Chapter 33
Hoses snaked the lawn, held by men and women in impossibly bulky gear directing high-pressure jets onto the structure. I saw no flames, but the air was thick with ash. With the acrid stench of scorched wood, metal, and plastic.
Not wanting to distract any of the first responders, I searched the crowd on my own. One hand covering my nose and mouth, I plunged through the onlookers, scanning faces and silhouettes. I didn’t know and didn’t care where Skinny had gone.
No Katy.
Finally, desperate to establish that my daughter was safe, I approached a firefighter who’d retreated to one of the trucks.
“I’m sorry to bother you,” I said, voice shaky.
The person turned to look at me, features obscured by a full-face SCBA mask. Given a height exceeding six feet, I assumed male gender.
“My daughter phoned me less than an hour ago from this location. I’m worried she might be inside.”
Moving a mic from his collar to the voice port on his mask, the man said, “We did a sweep. The house is empty.”
“You’re sure?”
The man nodded.
“Did you check the basement?”
“If the place has one, I’m sure someone did.”
Hardly encouraging.
“My daughter could be down there,” I pressed.
“Look, lady. You gotta step back.”
The man raised a gloved hand in the direction of the police cordon.
Struggling to keep my composure, I retreated up the block, my brain firing a barrage of questions.
Was Katy still in that house?
Was she alive?
Had Katy been abducted by the same person who’d called trying to terrify me, and succeeding?
If Katy was no longer here, had her abductor moved her elsewhere, perhaps suspecting his call had been traced?
My gaze never rested, at one point landed on a truck. On a logo with a familiar swooshing arrow.
My steps slowed as I felt a nudge from my lower centers.
What?
I studied the truck.
Noted spiderweb cracking on the rearview mirror.
A driver in a billed cap.
Again, the subliminal psst!, more adamant this time.
I’d seen the truck before. Where?
Pulse drumming, I looked around, anxious to find Slidell. I spotted him among the barricaded onlookers, between a kid in a Hornet’s jersey and a blue-haired granny clutching a canvas bag.
Digging my mobile from my purse, I hit Skinny’s speed dial number.
“Where the fu—” he began.
“I’m worried that the firefighters didn’t check the basement. One of them gave me a runaround. We need to check if—”
“I’ll take care of it. Your ass goes back to the car.” The intensity of his command left no room for protest.
I did as Skinny ordered. Sat on the passenger side, worrying the damn cuticle and checking the time every few seconds.
Tapping my mobile to be sure it was on. Of course, it was on.
Ninety minutes later, the call finally came.
Hand trembling, I snatched the device from the dash.
“The kid’s fine.” Slidell’s breath was striking the mouthpiece fast and raspy.
“Where is she?”
“On her way to an ER.”
“Ohmygod! What—”
“I said she’s fine.”
“If she’s fine, why is she in an ambulance?”
“I didn’t give her no choice.”
“Where was she?”
“The perp left her tied up in the cellar, then hauled ass.”
“With the house on fire.” The fury I felt was like a flamethrower piercing my chest.
“Whoever it is will pay for this. But you need to see this. The basement where this handiwork went down is a real freak show.”
I needed no urging.
Flying from the car, I raced up the street. Skinny met me on the porch and handed me a Maglite, saying that the lighting on the stairs was shit. With that colorful admonition, he led me into the house.
The front entrance gave directly onto a parlor. Cheap factory rug on the floor. IKEA-type chair and sofa trio facing a flat-screen TV. Everything bland and normal.
Until we entered the kitchen and crossed to an open door.
The odor hit me before we reached the threshold, a familiar blend of cedar and oil.
The tiny hairs rose on the back of my neck.
Where had I encountered that smell?
An image flashed.
Boots with yellow laces slogging across flooded concrete.
But this aroma included something else. Something organic.
The heavy thud of Slidell’s feet snapped me back.
I followed his retreating form down the treads. He’d been right about the bulb. A lame forty watter above and to the left was casting eerie copies of my movements onto the wall to my right.
Thirteen steps, then I felt hardness beneath my sneakers.
New smells took over. Mildew. Mold. A hint of damp concrete.
A furnace occupied the center of the room. Three doors surrounded it, roughly ten feet out. All stood open.
With a gesture that could have meant anything, Slidell disappeared through the farthest door on the left. I trailed him into a surprisingly well-lit room and looked around.
Ropes crisscrossed the small space, looping a few feet below the ceiling. Clipped to the lines by old-fashioned wooden clothespins were dozens of animal paws and several human hands, each neatly severed from the limb to which it had once been attached.
A counter ran along the back wall, tiled on top, with a small sink at one end. Metal shelving stretched floor to ceiling on both side walls. I crossed to inspect the unit on the left.
The shelves held scores of lidded plastic tubs in varying sizes. Each was marked by hand with a black Sharpie.
I scanned the labels at eye level. Degreasers. Picklers. Tanners. Deodorizers. Neutralizers. Preservatives.
My gaze dropped to a lower shelf.
Glass eyes. Ear liners. Jaw sets. Tongues.
“Follow me.”
Not waiting to see if I’d heard, Slidell strode from the room.
As before, I scurried after him.
The second room was identical to the first.
A set of clothing lay in crumpled disarray on the speckled laminate surface covering the back counter. A pair of jeans. A blue polo with black collar and sleeves.
I felt the edges of my mind go fuzzy.
Could it be?
I didn’t want to know.
I had to know.
Barely breathing, I stepped closer and lifted the shirt with a pen that I drew from my purse. Saw a logo. A single word with an arrow swooshing below.
Frantic strobe shots slammed together in my brain.
Suddenly, it all made sense.
An truck on the circle drive the day I fell.
An truck blocking the nun’s view at Cordelia Park.
An truck now parked outside on the street.
I tried to swallow but found that my mouth had gone dry.
I whirled to face Slidell.
“It’s an driver,” I said.
“There you go agai—”
“An truck has been present every time something’s gone down.”
“You got any idea how many of those truck—”
“There’s one outside on the street right now.”
Slidell’s features rearranged into an expression I couldn’t read.
“The person who abducted me smelled of this crap.” I jabbed a finger at a six-ounce bottle of Van Dyke’s Finishing Deodorizer. “I’m guessing that the driver of the truck out there lives in this house, and that he probably reeks of this stuff.”
“I’ll be goddammed.”
Face graveyard grim, Slidell yanked his mobile from his belt, whirled, and charged up the stairs.
I was right on his heels.