Killing Room

by Shawn Raiford

"Yeah."

  "I don't know, partner. In all my years, I've never seen one. Never heard of Houston ever busting anyone with such a film," Mitch said.

  "Chloe will find out if he's dirty or not."

  Mitch gave him a look. "What if he just had it on his laptop?"

  "You mean, what if he had nothing to do with in the making of the film but bought it?"

  "Yeah. You know, or maybe he found it online or something. You know there's a Darknet now."

  Henry had thought about that. No decent human being would ever have anything like that on their computer. "Up to Chloe. She might just hurt him."

  Mitch scratched his nose, and grinned at him. "And the good news is if he is dirty, we won't ever have to talk to that disgusting piece of shit ever again."

  Yes, if he is dirty, my sister will kill him.

  Chapter Eleven

  She smiled mischievously

  WITH SUCH A VILE specimen of humanity in my vehicle, I contemplated slicing his throat where he sat, but I decided it wasn't worth the clean-up.

  Barry sat in passenger seat of my car, his arms bound. Having this piece of shit with me, out in the open like this, made me uncomfortable, but I needed to verify his information about the man, Edward Rawlings, in the video before cutting him loose. Between us, a deal had been struck.

  Barry said, "I don't know him that well, just that he's crazy." Wincing, he placed his head against the window. Now, his sweaty forehead was touching the glass.

  Gross. Sanitizing the entire car would be necessary. Tomorrow.

  My head turned slowly to him. "If he's crazy then why are you two friends you dipshit? Why do you even have that kind of movie on your laptop, Barry? It is a good way to go to prison or even get yourself killed. I tell you what. If you didn't have Edward to trade, you'd be dead by now."

  Barry stared at me, but not a questioning-your-authority star. More of a I'm-paying-attention-to-what-you're-saying stare. "I only know him through other people."

  Barry was lying to me, but I let it go. Only a matter of time. Guys like Barry always landed in prison—where he undoubtedly would end up as a someone's bitch. Or Barry would end up dead in a ditch or back alley.

  If Edward indeed made snuff films, I wanted to meet him, then put a bullet in his fucking brainpan. Doubt grew in the back of my mind though. Was he setting me up for something?

  "Where is it, Barry?" This human shit stain was leading me to a particular house.

  He jutted out his chin towards a house down the road. "There, two houses down. The white one with the white siding."

  Spotting the house, I pulled over in front of it. An older style house. The grass was short, two trees in the front yard. Three concrete steps led up to a wide porch which reached from one side of the house to the other side. I cleared my throat. "You sure that's his house?"

  He nodded. "Yes, that's it."

  I stared a hole through him. "It better be, Barry. I am very good at finding bad people. If you're lying to me, I'll find you and take my time making it hurt. I promise."

  Barry turned and glared at the house. "Look, that's Edward's house. He lives there."

  Instead of shooting the shit stain, I cut Barry loose. He exited my car. Our deal was if he showed me where to find Edward I'd let him live. But he had to leave Texas tonight and go legit. Live small. I had my doubts he could do that, but I gave him my word. In a situation like this, Edward was a much bigger problem than Barry.

  "Hey!"

  He stopped in his tracks and faced me—his eyes met mine.

  Pointing at him, I batted my eyes and blew him a kiss. "Again. Stay gone, Mr. Olsen. If I find you again, it won't be pretty." Taking the time to kill him would only piss me off. So, yeah, I'd make it really hurt.

  Someone in his position might want to stay put here in Houston, keep working and making money. That meant he would have to kill me before I got to him. First impression of the guy, he struck me as incapable of such a monumental task.

  My red wig and brown contacts would throw him off. At times, I used false dentures, but I left them at home. When I left home to get food for my boys, I did not expect to do any kind of work tonight. Not that I'm complaining. Hunting monsters, Edward was a fucking monster, and killing them, made me feel good. However small, I helped.

  Just in case Barry remembered the license plate number of the car I was driving, it wouldn't give him my name. The car was registered to Sally. Whenever I was out and about, I always switched the plates, only to switch them back later, with random cars in parking lots.

  Sally was my friend over in Baytown. She took care of Kenneth Parnell, my ex foster dad, for me by watching over him at my house. When she was a kid, he hurt Sally. So she had no problem keeping him there against his will. Monsters don't have any rights.

  On many occasions, she told me he had asked her to kill him—poison or by a blade. She asked why he doesn't do it, and he said he's too scared. She hadn't killed him yet. Being a monster, Kenneth Parnell forfeited all his rights. Now, Sally and I, from time to time, make him pay. I like to use a knife, but Sally preferred using a Taser. He did not have much time left.

  Making my hand into a gun, I aimed it at Barry, bending my thumb. For his sake, I hoped he got a job as a janitor in Idaho.

  He smiled at the threat. Barry's hands went to his chest like he'd been shot. "I'll be good!" He then hobbled down the road.

  Not wanting to waste any time, I figured I should meet the man of the house. I exited my car and walked up to the front of the yard.

  The house was a single-story and appeared to be big enough to have three bedrooms. It was definitely the worst looking house on the street. Without the house, the land was worth more money.

  No lights were on anywhere in the house. I walked up to the porch and knocked on the front door.

  I waited. I'd ask for Timothy. He would say that Timothy did not live here. And that's when I hope he says that his name was Edward. After that, I'd apologize, telling him that I had the wrong house and would excuse myself. Later, I'd come back and do some surveillance. Find the best way into his house and find evidence of his abhorrent activities.

  No answer to my knock. That was fine, I would come back tomorrow and knock again. If he didn't answer, I'd come and knock again the following day. Eventually, Edward Rawlings would answer this door.

  I turned and saw a woman. In the next yard over. She appeared to be around thirty-five with thin, black wispy hair, and was two or three inches shorter than me. A white plastic bag dangled from her left hand. At her feet, a small dog sniffed the impressive pile of what just came out of its butt.

  A chain-linked fence separated the two properties. With her free hand, the woman gripped the top part of the fence.

  "Do you know if Edward Rawling lives here?"

  She nodded. "Yeah, that's Edward's house."

  "You know when he'll be back?" It didn't matter when he returned because I was pretty much done for the night.

  "If you knew what's good for you, you'd leave right now, and forget about Edward Rawlings." She bent down, and used the bag to scoop up what her pet just pooped out.

  She had me at 'you'd leave right now'. "Oh yeah?"

  “I’ve lived here a little over a year, and he's a damn sicko! Edward killed two of my dogs."

  Dog killer? More reason to hurt him. "Wow!"

  "My first dog, Precious, kept getting out of the yard and sniffing around his house. And I guess he doesn't like dogs. Precious ended up dead. At first, I didn't suspect him, just thought Precious was old, she was over ten years old. My other dog, Mitsy, ended up dead too," she said.

  My brow furrowed. "Sorry to hear that, I'm sure they were good dogs."

  She looked up at me, wiping her eyes. "Thanks. And they were great dogs.”

  Not wanting to pass up on an opportunity to know the neighbor of a potential snuff-film maker, maybe pick her brain a little. Walked up to her, I stuck out my hand. "My name's Rose.”

  The woman accepte
d my hand and said, "Hi, my name is Kathleen. Nice to meet you, Rose."

  "Nice to meet you too, Kathleen."

  "You friends with Edward?" Doubt showed in her face.

  This woman did not like Edward at all. Shaking my head, I answered, "No, my friends don't kill dogs. If they did, I'd kill them."

  Kathleen grinned, showing perfect white teeth. She released the bag of poop and scratched her dog's head.

  "Not friends, I just wanted to talk to him, that's all."

  One of her eyebrows shot up. "Talk to him? To Edward. He doesn't seem the kind of man who likes to talk."

  If she did not like him, she probably wouldn't mind giving me some inside information. Like his schedule. Or where he worked. "Yeah, I doubt he'll like talking to me. In fact, he won't like me at all."

  Leaning her head forward, she smiled mischievously, appearing to understand that I was here not to help her neighbor, the dog killer.

  Then, I released a silent fart. I’d been holding it in, but no more. It was a relief. I’ve never been a girly girl. If I needed to, I am farting—period. It didn't stink though. Before leaving my place, I took the time to take a shit earlier. And whenever I roamed the streets, working or visiting Henry and family, I rarely ate a lot of food. I hated having to use public bathrooms. If the situation called for it, I could shit where ever—in the woods or behind a dirty dumpster—but I preferred a clean toilet.

  On her hip, she placed a hand, and she gave me a look as if she contemplated something serious. "If you want I could show you where he is? Or at least where I'm pretty sure he is."

  How would she know where he was? Was he at the grocery store? Local bar? Yeah, probably a bar. "Where? A bar? Because I could use a drink."

  "No, I think he's at a warehouse. It's about ten minutes from here." She pointed in a general direction. It was my experience that members of my species were terrible at directions. Was it genetics? Or did father and mother just not teach girls directions? Being a contract killer, I had to be good at directions.

  "How do you know that?"

  "After he killed my dogs, I was so pissed at him. I wondered if he killed other animals so I kept an eye out. I stayed up late just to watch him. Edward left his house late some nights."

  "What time?"

  "Like at nine, ten o'clock at night."

  That didn't seem late to me. I understood that Barry telling me about Edward and now Kathleen telling me about her dogs, but it could all be circumstantial. To kill a monster, I needed to be a hundred percent sure.

  "But he wouldn't get back until three or four in the morning."

  It might be long enough for a shift at some job. "Do you think he's going to a job or something?"

  Her dog barked at a passing car. It calmed down when she scratched its head again. "I was curious where he went during the nights. So I followed him one night. And—"

  "You followed him, Kathleen?"

  "Yes. I was in my car. He stopped at warehouse. I stopped a couple of blocks away. And I watched him get out and go inside. That night I only stayed maybe an hour."

  I folded my arms in front of my body. "'That night'? So you followed him again?"

  "No, I didn't follow him the second time. My husband travels for his job. He's out of town right now. He'd never let me follow Edward like that!"

  Sounds like a reasonable man.

  "He was out of town that night. So I was up late, talking to a girlfriend on the phone. When I hung up with her I notice Edward's car gone. So, I went to that warehouse. I was surprised that I found it again, I'm not good with directions. But it found it and his car was there."

  "How long did you stay? Did you see him leave?"

  "Yeah, yeah! I was still pissed, so I was determined to wait that time."

  "When did he leave the warehouse?"

  "Around four thirty the next morning!"

  "The entire time he was in the warehouse?" I scratched my head.

  "Yes, he was! No telling what he was doing in there!"

  Talk about a ballsy woman; I decided I liked her. It took serious stones to do what she did. "Damn girl! You weren't scared?"

  "Yeah. It was kind of scary, but the strange thing is that his car was the only one. No other cars, and there's no lights on the inside!"

  That was weird. Sounded like Edward was up to something shady. He needed a kill room, and that warehouse was probably it. "An address would be great!"

  "I know where the warehouse is, but I don't know the specific address. It'll be easier if I just show you."

  This would save me some time. "I don't want to put you out, Kathleen."

  "Nah, like I said, my hubby is out of town on business and I'm bored. Come on, you can follow me in your car."

  My initial urge was just to go home, but getting started tonight, by doing some basic surveillance, would help save me a lot of time. Maybe I could get a look or even a picture of this guy. At home, later I would search him online. But most important I will have the location of his warehouse. Potentially, it was the place he made the films. "Okay, you lead the way, and I'll follow you."

  Chapter Twelve

  Uncooked kebab

  DISTASTE FOR WEAKNESS WAS something Edward got from his dad.

  At the age of five, he fell off his bike, skinning his knee, and ran to his dad crying. His dad pulled his cigarette lighter out. Flicked it, a flame popped up. He turned it over, so the flame licked the top metal part, heating it. When it was hot enough, he grabbed Edward by the arm and put the hot metal end on his back.

  Over the next few years, his dad put the hot metal end of the lighter on his back and shoulders dozens of time, teaching him not to be weak. On his fourteenth birthday his dad bought him a set of weights with a bench and made him work out. His son had to be strong. Within a year he gained fifteen pounds of muscle and grew four inches.

  Freshman year, Edward stood six foot-one and weighed two hundred and ten pounds and made the varsity football team as a linebacker. Football was fun. By the third practice he had been nicknamed, The Punisher. Throughout the season the coaches talked about which college he would attend, but he did not care about going to college; he only cared about hurting people. At seventeen, in his junior year, he stood six-foot-five and weighed two-hundred and forty pounds. That year he was expelled from school for beating up a teacher. Mr. Hamlin, his math teacher, failed Edward, which meant he was not allowed to play football. Five boys, in the class, had to pull him off the teacher. The cops were called, but Mr. Hamlin did not press charges.

  Edward found it funny that one night, years later, he ran into Mr. Hamlin at one of the rare occasions he went to a bar his cousin dragged him to. Mr. Hamlin was alone, talking to a couple of guys at the end of the bar. Edward didn't say much to the man, and only had a couple of beers and left. He waited for him outside with his cousin.

  Later that night he made his ex-teacher scream in the basement. While Edward worked on him, he asked Mr. Hamlin to count the number of incisions on an arm and subtract it from the incisions on the other arm. Add the number of holes he drilled on one leg with the number of holes drilled on the other leg. And divide number of incisions by holes and vice versa. Not lasting, Mr. Hamlin couldn't make it to multiplication.

  Over the years, he made a couple dozen women, and a few of men scream in there. If it was not for the soundproofing, screamers would have been heard a mile away. In the basement, he spent a lot of time but he had to move.

  Rotting flesh, the smell never bothered Edward. At times, especially in the morning with a cup of joe, he found it quite aromatic. Humans, Edward was positive, could not smell anything emanating from his basement. But dogs could.

  Edward had a habit of leaving body parts in different areas of the basement for a week or two before disposing of them. His killing room had not been dog-nose proofed. And the Hendersons, his neighbors, had a dog—a white poodle.

  After he discovered the nosy fleabag sniffing around his house, Edward killed it and discarded the c
arcass in a yard a few houses down. Nothing indicated he had killed the dog, but Mrs. Henderson made a huge fuss with all the neighbors and blamed Edward anyway. With an intense passion, he hated that bitch, Kathleen Henderson. Beyond anything else in this world, he wanted her on his table, screaming.

  After he killed her next dog and left its remains on her front porch, the bitch called the cops. They came over and talked to him but nothing happened.

  His killing room had to be moved, because more dogs might come sniffing around; the cops might come again—he could not have any of that. He wanted to keep making movies. Edward needed to hear them scream.

  Today, the warehouse afforded him much more privacy than the basement ever did. Which allowed him to make more movies. Before he had to be careful of nosy neighbors and stupid dogs, but now in the warehouse not at all.

  Payments for the next three movies had been received—so he would not worry about rushing Crystal's movie to be edited. Crystal's head occupied the shelf in front of him. Along with the other heads. All he had to do was put them on spikes and it would look like a scene from Game of Thrones.

  Over time, through trial and error, boiling the heads made all the meat fall off the bone much quicker. He had a two-burner electric stovetop. Which worked perfectly.

  But first he learned that presoaking them helped the boiling process. This morning, he filled the pot with water and placed the head inside.

  Upon seeing her head, her name came to him: Kristy Burns. He reached for it. In front of his face, he held her head. "You were a good screamer, Kristy," he whispered, looking into the head's dried-out, mostly-empty eye sockets. With a pair of scissors, he removed as much hair as possible, before placing the head into the pot of water.

  Before leaving to hunt, he put the pot on the stovetop, to simmer. When he returned with Crystal he turned it to boil. After an hour or so, he scooped the skull out of the water with the spoon. Tiny globs of flesh fell off into the water; split flesh revealed sections of bone. When he placed the head down on the desk, the nose halfway tore off. With a fingernail, he scraped some meat off. He sniffed it and it reminded him of pork.