The Basement

by Tom Clarke

  “Okay, do they have any other leads or information they could give you” I asked.

  “Yeah, listen, this next part is supposed to be super-secret fed shit but I’m going to tell you anyway because it’s important.”

  “My lips are sealed Darrel, let me have it” I said laughing to myself. Super-secret fed shit, if they had their way everything would be super-secret.

  “The suspect that they managed to grab said that Stevie shipped the tablet out of country with the cooperation of a Serbian organized crime group, they stuffed it into a shipping container with a bunch of other, and I am quoting the FBI, cargo. Care to take a guess as to where that shipping container landed?”

  “Seattle” I replied, “Fuck!”

  “Jimmy, every one of Stevie’s so-called informants over there killed themselves! He is also the primary suspect in the murder of several prostitutes.”

  “Don’t tell me” I said, “he chopped their heads off.”

  “The agent I spoke with didn’t say, but it’s a safe bet. Listen Jim, they want Stevie pretty bad, they heard that he was working some cases with us and that’s what brought him to my front door. They’re going to go and see Rick next and I would imagine that you can expect a visit as well.”

  I cringed. The local FBI office and I did not exactly see eye-to-eye on several things. It had made for some tense working contacts in the past, “Okay, anything else?”

  “Yeah, I guess Stevie has not been heard from or seen in a couple of days, not since the deal with Desie.”

  “Okay” I said, trying to block out the thought that a couple of FBI stooges could be knocking on my door. “Well that may complicate things with us trying to meet King tomorrow” I said, “just have to play it by ear I guess.”

  Darrel and I agreed to meet in the morning before the briefing and then hung up our call.

  As messed up as this entire situation was and the fact that it was stretching the boundaries of my belief system, it was somewhat starting to make some sense. That fact didn’t make it any easier for me to deal with it. I sat back and closed my eyes. Sleep had not been an easy thing for me the past few days, thankfully now it came roaring in with a gusto….I had a nap.

  It was about 4:30pm when I was awoken by my wife coming home from work. As she came in the front door the dogs and I started to slowly pull ourselves together after a hard few hours of no-holds-barred, Olympic grade napping.

  As Shelly changed out of her work cloths I told her that Keith was coming with us to visit with Sylvia and that he would be coming by in an hour or so. It was a little after 5pm when Keith showed up at my house. The three of us jumped into my wife’s car and headed over to Sylvia’s house.

  On the drive over no one said a word, you could feel the emotions in the car, a combination of overwhelming sadness and outright anger at what had happened to Danny. And then there was my guilt, I felt as though I had let Danny down. I kept thinking to myself that if only I had been a little faster getting him out of that basement, knowing what I know about the forces at work there, maybe he would have been okay. Maybe he would not have gone so far down that rabbit hole that there was no coming back for him….maybe it was my fault.

  Keith must have been sensing my pain; he reached forward from the backseat and put his hand on my shoulder. I reached over and grasped his hand by the wrist and took a deep breath.

  There was a deep, hollow pain that seemed to cut right into my soul, but I was not alone in my pain, and that was how we would all get through this, by not being alone.

  9. Sylvia

  When we arrived at Sylvia’s house there were cars lining the street. We parked and as we walked up to her house I could see people coming and going from her front door, some were in uniform, and not just from our department, but from all the surrounding agencies as well. A real testament to Danny’s reputation in the law enforcement community, it made me feel good in a bad situation.

  We quietly walked toward the front door, Keith and I doing our best to avoid the gaze of neighbors and other people driving by. In our undercover status, we probably should not have even been there, but it was Danny, and I didn’t need any justification beyond that.

  When we walked into Sylvia’s house I started seeing people who I had never seen before. I saw and spoke with a couple of officers that I knew, they said that Sylvia was in the living room and that she was not taking this very well.

  One of the officers told me that there was a contingent from her church that were consoling her, and that they were “managing” who Sylvia talked to and for how long.

  I turned to Keith and said, “Dude, as far as I know Sylvia doesn’t go to church.”

  “Seriously” Keith replied, “listen Jimmy, I am getting kind of a bad vibe in this crib, I mean do you feel it, the air, its heavy, kind of like.”

  “Kind of like in that basement” I replied, finishing Keith’s sentence for him.

  “Jim, are you okay?” Shelly asked.

  I looked back at my wife and smiled, “yeah, let’s go say hello to Sylvia.” When we walked into the living room Sylvia was there with a group of about five people I had never seen before, all dressed in the same colored suit, all standing in a circle around her.

  “Sylvia” Shelly said as she walked up to her, “Oh my God, how are you doing?”

  “Stacy?” Sylvia replied in a shaky voice. “It’s Stacy right, how nice of you to come.”

  Shelly looked back at Keith and I with a very concerned look on her face, “It’s Shelly, Sylvia, Jim’s wife….Shelly.”

  “Of course, Shelly….I’m sorry. It’s just been so hectic, so many people, thank you for coming by.” Sylvia gave Shelly a hug, it seemed like her fog had cleared.

  As she was hugging my wife I saw Sylvia look up at me and smile. “Jimmy, thank you for coming over” Sylvia said as she walked over to Keith and I. Sylvia leaned in and gave me a hug, and then Keith. I noticed that as we hugged she seemed frail. Sylvia and Danny both were avid gym goes and made a point to stay in shape. She just seemed weak.

  As she was hugging Keith I looked up and saw that the people who had been standing in a circle around Sylvia were now standing directly behind Shelly, who was watching Sylvia, Keith, and I.

  I stepped forward and motioned for Shelly to come and stand beside me, and then I turned and asked Sylvia, “How are you holding up Syl?”

  “Oh, as best as I can I guess” Sylvia replied as she looked at her feet. Sylvia then looked up at Keith and I, and with a strange, almost snarl of a smile said, “He’s hungry Jimmy!”

  “What did you just say!” I replied as I put both of my hands up on Sylvia’s shoulders. Sylvia looked at me with an expression of confusion on her face, “are you hungry? We have plenty of food here.” In that short exchange Sylvia’s demeanor changed from grieving widow, to almost aggressive, to borderline jubilant when she asked if I was hungry. I looked at Keith and Shelly, who, based on the looks on their faces had seen and heard the same thing.

  My heart was racing; the air in Sylvia’s house had seemed heavy to me when we walked in, now it was getting almost oppressive. I could feel it like a weight being dumped into my shoulders and chest. My breathing getting faster as I started to recognize the fight or flight sensation developing in my core.

  I clenched my teeth together and took just a half-second to refocus my mind, to take that fight or flight reaction and tuck it back away where it belonged. I looked back down and Sylvia who was just standing there smiling at me. Then I looked up and saw the people in the suits had started moving closer to us.

  “Sylvia” I said, “Who are your friends in the nice suits?”

  “Oh, they are from my church Jim” she replied with a huge smile on her face.

  “Which church are you going to?” I asked.

  Sylvia looked back at the group of three men and two women, who had now moved even closer to us, then back at me. She sheepishly said, “There from my church.”

  I looked over at Keith, who
had moved a few paces back and 45-degrees to my right. He was creating some space between us so that if we had to start moving we would have room to operate and not be tripping over each other.

  The sounds in the house suddenly seemed to stop. All the back-ground noise of people talking, coming and going, it all just stopped, and there was an unnatural silence that made my skin start to crawl. I looked around and saw that there were no more uniformed officers in the house with us, in fact I didn’t see anyone with the exception of Sylvia and the five people in her living room.

  The lights in the house seemed to flicker and dim, as a strange hum started to develop.

  Very low at first but seemed to be getting progressively louder. Shelly reached forward and grabbed my elbow. I turned to her and said in a hushed, yet aggressive voice, “You get between Keith and I and stay there, were leaving!”

  Shelly nodded, I could see fear starting to form on her face. I leaned in close to Sylvia and said “Syl, can I talk to you outside, I really need to talk to you in private, let’s go outside okay.”

  One of the men in the group, now standing in front of us said, “I don’t think that would be a good idea.”

  I looked up at him, then back at Sylvia, “Come on Syl, let’s go out front for a minute, okay.” I put my arm around Sylvia and started to lead her towards the front door. Keith who was in front of me turned and then stopped, “Jimmy” he said, “top-side.”

  I looked up and standing at the top of a stairwell were two more people we didn’t know dressed in the same suits as the ones down stairs. “I see them” I said. Keith turned to Shelly and said, “We’re getting ready to move, grab the back of my belt, don’t let go, and stay with me!”

  Things had just gotten real serious really quick, “Jimmy, moving” Keith said. As I moved forward following behind Keith with Shelly sandwiched between us, I again started leading Sylvia towards the front door. She was not resisting the movement, but seemed heavy.

  As we got close to the front door I looked back, the two people at the top of the stairs were still there, they had not moved. The group of five in the living room had slowly been moving with us towards the front door. The man who spoke just before said again, “I don’t think that’s a good idea, it’s not safe Sylvia.”

  I moved Sylvia in front of me, turned so I could see the man and said, “If you try and stop us it’s going to get unsafe for you!” He looked at me and before he could speak I said, “Not another word! If you come any closer I am going to fuck you up!”

  I could feel my teeth clenching as I looked at this guy in the suit. I looked him right in the eyes, my stare telling him that he was about to become a victim.

  Keith and Shelly reached the front door, “Jim, were out” Keith said as the two of them stepped out into the front yard. I was leading Sylvia out when she stopped on the front porch, she looked around, almost as though a fog was lifting. I could see the light coming back on in her eyes. Color started returning to her face and he posture seemed to straighten.

  “Syl” I said, “look at me, it’s Jimmy. Syl who made you call Danny the other day?”

  Sylvia just looked at me, I reached up and grabbed her by the arm, “Sylvia! why did you call Danny and tell him you had a flat tire, who made you make that call!”

  Sylvia looked up at the night sky, and then around at the street lights, and her front yard, “Oh hi Jim. Hey where’s Danny?”

  “Sylvia” I started to say, but before I could get another word out she looked up at me, all emotion had left her face. Her bottom lip started to quiver, “Jim, he marked me” she said in a voice that reminded me of a scared little girl.

  “What?” I replied. Sylvia let out a slight laugh, like she had just heard a stupid joke, turned, and without another word walked back into her house and shut the door.

  I exhaled as though someone had just hit me in the gut, panic started to run across my mind, then anger. I started to move back towards the front door of Sylvia’s house when Shelly yelled at me, “Jim!”

  I looked back at my wife who was pointing at the second floor of Sylvia’s house. I stepped back off the porch, looked up, and standing in the window of what had been Danny and Sylvia’s bedroom looking down at us were the seven people in suits. “Jim, please” Shelly said. I clenched my teeth, turned and walked over to the car.

  As I walked over to the car Shelly had already gotten into the driver’s seat, Keith was standing outside the car, watching the house and making sure that no one came out.

  We both got into the car, Keith in the back and me in the front and Shelly started to pull away. As we pulled out of the subdivision Keith leaned forward and said, “Brother, I think we got a tail.”

  “What does that mean?” Shelly asked. “It means someone is following us” I said.

  I looked up into the rear view mirror, “Two cars back” Keith said. “When we pulled out of Sylvia’s place I saw their lights come on and take us out of the subdivision.”

  I looked at Keith and asked, “Are you armed?”

  “Damn right!” Keith replied. “I’ve only got the one mag though.”

  I instructed Shelly not to use her blinker and to make a right turn off of the main street we were on and into the next neighborhood. As she made the turn I could see the car Keith was talking about get into position to make a right turn into the same direction as us.

  As we turned into the neighborhood I told Shelly to make a series of right and left turns crisscrossing the neighborhood until we were at the stop light putting us back onto the main drag. As we approached the stop light, which had just turned green, I told Shelly to slow down, then as it turned yellow I told her to hit it and run the light.

  As Shelly ran the fresh red light I could see the car that was following us stop at the light, start to lurch forward, but then get caught in traffic.

  “Jim, what the hell is going on?” Shelly asked as we drove out of the area.

  “I will tell you what’s going on” Keith said as he reached forward and patted Shelly on the shoulder, “You just busted a tail, good job girl! Jimmy, you guys don’t need to put this car back in front of your crib. Let’s go to my place and put it in the garage, you guys take my Jeep and put that in your driveway.”

  “You sure?” I asked, “Yeah, just promise not to judge me by the empty beer cans in the back.”

  We drove to Keith’s house, again executing a series of right and left turns along the way jut to be sure that we were not being followed anymore. When we arrived we parked our car in Keith’s garage, Shelly and I then took Keith’s Jeep and drove home.

  As we pulled onto our street I drove past our house, and then down the alley that ran along the back yard looking for anything that was out of the ordinary. Not seeing anything I parked Keith’s Jeep in our driveway.

  As we walked into our house we were greeted by two hungry dogs, everything seemed in good order. I sat down in my chair in the living room and just stared at the ceiling for a few minutes. Shelly walked in and sat on the couch across from me. “Jim, what the hell just happened?” Shelly asked.

  “I don’t know” I said shaking my head, “I just don’t know.”

  “Listen to me, you are eligible for retirement” Shelly said. “You working undercover all the time is hard enough, but this?” Shelly looked at me and said “You need to retire! We need to get the hell out of this town, this shit has me freaked out!”

  “What about your job” I asked.

  “I will find another job!” she replied throwing both her hands up in the air. “Who knows, maybe one that pays better too. That shit with Syl, Jimmy, that was not normal!”

  I took a deep breath, she was right. I had spent 20-years being a Police Officer. I had seen some really weird shit, but this was some next level weirdness. The idea of finding something else to do with my time was starting to become very appealing.

  As my alarm started going off I realized that neither Shelly nor I had gotten very much sleep that night. As usual she
was up and getting ready to head out the door for work before I even got out of bed. She came into the bedroom, grabbed me by my foot and said, “You guys be careful today, you hear me!”

  “Yes boss” I replied. She smiled, and then told me that she was going to take Keith’s Jeep and go to work.

  I got up and moving, making my way to the coffee pot in the kitchen. As I watched my wife back out of our driveway in Keith’s Jeep I started thinking about our conversation last night - retirement, it was sounding pretty good.

  My thoughts of living the retired life started to give way to more appropriate thoughts, like how was I going to pull off this undercover meet with King? There were a lot of variables, a lot more than your run of the mill undercover meeting with a suspect. What if I run into Stevie, what if we encounter both of these demons, or whatever they are. What am I going to do if this thing and its friends try to take me over and then chop my head off? Lots to think about.

  I then started thinking about Danny, and his wife Sylvia. I did not feel good about the way we left her last night….with those people. All I could think about was my friend had gotten killed, and now I left his wife with some weird ass shitheads, that probably were associated with the people who killed him.