There was no answer. Frank said, “Nice technique, boss. Works great.”
Vic looked back at the driveway and saw Helen’s cars were there. “Maybe they went for a walk?”
Frank shrugged. He bent to peek through the porch window and saw that the television was on. “Knock again.”
Vic held the screen door and kicked it again, harder and louder. He banged on the frame with his fist and shouted, “Open up, Billy. It’s the police!”
Frank pressed his face against the window, “There’s food on the counter. Half-empty bottle of milk on the coffee table. If they’re not here, they left in a hurry.”
“Shit,” Vic said. He opened the screen door and reached for the door’s handle when he saw that the frame around it was cracked. There was a large footprint on the center of the door where someone had kicked it in. Vic drew his gun and pushed the door open the rest of the way. “Billy? Mrs. Helen? You in here?”
Both of them crouched low, keeping their guns aimed at the hallway. “Police!” Frank announced. “Anybody in here?”
They moved together toward the hall, keeping out of the deadly “fatal funnel” where anyone could be ambushed as they squeezed together into a smaller location. Vic pressed himself against the sidewall and poked his gun and face into the hallway at the three doors that waited. “One bathroom and two bedrooms,” he whispered. “We’ll take them one at a time.”
Frank moved in behind him, keeping his gun aimed down the hall when Vic swung into the first doorway. It was the bathroom, and he instantly threw the shower curtain aside, expecting someone to be hiding behind it. “Clear.”
Frank felt Vic’s hand on his shoulder and they continued down the hall, moving so slow that Frank’s leg started to tremble from the weight. He was about to turn to the first bedroom, when Vic grabbed him and whispered, “Don’t move.”
Frank looked down at the dried drop of blood on the dirty carpet, leading back to the master bedroom at the end of the hallway. Both men straddled the blood trail and hurried down the hall until they came to the door. “Ready? Go!”
They piled into the bedroom, turning with their weapons in every direction of the ransacked room. Dressers were overturned and drawers lay broken on the floor. Clothing and bedsheets were strewn about the room and someone had cut the mattress open with a knife. On the surface of the mattress, soaked into the cotton and sliced open fabric was a pool of blackened, crusted blood.
Vic stood staring down at the bed and finally said, “Ruh-roh.”
* * *
Two cars rolled down the street toward the Helen house. Staff Sergeant Erinnyes arrived first in his green unmarked police take-home vehicle followed by Special Agent Dolos’ Audi. Dez stepped out of the car and fixed his suit coat, toying with the cufflink on his right sleeve. Erinnyes waddled toward the front step and reached out for the strip of neon crime scene tape, when Frank said, “Stand by, sir! You can’t come in.”
Erinnyes looked up at him with a thin-lipped smirk, “Excuse me, patrolman?”
Frank waved the clipboard in his hand as he came down the steps. “I’m running the crime scene log and not allowed to let anyone in unless authorized by the Chief or Detective Ajax.”
Erinnyes’s face darkened as he looked at the FBI agent and then back at Frank. “Get out of my way. That is a direct order.”
Frank shrugged and said, “I’m already following the Chief’s order, sir. Don’t get mad at me for doing what I’m told, here.”
“Actually, I think he might be right,” Dez said. “Too many people in there will destroy the evidence. That is, what evidence remains.”
Erinnyes sneered in agreement. “Go and tell the Chief of Police that I have arrived, and that Special Agent Dolos has accompanied me at my request to oversee the kidnapping investigation.”
Frank went back up the stairs, using the handrail to support his leg. He disappeared into the house only to return a moment later and say, “The Chief said to let Agent Dolos in, but that it’s already pretty tight in here.” His eyes lowered to Erinnyes’s bulging stomach, “They can only squeeze so many people in there at once, sir.”
Dez lifted the crime scene tape and headed up the stairs past Frank. He put on a pair of black rubber gloves and delicately opened the screen door. Vic was standing in the living room talking to the Chief. “Un-fucking-believable,” Dez said. “This is on your head, Ajax.”
“Oh, kiss my ass, you pompous dick,” Vic said. “Chief, we don’t need this asshole coming in here trying to tell us how to do an investigation.”
“Like hell you don’t,” Dez said. “If you’d done what I told you to do yesterday, we wouldn’t be in this situation right now. I’ve got an entire family missing and it’s all your fault.”
“Really? How was signing Billy up as a CI going to prevent the bad guys from showing up and doing this?”
“Well maybe at the very least, if you’d reached out to him, we’d have discovered the kidnapping an entire day earlier,” Dez said. “Now, they’re probably all dead in a gutter somewhere because you were too lazy to come talk to him.”
Vic shouted something back when the Chief held up his hands and said, “Enough! Both of you shut your mouths right now!” He turned to Vic and said, “The FBI is here to conduct this investigation with the full spectrum of their resources. Is that understood?”
Vic bit his lip but managed to nod.
The Chief turned to the FBI agent and said, “This is our town, and our case. My detectives are staying with it until the bitter end. We are not handing it over, is that clear?”
“Of course, sir. We only want to help.” Dez flashed a smile at the Chief, “After all, we’re on the same team.”
The Chief fixed his hat to his head and headed for the door. “I want this situation resolved, gentlemen. Get moving.”
Frank held the door open for the Chief and turned to see Vic and Dez glaring at one another. “Was it just me or did he say Detectives?”
* * *
They walked Dez through the crime scene and showed him the bloody, ripped up mattress in the back bedroom. Dez frowned at the mass of blood, then carefully inspected the walls and furniture around the bed. He even looked up at the ceiling. “You guys see any blood spatter?”
“No,” Vic said. He quickly added, “I already looked for it.”
Dez sighed, “Well, I guess that’s a good thing.”
“Why?” Frank asked.
“It means they’re probably alive. Or at least, they were when they left here,” Dez said.
“I don’t know… that’s a whole lot of blood,” Frank said.
“Not really,” Vic said. “You ever had a nose bleed? It can pour like a faucet. Maybe Paris punched Billy in the face and threw him down on the bed.”
“Or Billy’s wife,” Dez said.
Frank bent over the mattress to inspect it. “What about all the cuts?”
Dez ran his finger along the one of the long slits and said, “He was looking for the money. He probably thought they were hiding it in the mattress.”
“He should have checked the dirty baby diapers,” Frank grimaced.
Dez looked at them both, “What do you mean?”
“Long story,” Vic said. “Listen, are we going to work this together for real, or are we going to keep bickering?”
“I only care about the case, Vic. You know that. What do you want to do?”
“We need a crime scene unit here to process, a surveillance team at Paris’ house, and somebody to do the search warrants and court orders for the phones. How many people can you spare?”
“As many as you need,” Dez said.
Vic clapped his hands together and said, “We’re gonna nail this bastard! Me and Frank will head down to Paris’ house to help out with surveillance and track his ass down. I want to see the look on his face when he sees me coming through his door.”
“Excellent,” Dez said. He looked out at the driveway where the Chief and Staff Sergeant were standing. “I left my
phone in the car. Can you two stay here while I go get it in case one of those two nudniks try to barge in?”
“Absolutely.”
Frank held the door open for Dez and watched him go down the steps. “Maybe he’s not such a bad guy after all.”
Dez stopped in front of the Chief and spoke to him. The Chief smiled and shook Dez’s hand firmly. “Nah, he’s not that bad when it comes to stuff like this. Say whatever you want about him, he loves the job and will see it gets done. He and I are a lot alike, I think. That is why we—.” Vic stopped speaking as Dez hopped into his vehicle and peeled out of the gravel driveway, kicking up a large amount of dust as he gunned it. Vic crashed through the porch door and shouted, “Where the hell is he going?”
The Chief looked up at him in confusion. “He said he’s going down to the target’s residence to do surveillance while you two process the crime scene.”
Vic kicked the metal hand-railing hard enough that it vibrated and left a rust mark stamped on the front of his boot. He pushed past Frank to go back into the house and grabbed a stack of mail from the countertop and threw them into the kitchen.
Something buzzed in Frank’s pocket. He reached for his phone and picked it up to read a message from Dez: Tell him not to forget to photograph the scene before he collects any evidence. XOXO.
“What does it say,” Vic snarled.
“Nothing,” Frank said.
“It’s from him, isn’t it.”
“Nope.”
“Let me see it.”
“It was from my wife, Vic, and no, I won’t let you see it. It was personal.” He closed the phone and put it in his pocket. “So do you want me to take some pictures before we collect any evidence?”
* * *
They stacked bags all shapes and sizes by the front door. Frank made a trip to the local Home Depot for four packs of paper lawn bags that were big enough to stuff the pillows and comforters into. He bent down to scoop up a handful of cotton stuffing that had sprung out of the ruined pillow when he heard Vic say, “Because I’m stuck at work, Danni. It’s not like I sit on my ass all day just watching the money roll in. I have a job here and I can’t leave until it’s finished.”
Frank leaned forward to see Vic pacing back and forth with the phone stuck to his ear. “Really? So I can do what? Work construction? And who are the kids going to get health benefits from, you? Bullshit. I can’t take them tonight because I am working!”
Vic’s face grew red and he held the phone up to his face and started screaming, “Do not tell them that I don’t want to see them! Fuck you, Danni! Fuck you, you fucking bitch.” He looked at the phone and saw it was disconnected. He quickly redialed, waited, and it went to voicemail. He dialed again. It went directly to voicemail. He dialed again, and took a deep breath. “You piece of shit. If you tell my fucking children that I’m not coming to get them because I don’t want to see them, I swear to God I will—”
Frank snatched the phone out of his hands and closed it.
Vic grabbed for the phone and Frank pushed him back. “Give me my phone, asshole!”
“No!” Frank said. He kept the phone away from Vic by swatting his hands. “You leave her the wrong message and she’s going to use it to get you locked up or keep you away from them permanently, Vic. You’ll be threatening her on her voicemail and they will come here and put you under arrest. If she’s the vindictive bitch she seems to be, she’ll do it. I’ve seen it happen.”
Vic gritted his teeth and groaned. He backed away and put his hands against the wall to catch his breath. When he looked back up, his eyes were red. “You think the kids believe her when she says those things?”
“No, I’m sure they don’t. Kids believe what they see for themselves, not what people tell them.”
Vic wiped his nose. “You think so?”
“I do.”
Vic picked up the phone and said, “Thanks. You’re a good partner.”
“It’s what Sean Penn would do for Robert Duvall any day of the week,” Frank said.
“You finally saw it?”
Frank grinned, “No.”
Vic looked at him for a moment, about to say something, but then both men were too busy laughing.
10
It was midnight by the time they cleared the house and transported the evidence back to the station. Frank could barely keep his eyes open. He helped Vic carry the bags of evidence down to the office and by the time they’d placed the last one on the floor, Frank’s restless legs felt like they were crawling with bugs. “I need to go home, man. Let’s do this shit tomorrow.”
“Go ahead,” Vic said. He sat down at his desk and started clicking the computer mouse. “I’ll finish up here and see you tomorrow.”
“It’s late, Vic. Come on. Let’s shut it down for tonight and come back fresh in the AM.”
“I’m fine.”
“Do you want me to stay with you?”
“No. Go home to your wife,” Vic said. “She probably misses you.”
“You sure?”
“Okay, I don’t know for certain if she misses you or not. I was trying to make you feel good.”
“I meant are you sure it’s cool if I leave?”
“Yup.”
“You’re not going to call me a sissy for leaving? You’re not going to make jokes about how my vagina hurt too bad for me to stay and work late?”
“Your gynecological problems are none of my concern, Frank.” Vic looked up from the computer screen, “Go home.”
Frank was about to walk out of the office when he stopped and leaned against the door frame. “I keep thinking about that dead guy.”
“The dead guy that hanged himself or the dead guy in the car?”
“The one in the car.”
“What about him?” Vic said.
“I have a theory. He wasn’t supposed to die. One of the kids was.”
Vic stopped typing and leaned back in his chair, folding his hands over his belly. “Okay, you win. I’m all ears.”
“One of those little girls was supposed to die, if not both, and just as Death showed up, the Dad intervened. He cut a deal. He made such a heartfelt plea that Death agreed to take him instead of the kids. That’s how I look at it. That’s how I am wrapping my head around the fact that some fucking guy was just driving down the street with his little girls one second, and the next, he was dead.”
Vic saw tears forming in Frank’s eyes and he looked down, giving him the respect of not watching him cry. “I never even thought about you having two little girls, man. I should’ve asked if you were all right.”
“There’s nothing to ask,” Frank said. He wiped his nose and said, “The doctors thought I was a suicide risk. How funny is that? They thought after Heck’s funeral I might think about trying to end it all. Cops have one of the highest suicide rates already, but apparently ones who’ve been in shootings are even worse off. I bet nobody would have covered it up like we did, though. Nobody would care that much.”
“I didn’t do it for him,” Vic said. “He’s dead. Fuck the dead. They don’t count. No matter who you were, what you did, once you check out, it’s over. Whatever fucked up, selfish reason he had for killing himself ceased to matter the moment he made that decision. Why should Heck’s widow and kids pay a penalty for that?”
“It was illegal,” Frank said.
“It was right.”
“I can live with that, I think,” Frank said.
“Good. So can I.”
“I’m gonna go home, kiss my kids, and try to sleep. Why don’t you give it a rest for tonight?”
Vic turned back to the computer and said, “You ever think that the dead are the lucky ones? I do. All the time.”
“Go home, Vic.”
“This is all the home I have left.”
* * *
Dawn was sleeping on the couch when he walked in the door. Frank turned off the television and kissed her on the forehead. “Everything okay?” she said.
“Everything’s fine. I need to take a shower and go to sleep though.”
She put her arms around his neck and sniffed him. “You don’t smell that bad. Just come to bed.”
He thought about Al Charon’s body and said, “I have the funk.”
“Me likey you funky.”
Frank smiled and kissed her. “Me likey you funky too.”
* * *
He dreamt he was on a dark river like the Congo, floating downstream in a skiff with Vic standing at the front of it, holding a paddle. Vic was bare chested and wearing a necklace of ears. Strange symbols were carved into the thick coat of dried blood covering his skin. Vic looked back at him and nodded, “We’ll be there soon.”
“Where are we going?”
“To see the Snake God,” Vic said. Something hit the boat, and Vic laughed sharply. Tiny hands grabbed the side of the skiff, and the heads of children emerged from the water, trying to pull themselves up to join them. “No passengers!” Vic said, smacking their fingers with the edge of his oar.
“Why?”
“Because that’s the last thing I have left to show you. Once you look into the Snake God’s eyes, you’ll understand everything. Until you see him, you don’t realize he’s there. Once you see him, you realize he is actually everywhere you look.”
A red mist rolled in from the shore, covering the surface of the water, blinding him. “I don’t want to see him, Vic! I don’t want to be like you!”
Vic reached through the mist with a clenched hand and said, “If you’re upset take these.” He dropped a dozen pills into Frank’s hands and said, “Now that is the good stuff.” Vic’s eyes turned yellow with vertical black slits, and a forked tongue poked out of his mouth, flicking rapidly.
Frank startled awake at the touch of his wife’s hand. “You’re having a nightmare,” she said.
He got up and swung his legs over the bed, still seeing Vic’s serpentine face in front of him. He stumbled into the hallway and followed the wall toward his daughters’ room. He poked his head up to see the older one sleeping on the upper bunkbed and recovered her with the comforter, then dropped down to the lower bunk and tucked the younger one’s stuffed bunny into her arms.
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