Echoes of Darkness (16 page)

“Eccles, where did this camera come from?” Billy’s father pointed toward the camera in its case, lying on the greasy, glass-topped counter. “I know you,” he continued. “You know where all your goods come from.”

Eccles spread his huge hands.

“What do you want from me, Detective? I have a lot of stuff in here, and sorry, but I’m not the best record keeper out there. I mean, I could make something up to tell you, but that would be lying to an officer of the law, and that would be wrong.”

False contrition was stamped thick on Eccles’s face and voice.

“Come on, Roger. You sold the camera to my kid, and it’s taking weird pictures. They’re freaking him out, and I don’t blame him. I’m asking as a father, not a cop. What’s the deal with the Polaroid? Where’d it come from? Who’s the former owner? Something.”

Eccles raised his hands in a slightly defensive gesture.

“Look, Detective”—he lowered his hands with a smile—“sorry.
Dad
. The camera’s old. I had it so long I forgot I
had
it, and I don’t remember where I got it. If the pictures are weird, well hey, I warned him about the expired film when he bought it.”

He gestured toward Billy, who watched nervously.

“Ask him. I told him and his friend the pictures would come out funky if the film even worked at all.”

Billy’s father raised his eyebrows.

“Funky? You want to see funky?”

He unzipped the bag and pulled out the camera, set it aside and reached back in for the stack of photos. “This is a little more than funky, Roger. It’s weird.”

He slapped the whole stack down on the counter. The camera jumped and suddenly popped open, from storage to picture-taking mode. The sharp
clack
made them all jump.

“Look at these,” Billy’s father said. “Who
is
this guy?”

Eccles glanced at the photos, then did a double-take. He leaned in close, flipping through them slowly. His head was still down when he spoke, and all the cockiness seemed to have drained from his voice.

“I dunno, Detective. The . . . ah . . . the kids don’t know? This looks like he was following them around—you might want to be looking for this guy, instead of asking me.”

He pushed the stack away, avoiding the detective’s eyes. Billy’s father picked up the stack, studying Eccles, his face growing a little harder.

“But I
am
asking you, Roger, and now I’m asking as a cop. Who is this guy?”

He slapped the stack down in front of Eccles again, harder. The camera jumped, and the flash went off.

“What the hell!” Eccles shouted, startled, making Billy jump. The detective glanced at the camera as it whirred, then turned back to Eccles. He looked back to the camera when it hummed again. The first picture fell to the countertop, pushed out of the way by a second photo.

Then a third.

It was almost comical how both men suddenly leaned down at the same time, their heads nearly knocking together as they peered closely at the small pile of pictures.

A fourth whirred into existence.

With a sudden cry Eccles bulled past Billy’s father, swatting the smaller man aside as he made a break for the door. The detective, no match for Eccles’s strength, was still quick. He caught up just as the fleeing man was rounding the end of the counter and kicked out, catching the side of one running foot. Eccles’s leg struck its mate mid-stride, and the big man went down as if diving forward, launching all three hundred pounds of his body headfirst into the end of a shelving unit. He hit the ground, out cold. Breathing hard, Billy’s father pulled the handcuffs from their case on the back of his belt.

“We
knew
you were involved in some bad stuff, but Roger,” the detective said as he snapped the cuffs onto Eccles’s flaccid wrists. “Looks like you
do
know our mystery man, and you’re going to tell me all about him.”

Billy wasn’t even aware he had moved when his father looked up.

“Billy! Stay away from those pictures, son.”

But Billy could not stay away. Even while Eccles was running for it, Billy had been keeping unconscious count. He knew the last picture had come grinding out of the old camera just as his father was straddling Eccles with the cuffs. From a distance, Billy had been able to see color extruding from the camera, again and again—these nine pictures had come out fully developed, instantly available.

He was drawn to them.

The pile was splayed out enough for Billy to see they were all the same picture—nine copies of the same image.

The
image.

“Billy, I told you not to—”

The face, so familiar now, stared out from the photo, dark eyes wide with shock, wild hair in greater disarray. Behind and above him, Roger Eccles’s face was twisted in savage glee. One of his hands gripped the stranger’s shoulder, knuckles white, the other reached around in front of him holding something that sparkled in the light but was too streaked with motion to make out.

Beneath the glittering blur, the stranger’s throat seemed to have grown a second, lipless mouth. Blood poured down onto the collar of the dark coat, spraying into the air in an arc cast off by the steely blur in Eccles’s hand.

“You know how you said we could get more film for this camera?”

Billy’s father looked up from where he squatted over the prone Eccles, punching buttons on his mobile phone, and nodded.

“Forget about it.”

The bell above the door rang again as Billy walked outside. His father called after him before the door swung shut, but Billy barely heard him. He took a seat on the curb in front of the shop.

He was still there, listening to the rushing sound in his head, when the police cruiser, lights flashing blue and white in the late morning sun, jerked to a halt in front of him.

A MAN DOES WHAT’S RIGHT

Grandpa gripped Kyle’s wrist so tight
it hurt
, long bony fingers wrapping all the way around in a handcuff of knuckles. With the other hand the old man tore open the station door, the door-closer squealing over their heads in protest; Grandpa always had a surprising amount of wiry strength, but at the moment he was what Pop would have called “crazy strong.” Some of Kyle’s friends might have said Grandpa had gone “full retard,” but Kyle wouldn’t have said that. Kyle wouldn’t have even admitted to thinking his grandfather was
crazy
strong, though he was clearly out of control.

Kyle was mortified.

The sunset at their backs threw their shadows long across the bland linoleum; the silent struggle cast in ruddy light looked much more violent than the reality as Grandpa yanked him forward. The yank was unnecessary: contrary to what one might have thought, seeing just the shadow-play on the floor, Kyle wasn’t struggling to get away—if anything, he was struggling to keep up. There were about a million places he’d rather be than here, but Grandpa wasn’t going to let him go until he’d had his say. Kyle just wanted to get it over with so he could go home and get back to playing Minecraft. This was
so
embarrass—

“Where are the cops in this place?” Grandpa’s voice was high, and normally reedy, but there was power in it tonight. “Where are the police? I came to the police station to find—”

“Can I help you, sir?”

This voice was high, too, but not reedy at all, as the cop leaned into view from behind the big charge desk. Kyle thought the man was standing on tiptoe—he couldn’t see for sure behind the desk—in order to lean so far. He’d seen this officer around town—Kyle couldn’t recall his name—and the man was small, barely larger than Kyle’s older brother James, who was only twelve. All the kids avoided this particular cop like he had cooties—he was small, but he walked around with a chip on his shoulder bigger than he was, and every child Kyle knew could tell a bully on sight. It was how smaller kids survived on the schoolyard, after all.

“Can you
help
me?”

The tone in Grandpa’s voice made Kyle’s balls shrivel. It was the one he used when he said
now you listen here, sonny boy
to Pop, his I-don’t-take-shit-I-give-it voice, and Kyle remembered that, as old as Grandpa was now, he’d once survived the schoolyard, too.

“I didn’t come in here for you to help
me
! I came in here to help
you
!”

Oh, jeez, please don’t yell at this guy
, Kyle thought, picturing his grandfather behind bars as the little cop thrust his chin, already jutting aggressively, out even further, jaw muscles visible on the sides of his face.
How am I gonna tell Pop if you get arrested?

The cop’s hand came up, a finger pointing at Grandpa. Those bunched jaw muscles flexed and moved as his mouth opened, probably to shout for Grandpa to get up against the wall and spread ’em, but Grandpa beat him to the punch.

“I came in here to tell you about the Spellman boy.”

The pointing finger froze in midair. The mouth hung open beneath a sharp nose and dark, angry V-shaped brows, blissfully silent. In the next instant the brows pulled up into a surprised bow, the eyes shifting sharply away from Grandpa. Kyle followed the little cop’s gaze to another man in uniform coming around the corner with a hurried stride, and Kyle felt his tight muscles relax some.

“Just hold on a minute, Mr. Hickey. There’s no need to shout, okay? Let’s just calm down.”

It was Officer Downs, Kyle’s neighbor, and though he was talking to Grandpa, he was looking at the other cop, and Kyle knew he was talking to the little man, too. Officer Downs lived just two houses over from the Hickeys—Kyle went to school with his daughter, Bonnie, though she was a grade ahead—and Grandpa knew him. If Officer Downs could calm the old man, then maybe, just
maybe
, they could get out of here and head on home before Grandpa went and said something embarrassingly crazy.

“Now.” Officer Downs’s gaze shifted to Grandpa. “Mr. Hickey, you say you know what happened to Billy Spellman?”

Grandpa finally released Kyle’s wrist and spread his hands. “Well, no. I can tell you what happened to him, but not what
happened
to him.”

The cops exchanged a glance, and Kyle felt color rush into his face.

Great. Too late.

“Can I help you, sir?”

Carl Hickey heard the tone in the other man’s voice before he saw him, and recognized him right off the bat.
It’s that little prick, Saltz.

He was right. There was that little prick face hanging over the intake desk. He’d had a run-in or two with Tim Saltz before, and knew
exactly
what the pint-sized officer of the law was. Well, Hickey had worked for pricks back when he’d been at the mill; he hadn’t taken their shit then, and he sure wasn’t going to take any from this jumped-up little public servant now.
I pay your salary, Timmy-boy!

“Can you
help
me? I didn’t come in here for you to help
me
! I came in here to help
you
!”

Hickey waited a beat, letting his own tone soak into Saltz’s little doorknob head, watched the expression darken on that pinched face, then hit him with the second part of a one-two combination.

“I came in here to tell you about the Spellman boy.”

The little bantam froze, and though his mouth opened, his goddamned annoying voice completely failed to fall out of it.

There! That shut you up, you little pri—

“Just hold on a minute, Mr. Hickey.” Hickey turned and saw the Downs lad hustling toward them. “There’s no need to shout, okay? Let’s just calm down.”

Thank God
, Hickey thought.
I thought I was going to have to do this with just the Saltz jackoff.

Young Officer Downs—
Joshua
, Hickey remembered—had bought the house two doors down a few years ago. He seemed a decent sort: kept a tidy lawn, a clean car, and he’d never walked his dog over to the corner of Hickey’s front yard to take a shit, like that asshole Johnson across the way. Hickey swiveled away from Saltz, trying to cut him out of the conversation entirely. Honestly, if he knew that little turd was going to be here, he might have—

“Now,” said Downs, shooting Saltz a glance that said
I’ll handle this
before giving Hickey his full attention. “Mr. Hickey, you say you know what happened to Billy Spellman?”

“Well, no. I can tell you what happened to him, but not what
happened
to him.”

Aw, shit
, he thought at the cops’ shared glance.
That little prick actually has me rattled.
He knew what that glance had meant:
uh-oh, Old Man Hickey’s losing it.
It was bad enough that what he had to say was going to sound crazy anyway: appearing confused before he’d even started sure wasn’t going to help.

“What I mean is, I can tell you what happened, but I can’t tell you the
details
.”

The snotty expression on Saltz’s face made Hickey’s teeth itch, but as the little man opened his mouth, Downs held an
I got this
hand up in his direction. “How do you know what happened, sir?”

“The boy’s all torn up,” said Hickey, ignoring the question. “Partly eaten, I think.” Saying that last part made him feel a little sick, and he felt Kyle go absolutely still beside him, but he
really
wanted to wipe that smirk off Saltz’s face. The smile
did
slip a notch, but damn it if the son of a whore didn’t still look like he was enjoying this. “He’s out in the woods, probably stuffed under a log somewhere. I can’t tell you exactly where, but you should probably start looking near my house. That’s your best bet.”

Though that smirk still peeked around the corners of Timmy Saltz’s mouth, Downs’s face had gone flat and expressionless, and pale as milk.

“How do you know this, Mr. Hickey? Did you come across the body?”

Hickey wanted to turn and look at his grandson right then.
Needed
to. But he couldn’t. He was doing this for Kyle, for his safety, and he’d needed the boy’s presence to remind him of that: he might not have been able to do this otherwise. But if he looked at the boy right now it would break him. His dislike of that arrogant mouse-turd Saltz was spurring him on, keeping him going, but he’d be damned if he was going to cry in front of the man, so he
couldn’t
look at the boy.

“No. I didn’t come in here to report a body. I came in here to . . . to confess. I did it. I killed the boy.”

Kyle gasped, and Hickey locked his neck muscles just before his head swiveled toward the sound. He stared steadfastly at Downs, who went still as a stone, nothing moving but his eyes, flicking over to Saltz and back.

“You killed the boy?”

“I did.” It was an effort, but Hickey spoke these two words loud and clear, with nary a tremor in his voice, though he could feel his hands shaking.
I’m making the boy witness this.
Might as well show him how to do this shit right.

“If you killed him,” Saltz’s over-loud voice interrupted Hickey’s thoughts, “then maybe you’d be kind enough to show us where the body is?”

“I told you,” Hickey snapped. “Weren’t you listening? I don’t know exactly where he is.”

Downs opened his mouth, but he was moving slowly, as if dazed, and Saltz’s sarcastic tone lashed out again. “Kind of an important detail, don’t you think?”

“Yeah.”

“But you don’t know?”

“I can’t remember.”

“Seems to me,” said Saltz, finally sidling around the desk to stand next to Downs, “killing a kid would be the kind of thing to stick in a person’s mind. You trying to pull the ‘confused old man’ defense or something? Or are you really just confused, old man, and this is just a bunch of horseshit you made up in your own head?”

Downs held up a hand again, trying to get control of the situation, but he wasn’t quite there yet. Hickey was looking straight into Saltz’s sneering face—exactly where he hadn’t wanted to be at the start of all this. But he was hot now, not just annoyed, and the words slipped out before he could stop.

“No, you little asshole. I can’t remember because I’m . . . I’m . . .”

Aw, shit
, he thought.
I’ve started, I’m just going to have to say it.

He thrust out his chin, unconsciously mimicking Saltz’s own belligerent stance. “I’m a goddamned werewolf.”

“I’m a goddamned werewolf.”

Silence fell over the police station, so thick Kyle didn’t think he could have moved through it if he tried—but he
couldn’t
try. He was frozen in place with horror, just as sure as if Mr. Freeze had hit him with his cold ray.
I wish this
was
a Batman comic,
he thought.
Then maybe Mr. Freeze would just kill me, and I wouldn’t have to—