The Darkness Inside: Writer's Cut (16 page)

I pointed at the stills taken in the seconds the camera was in darkness, looking at what could be the edge of a table with light glinting from something metallic. “Can you lighten these up?” I asked. “Maybe we can see what the camera’s looking at.”

“Easily done. I’ll do the same with any of the earlier ones where the background is visible. Something might stick out of the gloom.”

Brandon spent another hour playing with the images at his disposal, brightening, sharpening, resizing. At the end, he ran off printouts of the results and handed them to me.

“Sorry,” he said. “Not much there, not with such a low resolution recording.”

I skimmed the results, passing them to Sophie as I finished with each one. The two pages that held my eye for the longest were blown-up and brightened stills from the shots in darkness. Even through the digital noise I could see a tabletop, what looked like a riding crop, a crude metal baton with wire running from one end, and a couple of spare sets of manacles.

“Someone takes their shit seriously,” Brandon said. “Wish I could tell you more about him.”

Sophie looked at the last of the pictures, then handed the whole bundle back to me. “Are you going to go through it frame-by-frame just in case?”

“Yeah. It’ll take me a day or two. I doubt there’s anything else there — haven’t seen any sign of it if there is. But you never know, huh?”

21.

Half an hour after saying goodbye to Brandon, Sophie and I sat in Gattuso’s, an Italian restaurant not far from the river. Not especially large, brightly colored, subdued lighting. A distant clatter of noise from the kitchens, murmured conversation from the tables around us. The aroma of garlic and tomatoes hanging in the air.

“Can I ask you a question, Alex?” Sophie said, laying her fork down.

“Sure.”

“Why is this thing eating at you like this? I mean, I know it was your case originally, and I know you think Holly’s still alive. But you’re becoming obsessed.”

I thought about spilling all again like I had with Rob, give up on holding on to the lie, but that was crazy. Rob was an old enough hand to at least understand how these things could happen even if he didn’t agree. Sophie was young and I didn’t know if she’d handle the news the same. I said, “It was my case, and I thought I’d got the right guy. But if Holly really is still alive then I made a mistake, and she’s paid for it with seven years of her life and God knows what kind of trauma. In the end I’m responsible for that. I’ve shot and killed several people in my career.”

“Yeah, but…”

“People I’ve arrested have had families, innocents who’d only get to see their father or mother, kids or parents, on the other side of a sheet of glass for the next ten-to-twenty. But when it comes to it, I’ve only ever done that kind of shit when someone’s done something to deserve it. Holly Tynon didn’t, and the fact she’s faced what’s she’s faced because of me and a mistake I made is killing me.”

She nodded and fixed me with wide eyes. “The FBI don’t believe she’s alive,” she said softly. “And if there was a mistake it was as much their fault as yours. That footage might just be someone’s home porno video.”

“Agent Downes never had to face Holly Tynon’s parents and try to find some way of telling them that their only daughter had in all probability been raped and murdered and was lying in a shallow grave somewhere. She never had to see the look in their eyes like their entire world had collapsed around them. She’s confident, but can’t be entirely sure, that Holly is dead. I can see the same odds, and all they mean to me is that there’s a chance she’s alive, a chance I never realized existed before now. So I’ve got to try.”

We ate in silence for a few minutes more. The cannelloni was good, so was the wine. Truth be told though, I wasn't paying much attention to either. Too much else on my mind.

Eventually, Sophie finished her spaghetti and reaches for her glass. “How’re you doing, Alex?” she said. “I never get the chance to ask at the office.”

“I'm OK.”

“You look thin. Really tired. Is anything bothering you, or is it just having to look at the old case again?”

I swilled the remaining Merlot around the bottom of my glass before downing it in one and reaching for a refill. Sophie nodded when I offered her one. “It’s mostly nothing, or at least, nothing unusual. Yeah, the whole Williams thing is a part of it. There's some other stuff as well that I can't talk about.”

“No?”

“No. But in any case it’s mostly just, well,
me
I suppose. I wouldn’t expect you to understand it at your age.”

“You're thinking of going through a mid-life crisis then?” she asked with a mischievous look on her face. “You've already got the flash car, so I suppose you’re halfway there already. Just need the ponytail and the twenty-year-old girlfriend.”

I smiled. “Hey, I’ve had the 'Vette for years. Way too long for it to be a vain attempt to recapture my youth.”

“And I don’t think the ponytail would really suit you either.”

“Yeah, not my style.”

“Somehow I can’t picture you with anything apart from the cut you’ve got now.”

“You should have seen me in my college years. My first year I had long hair, scruffy t-shirts, the works. Even tried a beard at one point. Well, I say ‘tried’, but in reality I was just too lazy to shave.”

Sophie laughed. “Please tell me there’s photographic evidence somewhere. That I
have
to see.”

“I’m afraid not. Over the years, a series of unexplained thefts and fires have conspired to destroy as much of it as possible. And I’m not telling you where I went to college — no class or department photos for you either.”

“I’m working for a detective agency, Alex. I’m sure I can find out.”

I shook my head. “I may have to resort to threats, bribery, or extortion if you try.”

“If it’s any consolation, I spent a month at high school walking around with an awful spiky punk cut.”

“Only a month before you came to your senses? You were lucky.”

“I found out how bad it was when the guy I had a crush on told me I looked like a porcupine that’d been struck by lightning in a paint factory.”

“Everyone’s a critic.”

“Yeah, I guess.” She smiled. “I’m glad you’ve lightened up a little, Alex, even if it’s just for now. It’s not good for you to let things get on top of you all the time.”

“Yeah,” I said.

After dinner, Sophie and I said our goodbyes and I headed for home, the image of the woman’s face in those stills never far from my mind. Sharpened, image-enhanced, magnified as much as possible. Eyes wide, glassy, scared. And the more I thought about them, the more I was certain it was Holly staring back at me.

22.

I was in a long, high-ceilinged room. Red velvet wallpaper and wood panelling, dim bulbs in sconces way up on either side. A vast table of polished walnut sat at its heart, surrounded by high-backed chairs. I walked forward, into the light, head bowed. There were tears drying on my cheeks.

“You know why you're here,” Brooke Morgan said as I reached the head of the table. A child sat in each chair, each wearing an oversized gown made of black garbage sacks. They were all watching me.

“We know what you did,” Abbie Galina said. Some of the girls had bruised faces, red-black marks around their necks. The hands peeking from the hems of the robes had purple welts and torn nails.

“You know what we want.”

I ran my eyes over the faces staring at me. Holly Tynon was the only one missing. There were no empty seats.

A shuffling sound behind me, feet sliding uncertainly against the carpet. I brushed my face with my fingertips, rubbed at the tear tracks, and came back with red smears, drying blood still tacky to the touch. I knew that if I turned around I’d see Travers lurching towards me, skull shattered and bloody from the bullet I put through it. He was coming for me and there was nothing I could do to stop him.

“No,” I said, but the dead girls just shook their heads. The wallpaper collapsed and shredded behind them, the wooden panels rotted and warped as I watched, the surface of the table bubbled and peeled, and finally the girls themselves began to shrivel and decay. A hand hit my shoulder and I woke up, screaming.

I found myself fully dressed, on the couch, and the phone was ringing. The drapes were closed and my watch said it was nearly eight in the morning.

“Yeah?” I said.

“Mr Rourke? This is Detective Sergeant Jack Gilbert from Hartford Police Department. Sorry to call you so early, but I was hoping to catch you before you left for work. I understand you're being kept busy at the moment.”

“That's OK, no problem. What can I do for you?”

“Just a courtesy call, really. Thought I'd give you the heads-up that we've had a couple of reporters call the last day or two, asking about one of our old cases.”

“The Clinton Travers rapes.”

“Good guess.”

“Only case I've worked in Hartford, Sergeant Gilbert.”

“Yeah. Well, they were interested in the whole saga really, but especially his shooting. Wanted to know what we found at the scene, things like that. How we linked it to your boy Williams.”

I kept my tone non-committal. “Uh-huh.”

“Just thought you should know in case they come calling on you too.” The cop paused, and I wondered how much of his build-up had been for effect. “Not that I had much to tell them, just that there were signs of a struggle at the scene, and the guy's gun was missing. No prints, no usable trace evidence we could identify the intruder with. Some witnesses reported hearing a gunshot, but no one saw anyone leaving or arriving at the house.”

“Yeah, I remember. Too bad no one kept him under surveillance.”

“Well, after what he did to Detective Carson, we would've nailed him before long. Guess we were just lucky your guy took such a dislike to him. Why'd you think he did that?”

“Williams is a fucking psycho, Sergeant Gilbert. Who knows why he does anything?” I said. “Is that all? Only I've got to get ready for work.”

“Yeah, that's all. Just an FYI, in case anyone bothers you. Frank Sutherland from the, ah,
Herald News
, and Jason Curtis from the
Connecticut Post
. Take it easy.”

I hung up, trying to figure out if Gilbert had just been making conversation, satisfying idle curiosity, or if we was inferring that he suspected what had really happened. And if it was the latter, what he thought of it.
 

23.

Boston, MA. 1998.

Winter, and a Boston courtroom. High ceiling bathed in the blue-white glow of fluorescent strip lights. That wood-and-red-carpet school of decorating so beloved of the justice system’s interior designers. The distant hum of the heating system, audible over the faint and muffled rustle of the crowd of people behind me. Every breath, every scrape of clothing on clothing was multiplied a hundred-fold, the white noise swirl of distant surf.

I sat in the front row watching proceedings, uncomfortable in a sombre graphite-colored suit. I’d been on the stand, said my piece, and now the prosecuting attorney was just finishing her summing up for the jury.
 

I’d told the court how Cody Williams might have felt so aggrieved at Clinton Travers’ expansive press coverage that he’d felt he had to eliminate him before abducting Nicole Ballard, trying to ensure maximum exposure for his own planned misdeeds. I couldn’t mention the other girls, because he wasn’t on trial for what he’d done to them. I’d explained how, in interviews with Williams, he’d revealed himself to be an arrogant, self-aggrandizing monster who loved to receive the attention he felt he had been denied in his normal everyday life. I’d run through the state’s preferred scenario for what had happened on the night Travers was murdered, and explained Williams’ role in the whole thing.

I hoped no one saw it all for the lies it was.

Now it was the defense’s turn to sum up their case. Cody Williams’ lawyer hardly seemed thrilled at the job he had, but he pushed on through. He was young, and from the looks of things knew that, unpleasant or not, this case was high profile and the TV exposure alone could make his career. No one could say that Cody Williams abducted and killed all those girls, but everyone was thinking it, and there’d been a regular media mob outside throughout the trial.

The attorney, whose name I vaguely remembered as Luther Ellwood, pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose as he reached the climax of his monologue, saying, “The man you see before you is not the freak of nature, not the monster the prosecution would have you believe. Cody Williams is a good man, a decent man. He has never denied trying to seize Nicole Ballard, but he has shown throughout his testimony that he acted out of a misguided desire to protect her, having been so concerned about the stories about these poor children in the media. Irrational, certainly, but his motives were good. He is not a man deserving of your hatred, but of your pity. He is not a man in need of punishment, but a man in need of treatment and re-education. He is not a monster, but a decent soul who became caught up in events he was incapable of fully comprehending.
 

“That is his only crime.”

24.

Boston, MA. 2004.