Damien Loose, Episodes 5: 10

By Robert Strasser

Noir and family life collide in this fast paced debut by playwright Robert Strasser. Filled with wit and memorable characters, DAMIEN LOOSE brings murder, mystery and mayhem to the south side of St. Louis.
Damien Berchshire wakes up one morning and finds his long lost Uncle Edmund dead on the front lawn. His search for justice threatens to bring down an international company and destroy his marriage. A gloriously mad mystery set in the back alleys and back patios of St. Louis.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Robert Strasser
• Release date: Dec 18, 2013
• ISBN: 9781311562562

Robert Strasser

Robert Strasser is a St. Louis author. He co-founded the Tin Ceiling Theatre Company and helped create the seven/24 short play festival. He's reviewed theater for KDHX radio. He's written for the St. Louis Evening Whirl. He is the creator and head writer for the sci-fi web series Artemis Burn. His travel pieces and artist interviews have appeared on numerous websites. He also lived in a bookshop in Paris for awhile, and the Canadian police stole his driver license.

Book preview

Damien Loose

Episodes 5 - 10

by Robert Strasser

Published by Robert Strasser at Smashwords.com

Copyright 2013 Robert Strasser

Cover designed by Elizabeth Byrd

No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission from the publisher, except in the context of reviews.

PUBLISHER'S NOTE: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

EBOOK NOTES: This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Episode 5

(Lost and Found)

Bump in the Night

The ache in his head throbbed up from his blackening eye. Damien sat on the kitchen floor, a bag of frozen peas precariously perched over one eye. His back was against the the dishwasher door, and the slight tilt of his head kept the peas in place. His large hands, palms up, rested on the flood beside him. Four $25 dollar casino chips stretched in an archipelago across the floor from his left hand to the table leg. His lanky legs flowed into him in a long V, like the two rivers on the St. Louis city flag. A dirty teacup rolled around in the space between his legs. He wore one shoe. The other lay by the refrigerator across the kitchen. He couldn't bother remembering why he took it off. A soft moan escaped his lips. He didn't expect any sympathy from anyone in the house. It just relieved some of the aching.

The peas did little to soothe his eye, and they did nothing to soothe his conscience. His little amateur murder investigation failed. Nobody at the casino knew anything about Edmund's murder. God, he almost went to jail because of a bad hunch. That bruised his ego more than his conscience. Why did he need to soothe his conscience? Fuck you. Oh, yeah. Better stick to the mystery of #6. He felt himself nodding off and let it happen.

Damien snapped upright, the peas hit the the floor. Tink-tink-tonk again sounded behind him on the patio door. When a man with a fenced in backyard hears knuckles on his aluminum patio door in the dead of night, he might reconsider the wisdom of his recent brush with casino authorities, and his heart might beat a little faster.

Theresa's head poked into the kitchen, worry on her face.

You better stay in the bedroom, Damien told her.

Her head disappeared. Damien went into the living room to grab the trusty front-door umbrella. Weapon in hand, he removed his other shoe and padded across the kitchen on stocking feet. The small window in the door looked on to nothing but shadows. The patio light burnt out weeks ago. Damien listened for a moment but heard nothing to tell him what awaited beyond. Tonk-tonk startled him, and he jerked his head back. He quickly regrouped. Now or never.

He threw open the door, or he would have thrown open the door if it hadn't been for the dead bolt he'd forgotten to unlatch. The door banged to a stop, and his hand to slipped off the knob. The basement stairs behind him almost swallowed him whole, but his outstretched arms caught the door frame. He righted himself, glad his wife hadn't been around to mock his folly. After unlocking the dead bolt, Damien opened door.

The light from the kitchen lit up a small patch of patio and revealed the knocking-man. The reflection off the lenses of his dark glasses played Damien's silhouette in stereo. Below the glasses he wore a porn star mustache. The visitor leaned against the back of the house and shivered in the spring chill even with a red flannel shirt on. He breathed heavy as if he'd run all the way from Daniel Boone Estates trailer park. For the briefest of moments, the grimace on his face teased a little sympathy out of Damien.

You expecting rain like a good Englishman?

Damien looked sideways at the umbrella and wondered when he'd raised it up like a club.

What are you doing here, Kinch? Damien asked without any sympathy anywhere near the question. It's late, and I'm tired, he said as he lowered the umbrella.

I have something you might want to know.

Who killed my Uncle?

No.

How did you get here?

Stole my neighbor's Buick Regal. She goes to bed early.

Right, right, Damien said. Details were best left for stories that didn't involve felonies. Why didn't you...

Damien trailed off. He must be tired. He'd almost fed Kinch a line that would lead to some long Kinchian rant about the breadth of modern electronic eavesdropping.

Why didn't I what? Kinch wasn't one to let an opportunity to rant pass him by.

Why didn't you just call? Damien sighed with resignation and readied himself for a lecture.

Kinch, his body exhausted from the very fact he was there, leaned in close. His breath, hot and infused with a medicinal smell, blew against Dame's chin.

Why didn't I call?

Yeah, stupid question. Forget I asked.

Damien turned to go into the kitchen. Kinch grabbed the shoulder of his fleeing host, maybe to stop Damien from leaving, maybe to hold himself up.

I didn't call, Damien Samuel Berchshire, because I didn't fucking feel like it.

An oddly reasonable statement from Kinch.

Right.

Plus, the NSA tracks every phone call.

There was the crazy. But it was late and not the time to argue with Kinch about his insane conspiracy theories.

Goodnight, Kinch.

Aren't you going to let me in? Kinch asked.

No, I don't fucking feel like it.

Why not? a female voice asked.

Damien spun. Theresa stood right behind him. He looked passed her and up the stairs and through the kitchen, around the corner and into the bedroom where there must surely be another Theresa who understood why a person stayed safely out of sight when ominous knocks come to the back door. But no, there was only one Theresa, and she stood in front of him on the small landing wearing her pajama pants and a baggy sweatshirt with a purple K and a yellow flame on the front.

Come on in, she said and headed up the stairs. Kinch, right?

Kinch pushed passed Damien and went up the stairs to the kitchen leaving Damien to close and lock the door. Not an easy task since the house settled and the door no longer sat square to the frame. A certain amount of jiggling, hefting and pushing was required.

Dame walked into the kitchen and found Kinch sprawled on a kitchen chair. Theresa was nowhere in sight.

Nice lady, Kinch said.

Sometimes.

Damien took the chair with it's back to the wall. It put him closer to Kinch than he'd like, but Damien wanted to be able to see both doors. It had been a crazy day and looked to be a crazy night, so vigilance seemed important.

Kinch opened his eyes and noticed Damien sitting kiddie-corner from him. He shifted in his chair to get his feet under him then spent a minute fidgeting and looking behind him at the door. He couldn't make it work, so he labored to get up. Kinch finally settled down in the chair directly across from Damien. Now they both could see the doors.

I've got something for you, The newly settled Kinch said.

Sao Paolo, Damien said with a little smirk to rub in the fact that he found this information before Kinch could tell him. So it was good to see you. Drive safe.

"Sure, whatever. It's right there on his facebook page. If you ever bothered to get on the damn thing, your stupid questions would answer themselves."

"You want me to be on facebook?" Damien asked.

Kinch hated the internet, or at least those fools who used the internet without the least understanding of how all their searches, tags and posts would lead to their eventual enslavement by the powers that be.

Whatever Kinch said, How'd you find out?

The police told me.

Kinch raised his eyebrows.

"So you haven't friended Edmund Spenser, single, living in Sao Paolo, hometown of Liverpool in the last 48 hours.

You know I haven't. Edmund's dead.

True, but just yesterday morning I logged on, found him and just for kicks sent a friend request. And my dear, Dame, not three hours later Edmund Spenser, the Edmund Spenser found dead on your lawn, accepted my request.

Damien stayed clear of most social media, but he still knew enough to understand dead men don't accept friends.

Why would he accept you as a friend even if he was still alive? He doesn't know you from Adam.

I made you a facebook profile.

Why? was the only question Damien could ask, and the one he knew the answer to.

How else was I going to do it?

Exactly. How else? No way else. No way around the monolith. Kinch needed to dive into the blue square with the white f, and there was no way someone named Kinch entered its domain without a disguise on. Damien didn't bother to ask how.

What's my login and password?

What are you pissed about? I tracked him down like you asked. Plus, I found out some important shit.

"Kinch, do I look like I want