There's a Killer Lurking At Every Curb

By Travis Ford

Lieutenant Schrinner Soebez is in command of homicide investigations in New York City at the 96th precinct. When a prostitute turns up dead, it's a murder case. But when another prostitute is found dead, is it the works of a serial killer? Lt. Soebez is on the hunt for a dangerous killer and finds something bigger.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Dec 27, 2011
• ISBN: 9781105395659

Travis Ford

Travis Ford was born in Brooklyn (Bed-Stuy) New York. He is a writer of mystery/suspense/erotic fiction. He writes with a sense of reality. Other subjects of titles include general and children fiction.

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There's a Killer Lurking At Every Curb

THERE’S A KILLER LURKING AT EVERY CURB

BY

TRAVIS FORD

There’s a Killer Lurking At Every Curb

By

Travis Ford

Copyright ©2017 Travis Ford

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission by the author.

All characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

THERE’A KILLER LURKING AT EVERY CURB

BY

TRAVIS FORD

CHAPTER 1

Run Schrinner! Run!  Rayleen screamed.

Schrinner was paralyzed. He wanted to help his father, but he couldn’t.  He was helpless.  While his father laid there he was screaming, frantically.  Terrified.

Get out of here, was all his father could say.

Schrinner took one last look then ran down the steps abandoning his father.

He woke from the nightmare sweating hearing the sound of the phone jingle in its cradle. Exhausted from pulling a double shift, he reached over and grabbed his pack of cigarettes and lit one up.

Ah. That feels so good.

A glance at the green glow of the digital clock showed 2:16 a.m. He picked the phone up.

What?

Lieutenant, Sergeant Pagciane speaking.  We found another one.  In an abandoned alleyway.  Bullet wound to the back of the head.

How do you know it’s related to the others?

Body arranged in the same position as the others.

Shit.  Where at?

Bottom of Harlem Street.

"Lieutenant Soebez headed for the closet and picked out a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt.  He reached into the nightstand which the phone was a top and grabbed his gold badge, keys, and service pistol.  A .38 special snub nose.  With that, he headed outside.  He forgot something.  What was it?

His cigarettes.  At the door he fumbled for the right key.

His cigarettes were right where he left them.

He retrieved his cigarettes and lighter.

This case was really getting to the Latin American 36 year old man.  At five eleven, he was proportionate with his height.  He had brown eyes and with his black hair cut close to his head, it made like he was in the military.

His head was still spinning from the night he came home.  As soon he got home, he had poured himself some gin.  Before long he was drinking straight out of the bottle.  That was the thing about Schrinner.  He didn’t know when to stop drinking.  But he was a good cop.  A good clean cop.  Not like most of them.   Most of them were on the take.  God, how he hated those slime buckets.  It was enough that there was a possible serial killer on the loose in the streets of New York.

As he entered the police unit, he lit up another one.  Traffic was clear this time of the morning.  But the hookers were still out hoping to turn a trick.  As he drove to the crime scene, he put the siren up, and then did otherwise.

What am I racing for?

The stiff isn’t going anywhere.

Relax, he said to himself.

As he drove in silence, he was thinking about his reoccurring nightmare.

It was a few days before Christmas.

He was so excited.  That night the Christmas tree had ignited and had caused a fire.  That’s what the fire department had traced it to.

Immediately after smelling the smoke, his first instinct was to save his son Schrinner.  After the fatal car accident that took the life of his wife a year before, he was determined not to lose his only son.

In an effort he had dashed into the ten year old’s bedroom an awoken him, picked him up and raced to the door.  The house was blazing.  Yellow orange flames were everywhere.  There was barely any oxygen from all the smoke.  It seemed like they were in for it.  Coughing and staggering with Schrinner, he reached almost to the top of the stairs.  Then it happened. Suddenly the roof begins to collapse.  He lets Schrinner go in time.  But he was pinned to the floor by falling debris.  He tells his son to leave him. Schrinner obeys his father and runs down the steps through the burning house to the neighboring home of the Andersons for help.  There at the household of the Andersons the fire department was notified.

Lt. Soebez finally comes across the scene.  He could tell by the looks of things that forensics had not left yet.  As he stepped out of the car, he hears a familiar voice calling towards him.

Lt.  Soebez.  Over here, Sgt. Pagciane hollered.

What are we looking at? Lt. Soebez asked.

A hooker walked back here to take a leak in the alley, found the victim up under some cardboard boxes.  Same position as the others.  Arms stretched outwards, legs together as if she was crucified on the cross as in the Crucifixion of Jesus Christ, though face down.  The victim, a brunet in her late twenties, early thirties, maybe.  Bullet wound to the back of the cranium.  No I.D.  No purse.  No nothin.  Looks the same as the other two.

This is just fucking great.  Just fucking great!  Lt. Soebez was furious.

What about the hooker who found her?

Her name is Sexy Chocolate.

Well Sexy Chocolate then, Lt. Soebez said.

She says she’s seen the victim around but she wasn’t a friend of hers.  She’s right over there if you want to talk to her.  Sgt. Pagciane then pointed to a lime green headed black female.  Perhaps in her thirties.  She wore a blue mini skirt with some fish net stockings.  She were asking one of the officers if she could go.

Sgt. Mathew Pagciane was your typical cop with wife, two kids; a boy and a teenage daughter.  He was a whopping six feet two inches.  A black guy full of muscle.  He’s the kind you wouldn’t want to meet unarmed in a dark alley like this one, by his appearance.  How he envied the guy because he was a family man.

Soebez longed for a family.

As he approached the hooker he thought about the victim.

How could any woman want that type of  lifestyle?

He hoped that if he ever had a daughter, he would see to it that she would never have to go that route.

Miss?

Hey handsome.  You wanna get together sometime? The hooker asked doing a dance.

Lt. Soebez thought, How could she think of sex after she done witnessed a hooker like herself dead?

She reached for his groin, but having those cop reflexes, he batted her hand away.  He suddenly started to get a hard on.  How long has it been since he had sex? It seemed like ages ago.  After having a six year old relationship with Tyisha, he wasn’t much for dating.  He had a few dates, but it was nothing worth wild.

Will you tell me what happened? Lt. Soebez asked.

It took a few minutes for Sexy Chocolate to comprehend that the officer now standing in front of her wanted nothing to do with her whatsoever.  She got to the point and said, Well, I came back here to take a pis and I noticed what looked like a hand up underneath some boxes.  So I moved the boxes out of the way and I seen her.  And I screamed and ran and called you guys.  You know the rest.

You said you knew her.  What was her name?

I said I seen her around but I didn’t know her.  Can I go now?

Did you see anything unusual?

"Honey, ain’t nothing unusual in the streets of New York City.  If you asking if I’ve seen anybody drag a body to the alley, I