Page 57 of Sworn to Silence
Death is a terrible thing, but murder is worse. No matter how many times I see it, the ugliness and senselessness of it frighten me on some primal level. My speedometer hits eighty miles per hour on the highway, but I slow to a reasonable speed once I reach Thigpen Road because it’s slick with snow. The Huffman place is down a short lane and surrounded by skeletal trees, like bony fingers holding the place together.
I turn the Explorer in to the driveway and follow the tire tracks to the rear of the house. Ronnie Stedt and a teenaged girl I don’t recognize huddle inside a pickup truck.
Jamming the Explorer into Park, I swing open the door. The kids disembark and rush toward me.
“What happened?” I ask.
Stedt’s face is the color of paste. His eyes are glassy. He stops a couple of feet away and I smell vomit. “There’s a dead person inside.”
I look at the female. Her cheeks are bright red and streaked with mascara. She looks a lot tougher than Ronnie Stedt. “What’s your name?” I ask.
“J-Jess Hardiman.”
“Is there anyone else in the house?” I slide my .38 from its holster.
“Just the...body.”
“Where?”
“B-bedroom.”
“Stay here. If you see something or get scared, get in the truck and hit the horn, okay?”
Both heads bob.
I jog to the back door and shove it open. The house smells of death and marijuana. An old Led Zeppelin song blares from a radio on the counter. My nerves crawl like worms beneath my skin. Fear runs thick in my veins as I enter the living room. I don’t think there’s anyone in the house. But I’m afraid of what waits ahead.
I move into the hall. It’s narrow and dark. The smell is stronger here. Blood and feces laced with the underlying stench of putrefaction. I sidestep a puddle of vomit. To my left, the bedroom door stands open. I don’t want to look, but I can’t stop. I see a horribly bloated corpse. Brown skin stretched impossibly tight. Hair matted and hanging down. Breasts drooping like wrinkled fruit. Ankles bound and chained to a beam in the ceiling. Black feet. A wet, black tongue protruding between swollen lips.
A sound escapes me as I stumble backward into the hall. My breaths come shallow and fast. My stomach roils, and my mouth fills with bile. Footsteps sound behind me. I swing around, my gun rising.
Glock halts, his hands come up. “Jesus Christ, it’s me.”
“Goddamnit.” I lower my weapon. “I almost plugged you.”
His gaze flicks down the hall. “Scene clear?”
I shake my head because I can’t find my voice. I’m dangerously close to throwing up.
He moves past me and peers into the bedroom. “Holy hell.”
While Glock clears the rest of the house, I struggle to pull myself together. By the time he meets me in the hall, I have my cop’s coat of armor back in place.
“It’s clear,” he says.
I don’t like the way he’s looking at me, as if he thinks I’m going to lose it. “Damn it, Glock, I should have asked Detrick to assist,” I manage. “I should have formed a task force.”
“Even if you had, it wouldn’t have prevented this. She’s been there a while. Fuckin’ hindsight.”
I walk into the living room. Behind me I hear him speaking into his radio. Through the kitchen window, I see Ronnie Stedt and his girlfriend standing where I left them.
Glock comes up beside me. “Pickles and Skid are on the way.”
I nod toward the teenagers. “We need to talk to them. I’ll take the Stedt boy.”
“Chick looks tough.”
“You’re tougher.”
