The Darkness Inside Us (A Detective King Suspense Thriller) (A Detective King Novel Book 3) (13 page)

“Oh, that’s so kind of you, dear.” Mrs. Connelly leans in for a hug. I embrace her and feel a cold chill like someone breathed down the back of my neck. I smile and endure it while she hugs me and fills my nose with the scent of old woman perfume. Why anyone would wear that scent is beyond me. “I’ll give you the details after the meeting. I think they’re about to start now.”

I look at Tim who shrugs and takes my hand, offering me a reassuring squeeze. We both walk into the enormous meeting hall where they usually address the numerous budget issues and the cutbacks that the schools hear about all the time. I kicked myself over and over in college for going into a field that is so readily slashed for the sake of the government, but I have a passion for what I do and I won’t let money stand between me and fulfillment. I think Tim understands that too. We both just came to terms with the fact that we wouldn’t be taking cruises any time soon. Together, we find two seats and drop down next to each other, nestling in for the long, sermon-esque address that is sure to put us both to sleep.

Together, we all listen as we’re notified that, like we all suspected in the first place, the CDC did not find any trace of neurotoxin or any kind of mind-altering chemicals or gasses inside of the school. There were no diseases, viruses, or bacteria detected either that would conclude that there was a biological attack upon the school. I look at Tim, who rolls his eyes for me, and we both continue to listen as the spokesperson tells us all what we already know. No one has a goddamn clue what went on at the school and why Pamela and the two students decided to kill themselves at the same time. Honestly, I don’t care anymore. It’s weird, it’s freaky, and I just want to move past all of this.

XIV

I stare at the girl putting the four tacos in a red, plastic basket in front of me and can’t help but realize that for a topless bar waitress, her nipples are nowhere near perky. They’re flat and bored and I can’t help but think that it should be a cardinal rule of any topless establishment that it should be cold enough or whatever needs to happen for the waitresses to all have pointy, erect nipples every time someone comes into the establishment for a shift. That’s basic customer service in these kinds of places and right now, I feel like I’m not getting my money’s worth.

She puts the food down in front of me and I can’t help but realize where I am and the fact that I’m about to eat the food here. I look at the tacos and come to terms with the honest to God truth that there is nothing appealing about the food in front of me. The waitress smiles at me in a phony sort of way that makes my skin crawl, like I’m being tolerated rather than appreciated. She looks at me with that grotesque smile and I realize that this woman is nothing but a sex doll. She’s got the big blonde hair that’s ratted in the back, a set of fake tits with no perky nipples, and the kind of makeup that makes her look like she’s been stuck in the eighties for too long. I don’t find her attractive, maybe because she’s too old for my selective tastes, but so far, I know that I’m not tipping her.

“Will that be all, sweetheart?” As she says the words they feel like ash being stuffed into my earholes. It’s just wrong and completely unwanted. What I want is for her to go away. I nod to her and thankfully she does go away.

I don’t know why I eat at places like this. After a night of drinking myself into oblivion and a morning filled with paperwork, though, who could blame me? As I look at my waitress walking away with cottage cheese legs, I can’t help but feel like this is an omen of things to come. Maybe Florida isn’t going to be that amazing. Maybe I should go attend Kate’s funeral and wipe away all the plans of running away to some sex-infested beach and think of some other way to invest my time. God knows what I’d do, but maybe there’s more out there for me than private investigation and cheap sex.

My phone vibrates and I dig it out of my pocket. I look at the name when I flip it open and realize that I never called Owens. I never told him that we were done, and lo and behold, here he is, calling me. I hit the talk button and think over the multitude of excuses and reasons that I could give him, but I figure that in the end, I’ll just wing it with him. Who knows how much Lola has told him? I hold the phone to my ear. “King,” I answer.

“Where the fuck are you?” Owens demands instantly. “We get two bodies in twelve hours and everyone keeps telling me that you’ve gone off the radar. Penny and Lola said that you’re off the case, that you pushed it up the chain of command. What the fuck is that all about, King?”

“I didn’t push it up,” I tell him honestly. “The feds showed up at the high school, and they took over from there. It’s all theirs now and there’s not a goddamn thing that you or I are going to do about it, Owens. It’s their case now. We’re running support wherever they need us.”

“You know the feds, King,” Owens argues with me and I have no idea why. “They’re going to backtrack, get lost following their own footsteps, and this killer is going to keep on killing and you know that he’s got Kelly in his sights, and you’re just going to pack up and call it quits on me? What the fuck is this all about? Since when did your balls abandon you?”

“Three people died yesterday because of me,” I tell him coldly, letting my tone and attitude speak more than volumes of shouts and profane berating ever could.

“I hate to break this to you, King.” Owens brushes it off, not even letting my reply faze him. I can’t help but envy that sort of attitude. I wish I could just let all of this fall off my shoulders, but I can’t. It’s stuck with me, because I’m the one with the responsibility. I got exactly what I didn’t want out of this arrangement, and now I’m dealing with the guilty conscience, not Owens. “But, there’s been a hell of a lot more than three people killed during the course of this investigation and I’m not done hunting this asshole, which means that you’re not either. You’ve still got time before you retire and I don’t intend on letting you sit behind a desk when this fucker is still running free. You got me? So get a pen, get something to write on, and take this address. We’ve got another one.”

I don’t know what it is, maybe the disappointing tacos, the depressed nipples, or maybe this whole damn speech that Owens so eloquently crafted for my benefit, but I take the address on the napkin and leave the diner, tossing a few quarters from my pocket on the table next to a ten dollar bill to pay for my tacos. It’s more than she deserves for making my lunch more depressing than what I’m already dealing with. Getting into the Shelby, it takes me thirty minutes to get to a parking garage at the Garden Hills school district main offices that are tucked away near where Parker High is.

I’m met by Owens and the original cohorts of the patrol division who have so fraternally built up a network to help Owens get revenge on his mythical serial killer. Today, his victim is no doubt whoever the kid on the overpass met with last night. To my surprise, what’s left of the woman looks like she’s an adult, which means that she’s probably a teacher. Again, I feel the familiar burn that I’m just playing cleanup for the demon and that there’s nothing really proactive here that I’m going to learn. There won’t be fingerprints or DNA, because this woman, whoever she is, really did mutilate, maim, and horrifically kill herself. That’s the sad truth here.

“Meet Susan Larsen,” Owens says to me, holding his hands outstretched to a rolling parking garage gate that has rolled up into the ceiling, but has stopped just in time for the victim’s body to still have her legs intact. I’m not sure what kind of a benefit that will be to her family, but it makes things interesting for us.

Looking at the scene I can read it rather easily. Susan Larsen came down to the parking garage, stuck her head in the vertically ascending grated gate that triggered whenever a vehicle came near the sensor. Sticking her head, hands, and legs through the grates in the fence, she sat there, waiting for someone to come and slowly, the gate rolled up toward the ceiling where it crunched, crushed, and detached her head from her neck, ripping and tearing it free brutally before it repeated the process with her hands. Whoever the driver was, they got out and rushed over to the emergency shut off switch and stopped it before her legs could be ripped off by the motor and the unyielding ceiling.

What remains is a woman in a floral sundress hanging upside down from a metal, grate patterned fence with her arms shattered, broken, torn apart by steel and concrete and most of her forearms taken off as well as her head. Her dress is hanging down, exposing her underwear that is soiled brown with her emptied bowels and the blood that’s run down her stomach and chest, before dripping from her savaged neck down into a puddle of blood, shit, and urine. Her head is caved in, badly broken, and right in the middle of all the blood. It’s hard to tell that this was a woman. Whether she was attractive or not is beyond me. I can hardly even tell if she was anything other than a redhead. Her mode of killing herself was beyond efficient.

“What did she do at the school?” I ask Owens, looking at the mangled fingers and hands near her head, jagged bones ripping up out of her skin. “Was she a teacher, a counselor, or something else?”

“She was a teacher at Parker High,” Owens answers, but I didn’t need to know that. I already know that she worked at Parker High. Everyone who is dying right now is someone at Parker High. I look over at Owens and turn away.

“So it’s still after Kelly then,” I say, feeling the weight of the world on my shoulders once more.

Honestly, the disappointment comes from the fact that I had been wrong. I know that the demon has a weakness and that I’m close. It’s what has driven it to the frenzy and murderous vendetta against me, because I’m closing in on it and it wants to discourage or break me before I find it. But I also hoped that maybe it would find Agent Halbert as its new target, now that I was supposed to be off the case. Granted, the creature probably doesn’t know that I’m off the case unless it was taking refuge in a police officer or someone in the department who is well aware that the FBI are starting to take point on all of this. Maybe the creature needs to have a run in with Agent Halbert.

“I’ve got men outside of her house,” Owens tells me. “There’s been no sign or movement for a while. Did you tell her that someone is after her?”

“Yeah,” I nod, lying to him. She’s not in the house, but I’m not about to let that information slip out. I don’t want anyone knowing where she is, because right now, there’s no way of the creature tracking her if she’s using cash while she’s on the run. I don’t even know where she is. Unless she’s drawn out somehow, she should be completely safe. If I’m really lucky, she’ll get out of here before her mother’s funeral. That’s the only time I think she could be successfully lured out into the open by the demon and struck. I realize that the clock is ticking and that I need to stop this thing before they lower Kate into the ground. “Was there a note?” I ask Owens, trying to pull him away from the subject of Kelly. I don’t want Owens messing up her silent escape.

“There was.” Owens hands me a slip of paper and I wish that I was surprised by all of this, but I’m not anymore. This demon has a hard on for me and I’m going to have to kill it before it kills me. I take the note and read it.

‘
When those you care for have died, you’ll wish you were next. –Susan
’. I find it strange that the demon didn’t address it to me and that it’s only one sentence this time. It’s starting to slip more and more. It’s not even willing to follow through with all the signs and little tricks it had employed prior to my involvement. It’s getting sloppier by the minute. I’m close to the thing. I just need to get a little closer.

I decide that I need to take a chance, but it’s risky. I know that it’s going to try to lure Kelly out into the open and it’ll most likely try to do this with Kate’s funeral. I need to talk to her. I need to tell her what’s really going on here, and if I’m lucky, she might actually listen to me. I need her to see that I’m not a madman and that there’s more going on here than meets the eye. I need to tell someone other than Lola what’s really happening here. I need to tell her the truth.

XV

The phone rings and I’ve never felt this nervous. I can feel my bones rattling, shaking with my nerves that have been unleashed upon me like nothing I’ve felt before. I feel like a fool, a child attempting to voice pure madness. I look back at the crime scene, where Susan Larsen is hanging like some sort of horrifying Halloween piece. I listen to the second ring and I can feel my heart thundering, sending tidal waves of terror shooting through my veins while I wait for her to answer. This is madness and this is insanity and I’m about to tell my daughter something that no one would ever hope to believe.

“Hello?” I hear her voice and I feel all that thundering blood in my veins freeze over like an arctic gale washing over me. I stare at Susan Larsen down the driveway that’s packed with patrol cars and I wonder if I could just show her the video footage.

“Hey, Kelly, it’s your father,” I say after a moment. “I need to talk with you about something and I know that it’s probably not going to make sense a whole lot, but I just need you to listen and have an open mind about it. Can you do that?”

There’s silence on the other end, Kelly listening to the breathing, waiting to assess whether she should trust her father or not. I feel nothing but fear right now, it’s the kind of aching fear that makes me wonder why I’m even trying. It screams at me to give up and to try again another time. I was a fool to think that this is the route I should take. No, I should have been smarter. I should have gotten the footage for her to see. I should have gotten some kind of proof for her so that she wouldn’t doubt what I have to say. Slowly, I drop down into the driver seat of the Shelby and shut the door behind me. I don’t want anyone to hear.

Quite frankly, I’m scared that the demon is watching me, lurking inside the skin of another person, listening to my every word, my every movement, and watching who I talk to. It’s taking down names and numbers, waiting to find someone to strike after it gets Kelly. It’s going to keep striking until everyone I’ve ever known is dead, that’s what it implied with Susan Larsen’s note. I can’t let it get to Kelly. I can’t let it kill anyone else. It’s time to end this. It’s time to end all of it and get on with life. This thing has been around for God knows how long and I’m ready to finish the job Owens started.

“Okay,” Kelly answers, and I feel a skip in my heartbeat. I feel a smile spreading across my lips and then a new sort of horror sinks into my mind. I have to phrase everything that I’m going to tell her in a way that’s perfectly normal and as comprehensive and believable as possible. I need her to understand exactly what I’m saying and get it to sink in. I need her to believe me just long enough to catch this asshole creature in some sort of trap. I’m not sure how, but it’s going to end just how it started, in bloodshed.

“I’ve found out how the killer is tracking his victims,” I tell her calmly, trying to string this together as I go along. I feel like I’m one step from oblivion and as I take a moment I can almost hear the silent breaths wafting through the signals hitting my cellphone. “For a long time now, we’ve been wondering how the killer tracks two people at once, the immediate victim and the preceding victim. Some thought that there were multiple killers, but the degree of maneuverability that would require is too great. No one was really sticking with the multiple killers because in the end, no one knew how the killer got out of the crime scenes so quickly. He would have to be a Houdini-esque escape artist. No one was buying it for long. So we started thinking that it might be a poison of some kind, a neurotoxin that the killer is passing on from victim to victim based on the last person they meet. But, none of the tox screens were coming back with any kind of confirmation on that. So we were left at a dead end. All the while, the killer was getting bolder and bolder.”

“So you now know how he’s killing them?” Kelly asks, thankfully reminding me that she’s actually interested in what I have to say. Bless her heart, but the hard part is coming. I take a moment to gather myself before I speak.

“Sort of,” I answer. “The night your mother died, the last person she came in contact with was David Marcus, her fiancé. Did you know him?”

“A little,” she answers. “Mom and I weren’t on the best of terms there at the end. I didn’t think that David was the kind of guy that she should be marrying. I accused her of gold digging.”

“Well,” I said, glad that I wasn’t the only person who thought that, “when you were going to meet your mother and I intercepted you with the call, I went there hoping to catch you and tell you in person. After we talked on the phone, I decided to go in and get something to eat since I hadn’t eaten in forever and it was a place with good memories for me.”

“Okay,” she says, and I realize I’m starting to lose her.

“Well, David Marcus was there, waiting for you,” I tell her and the silence on the other end of the phone is pregnant with silent contemplation and unspoken questions. I can feel it strangling me, but I have to keep talking. “He’d come there because he knew that you and your mother were going to meet there, even though he was well aware of your mother’s death at that point. When I walked in through the front door, he rose and confronted me, even though the two of us had never officially met. I brushed it off like he’d maybe seen a picture of me, but it felt odd. Finally, he swore to me that he was going to get you, Kelly, even though he’d missed you this time. Then he ended his life. Killed himself right there.”

The silence is poisonous and I want to hear her say something. Finally, after moments of silence, I can hear her exhale. “That doesn’t make any sense, Steven,” she says in a very empirical voice. “Why would he swear to get me and then kill himself? If you’re trying to pin this on David, then it doesn’t make any sense. Why would he kill Mom or any of the other victims? Why would he be a serial killer?”

“He wasn’t,” I tell her.

“Then what are you saying?” Kelly presses.

“I grabbed the security footage and headed to the tech lab at the precinct,” I tell her, continuing on with the story so she can catch up with me. “I had one of the best technicians analyze it and when we did, we discovered something that sounds absolutely impossible and completely insane, but I assure you that it’s the God’s honest truth. I need you to trust me on this, Kelly. I can show you the footage if you need it, but you have to trust me.”

“Steven, what is it?” she presses, the suspense, no doubt, killing her.

“We saw something transition from David’s body to the next victim’s body,” I tell her. I don’t wait for the impending silence and keep pushing. “The last person that David touched was found the following day dead as well, and the last person he in turn touched was one of the students at your school. But that night, at the bar, they had a high enough quality of security systems that we were able to slow things down and clean them up, and what we saw was some kind of shadowy entity passing from David to the next victim. When we started researching it, we came up with the fact that it’s some sort of demonic entity. I know it sounds insane, and I swear to you that I’m as much as a doubter as anyone, but this is enough to make me believe. The killer is a demonic force, possessing people in order to get to you and when it gets a little closer or finds someone who is a little closer to you, then it discards their bodies and they end up killing themselves. It defies everything I know and believe, but when I saw the footage, I knew instantly what we were dealing with was supernatural. I need you to believe me on this, Kelly. You have to know that this thing is getting closer and it wants to harm you.”

There’s another long period of silence and I wait patiently, praying to whatever god there is that she’ll believe me, that she’ll understand what I’m saying. I don’t know if I should say anything more or if I should try to explain why she needs to believe me, but I don’t think it’s going over well. If she doesn’t believe me, she might just give up hiding and go back to her home where the demon will gladly kill her. It’ll get to her easier that way and I’m not about to let the thing keep going for her. I’m not a good father, but I’m not giving up my daughter either.

“Miss Beasly was a good woman,” Kelly tells me. “Alice Walker was a bitchy prima donna, but she wasn’t a suicide case, she loved herself too much. Miss Beasly would never kill herself either. They said that Mom killed herself too, but Mom was about to get everything that she thought she wanted in her life. It didn’t make sense to me that she killed herself either. When they told me David killed himself, I suspected that it was just because Mom had killed herself. Honestly, none of this makes sense, Steven. But I’m not a skeptic like you are. I’m not a cynic. I’ve been a romantic for the majority of my life, just sick of my reality. I do believe that these sort of things are possible, always have. I never discredited what I couldn’t see. If you say that this is what you and the others believe, then I’m willing to believe also. But where does that leave me? If I can’t trust another person who comes up to me and wants to hug me or shake my hand, then I’m not much use to the world.”

“I know,” I tell her honestly, so grateful that she is who she is. I’m glad that I wasn’t there to corrupt her, to quell her spirit and dampen her ideals. I’ve always been too vocal about my disliking of others and their beliefs. I’m glad that she was able to grow up without that in her life. Sometimes, people are better off without their parents. “I think this thing is going to try and lure you out. I need to know if you know a woman named Susan Larsen, she was a teacher at Parker High with you.”

“Was? Jesus, Steven, how many more people that I know are going to die?” I can almost hear the hatred and fury in her voice and feel pity for her. I know exactly how she feels. It’s a dark and unwelcoming reality. I look at her dead friend and wonder how many more do have to die before this thing finally gets to my daughter. When everyone she knows is dead, will the creature give up because it exhausted all of its resources in getting to her? I don’t know. I don’t want to find out. “I knew her, Steven. She was new at the school, but we were starting to become really close friends.”

“Well, she died at the district offices,” I tell her, suddenly wondering when the FBI are going to get here. They’ll be furious if they see me at the scene. Besides, I need to act. I need to start setting the trap for this demon. “I know that the demon is now in one of the staff members for the school, probably someone you’re close with.”

Again, the silence is enough to make me want to scream, but it gives me time to start the engine and look down the ramp, out of the garage. I don’t want Agent Halbert or the demon knowing what my next move is. Mostly, I don’t want Agent Halbert here to see me when he arrives. I’ll get the ass-chewing of a lifetime and I don’t have the patience for one of those today. If my luck still holds, I can get out of here before he pins a bull’s eye on my back. No doubt, he’s already looking into me. All he’s going to find is a bunch of whoring and a bunch of nothing. As I back, out, I can hear Kelly exhale again on the other end of the line.

“Debra Connelly called me,” she says to me finally. “I didn’t answer the phone and let it go straight to voicemail. She said that she missed me at the meeting and told me everything that was discussed, how the school is going to handle the tragedy. She sounded completely normal, but I suppose she would, wouldn’t she? I don’t think it would be like the exorcist really.”

“David sounded the same as he did on the phone when I talked to him,” I tell her. “Did you make any plans with her?”

“Debra doesn’t really do things like a normal person,” I tell him. “She makes the plans and then sort of guilts you into coming through her invitation. And that’s exactly what she did. They want to have dinner at Goliath’s tonight and she told me that there’s a whole group from the English department going to be there. She listed off everyone who was going and Susan was one of them. I think that’s when it’s going to happen, Steven. If they want to draw me out, that would be when. I mean, she obviously talked to Susan today.”

She’s right. “You’re not going to that, obviously,” I tell her. I feel something inside of me, a spark of hope that’s starting to roar into a fire of confidence. This might actually be the chance we need to get this thing. It’s shown its hand too early and I’m going in for the kill. I think back to the other times that I’ve been this close to the demon and it’s slipped past me. I’m not willing to let that happen again. I’m not going to let it go. I’m going to catch the bastard this time and I’m going to end its reign of terror. “I’m going to make sure that I catch this thing, Kelly. This is the best chance we’ve got,” I tell her honestly.

“I hope you get it, Steven,” she says to me.

“I will,” I promise her, but I know that this thing is slippery and I’ve been down this road before. I don’t want to fail like I did last time. I don’t want to let it get away and get one step closer to Kelly. It’s going down this time and there’s nothing it can do to stop me. It’s not going to escape me. “I’ll talk to you soon, Kelly.”

“Be careful, Steven,” she warns me.

I feel a flutter of happiness in my heart. She cares at least a little about me. “I will,” I tell her before hanging up. As I drive away, I try to remember where Goliath is. It has to be close to this general part of the city. Why else would they plan it here? I quickly call dispatch, transferring myself to Penny’s extension. Thankfully, she answers after the first ring like the professional that she is. “Penny, it’s King,” I tell her.

“Hey, did you talk to Owens? He’s going crazy about this whole thing,” she says to me.

“I did,” I tell her. “He’ll get over it, I’m sure. But right now, I need the phone number to a restaurant called Goliath and it should be in the general area of Parker High School. Can you find that for me?”