31: Special Agent Frank Poole parked his red Jeep Cherokee on the 300 block of Mckeen Road in Downers Grove a few houses down from 317 on the right. Barbara McInley’s file lay open on the passenger seat.
This was the only known address for Libby McInley, noted in her file by her parole officer upon her release six weeks earlier.
He shouldn’t be out here.
He knew better.
A late-eighties Ford Taurus sat in the driveway. By the looks of it, the car had sat there for some time. The color appeared to be a faded burgundy or brown, hard to tell in the remaining trickle of evening light. There were no tracks in the driveway, snow piled high on top. Substantial rust, low tire pressure, neglected, forgotten. Long blades of brown grass and weeds poked out of the fresh white layer of snow, winter’s attempt at covering up an unkempt lawn, failing. The house was a single-story box of a thing, no real discernible style. Four walls and a roof with an attached one-car garage. White paint had long ago given up its hold on the siding, and dark wood shone through from beneath where it had peeled away. The roof was in need of replacement, visibly sagging over what was most likely a very small living room.
Lights began coming on in the surrounding houses, but 317 remained dark, lifeless.
You want to take a look, a voice at the back of his mind whispered. Just a quick peek, and you can be on your way. No harm, no foul, nobody will ever be the wiser.
Poole did want to take a peek. He wanted to talk to her. Porter had been right. Something felt off about her sister’s death. It nagged at him, and Poole knew if he didn’t do this, he’d spend the next two weeks thinking about doing it. The only way to get it out of his system was to walk up to that house, ring the bell, and have a few words with Ms. McInley.
After hanging up with Porter, Poole had run a detailed search for Franklin Kirby, McInley’s hit-and-run victim. He came up blank. The man had been identified by the driver’s license in his wallet. There was a photo of it in the McInley file but no record of him in the driver’s license database. The number on the license was assigned to a woman named Lesley Carmichael, forty-six, living in Woodlawn—not Franklin Kirby. Libby McInley hit and killed a man carrying false identification, although still a name Porter clearly recognized.
Poole stepped from the Cherokee out into the cold evening wind, closed the door behind him, and crossed the street to 317. Neither the public sidewalk nor the stone walkway leading to the front door had been shoveled. The front porch was also lost beneath a layer of at least four inches of snow. He pressed the bell with a gloved finger, heard the double chime inside, and waited.
Nothing.
He rang again, glancing back at the driveway.
Poole turned back to the door.
No sound from within.
No lights.
Libby McInley might have spotted him, killed the lights. She wouldn’t be the first person on parole to hide from a cop on their doorstep. There was no current employment information listed in her file. She probably had little reason to leave the house. Hell, he wouldn’t be out in this weather if he didn’t have to be.
He knocked on the door, three loud raps. “Ms. McInley? I’m Special Agent Frank Poole. I know you’re in there. Open the door.”
He had no idea if she was in there, but the ruse typically worked.
Poole blew into his gloved hands. He felt like he was standing in a tub of ice water. His breath fluttered through the air and dissipated.
Poole stepped off the porch and over a small hedge, then pressed his face to the large picture window. The glass was cold, covered in frost. He couldn’t see inside.
If the heat were on, you’d feel it at the glass, right? Who doesn’t have their heat on in this kind of weather?
He stepped back and began to circle the house, attempting to look in each window as he went. If one of the neighbors saw him, they’d surely be dialing 911 right now. At the side of the house he nearly tripped over a rusty bicycle, an old red Schwinn lost beneath the thick snowdrift. There were also the remains of potted plants, long since dead, and random lengths of garden hose, coiled and forgotten for the winter.
Around back he found a wood deck. A black Weber BBQ lay on its side, lost to slumber, lawn chairs piled up around it, no rhyme or reason. He stepped up onto the deck, the boards creaking under his weight, popping noises.
Could be rotten. Might fall through.
He carefully made his way to the back door.
The screen was cut.
A straight cut, about five inches long, enough for a man to get his hand inside the door.
Enough to unlock the screen door, get to work on that deadbolt with a lock picker’s kit.
Poole tried the doorknob. Unlocked.
He reached inside his coat, unsnapped and removed his Glock 22, held it low, against his hip, pointing at the ground. A small LED flashlight was attached to the barrel. He flicked it on with his forefinger.
He gave the door a little push. It protested, frozen in the frame. Again, with more force. When it finally opened, it did so with a loud thwack.
The smell hit him first, the sweet, sickly odor of something turned, something gone bad. It wafted out, warning him off, telling him to get back into his car and drive away.
“Ms. McInley? This is Special Agent Frank Poole. I’m coming inside.”
The wood door opened into the kitchen. Poole gave it a push with the toe of his shoe while sweeping the room with the barrel of his gun, the light. Dishes were piled high at the sink, the counter buried under them. There were also pizza boxes and cartons from Chinese take-out, empty soda cans and water bottles.
The heat was off.
As he approached the sink, he realized the dishes were frozen in a block of ice. A thin coat of frost covered everything.
Still, the smell.
Poole walked past the kitchen counter into a small dining room. Boxes and paper littered the table—job applications, copies of a résumé, “Elizabeth McInley” printed in bold font at the top. There were newspapers, unopened bills, clothing—a woman’s blouse and bra, all haphazardly tossed about.
“Ms. McInley? Are you in here?”
Poole’s breath floated through the cold air. He spotted the thermostat on the wall and glanced at it. The heat was switched off, the dial turned to the coldest position.
An open doorway stood to his left. Poole followed it into the small living room, the gun and flashlight pointed forward now, leading him. To his right stood the front door, along with the picture window he had tried to peer into, as opaque from this side as it was from the front yard. On his left, a couch lined the wall, facing a small television propped up on milk crates. There was a cheap pressboard table in front of the couch. Someone had shoved the contents to the floor—magazines, a remote, a few utility bills, and some advertising circulars.
Sitting on top of the table, spaced evenly, centered, were three white boxes tied off with black string. The white of the boxes was riddled with specks of brown and crimson, a spatter of sorts.
There was a small bathroom directly across from where he stood, and another door to the left of the television, most likely a bedroom.
Poole stepped forward and swept his eyes over the bathroom. The white tub was ringed with brown, the sink covered in dry toothpaste. A moldy towel was on the floor, bunched up and shoved to the side near the toilet. Someone had wiped at a spot in the middle of the mirror; Poole’s hazy reflection stared back at him.
He backed out of the bathroom into the living room, his gun now pointed at the bedroom door. He saw the boxes on the table from the corner of his eye. He tried not to look at them. Poole approached the open bedroom door with a wide arc, preferring to enter the room straight on rather than sliding against the wall and going in from the side. The beam of his flashlight dancing over the walls revealed a ratty dresser, the bed.
A woman’s body was tied to the bed at all four corners. Her clothing had been cut away, the tattered remains scattered about the floor. Her flesh was covered in tiny red cuts, thousands of them, every exposed inch. The eyes were gone, two black sockets. Her mouth was filled with dry, crusty blood. Poole knew that beneath her matted hair her ear was gone too. He’d find those things in the boxes.
He removed the flashlight from his gun and holstered the weapon.
He stared at the remains of Libby McInley.