A Deadly Sin: An epic dark thriller that will have you wanting to leave the lights on.

by Tracie Podger

  “She was wrong, I guess.”

  “So you went to Perry Street, while Casey was supposed to be missing, I’ll remind you, camped out, scared the shit out of the others, got high, and then left?”

  “We didn’t scare the shit out of anyone, there was a noise, and we all ran.”

  “What noise?”

  “Scraping, like a wood against wood type thing, as if someone was trying to move a piece of furniture, I guess.”

  “Where?”

  “A room upstairs, I didn’t hang around long enough to find out.”

  “Do you think my son and his friends are targets?” Mr. Chapman asked.

  “I don’t know yet, which is why I need to get to know them all. Except, they appear to be stalling me.”

  “What do you need to know?” Mr. Chapman said.

  “I’m going to be honest with you here. Casey, Dale, and possibly Vicky. Your friends. Murdered, or missing. Why? Why, your circle of friends, Louis?”

  I could see tears forming in his eyes; he tried to subtly wipe them away. His shaking hand gave away how frightened he was.

  “I don’t know,” he whispered.

  “Someone knows a lot about you guys, he’s leaving us clues that we just can’t tie in yet. Answer me this, if you can. Why would anyone associate the word lust with Casey?”

  “Lust?” He paused, and then shrugged.

  “She slept around, a lot. I told her she had an addiction. Detective, she was so insecure she thought if someone fucked her, they liked her. And, yeah, I guess I took advantage of that, too. She used to brag a lot about how many men she’d had. She even said she’d had a couple of teachers, but I’m not sure if that’s true.”

  “We think she was taken fairly soon after your campout. What happened there, where did she go?”

  “I told you, we heard a noise and ran. I didn’t wait for them, I should have,” his voice trailed off to a whisper.

  “Did she run?” I asked. He shook his head.

  “She wasn’t scared, like she sort of knew or was expecting the noise.”

  “Expecting it?”

  “Yeah, she laughed, it seemed a strange thing to do.”

  “Louis, I’m concerned for you, Alison, and Kay. I can’t get my chief to agree to placing you in a safe house, we don’t have one but I think if you can all keep together, maybe in one house?” I finished my sentence looking at Mr. Chapman, who nodded.

  “I’ll have everyone at mine, the house is large enough and we have security gates.”

  “I’ll post someone to patrol the grounds. I might be way off here, it might be coincidence but I don’t believe so. And I’m asking one thing of you, this doesn’t go any further than this room. I can’t stress the importance of not leaking any information to the press, or anyone. I need to catch this person. I don’t need for him to know what we are doing.”

  “By putting these kids together, is that not offering him bait?” Mr. Chapman asked.

  It was a valid point and one that had crossed my mind for both good and bad reasons.

  “I don’t believe he’ll come after all of them at the same time,” I lied.

  Mr. Chapman nodded, whether he was convinced, I wasn’t sure. But what else could we do? At least if all the kids, and their families were together, they stood a better chance.

  “Louis, if you think of anything, no matter how inconsequential, I need to know,” I said.

  “I think the dealer is a teacher,” he said, quietly.

  “A teacher?”

  “Yeah. I don’t know a name, just something Dale said, but then, he told a lot of lies.”

  “Where did he get the money from?” I was expecting Louis to tell me they all contributed.

  “His family is wealthy. Dale liked to flash his cash around, waste his allowance on shit. Vicky was all over that. She liked him only because he had money.”

  “Okay, for now stay home, Louis. Mr. Chapman, thank you. Perhaps you can let me know when you have everyone together.”

  I left them and headed back to the incident room. I went straight to the whiteboard and wrote. Casey liked a lot of sex, hence the lust. Dale was wasteful, did that relate to gluttony? Vicky, if she was the next victim, was greed. Did her wanting Dale’s money constitute greed? I scanned the room.

  “Tim, I know it was theology you studied but what about Dante’s version of these deadly sins?”

  “I don't know, to be honest. You’d need to speak to someone else on that. Like I said, I just studied theology. My mom had an idea that I’d go into the clergy.”

  I picked up the notes I’d written and scanned through looking for the name Mr. Turner had given me.

  “Dean, we need to head to the school,” I said.

  She looked so pretty, all sparkly. Now all she’d see is gold, the greedy girl. I had to leave her for a while; I needed my Michfix.

  It felt wonderful to walk the streets with the autumn sun on my face. I smiled and bade a greeting to passersby. It was as I crossed the street that I saw him. I wandered into the school parking lot and watched him climb from his car. His sidekick dipped his head to speak to him and my hands curled into a fist. How dare he be so close! I bet he could smell him, I bet his stomach fluttered as his senses were assaulted by Mich. I kept to the shadows of the trees that lined the parking lot, moving slowly toward them. I wouldn’t get close enough to hear their conversation though. I wondered what they were there for. Still clutching at straws, I bet.

  Without thinking, my hand pressed against my pocket. I heard the comforting sound of folded paper as my fingers brushed over the newspaper clipping. Oh, Mich, if only you knew. One day I’ll show him what’s written on that piece of paper. A moment of conflict hit me. I should hate him for what he did, but I found myself so drawn to him that I couldn’t distinguish between love and hate. I guess they were so closely related it was natural.

  I’ll give you Vicky, tonight, I thought. There was a perfect location in town for her discovery, a very apt location.

  I wondered how the investigation was going. I imagined he’d arranged something to get the friends together and into safety. Good boy, Mich, it would be a sensible thing to do. I mean, you’d hate for the murder of the other kids to be on your conscience because you didn’t take measures now, wouldn’t you?

  “See you soon, Mich,” I whispered, as I watched him head into the school.

  “We’d like to speak with Mr. Thomas, the philosophy guy, if he’s around,” I asked Mr. Turner after being shown into his office.

  “Of course, is there anything I need to know?” he said, as he picked up the phone from his desk.

  “No, it’s a question I’m hoping he can help answer, that’s all.”

  Mr. Turner spoke to his secretary, asking on the whereabouts of James. Once he’d finished his conversation, he stood and beckoned us to follow him. We walked in silence along a corridor; occasionally Mr. Turner would nod or greet a student who eyed us suspiciously. We came to a halt outside a brown, wooden classroom door with a glass panel. I looked through to see a man sitting at his desk, marking papers I guessed. I thanked Mr. Turner and gently knocked on the door before opening it.

  “Mr. Thomas?” I asked.

  The man rose. He looked exactly as I would imagine a philosopher to look. If he’d had corduroy patches on his green chunky knit sweater that would have completed the look.

  “How can I help?” he said, making his way out from behind his desk.

  “I’m Detective Curtis and this is Detective Saunders, I wondered if we could have a moment of your time?”

  “Of course, please take a seat. And call me James,” he said.

  “Thank you, James. I have a couple of things to speak with you about. First, I understand both Casey Long and Dale Stewart attended Philosophy Club for a little while, can you tell me about the club and their involvement?”

  “Yes, of course. It’s a student run club; they appoint a president, that kind of thing. My involvement is really only
to supply material for them to read and discuss, perhaps answer a question or two, and occasionally to give a lecture. I don’t think philosophy was really the best subject for Casey and her friend. Sadly, some students take these clubs because it looks good on any applications they need to send out. Such a shame really, because she was quite an intelligent girl, if I remember right.”

  “And Dale?” I noticed that he hadn’t spoken that much about him.

  “I got the feeling Dale only joined because Casey did, and their other friends, of course. I’d have to check with the president to see how long they lasted, but I don’t think it was too long.”

  “And they didn’t take philosophy, isn’t that strange?”

  “A little, but there are students who might join a club to see if the subject is something they might like, try before you buy kind of thing,” he chuckled. I stared at him.

  “I’m sorry, I guess that was a little inappropriate,” he said.

  “What were they like, as a group of friends?” Dean asked.

  James leaned back into his chair, he sighed, rocking back on two legs.

  “I think you’ll find the pupils are divided where that group is concerned. I hate to speak ill of the dead, but they were the ‘in crowd’, the ‘clique,’ and therefore not overly liked by some. But other than the odd lecture in the club, I didn’t really have a great deal to do with them. I wish I could help more.”

  “Okay, thank you. Before we leave, and this is unrelated, what would be the best reading material to learn a little more about Dante?”

  “Dante? That’s pretty heavy reading, Detective. I’m thrilled that you’d take an interest in him, of course. His work is one of my favorite things to study.”

  James became animated when he started speaking, giving me an overview of Dante, a history lesson, and a rather long synopsis of Dante’s Inferno, Purgatorio, and his poetry.

  “Consider your origin; you were not born to live like brutes, but to follow virtue and knowledge,” he said, quoting Dante, I assumed.

  He rose and headed to a bookcase. While he stood scanning the shelves, his finger trailing along the spines of old, dusty books, I took the opportunity to study him. He wasn’t a particularly tall man, and it was noticeable that he wore clothes at least a size too large. His shoes were polished, which seemed at odds with the scruffiness of the faded at the knees corduroy pants, the checkered shirt with the frayed collar, and the green sweater, stretched as if it had been through a too hot wash. He was odd, but then I don’t think I would expect a teacher of philosophy to be anything but.

  “Ah, here we go,” he said, sliding a book from the shelf. “This is really an overview of Dante’s work. It might help you decide what you’d like to discover further.”

  I thanked him, took the book, and Dean and I left.

  “Odd guy,” Dean said, when we were away from the classroom and out of earshot.

  “Yeah, he contradicted himself, saying Casey was an intelligent girl but then he didn’t really know them. And his shoes…highly polished, but he didn’t seem to take much care with the rest of his clothes,” I said.

  “He looked like an old-fashioned university lecturer to me,” Dean said, with a laugh.

  I got what he meant. James Thomas looked like he’d stepped out of a British TV show about college life.

  We were at the most frustrating part of any investigation. We had a fair amount of information but nothing that led anywhere. The turnout for the voluntary DNA was better than I had expected, which meant we were backed up with getting the information on our database.

  I had a file prepared for Corey’s perusal when he finally arrived. The chief wouldn’t sanction payment for his services, of course, but Corey was doing us a favor on this one. His profiling skills surpassed mine. I prayed that he’d be able to give us some clue as to who we should be looking for. I had my ideas, of course. I stood for ages, just looking at all the information written up on the whiteboard, trying to build a mental image. Our killer had to be strong but that didn’t necessarily mean he had to be big. I suspected he was a loner; someone who kept to himself yet had knowledge of those kids.

  I felt a hand on my shoulder and I turned to see Eddie standing behind me. I hadn’t heard her walk into the room.

  “I have the report for Dale, thought I’d bring it over in person,” she said, handing me a large envelope.

  “Thank you, got time for a coffee?” I asked.

  “I do, although not the shit you have here. Come on, you could do with an hour of sunlight, you’re turning pale.”

  I looked toward the window; the sun was setting so I wasn’t sure about getting any sunlight. I called over to Dean, who looked as shattered as I did, to let him know I’d bring him back a coffee. He gave a thumbs up as he took a call.

  “How are you doing?” Eddie asked.

  “Getting very frustrated.”

  “I can imagine. Have you any leads?” she asked, as we crossed the street.

  “We have a lot of information, we know the next one will have the word greed attached to it. That’s assuming he’s following the list.”

  “The list?”

  “The seven deadly sins. Greed is next. We’re scouring this fucking town inch by inch, Eddie, and we can’t find her. I wanted the kids brought in, if I’d done that earlier she might still around.”

  Eddie placed her hand on my arm, a rare moment of affection from her, as I opened the diner’s door.

  “You can’t know that, Mich.”

  We fell silent as we stood and looked for a booth. I spotted one and noticed the silence and looks as we headed toward it. I guessed the patrons weren’t happy that I was taking an hour out of the investigation. Eddie slid across the black leather bench seat and I opted to sit beside her. A waitress came over and we ordered our coffees with one to go.

  I rested my forearms on the table and my shoulders slumped. “If we could just find her,” I said, quietly.

  “I did a little research, I’m sure you’ve already thought of this, but there’s a meat packing plant outside of town. That, in theory, would be a clinical environment.”

  “Been there. We’ve checked barns, empty houses…Shit!”

  I stood, grabbing the coffees and slid from the booth.

  “Mich?”

  “Come with me.”

  I threw some dollars on the counter as I passed, not sure if it would cover the coffees and tried not to rush from the diner. I didn’t want the patrons to notice.

  “Mich?” Eddie said, again.

  “Louis Chapman said something. When they camped out at the house on Perry Street, a noise, wood scraping against wood, spooked them. When Dean and I were there, we heard a similar noise, assumed it to be a bird trying to get out.”

  “But you checked all the rooms?”

  We had crossed the street and were climbing the steps to the front door of the station.

  “We did, or we thought we did. We didn’t get into the attic.”

  “Let me come with you,” she said, as we hurried to the incident room.

  I called for Dean, leaving our mugs and his takeout container on a desk.

  “We need to get back to the house on Perry Street.”

  We checked the glove compartment for flashlights before driving over to the house. Dean halted the car, leaving the headlights on and facing the front of the house. At first, once we’d exited the car, we stood, scanning each window.

  “What exactly are we looking for?” Dean said, as we walked around the side of the property.

  “We heard a noise, assumed it was the bird. What if we were wrong? Louis said they heard a noise.”

  “We checked all the rooms,” he said.

  “We didn’t check to see if there was an attic.”

  I was thankful that the backdoor hadn’t already been boarded up; we had no time to get permission to enter. It stood slightly ajar, exactly as we’d left it. I used my foot to push it open, trying to remember if I’d touched the hand
le the last time we were there. Forensics would have my balls if I hadn’t thought to put on gloves.

  “Who owns this?” Eddie asked, as she stepped in behind me.

  “The daughter of the previous owner, I have the name somewhere back at the station. We meant to contact her, tell her the place was being used as a playground,” Dean said.

  With the flashlight beams guiding us, we walked from room to room before standing at the bottom of the staircase. We fell silent. Other than the short breaths from Eddie, I couldn’t hear anything.

  We crept up the stairs, hesitating on every creaking floorboard and listening again. Once we hit the landing, I rotated my flashlight to scan the ceiling.

  “Shit,” I whispered. There was no obvious entrance to the attic. I had hoped to see a hatch.

  I took the lead and walked into the nearest room. It would have been a bedroom at the back of the house, I imagined, although now empty. Keeping my shoulder as close to the wall as possible, I circled the room. I ran my hand over the wooden panelling. Nothing.

  We crept to the room we’d discovered the bird in and I did the same. I placed my hand on the wall and walked around the perimeter, stopping at the back wall. Eddie had her flashlight trained upward, covering inch by inch the aged cream painted ceiling. I paused, and took a couple of steps back. I looked over to Dean and placed my fingers over my lips.

  “What?” he mouthed. I motioned for him to join me.

  I held my hand over a joint in the wood panel. I could feel a gentle breeze. Dean placed his hand alongside mine. I crouched, not wanting to use the flashlight in case it alerted anyone to our presence. I squinted, studying the joint. It was too narrow for me to get my fingers between and too dark on the other side for me to see through.

  I felt Eddie place her hand on my shoulder, she gently squeezed as she crouched beside me. I moved to one side. Her small hands ran slowly down the seam, she’d pause every now and again, pushing on the wood.

  “You’ve seen too many movies,” I whispered, close to her ear. I heard her quiet chuckle. We wouldn’t be so lucky as to find a secret catch that, once pushed, would have a door swing open.

  Fuck me if we didn’t hear a click.