Chapter 23
Devon left Camden behind, with Mark writing out a statement in order to keep from going down to the station himself right now.
She wasn’t sure how Camden had persuaded him, but it was probably half threats and half cajoling in order to get him to confess to what he had actually found at the crime scene, what he had not done about it, explaining that he was in shock.
Even to this day, he wasn’t exactly sure of all he had seen.
By the time Camden rejoined Devon in his vehicle, he remained silent as he drove them home.
She finally asked him, “What do you do with this now?”
He glanced at her, a pensive expression on his face.
“I honestly don’t know,” he admitted. “I’m definitely not supposed to be working on this ancient cold case, but it was a miscarriage of justice that needed to be fixed.
In terms of what’s happening with you, I’m not sure how important it is or if it has any importance at all to your situation … ” He let his voice trail off.
She asked, “Do you think that’s why Stefan told me to go along, to stay here, to not leave after all?”
“Probably,” he guessed. “I mean, you never really know with Stefan but, in a way, yes.”
“I don’t really know how to feel about what Mark finally revealed. … He has already lost so much,” she noted, “that I can understand why he didn’t dare take a chance on telling his secrets.”
Camden arched one eyebrow at her and asked, “You feel sympathy for Mark, even when you know that this Jerry guy has gotten off scot-free the entire time?”
She nodded. “I know. It doesn’t make sense. That’s the hard part, isn’t it? Because Mark didn’t speak up, this serial killer is now, what, seventy?”
“Probably more like sixty-six,” he clarified, with a nod.
“It’s amazing to me that Jerry didn’t kill Mark on the spot.
Maybe murdering a cop was a step too far for him.
However, Mark did go on disability soon afterward.
Maybe Jerry thought Mark had just blocked it all out.
” Camden shook his head. “Jerry was going out with the eldest Herschel daughter.”
Devon nodded. “What do you think happened?”
“I suspect that they were home alone in the house, fooling around. The dad must have caught him, and, being the bigger man with a hot temper, probably thought he would teach the teenage boy a lesson. Only the boy taught him a lesson instead, then found himself dealing with a screaming girl who may have tried to defend her father.”
Camden shook his head. “I mean, that’s purely speculation of course.
So exactly how it all played out? We don’t know.
We may never know it all. Still, I highly suspect that things then went way too far,” he replied.
“Once he’d killed the father, he might have gotten off, claiming self-defense, unless he couldn’t get the daughter to shut up. ”
“And he killed her at the same time?” Devon asked, frowning at him.
“That’s only a theory at this point, and we know nothing for sure.
But the mom and the other kids? Chances are, they came in soon afterward, maybe straggling in separately, and Jerry found a way to dispatch them.
If the kids were coming home from school on their own, that wouldn’t have been too difficult for Jerry to take care of each one, a kid at a time.
And, if the mom was returning home from grocery shopping or something, well, she would have been distracted, and Jerry probably could have taken care of her easily enough too, particularly if he’s panicked.
Plus, I suppose, even as a teenager, Jerry was bigger and stronger than the mother and the kids back then.
And, you know, in for a penny, in for a pound. What else was he supposed to do?”
Devon snorted. “Add in the fact that Jerry was still in the house—my house now—with all his bloodied victims, when his cop buddy pulls in. Maybe Jerry doesn’t even know it until Mark starts screaming, and then Jerry acts as if he’s just come in from the other room, finding all the dead bodies too.
I mean, in a way,” she added, “it’s brilliant. ”
“But it wouldn’t have held up,” Camden stated, turning to her in the vehicle.
“I mean, if Jerry had been questioned about any of this, he was still a teenager—I figure about sixteen—and, once confronted with the facts related to the timeline, plus the blood all over him, Jerry was cooked. So I suspect he would have broken fairly quickly.”
As they pulled onto their residential block, Jerry’s house was off to the side, all alone at the far end. She stared at it as they drove past it and circled back to their houses. She asked, “What do we do now?”
Camden shrugged. “I’ll go talk to him.”
“Alone?” she asked.
He gave her a frown. “I am a cop, remember?”
“I know,” she muttered, “but the man butchered six people as a teenager. I’m not sure you should be going alone.”
“Good point,” he conceded, “but I don’t want you coming with me either.”
“And yet,” she noted, “if I’m with you, it won’t look like any official visit. So we’re just talking to him, and he won’t have any idea why we’re there. I can potentially ask him if he’s had any hauntings around his place.”
He frowned at her, then shook his head. “I don’t want you anywhere close to him.”
“He was just talking to me in my front yard, remember? And that was a friendly enough conversation.”
“Sure, because look at what he’s gotten away with at this stage of his life. The chances of anybody capturing him now are pretty minor.”
“Except for you,” she pointed out.
“I probably wouldn’t have gotten Mark to open up if you hadn’t been there,” he admitted. “So, I think that was definitely a good call on Stefan’s part.”
“I really want to know if whatever Jerry did back then had anything to do with what’s happening now,” she shared, “at least at my place. Are these remnants in my yard parts of his victims from fifty years ago, still hanging around? And remember too that they are blood relatives to Tabitha’s mom.
So definitely Tabitha was related to them.
Yet, even if we might be solving this cold case from fifty years ago, does that also resolve the issue that’s right in my backyard? ”
“Good questions. Something else to ask Stefan,” Camden suggested as they pulled into his driveway.
Like clockwork, Stefan called. Camden greeted him with, “Just talking about you.”
“I know,” Stefan replied. “Devon’s with you?” he confirmed with Camden.
“Yes.”
“Good. Here’s the update on the kids’ artwork.
A few in my circle have more knowledge about this than I do, so I handed it off to them.
Sorry for the delay getting back to you, but these are ancient text symbols, from various religions around the globe, starting back at the beginning of time.
While my experts, given enough time, could translate these, they have singled out suspicious words among all these languages.
Basically, the twins have an amalgam of dark arts working together here.
None of it deals with the healing arts. Another deep-dive search confirmed that Tabitha was related to the mother of the four girls who died in Devon’s house.
So there could also be a blood oath in place as well.
And, Devon, worry won’t help anybody here.
Believe in yourself. You are gifted, you just haven’t been aware of it fully—until now.
Regardless, remember that your light washes away all the darkness.
Also that your heart of love is the best protection you can have.
… Look after each other, even the twins.
They know not what they’ve set loose.” Then Stefan disconnected.
Devon was speechless, staring at Camden, who didn’t have anything to add at this point. With a shake of his head, he muttered, “Let the games begin.” And he opened his door to the truck and got out. So did Devon.
She hopped down, and, when she turned around, Jerry stood there, with a big beaming smile on his face. “Hey, neighbors,” he said in a booming voice. “You two hitching up or something?”
She looked at him, a creepy feeling swirling inside her, now that she had a much better idea of who this person really was. “You mean, outside of being friends?”
“Yeah, sure,” he replied, with a wink. Then he laughed. “Hey, I mean, more power to you. It’s a difficult world out there sometimes. You got to catch the love where you can.”
“Did you never marry?” she asked, without even thinking.
“No, I sure didn’t,” he stated. “I found a girl for me, but that was a long time ago, and she, she didn’t really want me.”
“Sorry,” she muttered. “That’s always tough.” Her heart sank as another puzzle piece fell into place.
“Yeah, it was tough,” he agreed, “but it’s all good now.”
“You forgave her?” Devon asked.
“Nothing to forgive,” he declared, with that wicked smile. “I mean, if you’re not loved, you’re just not loved. What can you do about it?”
She didn’t quite know what to say to that, but she shrugged an agreement of sorts. Camden walked around the side of the truck, facing him now, and asked, “And you never found another love like that one, I suppose?”
“Nope, she broke my heart, and that’s all there was to it.”
They couldn’t tell if he was truly sincere or being flippant. Either way, she didn’t particularly like the direction this conversation was going. “You’ve lived here a long time, huh?”
“Yeah, I sure have,” he confirmed, with a nod. “It wasn’t all my life here, but it was the bulk of it. There’s just something to be said about staying close to where you grew up.”
Devon shrugged. “And yet so many people just want to take off and leave the small towns of their birth.”
“Sure, and I did that for a while, but then something draws you back again.” He looked at her and asked, “And what are you doing here? This isn’t really your kind of place, is it?”
She shrugged. “I’ve got the twins to look after,” she shared, her tone mild. “So, when this place came up for sale, it seemed too good of a deal to pass up.”