the push-to-talk button.

"Six-three David on scene. All covers come in stealth." The sirens went silent into the night. It was quiet, eerie almost, our black cars hidden all but for the streetlights.

I stopped the RMP three houses down from the store. Keegs and I got out of the vehicle, and both drew our Smith and Wesson 40 caliber pistols.

I tactically staggered us as we approached the shop facade. I positioned closer to the storefront. Keegs, on my right side, maintained a three-yard disbursement.

I held my fist in the air, my elbow flexed. Then I outstretched my arm, my palm facing down, and motioned for Keegs to stay low. Finally, I slowly circled toward the street to better my line of sight inside the store.

The windows shattered on the sidewalk and into the building.

There was no movement. I waved Keegan forward and waited until he was on my inside hip. He tapped me, and we were swift in entering the shop.

There were three bodies on the ground. The first one was dead, brains all over the counter and display case. They hit the second badly, bleeding from the neck, but not from a bullet.

The third, a woman, was shot in the back. She lay face down, and her throat rattled every breath.

We continued forward towards the back of the shop. We positioned ourselves on our side of the archway. I nodded, and we crisscrossed, moving through the room towards the rear.

"Clear," I yelled out as I looked into the bathroom and small office, both doors open.

"Small room, clear," yelled Keegs. We put our pistols away, and I reached for my collar mic.

"Six-three David, Central. Scene secured. Need a bus forthwith this location, and homicide. Have at least one D.O.A."

"Central, Six-three Senior Corporal, copy... Bus dispatched, homicide notified."

It wasn't long before the place swarmed with bystanders, busses, medics, and homicide. I reported to the detective in charge and received the customary, "thanks, Corporal. We've got it from here."

This was a strange hit. A health food store, no money taken out of the cash registers, no merchandise missing, and no sign of territorialism. Nothing but three vics and none of them had any I.D. on them.

No. Don't go there.

I had to stop myself because this wasn't my problem, and I was too tired to figure it out.

"Hey, Keegs," I shouted. "Keep those freaking people back, will you please... Detectives are inside, and God Forbid, we step on their evidence."

I watched Keegan push the crowd back. Then, C.S.I. stretched the yellow border tape across the street from light pole to light pole.

That was when I first saw him.

A white male, he stood five foot five, weighed about one hundred twenty pounds, and was scrawny. The only word to describe him was black. He dowsed himself with it. Black fingernails, eyelashes, makeup, as Goth as they come. His hair came to a point in the middle of his forehead, stiff with gel. His boots, navy pea coat, high-collared shirt were all black. Yet I'll never forget, as long as I live, that warped smile on his face.

"What the hell is your problem?" I asked him as I walked over to the line. "Something amusing you?"

He was pale as a ghost, and the black eyeshadow, lipstick, and mascara didn't help his complexion.

"Yes, please, officer, I am the owner. My name is Caleb Crowningshield. I would like to access my shop."

"Well, Mr. Crowningshield, three people are wounded in your shop. Two shot, one killed. Perhaps you can help us identify them. None have I.D."

He had a proud smile on his face.

"And you won't identify them, and I can't help you, ours is a place of anonymity, and I must keep it thus."

He looked past me and shook his head slightly.

"These people have no family, and nobody will come looking for them, I assure you."

His smile was slow to vanish as he put his hands and fingers together as if to pray. "I would like to see them. To say goodbye."

By now, Keegs was at my back. I turned and looked at him wide-eyed at the presentation of Mr. Crowningshield. Keegs had a wad of chewing tobacco back in his mouth and spat on the street.

"Listen, Casper, " he said. "I don't give a rat's ass who you are. One of your friendly ghosts is in there with a canoe-sized hole in his head. One of them has his throat cut, and another won't live the night."

Keegs paused and loosed a stream of tobacco juice towards Crowningshield.

"Do yourself a favor, snowflake. Stop acting like an asshole and help us figure this out."

I took Keegs by the shoulders and patted him on his right cheek. "Okay, we're done here."

I moved Keegan to arm's length and sent him back to the car.

As I turned back to Crowningshield and waved him through the tape,  he stopped and bowed. As he walked away, he looked over his shoulder at me, making direct eye contact.

"It was nice to meet you, Senior Corporal Kelly," he said as if to mock me. "They call you the Prophet, don't they? The street thugs? I will see you again, yes?"

Tuesday, November 20

A new day, a new shift. I was tired and certainly wished my days off were longer. Maxine walked from the sallyport. She glared at me but waited to speak until in range.

"William Kelly... Keegan's finished." She adjusted her shoulder mic, pulling some hair from her shoulder. "They're going to hang him, you know."

She was irritable from whatever Keegs had done. Max opened the passenger side door, sat down, and snapped the shotgun into the brace.

I closed the trunk, got into the driver's seat, and tested the lights and siren.

"Hold that thought, love," I said and picked up the mic to call us mobile. "Six-three David to Central, two-man unit in service, good afternoon."

I sighed and took the Redman tobacco pouch from my front pocket. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I knew what was coming.

"Okay, I'll bite. What the hell did he do now?"

"You know I hate when you call me love," she said. I had added more frustration on top of what she was already feeling.

"And he's your partner. You should know, Prophet. You and he are thick as thieves, so you're just as guilty."

Out of courtesy, I nodded, and out of selfishness, I stared.

Maxine

Maxine McMenamin was the love of my life. She was breathtaking, and her beauty was beyond compare. Max had wavy, long, brown hair that dropped well below the shoulder and pulled into a ponytail. She had the most incredible eyes to match and darker skin for her Irish heritage. Her body was athletic, tight, and incredibly sexy.

What enchanted me beside her physical beauty was her singing voice. Max's parents brought her up as a church choir soloist. When she sang, it captivated me. When she sang to me, I melted. It was one of the sexiest things she did.

She was my everything.

Maxine was a second-generation street cop. Her father retired from the six-three when I first arrived. So in the department, she was considered a legacy.

We had the same rank. Corporal. She had two stripes on her sleeve, as did I. But as her ranking senior, mine had a rocker.

Her intelligence far exceeded that of the above-average street cop, much less the average. She was on scholarship at UMASS-Lowell and on the path to being a lawyer. Instead, she opted to follow in her old man's footsteps.

We'd been a couple for several years and were just recently engaged. Now, my life was about wedding cakes, gowns, invitations, and banquet halls. It was almost everything that made me want to vomit. So, when the opportunity came to engage in good old-fashioned American street violence, I relished in it, and dare I say, rushed into it with great zeal and anticipation.

"You know you'd be in trouble with him if you weren't sick and missed the shift," she said with a grimace. "You'd be sitting in IAB right now defending his ass. He'd be lying through his teeth, and you'd be swearing by him. It really pisses me off you defend him as you do."

She threw her peaked cap onto the dashboard as always, this time out of frustration.

"Do you ever even wear that thing?"

"I hate it, but we're supposed to have it with us, Kelly."

"Yeah, try wearing a piss cutter for eight years... then it wouldn't be so bad."

She glared at me. "You’re an ass. And can you please speak English and stop with the Marine Corps stuff? I know eight years of old habits die hard, but..." 

Ignoring her poke at my years of service in the Corps, I switched the conversation back to Keegan.

"Sweetheart, you don't know him like I do. He's one of the best street cops around.  Nobody better to have at your back when it hits the fan." 

She rolled her eyes.

"Whatever, Prophet."

Being the Prophet, it was my street name. The gangbangers tagged me with it for my ability to catch them in lies. I could almost predict when certain crimes would go down. I teased everyone and would say my Spidey Senses were tingling, but it was nothing more than a cop's sixth sense I seemed to have inherited from my grandfather. 

I was a true blueblood legacy. I traced the Kelly bloodline in this department back to 1866 to my fourth-generation grandfather, Finbarr Kelly. He served with the 69th Irish Brigade during the American Civil War before becoming a cop.

My father and both of his brothers were still on the job. My old man was a Detective Captain in Major Case Detectives and my Uncle Michael, a District Chief.

My Uncle Peter was a Sergeant with Tactical but lost his life in the line of duty. He was the eldest.

Keegs

Johnny Keegan and I met at the Six-three eight years ago.

The good Lord broke the mold when he made Keegs. He was the guy that if you didn't know him, you didn't like him.

Max hated him and would have had him suspended several times if I hadn't intervened on his behalf. Keegs was the guy that got the girls. He's the guy that broke the rules and got away with it.

He lived by a straightforward code. It's better to beg forgiveness than ask permission.

Getting it done was all that we cared about. Did it get us into trouble? Yes. Did we find ourselves occasionally reprimanded or spending a few days off? Yes. Was it worth it? HELL YES! I suppose that's what bothered Maxine.

I needed a cup of coffee. I had a feeling this was going to be a long shift. We pulled across the street to the Wawa, and I dragged myself from the RMP. I beat Maxine to the front swinging doors and held them open. She pushed past me into the store without a word. She was steaming mad, and I didn't make it any better.

"You are unbelievably sexy, Max," I said as I smiled at her. Unfortunately, she wasn't having any of it. I followed her into the store to continue our conversation.

"He treats women like crap. He's arrogant and acts like he's above the law. Something's got to humble that guy. Otherwise, he's going down and bringing you with him."

I smiled at her and kissed her forehead as we heard the other RMP's checking in for the shift. I would never admit this to her, but I admired him. Nothing bothered him. It seemed to roll off his back.

Unfortunately, I wasn't so lucky. Diagnosed with P.T.S.D., long before I came on this job, I had a much harder time letting things go, especially with what we've seen and done.

"The time is 15:35 hours. Central Operator, 1-5-7, Heights Police forty-nine, station number K.G. 49 Bravo. Six-Three Precinct in service. Good afternoon. Stay alert - stay alive. Stay alert - stay alive."

Max talked with her regular partner, Marcello, as I walked to the RMP. I stood in between the driver's side door and the car. I dumped the coffee I had just bought and chewed instead. The cup would serve as my spit container.

"Come on, Max," I said as I opened the pouch and took some leaf. "All units are in service. I love you, but we need to get oscar-mike."

She walked over to the car and looked down at me. Her eyebrows came to a point, her mouth opened, and she pushed her jaw forward and glared.

"You've got to be kidding me. Really? Didn't I just ask you to stop with the Marine Corps stuff?"

We got in and closed the doors. I leaned and asked for a kiss.

"No," she said playfully. "I'm mad at you." When I put the car in reverse, she leaned over and gave me a quick peck on the cheek.

"That's only because I have to marry you. But I'm still mad at you."

"Okay," I said and smiled. "We're on the move."

Max hit me on the arm.

"Ha-ha," she said as she made a mocking face at me. "Oscar-mike means on the move… I get it."

The Six-Three

The Six-three Precinct covers a 7.25-mile radius. It has a population of skells, welfare, and scum bags of society numbered over four hundred thousand.

The south side of Shenandoah Creek separated them from the upper class. The creek ran through the town and emptied into Potter Pond, near the old Puritan Cemetery. Transit Commuter Trains ran north to south and formed the square topography known as "The Heights."

Right smack in the middle was Statue Park. It was a memorial to the Irish Civil War Soldiers who fought in the battle of Petersburg. One of them was my fourth-generation grandfather.

We have bars, drugs, gangs, prostitutes, and, of course, a history.