Excerpt from Stone Cold Killers

by Cortez Bryson

The Phillips’ home is a tri-level five-bedroom brownstone in Chicago’s well-to-do Gold Coast neighborhood.  Dusk was blanketing the evening sky and the cool spring breeze was blowing in off Lake Michigan.  The two front porch lights illuminated a warm and inviting glow.  From the sidewalk the sounds of music, laughter and cheerful conversations could be heard through an open window.  This particular evening the Phillips’ were celebrating the re-appointment of Justice Henry Phillips to the Illinois Supreme Court.  Henry hadn’t arrived yet.  A few of their closest friends and family were gathered in the living room for Henry’s surprise party.  It was a large room with a twelve-foot high ceiling.  The décor reflected a stylish and elegant art deco flare.  Various abstract and expressionistic paintings accented the walls and a sizeable bar was set at one end of the room.  Gloria Phillips was quite the hostess, a tall, slender, eloquent woman.  Shoulder length dark brown hair with murmurs of gray.  She had a warm yet slightly genteel personality that could brighten any room.  She made her way around the room of her eight guests with a graceful, yet, tactical precision engaging each of them in stimulating conversation.  Holding a drink in one hand and a cigarette in the other, Gloria knew how to work a room.  Her brown eyes sparkled as she cleverly dropped anecdotes that would rouse any conversation before whisking away to engage the other guests.  In all, her guests consisted of the elderly family physician Dr. Samuel White and his red-headed wife Frances, real-estate mogul Maxwell Wellington and wife Margaret, Henry’s closest friend and confidant the stoutly Chicago University Professor Jonathan Bernstein, Henry’s buoyant and beautiful secretary Stephanie Miller, his young protégé Attorney James Mallory, and Henry and Gloria’s only son Henry Jr.

It’s six o’clock on a Friday evening; the fresh spring air was blowing the sheers about an open window.  The waitress was offering hors d’oeuvres to the guests while the bartender was busy keeping the cocktails flowing and the sounds of Sarah Vaughn were resonating from the Hi-fi.  Conversations ranging from art, literature to various opinions of law were fluttering from one end of the room to the other.  The doorbell rang.  Gloria quaintly pardoned herself, sat her drink down and answered the door.  No one was there save a package wrapped in brown paper neatly bound in twine and positioned on the concrete porch.  She peered up and down the length of the block but saw no one.  Gloria curiously picked up the package and brought it inside when she saw the writing on it, which simply read Gloria Phillips.  Bewildered and apprehensive, she laid the package on a half table in the foyer.  She stared at the poorly handwritten name on top of the package, contemplating if she should open it.  Uneasiness welled within.  Convincing herself that it was harmless, she slowly untied the string, lifted the package and opened it.  Instantly panic and fear struck her like a surge of electricity darting through her chest.  An ill and nauseas feeling filled her stomach, then her mind raced frantically and her hands shook nervously.  The box slipped from her fingertips and fell to the floor.  Raising her hands to her face she screamed in frantic horror.  Inside the box lay a bloody finger with a ring attached to it.