After he had gentlemanly walked her home and silently said goodbye to her with a prolonged kiss, she had slowly then re-entered her bedroom through the window and tried not to make a sound because she not want to awaken her drunken farther for fear of more abuse. As soon as she entered her bedroom she smelt the distinctively unnerving smell of alcohol saturating the surrounding air and saw her dreaded little wooden doll sitting upon her bed, causing her to instantaneously freeze in fear and began to panic. Lightening illuminated its vibrantly coloured and painted wooden surface which gave it a harmless appearance to the uninitiated eye, but she only saw a horror amongst horrors and felt a fear that only she could know. She had come to hate this doll which now represented her twisted father’s constant sickly sordid abuse of her and smelling the accompanying alcohol instantly identified his presence was within the room.
The only question however was is he asleep or awake? And she thankfully then heard him snoring on the chair located at the far side of her bedroom and this gave her a brief moment to consider her limited options. She pondered running away from him forever right then and there because she was weary of this tiresome game that they were playing but resisted this instinctively hasty decision due to the fear of living with the rest of the vagrants within the notoriously bad area of Kingsbury Run. She had heard frightening stories about the place and she was also a creature of habit and found it difficult to break familiarity because for her familiarity and constancy was what she had always lacked within her own existence and for all her father’s faults, he offered her this.
As she slowly climbed into her bed in full clothes she still could not help but silently debate on whether or not to flee until she suddenly heard him arouse from his alcohol fuelled slumber and mumble some incomprehensible words. He then frighteningly stood up and slowly staggered over towards her whilst all the time attempting to keep his balance by periodically leaning against the wall. She denied herself the fruitlessly pointless exercise of pulling the bedsheet over her head which she had done so many times before in the past, in the vein hope that this would somehow prevent him from touching her, and decided desperately jump back out through the window and into the cold lonely night.
As she clumsily landed on the bush outside her bedroom window her eyes were greeted by the unfamiliar sight of two unknown men beating up another man in the shadows from across the rain soaked street. The two men continued to mercilessly beat the battered man whilst she shockingly watched them in a frightened silence until one of them drew his gun and shot the unsuspecting man in the head. The startlingly deafening sound reverberated around the street as the mussel flare lit up the darkness with a blinding light, causing the frightened little Poppy to instantly run.
Her hastily timed fleeing was immediately noticed by both men as they looked on as she fled into the darkened street ahead of her and was being closely perused by her angry drunken farther. Her furious farther had his usual leather belt drawn in one hand and his fist clenched in the other as he ran after her as best as he could in his inebriated state. He continually shouted abuse at her until she unsuspectingly crashed into a pile of garbage cans at the dead end of a dark alley way. The frightened Poppy knew of her father’s dementedly scary furies over the years and pleaded with him to stop slowly coming towards her as he clenched both his leather belt and fist harder.
Her cries for mercy where pointless however because his paranoid mind had already branded her sinful betrayal as a mark of shame upon herself and his righteous teachings and it was almost too much for his weakened mind to bare. He felt the need to severely punish her for her sins even more so than he had done in the past to both ensure her loyalty towards himself and instil a newfound fear within her, a fear that would forever dominate her and forever control her. He was in such a drunken rage at her blatantly apparent attempt to leave him that he would have to reinforce his will upon her yet again as he had done so many times before in the past. Her betrayal would have to be severely punished and he secretly relished her slight frame trembling before him and got even more aroused as she became more fearful. This was because her precious fear was now blanketed his own weak ego with the power that he lacked in life and was filling him with the strength that he could never obtain within his own pathetic existence.
Once he was upon her crying and tremblingly small cowering body he slowly raised his hand and continually whipped her with his bloody leather belt. He took out his frustration upon her, frustration about her wanting to leave him, frustration about the way his life had turned out and frustration about her lack of respect that she had shown him with her deceitful actions. She cowered under his merciless assault of cruelty and silently begged that she could finally be taken by the cold arms of death that had so nearly taken her upon her first night on this earth. She now longed for its cold embrace and strangely felt at peace knowing that this might be her end from this short life that even her own mother did not wish to share in. She thought that perhaps she should have died within that lonely graveyard and not have been saved by the nun as death now seemed to be a blessing and she desperately longed for.
Suddenly the two shadowy men whom had killed the stranger a few minutes ago miraculously came to her rescue and stopped the beatings by grabbing the whipping arm of her cruel farther and shoving a gun into his startled face. The blood soaked and trembling Poppy was by now crouched down in pain with her shaking arms over her head until she realised that the screams where no longer coming from her but her own farther. The two unknown shadowy men now beat her cruel farther with such a merciless violent rage that even she was astonished. The most violent of the two wore a distinctive pair of gleaming owl themed silver knuckle dusters whilst the other man held her farther from behind which allowed the man’s forceful punches to land undefended upon her father’s face, chest and stomach. The silver knuckle dusters glinted and gleamed in a frightened Poppy’s eyes as blood splatter rained down upon her whilst there wielder appeared to be amused as the sight of her father’s quickly evolving bloodied appearance.
After they finally stopped there violent onslaught upon her defeated farther they both laughed whilst looking at each other and where apparently satisfactorily amused at his poetically justified situation. The larger and less violent of the two shadowy men then slowly came towards her as she still crouched down in fear whilst his unseen colleague marvelled at his silver knuckle dusters impressively destructive capability. This man then stood over her and spoke whilst she cowered under him in fear “Hey! Little girl, its ok! It’s okay now because you’re safe alright? Did this piece of shit hurt you? Touch you in a sexual way? Abuse you? We both heard him call you a ‘filthy lying whore’ and so we thought…” She interrupted him and spoke with a still trembling voice, adamant that she wanted to voice her silent abuse to anyone whom would listen or care “Yes! He touches me! Please kind sir! Please stop him!”
The large and unseen man stayed motionless for a moment because he was shocked by her sheer strength of will to vocalise her abuse before he then crouched down towards her and revealed himself to be a young and thinner Martin Sweeney. He then slowly helped her to her feet and carefully guided her towards her battered and blood soaked farther, helping her weak legs to sustain her weight by putting his massive arm around her fragile little body. As the other man came into view, a young and smiling Alfred “The Owl” Polizzi, he satisfactorily put away his silver knuckle dusters back into his upper jacket pocket whilst using a cloth to wipe his hands clean of the bloodied residue.
The terrified, battered and bruised Poppy stood trembling there above her defeated and groaning farther as the young Sweeney took out a luger pistol and placed it into her shaking hands. He then helped guide it onto the temple of her father’s bloody head and the frightened Poppy reluctantly looked at her father’s obvious pain which seemed to be all encompassing and strangely affected her, making her saddened to see him in such discomfort regardless of the pain he had mercilessly inflicted upon her for so many
years. A smiling Sweeney then looked at the amused Polizzi whom knowingly winked back at him in return before the future congressman spoke to the trembling little Poppy “You can end him right now and make him pay for what he’s done to you or you can save this no good for nothing piece of shit and continue on with your traumatically troubled life? Which is it going to be little lady?” The scared Poppy then spoke directly towards her farther in an emotionally charged voice whilst she tried to keep back the unstoppable tears “Why?” Her father’s unrecognisable battered and bloodied face sadly looked back at her as he attempted to gargle a response from his blood soaked mouth but before he could Sweeney helped her pull the trigger, not caring for the abusive man’s meaningless reply.
The sudden shock of the loud bang and the blinding light of the lugers mussel flare startled the already frightened Poppy whilst Polizzi joyously laughed as her father’s brain matter decorated the dark alleyway in the new colour of crimson red. From that moment on Poppy’s future was intertwined with that of Sweeney’s and Polizzi’s as her father’s blood liberally filled the street drain with a lingeringly reluctant relief that only she could ever truly know. After the events of that dramatic night she had changed her name with the help of Sweeney because she had always detested the one that her deceased farther had given to her because it reminded her of being his property. She wished to officially change it back to the one that the old deceased nun had unofficially given her and the one that reminded her most of her unknown mother, whom was little more than a phantom to her by now.
Poppy Rose Valentine was a homage to her long lost mother whom would always be with her in spirit if not in body and this name was lovingly given to her by the caring nun whom saw her as her mother never could, a gift from god. She knew that her mother left her on Valentine’s Day by the church graveyard whereby she probably knew that the nun’s would take her in and for whatever reason she had left her with the two vibrantly coloured flowers within her basket. She had often speculated upon the reasoning for this strange act and theorised that it was a bizarre act of love from a disturbed young mother to help the old nun’s to see her amongst the grey tombstones within the thick snow that year. This is why she had selected her unforgettable name and she would often wonder what her unknown mothers response would have been if she asked her the very same question she had asked her farther before she had killed him that night.
The troubled Sweeney was no saint but he had taken her in that night and under his wing, caring for her where others had let her down such as the church and her adopted farther. He had even given her the power to finally end his unrelenting reign of terror upon her life and for this she had been eternally grateful to him but knew not how to thank him other than the ways that her cruel farther had shown her, causing them to ultimately become lovers even though he was significantly older than her. Poppy’s natural attractiveness had always apparently overridden her troublingly distorted own self-image but this was far from the truth as it actually reinforced her mentality that she was somehow responsible for her abuse. However her naturally gifted powerful control over men, regardless of their age, was seen by Sweeney and skilfully utilised by him to not only help him steadily ascend the slimy political ladder of politics but also to entrap his unsuspecting competitors. She would also be cleverly used by the cunning politician in collaboration with his underworld partner, Polizzi, to help there twin nefarious business activities and subdue rivals within the drugs distribution and gambling trade.
The dominant Sweeney was always protective of her and she came to see him as somewhat of an unintentional surrogate father figure as time wore on. In the more recent years however she had come to the realisation that he had never truly loved her and that he was simply using her like so many others had before him. Knowing how Sweeney’s calculating mind worked she knew that he was meticulous about all his employee’s because he would regularly use there prior crimes against them if they saw fit to challenge his authority or disobey an order. She knew that he kept a detailed record of all of her illegal activities whilst within his employment and had long ago attempted to acquire it in order to be free from him once and for all but could never gain access to his secretive draw until now. She desperately sought a way out of his control because she had hated the man whom he had become, gone was the younger and more sensitive Sweeney only to be replaced with a larger and crueller unknown man whom was strikingly reminiscent of her own abusive farther. Sweeney had slowly changed from a young politically well-connected man whom had positively infectious ideas about changing society for the better and transformed into a distasteful man whom was now only interested in helping himself gain more power.
Poppy’s frantic mind was then brought racing back into the present when she heard Sweeney groan loader with pleasure as he fondled her breasts some more and pulled her in towards himself whilst his chair creaked and groaned in protest under the strain of his immense weight. She cautiously scanned the remaining papers upon the desk until she saw something immensely interesting, personal correspondence with the very same man whom had saved her from her abusive farther, Alfred Polizzi. This in itself was not that interesting because she knew that they had been close friends and business associates for a long time now but seeing the actual correspondence just lying here upon the desk was shocking within itself. She also saw numerous letters which documented an assortment of private and corrupt doctor’s names with the words “opium” and “Ness” highlighted, instantly insinuating that Sweeney and his associates had been deliberately attempting to keep her former lover on a constant drug binge to alleviate the pressure upon themselves.
She then realised that both where attempting to keep Ness addicted to the opium that had so blighted her own relationship with him and understood that their actions where in order to keep the famed lawman off their tails and within a constant drug infused delirium. His actions did not shock Poppy because Sweeney had used worse methods before on political or business opponents but him not telling her did shock her because she was heavily involved with Ness and his investigations over the recent years. Sweeney had personally asked her to join the police department so that he could use her, Trunk, O’Donnell, Kilbane and “Gentleman” Brown, as well as other mole’s within the department, in order to keep tabs on the various complex investigations that where going on against him and his associates.
During this time her loyalties would be tested when Sweeney had asked her to destroy evidence that Merlyo had on his convoluted but potentially damaging relations with the Mayfield Road Mob and Polizzi. She had loyally destroyed these files without question even though she was dating the love-struck Merlyo at the time and genuinely liked him but she did however feel guilty inside about her actions and chose not to see him again after a night out at the cinema. She cruelly choose to use his tentatively warming nature against her as an excuse to finish off their briefly romantic relationship and hated herself for doing it but she cared for him to much to hurt him with an avalanche of lies about a false past. When Ness had then come riding into town Sweeney had immediately instructed her to completely break off all relations with Merlyo and focus upon this newer and bigger threat. He wished to keep constant tabs on the new safety director and county prosecutor Cullitan’s numerous convoluted investigations into his private affairs with the Mayfield Road Mob however this mission soon changed after the first few Mad Butcher murders had occurred.
He then instructed her to also focus upon Ness and Merlyo’s investigations into the Mad Butcher case and whilst she obediently obeyed, he had in turn used the well placed Trunk, O’Donnell, Kilbane and Brown to help infiltrate the county prosecutor’s numerous investigations and sabotage the evidence which implicated his secret involvement with Polizzi. These successful endeavours had all but eliminated the potential threat posed by both Ness and Cullitan and left the triumphant Sweeney free to reassert his shadowy dominance over the broken city. At first Poppy had diligently and willingly relayed the information that he desir
ed back to him but as time wore on and she fell more in love with both Ness and Merlyo and slowly begun to realise that the heartless Sweeney was simply using her just like her farther had done.
After the potentially fatal events of Polizzi’s death rally whereby Ness, Merlyo, Zalewski and even Gerber where almost killed, she had felt immensely guilty over her use as a mole within the department. She regretted helping him because it had almost cost the lives of her dear friends and chose to stop mindlessly filtering valuable information back to him and just gave him a small trickle of information when she deemed it fit to do so. She would from then on give him just enough to keep him at bay until she could figure out what she was going to do with her life and why her irrationally mixed up feelings of love for both Ness and Merlyo where confusing her normally rigid allegiances.
As Poppy’s frantic mind returned back to the present she saw upon the desk the rough draft of the letter that she had recently seen printed within the Cleveland press that was supposedly from the Mad Butcher himself and sent from California. She then saw the old photo of the young Martin Sweeney with his first cousin Francis Sweeney and instantly recognised the name upon the back of the photo because Ness and Merlyo had mentioned it numerous times within their personal correspondence about the Mad Butcher case, along with their ridiculous code name for the individual “Gaylord Sundhiem”.
She then had an overwhelming sinking feeling within her stomach as she suddenly realised what other dark secret the congressman had been keeping from her all these years. Dr Frank Sweeney was in fact none other than the Mad Butcher himself and the congressman had been actively protecting him for all these years and using her to do it! She suddenly felt scared as she stood there and listened to the slumbering Sweeney’s snoring as he had apparently fallen asleep whilst fondling her breasts. As she gently removed the sleeping Sweeney from her chest area and nestled him back upon his leather bound chair, she then continued her enlightening search and gently opened his secretive draw to look for yet more valuable information about Sweeney and his unseen affairs.
The Noir Evil Page 62
