Lethal love triangle

WHEN FAY SHORT learned that her live-in boyfriend, Thomas Higginbotham, had been found stabbed to death inside their South Philadelphia home last Friday, her heart-wrenching screams echoed down the block.

Friends and relatives consoled Short, 26, who had lived with Higginbotham for nearly three years and was the mother of his 6-month-old, as she threw herself to the ground, sobs racking her body.

With the baby in her arms, "she ran over to the stoop across the street and was bawling her eyes out," said Jacob Keen, 27, a next-door neighbor who was outside when medics found Higginbotham's body. "Someone had to take the baby from her arms."

But police say it was nothing more than a well-crafted performance by a devious woman who led a double life with two men - one of whom was Kieran Loyd, 24, whom she allegedly convinced to kill her other lover while she watched.

A week has passed since police say her cold-blooded scheme unfolded. Higginbotham, a 44-year-old father of seven, will be buried today.

"My dad was special. He was my best friend . . . He definitely wasn't perfect, but he didn't deserve that," said his son, Brandon Simmons.

Police have reported no motive in the fatal stabbing. Even Higginbotham's dumbfounded relatives offered no explanation for Short's alleged involvement.

The couple seemed happy, family members said.

The two had grown up together in the same neighborhood and their families were close, said Harold Higginbotham, Thomas' younger brother. But she was 18 years younger and didn't notice him until years later.

Eventually, they began seeing each other and decided to move in together in a home on Chadwick Street near Morris in South Philadelphia.

She was a trade-school student at the time; Higginbotham was unemployed but picked up enough construction jobs to support his family.

Simmons, 19, said that after his freshman year at Drexel University, Short got pregnant and the pair relocated to a rowhouse on Mole and Morris streets.

When the baby, Tyheem, was born, Simmons would visit and babysit.

"There didn't seem to be problems in their relationship," Simmons said.

Harold Higginbotham agreed.

"She seemed happy," he said. Thomas "was a jolly guy. She was a good actor."

It wasn't clear when Short started seeing Loyd - who got probation for a burglary conviction - but police say she told him that Tyheem was his son and that Higginbotham was her uncle.

"Where did this guy come from?" Harold Higginbotham asked of Loyd. "I never heard of him; I never saw him."

The night Higginbotham was killed, police say, Short was hysterical when she called Loyd, of Hunting Park, and begged him to come over.

"Loyd thought she was in serious danger and he was coming to protect her," said Sgt. Bob Cooney of the homicide unit, who added that police reported no domestic dispute at Short's house.

Loyd arrived at the house about 10:30 Thursday night, and Short met him outside with a knife in her hand, which she then handed to him, Cooney said.

She told Loyd to go inside and stab Higginbotham, he said.

Loyd went into the living room and stabbed Higginbotham to death while Short stood nearby, police said.

The pair, along with the child, then drove in her car to Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, where Loyd was treated for a gash on his hand, allegedly suffered during the assault, police said. Tyheem was unhurt.

Authorities were alerted the next morning after several visits to Higginbotham's home and phone calls from relatives went unanswered.

Relatives, unaware of her alleged involvement, called Short on her cell phone, and she returned, police said.

At 10:53 a.m. that day, Simmons got a phone call from Short, who he said was sobbing.

" 'Brandon, oh, my God!' " he said she told him. "Something happened to your dad. Somebody killed him.

"She was talking to me like she wasn't the prime suspect," he said.

Police later brought Short in for questioning, during which she allegedly revealed the details of her plot and Loyd's involvement.

Both have been charged with murder, conspiracy and related offenses.

Tyheem was sent to stay with Short's sister, who declined to comment yesterday.

Simmons said he and his other siblings feel cheated by who they thought was a part of their family.

"Whatever she needed, she got it," he said. "She didn't want for anything." That was the kind of guy their father was, he said.

A faithful churchgoer, Higginbotham regularly gave food to the homeless and was a go-to guy at his church, his brother said.

"Knowing who killed my father won't bring him back," Simmons said. "For those two to take his life . . . it wasn't theirs to take.

"I have to pray to God to have mercy on her." *