Chapter Thirty-Seven

Raven couldn’t get Cameron’s face out of her mind when he gave up in the interview room. He was picturing the rest of his life in jail branded as a child killer. The Cameron she knew wouldn’t stand for that, but the thought of losing Noe broke him. She had to do something. They had already talked to Edmée, and there was no evidence that the boys were at her home on Friday. Willie Lee was next on the suspect list. His house was in the circle after all, a distance the boys could have walked from the bus stop. She needed to talk to him, but he had lawyered up, even spelling it out for them.

Now standing in front of Speck’s residence, she had decided to take the investigation to his front door but come at it, as that famed poet would say, slant. Her plan was to knock on Speck’s door under the pretense of just wanting to talk about cleaning Oral’s house. She would casually steer the conversation around to the case, wander around in search of any traces of Noe, or for evidence that Willie Lee Speck was indeed the Sleeping Boy killer. Maybe she’d find the hoodie Noe was wearing the day he went missing, or blood spatters on the drywall.

Of course, she knew how it would play in court if she did find something, but right now, she didn’t give a rat’s toenail. Her goal was to find her nephew. Alive. If Speck were the killer, they could work backwards later to find the evidence they would need to put him under the jail where he belonged. Besides, what were they going to do? Fire her?

The house was as Speck had described to her many times: sprawling, neat, and made of brick scrubbed so clean that it looked pink. A blue bicycle with a white seat lay on a field of thick grass. A tall bush of yellow angel’s trumpet stood against the right side of the porch. On the front porch in the shade of the angel’s trumpet lay an old-fashioned Raggedy Ann with bright, black button eyes folded over the armrest of a wicker rocking chair.

Raven studied the front door. It was made of a heavy, dark wood that gleamed from polish. Speck, she thought, did have it good. There was no camera on the front porch, so no Ring doorbell. The angel’s trumpet effectively hid the view of the front door from the street. She was surprised that a man who cared about his lawn so much would let the bush with its thick leaves and trumpet-shaped flowers grow so wild.

A low, sweet whistle pierced her thoughts. It was so Floyd that she wouldn’t have been surprised to find him standing right next to her. That should have been her first warning. Floyd rarely appeared unless there was a chance he’d be able to play. We ready for some fun, Birdy Girl, he said, not in a mean, killing mood, but in a mischievous way like he couldn’t wait to see what would happen next.

She didn’t let herself dwell on Floyd’s antics or the fact that she could smell him ever since her return to BLPD. She rang the doorbell, expecting wind chimes to go along with the fairy-tale lawn and porch. What she got instead was a hard buzz that played for a good five seconds before abruptly shutting off. She waited. Nothing. She rocked back on her heels, a thought sidling along the edge of her consciousness.

Raven pressed the doorbell once more. No answer. She jiggled the handle, pushed the door inward a fraction. No deadbolt, either.

We gone do this? Floyd asked in her head.

Her answer to him was, Yes, indeed we are. She reached inside her jacket pocket for her pick set. She had the door open in less than fifteen seconds. That had to be a new world record. When all this was over she’d have to tell Cameron about it.

She began to slowly push the door open, calling out for Willie Lee. Not only was there no answer, she could only push it open a few inches before it stopped, refusing to go any further. She called Speck’s name again, all the while thinking that something wasn’t quite right. There was this smell, too, a sugary, rotten smell that reminded her of the inside of a dumpster.

The smell on the porch only hinted at what was to come. It grew as she forced open the door a few inches more. She sidled through the narrow opening to get inside. Her eyes watered in protest. She rubbed her nose with her knuckles as if she could erase the scent. She tried to close the door behind her but no joy. It had caught on something and wouldn’t budge. She looked down to see a box she didn’t realize had fallen blocking the way.

Looks like good ole Willie Lee never used the front door, Floyd piped up in her head again. Maybe it’s time for you to do, what do you police say? Call for backup. But her backup would be Stevenson. There was no way that was going to happen. And no, she would have never thought that Speck and his family didn’t use the front door. Everything on the outside appeared so perfect.

But Floyd was ready to set her straight on that topic. Now that ain’t quite right, is it? That bike was rusty as sin, didn’t have no chain on it. And that doll with them black button eyes? Mildew running all up and down them white arms and legs. Playing cops and robbers with no sleep is making you blind, Birdy Girl.

She knew Floyd was right. Her exhausted mind was seeing what she had expected, and that was Speck’s perfect house representing his perfect life. She had been careless, stupid. She considered turning back. But she couldn’t. She had to find Noe.

She turned toward what must be the living room. No choice but to look straight up. That was the only direction the piles of trash bags and junk filling the room would allow her eyes to go. Some of the garbage bags had burst open. They oozed a black, viscous blend of what must have been discarded scraps of food and God knew what all. Junk was stacked so high that Raven speculated that she could topple it with a breath. An overturned loveseat with a blue child’s dresser in its gutted belly. On top of the loveseat, a toaster oven; beside the toaster oven, a broken espresso coffee machine. On top of the toaster oven and espresso machine, stacks of clothes, more bags, stuffed animals including what looked like a Tickle Me Elmo, its mouth wide as if screaming in fright from being buried alive. On top of that were clothes, more bags, and more toys – was that a red tricycle? – in a teetering tower that stretched all the way to the ceiling. The smells were changing. She’d see something, like a dead rat amid the junk, and the new scent of decomposition would mingle with the fetid, sweet smell of the dumpster.

Anything but this, her frantic mind thought.

She turned intending to bolt out the front door and call for backup, but she dislodged one of the towers. It fell with a crash into the foyer, further blocking her path to fresh air, to sanity. The little light that was coming through the front door window was now gone. She was trapped.

She covered her nose with the sleeve of her jacket, and fished out the mini flashlight from her jacket pocket. She flicked it on and noticed that she was probably only a few feet into the foyer. After that, the massive hoard went up and up. There was a trail between the bags, a walking trail in the putrid jungle.

Raven’s mind screamed for her to get out. And for once, Floyd, who hated disorder as much as she did, was silent. Not talking so big now, are you, old man? Raven asked, knowing that even by asking it she had stepped over the line of sanity. She considered her options. Try to make her way through the trash and out the front door, or follow the trail through the hoard. She flashed her light over the blockage. Breaking her way through that was impossible. She had no choice but to follow the trail. Pretend like you’re on a hike, or a particularly steep, but nasty trail run, she told herself before quickly amending, a trail run in hell.

She started carefully up through the mounds of junk, holding her arms out for balance, clutching the flashlight so hard her hand ached. Two times she had to stop because the smell made her gag so bad that she almost fell. Once she actually vomited a clear line of bile. After she was done, she wiped her mouth with the sleeve of her jacket and continued upward. A few carefully placed steps later, she was able to use the ceiling for balance. The scratching sounds her flashlight made against the ceiling sent her imagination in unwanted directions. She thought she heard movement in the trash heap, more rats, or cats that may have somehow gotten trapped. No telling what might be hidden in there.

When she thought that she couldn’t take it anymore, the trail led downward into what must be the kitchen. The stove had been ripped out of the wall, the gas pipe reaching for nothing. The refrigerator’s door hung open with various packages falling out of its gaping mouth. It wasn’t as bad as Oral’s refrigerator; at least it worked. There was a light, but from what she could see a good portion of the food had rotted.

The kitchen wasn’t as full to bursting as the room she just made her way through. Thank God there was a relative clear path to the back door, and there was more morning light sliding through the kitchen window. She started toward it when something caught her eye. A fast movement, no more than a flicker, coming from the dining room.

Raven dropped the flashlight into her pocket. She unhooked her holster and removed the Glock. Careful not to topple any of the smaller hoards, she started toward the movement. Something brushed against her leg, soft as a kiss.

“Jesus,” she said.

She looked down. A scrawny yellow, one-eyed cat hissed at her, showing every one of its tiny, sharp teeth. Raven gave it a gentle nudge with her boot to make it go away. But it wasn’t having any of it. A paw fast as lightning scratched her so hard that Raven could feel the claws through her jeans. She yelped as the cat skittered away.

“Crap,” Raven breathed, forgetting about the movement in the dining room. The thing had drawn blood. But she didn’t have the luxury of forgetting for long. A blow to the back of her head drove her to her knees. Before she could regroup, there was another blow on her back, this one knocking her face down on the top layer of trash on the filthy floor. Instinct took over. Raven flipped on her back and fired two quick shots.

The two soft thuds that followed made her sure that she hit something. She would swear later, even if only to herself, that she saw stiff, blond hair, and a flash of black moving fast. She leapt to her feet, maneuvered through the trash, calling out “police.” The only thing that returned her greeting was smoke from her own weapon.

Further in, she saw what she had shot. Not the man she was sure had been stalking her, but a black garbage bag. She felt the top of her head, and her fingers came away with blood. She made her way back to the kitchen. The cat had carved a place for himself on top of the crowded refrigerator. He had a very smug look on his face. Near where she had been lying was a marble rolling pin with blood on it. Next to it was a lead crystal iced tea pitcher, the rim almost a half-inch thick. The cat must have pawed the rolling pin off the refrigerator, and next the pitcher. There was no man chasing her, just a pissed-off cat. Raven wanted to lean against something. To take a breath. Except there was nothing to lean against. There was no good air to breathe.

Noe wasn’t here, she thought. Any evidence of Speck being a serial killer, if that evidence existed, was buried in ceiling-high filth. She made her way to the back door and pushed it open. She thought that the fresh air was the sweetest thing she ever tasted. She walked down two cement steps into a diamond-shaped yard covered in pea gravel. On her right, stepping-stones led to a long shed with black windows.

On surer footing now, she thought, maybe, just maybe. With her weapon pointed to the sky, she rapped on the shed door. Just as with the front door, nothing. She called Speck’s name and still didn’t hear anyone answer in return. She gripped the Glock tighter and opened the door.

The air was cooler than the outside air, but ranker. The morning sun fought its way through the scraps and scratches in the black paint covering the window, casting jagged beams of light inside the shed. There was enough light to give her a suggestion of what was going on but not the detail she needed. She holstered her weapon and retrieved her flashlight.

“Noe,” she called experimentally, as well as wishfully. She didn’t expect anyone to respond. She wasn’t disappointed.

What Raven saw in the flashlight’s beam made her gag. Her stomach rushed to her throat. If it weren’t for years of training by both Floyd and the academy, she would have been outside to puke more bile into the pea gravel. Several dead dogs were stacked in one corner. Some must have died fast and snarling because that’s how they looked in death. The same thing that happened in the house happened here. She would see something first, and then smell it.

As she moved the light around, it flashed on dead possums and squirrels. There was a work table in the middle of the room. Raven told herself not to move toward it, but she couldn’t help herself. She did so, slowly, her boots moving heavily over the hard floor, the circle of light leading her way.

On the square wooden table were more animals. A possum was stretched out with a nail in each five-fingered paw. She looked a day or two dead, the corpses of her children still poking their little heads from the pouch in which she carried them.

No time for screaming.

Something out of the corner of her eye made her spin around. She thought she heard a whisper, a voice that said don’t turn away yet, look again. So she did. There on the table next to the possum was a non-penetrating captive bolt gun. This one wasn’t like the one Stella had shown her, but an old-fashioned-looking one with a handgrip and a barrel with a mushroom-shaped tip. Enough to stun, to concuss, but not penetrate the skull. So I can sell the brain with the other meat, Raven heard Stella’s voice in her head. She was going to take a photo with her Android, but stopped, reconsidered. Noe obviously wasn’t here. No need to continue to contaminate this evidence by being inside the shed. Let the uniforms find it, and CSI deal with it. She dropped the flashlight into her pocket along with the cell phone, and started making her way out of the shed.

She would make the call from her vehicle so no one would think for a minute that she had been in that shed. She was already making up in her head what she would say. She went to question Speck, and noticed that his front door was open. When she realized that something was blocking the door, she stepped back to advise dispatch that she was going in, and to send backup. She’d just have to hope that CSI didn’t find the bullet holes in the garbage bags or shell casings in the filth. Just flows from the tongue like honey, them lies do, don’t they, Birdy Girl?

“Shut up, ole man,” Raven whispered. “You’ve done worse. I’m trying to get some good done here.”

Raven was so into her story that she didn’t see Speck before she heard him. An angry roar ripped the lie she had been making up in her head to pieces.