The Ashes (The Rebecca Underhill Trilogy Book 2)

by Vincent Zandri

  Now today, Rebecca is back in his office, swearing that Skinner is living inside a cornfield in the back of her property. Property that abuts a hilly, wooded landscape that once belonged to Joseph William Whalen, the man that abducted her not once, but twice. The man who killed her ex-husband and who indirectly killed her autistic savant friend, Francis Scaramuzzi. A man who, in Rebecca’s battered mind, is still somehow capable of killing even in death.

  He recalls a recent dead-end case. A cold case. An old man who washed up on the banks of the Hudson on the Albany side. An old man of eighty-five or so. Homeless, with no ID on him. The body was badly decomposed from having been in the water for at least a week. But one thing was clearly evident. He hadn’t fallen into the river by accident. He’d been tossed into the water, but only after the skin on his neck, face and scalp had been sliced and peeled away.

  Logging into the APD data site, Miller clicks on the John Doe’s page, once more takes in the mutilated body where it lay on the rocky riverbank, the State Troopers and uniformed APD personnel surrounding it. He then scans the autopsy photos once more, his stomach tightening at the sight of the skinned man’s exposed nasal passages and eye sockets, his gaping mouth opened wide, the gray, broken teeth no longer hidden behind lips.

  “What kind of animal are you, Skinner?” he whispers. He might not have definitive proof of Hanover’s guilt in the skin job, but in his detective’s gut, he knows The Skinner is responsible. The MO matches precisely. He wonders what other dead and skinned bodies he might come across one day soon. That is unless he can finally find a way to smoke the psycho killer out.

  “Rebecca Underhill,” he whispers. “She will lead me to you.”

  Miller switches the screen to a new Google search engine. This time, he goes to Google Maps and types in Garfield Road, Troy, New York. He switches to “earth view,” and the pristine aerial view of the rural farmscape emerges. He spots Rebecca’s house and then Sam’s house not far down the road. He zeros in on the cornfield they share behind their respective houses and barns.

  He then shifts the cursor so that it focuses on Mount Desolation, the stream and the waterfall beside it, and the plot of property that once belonged to the Whalen family. Zooming in as far as he can, he brings up what’s left of the house that burned to the ground eight years ago. The house that now has been reduced to a big black hole in the ground.

  He sits back in his swivel chair, steals a small sip of his whiskey.

  “Mr. Skinner,” he says, “is it possible you are living inside Whalen’s hole in the ground? Or have you found another rock under which to crawl? A place well within proximity to Rebecca Underhill and her family?”

  Rebecca is paranoid, he thinks. But not that paranoid. I’m guessing her kids have spotted Skinner and, assuming they have, he’s got to be living somewhere in the vicinity. But where? How?

  Then it comes to him. He might not be living inside Whalen’s old basement since it’s unlivable. But what if there’s a vacant house, or trailer, or structure that’s long been abandoned that he’s presently squatting inside? Something so out of the way no one in that sparsely populated area ever takes notice of him?

  He picks up his smartphone from off the desk, glances at his watch. Ten minutes till five. He thumbs the little microphone app on the Google search, and speaks, “Rensselaer County Tax Accessor.” A photo of the Accessor’s building along with driving directions and a phone number appear beside a green phone-like symbol. He taps the phone symbol, presses the device to his ear, listens to the electronic rings.

  “Come on,” he says, stealing another sip of whiskey. “Pick up . . . pick up.”

  Then someone picks up. “Accessor’s office.”

  He explains who he is, and if someone is there who can help him with a parcel of land he needs information about.

  “I can help you,” says the gentleman on the other line.

  “I’m wondering about some property on Garfield Road,” Miller says. “You know of any properties that have been abandoned and/or presently are not occupied?”

  “Like homes and houses?”

  “Even trailers,” Miller says.

  “Not that I know of. It’s mostly farmland and woods out there, and everything is occupied by either families who’ve been living there for years, or New York City Wall Street types who’ve bought up the property, converted them to weekend country getaways.”

  Miller can’t get Whalen’s basement out of his mind.

  “A basement,” he whispers.

  “Excuse me?” the man says.

  It’s as if a lightbulb has ignited over the detective’s head.

  “What about empty basements or cellars? You know, like a house construction that got started and then abandoned?”

  “It’s certainly possible.”

  “Have there ever been any plans as of late to subdivide any of the for-sale properties?”

  “Not recently,” the man says. He stalls a beat. Then, “But you know what? There was a subdivision that was under construction back in the mid-1960s if my memory serves me right. Of course, I’d have to pull out all the information.”

  Miller once more glances at his watch.

  “How much longer you open?”

  “Close up at six,” he says.

  The old detective pushes back his chair, stands.

  “I’m on my way,” he says.

  The stairs are older than my dead-and-gone great grandparents. They creak as I put weight on them while I descend into the damp, musty basement. Most people don’t think twice about the basement that exists beneath their everyday living space. The house I live in is over one hundred years old. The original structure started out as nothing more than a couple of rooms, the main room being the kitchen.

  Over the years the structure was added onto. The basement I’m descending into supports only the kitchen and a part of what is now the living room where the big stone fireplace is located. It’s a long, but narrow, stone-walled foundation with a packed dirt floor and only a single ceiling beam-mounted lighting device to illuminate the area closest to the staircase.

  No one comes down here anymore except Robyn who likes the way the minimal light shines on the old fieldstone walls, making them the perfect subject for one of her eerie, if not spooky, black pencil drawings, or even photographs. There’s still some old moldy furniture and knickknacks from eras gone by stored down here in old wood crates. On occasion, Robyn would rummage through the boxes and find a gem to utilize as a subject for her drawing or clay sculpture classes. A glass insulator from an old electrical pole maybe, or a pitchfork, the forks rusted and dulled. Once, she found an old Civil War-era pistol that must have belonged to my great-great-grandfather, the workings rusted out, the wood stock all but disintegrated.

  With each step I take down into the cavernous space, I feel my skin prickle and itch. It’s as if the insects that live and thrive down here have already begun to crawl into my clothing. When I come to the bottom, I take a step forward toward the upside-down cone of light, and I feel a thick spider web against my face and neck. My gut reaction is to slap the web away. But that’s when I feel the unmistakable sensation of a spider’s legs rapidly traipsing up the left side of my face.

  I scream.

  Raising my free hand, I slap my face so hard it’s as if it doesn’t belong to me at all. The spider drops to the dirt floor. Looking down, I can see that it’s a big, black ugly thing, its legs long, its belly bloated, and no doubt filled with thousands of little baby spiders. Lifting my foot, I bring it down on the son of a bitch. I feel its skin and skeleton and flesh crushing beneath my boot sole, the sensation not all that different from stepping on a soft-boiled egg.

  Bringing my fingertips to my face, I feel for a bite. There’s a pimple-like bump or growth on my right facial cheek now. The fucker bit me.

  “Now I know why we never came down here when we were kids, Mol,” I whisper.

  That place is major creepo, Bec. Not even Super Duper Troo
per Dan went down there. I think there're bodies buried there. I swear to God, lady.

  “Oh, well, now that makes me feel even better.”

  I move forward into the dust-filled light, wiping away webs that truly exist along with the ones that exist only in my imagination. The light is so dim I can hardly make out the walls that surround me. There is only darkness.

  The old light bulb flickers — off and on. My heart jumps into my throat.

  Christ, I should have brought a flashlight with me, and a knife. Why didn’t I think enough to bring a flashlight? Because my mind is a little pre-occupied right now. There’s a man who skins people alive living out in the cornfield. He’s abducted Mike Jr. and little Molly. He’s taken Robyn, maybe even from right out of her bed. He’s taken Sam. He’s hurt Sam. The proof is the blood on the kitchen floor. A blood trail that leads all the way down here.

  I peer down at my feet. Spots of blood on the packed dirt floor. Bending at the knees, I touch one of the droplets. The blood stains my fingertips. It’s that fresh. As if drawn to the blood, a snake crawls into the light, and my body goes catatonic. Paralyzed. I don’t possess the strength to stand up straight. The snake crawls over my booted foot, slithers its way out of the light and back into the darkness. It is as evil as it feels.

  I close my eyes, hoping that when I open them again, I will be lying on my back in bed. That this day, this hour, this minute, will all belong to a nightmare that is as fleeting as it will be forgettable. But when I open my eyes I am still down in the basement. I am still smelling the raw, cool, moldy odor, and I can still feel the snake that slithered over my foot. I find the strength to stand back up and move on into the depths of the old room.

  I don’t take three more steps before I make out the silhouette of a man.

  I need light. Maybe I should run back upstairs, find a flashlight. That would be the logical thing to do. But I know if I go back upstairs, no way in hell I’m coming back down into this dungeon. Not even for Sam. I swear to Christ I won’t be able to do it.

  That’s when I recall Robyn’s cigarettes. Rather, not her cigarettes, but her Bic lighter. I dig inside my jean’s pocket, pull it out. My hand shaking, I thumb the lighter and produce a flame, its orange glow flickering off the far stone wall. The glow also reflects off something else. Something that brings tears to my eyes and sucks all the air from my lungs.

  “Sam,” I say. “My God in heaven, what has he done to you?”

  The sun is setting as Detective Miller pulls into the small parking lot of the Rensselaer County Town Hall. The old, two-story brick structure looks like something out of an era gone by when radio was the dominant form of entertainment and people actually sat down to read books. Real paper books.

  Parking his unmarked APD cruiser, he jogs up the steps and heads inside. On the wall-mounted directory to his right, he finds the second-floor location of the Tax Accessor’s office. A wood staircase is to his left, and he doesn’t hesitate to climb the steps two at a time.

  His gut instinct has kicked in.

  At his age and experience on the job, it doesn’t require a lot of thought to know when something isn’t right or when an emergency might be brewing. It’s more of a gut feeling. A slight tightening of the stomach muscles maybe, or a noticeable rise in the blood pressure or a suddenly dry mouth. It all combines to translate into one thing — something bad is about to go down or something bad has already occurred, and something worse is now in the works.

  Coming to the top of the stairs, he hooks a quick right and finds himself speed walking to the office, the leather soles on his cordovans clip-clopping on the old, stately marble floor. Entering the office, he finds a big wood counter. A bell like you might find on the desk of an old motel is set on top of it. He slaps the bell, and a man walks out of a back room.

  “Detective Miller?” the short, balding man says.

  “That’s me,” Miller says.

  Short Man grins. “You must have flown here.”

  “I’m the law,” Miller says. “It’s okay if I speed.”

  “You own the road I guess,” Short Man says, his face pleasant and friendly. He holds out his hand. “I’m Mel. You were interested in the Garfield Road properties. I’ve already pulled the maps out. Hang tight.”

  He heads back into his office, comes back out with several maps that have been rolled up. He sets them down on the counter, spreads them out with his hands, places the bell on one side and a stapler on the other so that the maps don’t roll in on themselves.

  Miller peers down at the topographical map of squiggly lines combined with straight lines and coordinates that might as well be Greek to him.

  “What am I looking at?” he says.

  Mel says, “This is the most recent properties map on record. It’s from five years ago when the mayor called for an entire county reassessment of property taxes.”

  “Sub-divisions?”

  “As you can see, Detective,” Mel says, “there are none listed. At least, none listed on Garfield Road in the vicinity you’re interested in.”

  Miller stares down at the map. It takes a long moment or two, but eventually he recognizes the Underhill property and Sam’s beside it. Also, the cornfield. Behind that, the undeveloped second growth forest which now covers the old Whalen property along with Mount Desolation in the background.

  “When we spoke on the phone a few minutes ago,” Mel goes on, “you asked me if there were any abandoned houses or trailers or even basements that might be occupied by a squatter.”

  “That’s right,” Miller says.

  “So I’m assuming you’re looking for somebody in particular.”

  “Maybe.”

  Mel tosses Miller a wink of his eye like he’s about to one up the old detective.

  “Well, take a look at this,” Mel says, lifting the bell, and allowing the old map to roll up all on its own.

  Miller stares down at a property tax map that is clearly far older than the map from 2011. In fact, when he examines the far corner of the map, he can see that the date printed on it is May 1965, the same year he entered his freshman year at Albany High School.

  While the shape of the road snaking through the rural area is the same as the 2011 map, the properties carved out are not. In fact, the property where the cornfield exists is now separated into dozens of square parcels with a road in the center that ends in a circular turnaround or what’s sometimes known as a cul-de-sac.

  “What’s this?” Miller says, pressing his finger down on the turnaround.

  “That, my friend, is a subdivision.” He taps one of the little squares and rectangles that’s been drawn in the center of each small subdivided lot. And these are all the nice little houses that were supposed to be built on them.”

  Miller feels his blood coursing fast through his veins.

  “Did any of this get built?”

  “Not at all,” Mel says. “Records indicate that the property owners put up a fight to bar that kind of suburban sprawl from ever tainting what to them was an idyllic country setting. In the end, the investors went belly up.”

  Must be Trooper Underhill fought the subdivision and won, Miller thinks. Underhill and his then neighbors.

  “However,” Mel says, raising his hand, extending his index finger like he’s about to make the revelation of the century. “Some construction did begin on the property after the court extended a temporary right-of-way to the contractor. From what I understand, the basement on what was to be the showcase home was constructed along with the overhead flooring. Also, a series of sewer lines were excavated and the pipe laid. Deep lines that potentially run anywhere from a mile to three miles, all the way into the city of Troy, east of downtown Albany.”

  “Where is this basement you speak of?”

  “If I had to guess, it would be located in this vicinity here.” Mel brings his finger down on top of the location, on the house that would have been located at the very southern end of the subdivision on the circle.

>   “That’s in the middle of the cornfield,” Miller mumbles to himself. “Maybe one hundred feet behind Rebecca’s house. Holy Christ almighty.”

  “Excuse me?” Mel says.

  “You’re sure the records indicate that the flooring for the first floor of that one house was installed prior to the project going bust?” Miller says, peeling his eyes away from the map.

  “That’s what the notes indicate.”

  “Can you get me a copy of this portion of the map, with the subdivision?”

  He makes a circle of the area he wants using his extended index finger as a pointer.

  “No problem,” Mel says.

  “Also, do you know who the contractor was on the job? The one who built the road and the basement for the one house?”

  “I can find out for you,” Mel assures him.

  Mel disappears into the back room with the maps. When he comes back out, he’s got the copy that Miller requested. There’s a yellow Post-It-Note stuck to it. He hands it to the old detective.

  “Contractor was a man by the name of John Jersik. Long retired. Still lives in Troy up near the engineering college. Comes in now and again to get information on little side projects he might be doing for someone. Just to keep himself busy. His name, number, and address are there on the Post-It-Note. Just give him a call.”

  “I will, thanks.”

  “Hope you find whoever it is you’re looking for.”

  Miller bites down on his bottom lip.

  “To be perfectly honest,” he says, “I almost hope I don’t.”

  Skinner eyes her through the darkness.

  Her trembling, nearly shattered existence. Her still baby-like face, her big brown, tear-filled eyes, her smooth hands, one of them holding a knife. How delicious she looks. How tasty. How inviting. His little kitten. He wants to sing to her. Ring around the Rosie . . .