by Mark Lukens
Near the overturned chair he saw something on the wood floor; a few pieces of duct tape that looked like they had been pasted over someone’s mouth. He shined his flashlight beam down at the tape, and he could even see the slight impression of someone’s mouth in the middle of the tape.
“Duct tape over here,” Perry said.
Jackson nodded, but he kept glancing back at the bedroom door, his flashlight beam trained on the far side of the hallway.
Perry shined his light on the overturned chair, and then he panned his light slowly around the room again.
“No rope,” Perry said. “We’ve got duct tape like someone was tied to the chair, but no rope. I don’t see any tape or marks on the chair.”
Perry took his phone out and snapped a photo of the duct tape and the chair. And then a small object in the corner of the room caught his eye. He stepped over to the corner and stared down at the small canister of pepper spray.
“Pepper spray,” Perry muttered as he took a photograph of this item with his phone. Then he looked at Jackson. “Let’s check out the rest of the rooms.”
They checked out the next bedroom directly across the hall from the room they’d just been in. Perry walked across the room towards the shattered window. Bits of broken glass winked back at him when he shined his light on the floor. He panned the light up the wall beside the broken window.
“Bullet hole,” Perry said to Jackson who waited near the door, his gun still clenched in his gigantic hand.
They did a quick check of the hall bathroom – nothing much there.
It was beginning to sound like Tara’s story was true. And if that was the case, then the worst was still waiting for them at the end of the hall in the master bedroom.
Perry could smell the dead body before they even opened the door. He entered and saw the hanging man beside the door. He backed away so he could let Jackson inside. They stood beside each other and stared at the dead man.
The hanging man was dressed in layers of filthy clothing; he looked like he might’ve been a street person. The man had been hung by his ankles from an iron ring that was attached to a rafter in the ceiling – pieces of drywall were ripped away to expose the rafter. The man’s legs were tied together and his arms hung free, lying limply on the floor in the now-sticky dark blood pooled up underneath his head and slit throat. His mouth was wide open, and his eyes had a milky glaze over them.
Perry shined his flashlight around the room. Like the first bedroom, this one was nearly empty; except for the dead man, the only other things in the room was a wood table in the center of the room, and groups of unlit candles in the corners.
It was like the killer had purposely cleaned out these bedrooms, perhaps moving the junk and garbage either outside or to some of the other rooms. He wanted to set the first room up to take a picture of someone in a chair, and he wanted this room for his bizarre ritual.
Perry shined his light over the table slowly. Ropes were tied to each leg of the table. A pentagram was painted on the tabletop in dark red paint. Or maybe it was blood. The homeless man’s blood? Perry wondered. Jen’s blood? There were a number of squiggly-looking symbols inside the pentagram. And some of those same symbols, and others, had been painted on the walls around the bedroom in the same dark reddish-brown color.
The killer had planned on sacrificing Tara here for some reason.
Everything Lorie had told him was true, and Perry felt a pang of guilt as he stood in the room. He felt a little bad for doubting his niece’s word, but even more for doubting Tara so much. He’d always liked Tara; she’d always seemed nice and polite. But he had always doubted Tara’s psychic abilities – Perry just didn’t believe in that sort of thing, he couldn’t help it.
But it was all true. A killer had somehow lured Tara and Woods out to this abandoned house for a ritualistic killing (and Perry was sure the room with the chair and camera had something to do with that lure), and he had nearly succeeded in killing Tara – but Woods had saved his niece’s best friend.
“Let’s call it in,” Perry said to Jackson.
Soon this house would be crawling with cops, photographers, forensics, and coroners. This case would probably get filed away as the hangout of some kind of fringe satanic cult that had sacrificed a street person that no one would even care about. It would fall to the bottom of the list unless they caught this guy and proved that the same man had killed all of these people.
Perry knew this was the same killer who had murdered the two teenagers nearly a week ago. This was the same killer who had peeled a man’s skin off of his torso after hanging him in his own garage. Perry also believed this was the same killer who had shot Miss Helen in the forehead. He had taken blood from the first girl, skin from the second victim, and something from the third that Perry hadn’t figured out yet. He must’ve planned on using those items for this ritual, but the items weren’t here in the house.
The ritual hadn’t worked out like the killer had planned.
But this killer wasn’t going to give up – Perry was sure of that. This guy wanted Tara for some reason; he’d gone to an awful lot of trouble to get her out here and to set this whole thing up. He would do it again soon.
Perry dialed Lorie’s number. It rang a few times and then he was sent to a voicemail box that was already full.
Great.
He hung up the phone as Jackson called this in to the department. Jackson hung up his phone.
“They’re on their way.”
Perry nodded. “After we’re done here, I want that warrant for Steve’s apartment. I want to be there first thing in the morning.”
Jackson nodded. “I got Judge Whalen working on it. He’ll get it for us. Should be ready in a few hours.”
Perry nodded. He was going to take a look around the outside of the house while he still had a chance to be alone.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
1.
The next morning Tara woke up in the back of Woods’ unmarked sedan, choking back a scream. She’d been having a nightmare. No, not a nightmare, a night terror. She had walked in her sleep again. And this time Woods must have seen it. Oh God, her second night with him and she had already walked in her sleep.
She looked down at the backseat and the floorboards. The garbage bag of clothes was still behind the passenger seat and her body rested against it like it was a pillow. His tattered suitcase was down on the floorboard behind the driver’s seat.
Tara heard a thumping at the window behind her, someone pounding on the glass with a fist.
Woods must’ve woken up and noticed she was gone. He had come outside to look for her and found her in his car, curled up and hiding away from her nightmares.
It was time to turn around and face him.
Tara turned around and saw Jeremy on the other side of the window, he stared at her with his coal-black eyes and insane smile, the same smile he’d had when he was tying her down to the wooden table adorned with satanic symbols. He beat on the window again and she saw that his fists were covered in blood, and every time he beat on the window he left a smear of blood behind.
2.
Woods jumped awake in the motel room. Tara wasn’t there. He called out for her and ran to the bathroom – she wasn’t in there.
She must be outside.
He hurried back to the door and looked for his car keys, but they were gone. He didn’t even waste time putting on a shirt or his shoes. He ran out the door and left it wide open. He ran out to his car and he saw Tara curled up in the backseat. Her body was twitching like she was in the throes of a nightmare at this very moment. He felt so bad for her; these night terrors had ruined her life.
He tried the back door. It was locked. He tried the passenger door. It was locked. All of the doors were locked.
Tara had his keys; he saw them clenched in her right fist. And there was something else clenched in her other fist, it looked like it might be a balled-up piece of paper.
“Tara! Wake up!”
&nb
sp; He beat on the door window with the side of his fist.
“Come on, Tara, wake up! You’re having a bad dream!”
Out of the corner of his eye Woods saw that one of the doors to a downstairs motel room had creaked open, someone was curious about all the noise out here so early in the morning.
3.
Tara jumped awake in the backseat of Woods’ sedan and she whirled around and stared at the window where she’d seen Jeremy beating on the window. But Jeremy wasn’t there. And there were no smears of blood on the glass from where he’d been pounding on the window – it had been a dream.
The pounding was coming from the other window.
She looked at the other window in front of her and saw Woods. He was shirtless and pounding on the glass. His eyes were wide with concern.
“Let me in, Tara!” he screamed at her.
Tara nodded, but she hadn’t made any kind of a move yet. She felt very tired, like she’d been running in her sleep all night.
“The doors are locked,” Woods said through the glass. “Unlock the door.”
Tara became suddenly aware of pain in her hands and fingers. She looked down at her hands and saw that they were both clenched into tight fists. She was holding something in each of her hands.
She opened her right hand slowly and saw the keys to Woods’ car. There were deep impressions in the flesh of her palms and fingers from the keys, and there were even a few drops of blood; the keys had opened up the small wound from the pencil she had snapped in half while drawing in her sleep a few days ago.
She unclenched her other fist and saw a balled-up piece of paper, and she immediately guessed what it might be – another drawing. But she knew that what was on this paper was for Woods and she couldn’t let herself see it.
4.
“Tara, please open the door,” Woods said again.
He had stopped beating on the door now that she was awake.
He could see that she was terrified. When she’d talked to him about her night terrors, he thought he might know what to expect. But he hadn’t expected to see this kind of fear and vulnerability on her face right now. She looked so small and helpless, she looked so frightened.
And he wanted to help her.
An overweight man stood in the open doorway to his motel room, staring at Woods suspiciously.
Woods looked at the man. “Mind your own business.”
The man looked like he’d been slapped. He ducked back into his motel room and slammed the door shut.
Woods suspected that the man might be on the phone with the manager of the motel in the next few minutes. Or maybe even the cops.
He couldn’t have the cops here. He would face his punishment for impersonating an FBI agent when this was all over; he would do whatever jail time he was given with satisfaction and a smile on his face once he killed Jeremy and everyone else was out of danger.
But right now he needed Tara to open the car door.
5.
Tara looked at Woods again, at the fear and compassion in his eyes. He wasn’t looking at her like she was some kind of freak, he was worried about her. She sat up and lunged for the door and unlocked it.
Woods helped Tara out of the backseat of his car.
She stumbled out, her legs were weak. She felt like a newborn fawn struggling to walk. Woods held her with his strong hands.
“It’s okay,” he whispered. “Everything’s okay. I won’t let anything happen to you. I swear.”
Tara held on to Woods and she felt tears stinging her eyes. It felt so good to be in this man’s arms. She had always been a strong woman, she had always trained and strengthened her body to be a weapon, she had always been proud of being alone and standing strong, but right now it felt good to have someone else in this world looking out for her, protecting her, caring about her, someone on her side.
But there was work to be done. She’d seen things in her dreams, fragments really, but the pieces of the dream-puzzle were beginning to come together in her mind and there were people in danger.
“You must’ve been sleepwalking,” Woods said.
Tara pulled out of his arms and she felt herself blushing. Her night terrors was her most embarrassing secret, and now Woods was discussing it out here in the morning light like she had just tripped or something, like it was no big deal.
She handed Woods the balled-up piece of paper. “This is for you.”
“What is it?” he asked. “Another drawing?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. I just know that you can’t show me what’s on that paper.”
Woods opened the ball of paper and looked at it. It wasn’t a drawing. It was a list and what looked like a set of instructions. It didn’t really make much sense to him, and he would have to study it more carefully later. Right now he balled the paper back up, not wanting Tara to even get a glance at it.
“Let’s get back inside,” Tara told him. “I need to call my aunt.”
Woods put an arm around her shoulder and led her back to the motel room door that was still wide open. She felt the warmth from his skin on her cold flesh, and a shiver ran through her body. She could feel the lean, hard muscles of his arms, holding her and protecting her like a girder of steel.
Once they were back inside the motel room, Woods closed the door and secured the locks. Tara went straight to her cell phone. No messages from her aunt. She never called back. Not even a text from her.
She dialed Aunt Katie’s number, but only got her voice mail.
“My aunt’s not answering,” Tara told Woods as he put a T-shirt on.
“You think she’s okay?” he asked her.
“I don’t think so,” she said and her stomach fluttered with fear.
A sudden memory jumped into her mind so forcefully that it almost felt like it had been shoved into her consciousness. She remembered leaving for the airport after her “date” with Jeremy – Oh God, the thought of her admiring his looks sickened her now.
But now she remembered when she was leaving that she told Steve (Jeremy) that she was going to pick up her aunt at the airport and stay with her in a hotel room.
Oh God … she’d told Jeremy where her aunt was going to be.
Tara looked at Woods with horror.
“We need to go. I think my aunt might be in trouble.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
1.
Detective Perry and Detective Jackson swung by the police station for the search warrant. Judge Whalen had okayed it early in the morning. Perry and Whalen had known each other for decades, and Whalen trusted Perry completely.
Jackson drove Perry to the Garden Apartments where Tara and Steve lived. They pulled into the parking lot. Tara’s Jeep was parked in front of her apartment, but Steve’s pickup truck was not parked in front of his place. A squad car followed them into the parking lot and parked a few spaces away.
One squad car was already parked in front of Steve’s apartment, a cop waiting for them. He met up with Perry and Jackson as they got out of their car. There was also a faded red Cadillac, Mel’s car, parked next to Tara’s Jeep Cherokee. Mel waited by his car, and he already had a set of master keys in his hand, jiggling them nervously as he glanced around. A few residents in the other apartments stood in their open doorways watching, even the older man on the other side of Tara’s apartment who kept to himself.
Mel had already talked to the other tenants and explained what was going on. They stared at him with wide eyes and they had questions. But Mel didn’t have any answers right now. All he knew was that the man who had just rented the end unit, the man who called himself Steve, was wanted by the police for questioning and they had a warrant with them to search not only his apartment, but Tara’s as well.
Was Tara in trouble, too? The other tenants asked. Mel didn’t know. But deep down inside, he didn’t think so. He couldn’t imagine Tara being in trouble or doing anything wrong.
As Perry and Jackson walked from their car towards the apartment building, a police o
fficer met them.
“No answer from either apartment,” the police officer told them. “Doesn’t sound like anyone’s home.”
Perry nodded at the police officer and brushed past him. Jackson instructed the other two police officers to stand back, but have their weapons drawn and ready; they were possibly dealing with a very dangerous man inside this apartment. Jackson drew his weapon, and much like he’d done at the abandoned house, he stayed two steps behind Perry, covering him.
Perry crushed the doorbell button with his thumb, and then he pounded on the apartment door.
“Steve! Are you home?!”
No answer.
“We’ve got a warrant! I’ve got the building manager here with me! We’re going to unlock the door and enter the premises unless you open up!”
Nothing but silence.
Perry nodded at Jackson who turned and nodded at a police officer next to Mel. The police officer gestured at Mel to open the door.
Mel walked down the walkway to the end unit with the ring of keys in his hand. Each key was marked for each apartment. There were only eight apartments in the two buildings that sat side by side, so the ring of keys wasn’t that big. There was another set of keys for the utility shed which was housed in a block building set far off from the other end of the small apartment complex.
Perry drew his gun and looked at Mel. “Give me the keys.”
Mel hesitated.
“If this guy shoots at us, I don’t want you here in front of the door,” Perry told him.
That sounded okay with Mel. He picked out the key for Steve’s apartment – Unit Number One – and gave it to Perry with a trembling hand. Then he hurried back out of the way.
Perry took the key and unlocked the lock on the door handle. He twisted the door handle, expecting the deadbolt to be engaged, but it wasn’t. He took a breath, clenched his gun in his right hand and opened the door with his left. He flung the door open and then moved out of the doorway, to the side.
