Steve’s unsure about this. He is leading a possible, though unlikely, suspect to the crime scene of an open investigation. But he understands better than most the need to confront your demons. Parsons’s house is just that, a house, and if it helps Denise see that, it will be worth it.
The night sky is black, and a billion stars shine down from above, the lack of light here in the desert creating the remarkable brilliance. Denise walks beside him, bare feet padding softly on the road.
When they reach Parsons’s walk, he stops.
“There’s a smell,” he warns.
Her eyes are fixed on the door, and again he wonders if this is a bad idea. They’re still outside, and already she looks rattled.
“Denise—”
“There’s a smell,” she says, cutting him off. “Got it.”
She continues toward the stoop, and he follows, wanting to protect her but knowing it’s already too late, the damage caused by this place and the man who lived here inflicted long before this moment.
He lifts the police tape for her to duck under, then follows her beneath it and opens the door. She steps through and stops just inside. The odor is half what it was this morning, a day with the doors open reducing it to a smell no worse than rotten food in a fridge.
She scans right to left, and her eyes momentarily pause on the table in the kitchen. The juice glass and Minute Maid container are gone, and the chair that was askew has been straightened. Expressionless, she takes it in, and then continues to the hall.
She glances into the first bedroom, stops at the bathroom to study it a second, then continues to the main bedroom. Steve follows a foot behind. She walks into the room and stops at the foot of Parsons’s bed. The drab gray spread is pulled taut, and two dingy white pillows are propped against the headrest. Her right hand goes to her mouth, the knuckles against her lips, and her left arm hugs her waist as her body begins to quake.
Steve sets his hands on her shoulders to steer her away, but she resists. Her head shakes as she shrugs him off, then, with a deep shuddering breath, she turns and steps toward the closet.
“Denise—”
She shakes her head harder and takes another step.
“Denise, stop. It’s just a closet.”
But she knows, like he knows, it’s not. The bathroom is too small.
She reaches for the knob, and he grabs hold of her wrist, stopping her. She tries to wrench free, but he continues to hold it tight. She cranes her head back, and her green eyes flash bright with tears.
“Trust me,” he says, his voice low. “You don’t want to see what’s in there.”
Her chin juts forward.
“Trust me,” he repeats, his eyes holding hers.
Giving up the fight, she allows him to pull her into his arms, and her tears soak through his shirt and straight into his heart.
After a minute, she sniffles, and pulls away. She wipes her eyes with the back of her hands and says, “Do what you need to. I’ll be outside.”
He waits to be certain she’s gone, then opens the closet door.
The hidden door is cleverly disguised as an air vent and is concealed by a large roller suitcase. He grumbles in irritation at whoever investigated Parsons a dozen years ago and missed it. Though, in truth, he almost missed it himself. He was nearly to his car before the thought occurred to him that houses from this era typically have tubs, which was when he realized the bathroom was too small.
He turns on his penlight, then crawls through the hole into a space about four feet square. He straightens, and the airless stench of stale semen and sweat makes him want to retch. Breathing sparingly through his teeth, he pulls the light chain, which sets the room aglow.
Steve considers himself tough. A veteran of two tours and a twenty-year FBI agent who has worked cases on every crime imaginable and witnessed the worst humans can inflict on each other. But nothing prepares a man for the kind of evil that surrounds him.
The photos are mostly beautiful—boys smiling and laughing, caught in unguarded moments of childhood—almost as if Parsons profoundly understood exactly what he was stealing. The before images evidence of a truly twisted individual who stalked his victims like prey before pouncing. The other photos, fewer and far more gruesome, are of the boys stripped naked, terror and confusion on their faces.
Steve focuses on the job. Using his phone, he documents the scene. Every inch of wall is plastered—polaroids, snapshots, and inkjet prints. Decades worth. Some so faded they’re gossamer. He does his best to count the victims, but there are photos on top of photos, and some are multiples of the same boy. At least a dozen are of Jesse, his images taking up a two-foot strip of honor in the middle of the main wall.
* * *
Denise sits on the stoop, and Steve lowers himself beside her. She takes his hand and holds it on her thigh as if it’s the most natural thing in the world.
“Was it bad?” she asks.
“It’s always bad,” he says, his emotions close to the surface. “But, yeah, it was bad.”
They sit silent after that, lost in their respective thoughts.
A moment later, when she shudders, he turns to see her touching the bricks beside her.
“Are you cold?” he asks, wanting to put his arm around her but unsure.
She looks at him surprised, as if she’d forgotten he was there. “Huh?”
“You shivered.”
Her smile is sad. “It wasn’t from the cold.”
This time he doesn’t hesitate. He wraps his arm around her, and she curls against him, her head nuzzled against his shoulder. She smells like shampoo and something citrus, lemon or orange.
Realizing he shouldn’t be inhaling her scent or thinking about how wonderful she smells, he untangles himself and stands. “I should go.” He holds out his hand to help her up.
She doesn’t take it.
“Denise?”
“No,” she says. “I want to sit here, and I’d like for you to sit here with me so I know I’m okay.”
So he sits back down, and she leans against him again, and he wraps his arm back around her as her scent envelops him and he listens to the chirps and screams of the bats.
After a long time, she says, “Okay,” then pushes to her feet, and, hand in hand, they walk back to her house.
When they reach her steps, she takes his other hand as well and looks up with her bewitching eyes. “I’d like you to stay,” she says, startling him speechless.
She gives a sad smile. “I know you’re leaving in the morning, but tonight, I’d rather not be alone.”
He stares, unable to formulate a response.
His brain screams, No! Absolutely not! Bad idea! while an entire other part of his body enthusiastically wags its tail and does somersaults.
“I think it’s best if I go,” he says, leaning in and kissing her gently on the head.
“Why?” she says plainly when he pulls away.
“Because,” he says, feeling frustrated with himself and with her. This is ridiculous. They just met. She’s tangled up in his murder investigation, and she’s far too young . . . and far too beautiful . . . for this to be happening. “It’s been a long day, full of emotion, and I don’t want to take advantage of that. I’m being chivalrous.”
“Screw chivalrous,” she says, then before he can say anything more, reaches up and pulls his mouth down on hers.
“Screw chivalrous,” he mumbles through his lip-locked mouth, then sweeps her into his arms and carries her into the house.