The Devil's Closet

by Stacy Dittrich

  For some reason, the thought of walking across the dark open room terrified me. But thinking of Brooklyn Phillips, I grabbed my gun out of its holster and slowly began the trek across the room. I was heading for a staircase at the other end, and it seemed like hours before I got to it.

  At the bottom of the staircase I leaned against the wall. I had to stop to breathe. This was ridiculous. I worked uniform patrol for seven years before going into the detective bureau. I always cleared houses, buildings, businesses, barns—any type of structure possible—even catching burglars inside, and I was never this tense and nervous. I honestly didn’t think I would be able to bring myself to go upstairs. Now, on top of sweating and a heart that was beating like a newborn hummingbird, I was shaking like a leaf.

  I felt nervous laughter begin to erupt, but did my best to quell it. This actually eased some of my nerves, so I was able to slowly start walking up the steps. My handgun pointed toward the top of the steps, and I was reminded how much I hated climbing staircases. It was a bona fide kill zone. If someone were to peer around the top and fire at me, I would have nowhere to go.

  The stairs squeaked, which made it worse, and when I got to the second-to-top step, I stopped. I didn’t know the layout of the house from there and got to my knees before looking around the corner. This time, I quickly flashed my light twice. It felt safe to do so since there weren’t any windows. When I decided all looked clear, I went forward.

  There were three doors. Knowing I had to check every room, I moved to the first door. By now, I could see the tip of my gun bobbing up and down from the tremors in my hand. I wished Michael were there. I’d bet he did too. I hadn’t bothered to look at my watch, but I knew I was well over an hour by now, probably going on two.

  I got the first two, completely empty, rooms cleared without any restless souls jumping out at me or a barrage of gunfire erupting. Then I got to the third. There was a paint smell coming from this room. I looked in and didn’t see any windows, so it was clear to use the flashlight. Shining the beam into the room, I sucked in my breath and stood still.

  This room had a bed, a neatly made twin bed with a flowery blue comforter and white pillow at the headboard. It was at the farthest wall away from me and had a small nightstand next to it. On the nightstand was a white antique lamp. I took my chances and felt for a light switch next to me.

  I flipped it on, and the room became illuminated in a dim, soft light. I was completely overcome. I could see the entire room as plain as day.

  The room had windows, but they were covered with pictures, newspapers, and magazine pages. However, it wasn’t just the windows that were covered. Every wall in the room was plastered with them, and half of the ceiling. There wasn’t a centimeter of wall exposed.

  It wasn’t the wall being covered that disturbed me so much; it was what covered them that was so unspeakably macabre. Every newspaper, magazine page, and picture contained little girls. There were pictures of child actresses, sports stars, pages from children’s clothing catalogs with girls who looked about five, and the newspapers all had pictures of little girls walking their dogs, playing in the park, or with their parents.

  As I walked along each wall, scanning every horrific page, I realized I had walked into the room of our killer. It wasn’t that each picture terrified me. It was everything put together and how neatly it was done. All the pages fit together, cut just right and glued onto the wall, one piece nestled against another.

  My attention was drawn to a small box under the bed, a corner of its red lid sticking out. I didn’t know if I was able to handle another surprise, but I grabbed the box anyway and opened the lid. It was full of news articles on the recent kidnappings.

  The article on top was dated yesterday. The deeper I delved into the box, the worse it got.

  At the very bottom was an entire stack of articles about me and the Murder Mountain case. My interviews, photos, personal information. Everything. There were photos of Michael and me as far back as last year at the trial. There were photos of us at the hotel, eating at the diner, walking out of the department, and standing at the crime scenes of the dead children. The killer had been watching us every minute from the very beginning.

  My hands were shaking so badly I almost couldn’t get everything back into the box the way I’d found it. Before I shoved it back under the bed, I took the lid off again, grabbed the picture of Michael and me at the hotel, and put it in my pocket.

  Kneeling in the middle of floor, I looked around and above me at the crude shrine, then focused on the closet door. I hadn’t noticed it before because it was covered with paper as well and blended in with the walls. I didn’t know if I could open it without tearing the pictures until I saw the exposed seam running up the wall.

  I opened the door and looked into the darkness of the closet, the dim light of the room too weak to do any good. I turned my flashlight on, but it was dead. I opened the door wider, hoping to catch some of the light from the lamp behind me.

  When I looked back into the closet, I found myself screaming so loud it sounded like someone else. I flew backward, hitting the door, falling to my knees. My hands covered my mouth so tightly I thought I would suffocate.

  There were children in there, at least fifteen of them. I could see them standing in rows, their eyes shining out at me in the light. I didn’t think I would be able to compose myself, enough to get out of the house for help, until my eyes adjusted to the dark and I saw the children were actually My Size dolls.

  There was no quelling the nervous laughter that erupted. I bent over and held my stomach. When I finally stood and walked back to the open door, I could see a white string hanging from the ceiling of the closet. I pulled the string, and the closet exploded in bright white light. There was no laughing now. I was horrified.

  Each doll was different; its hair color, eyes, clothing, and shoes. They were meticulously lined up in four rows of four dolls each. The size of the closet was, at first glance, deceiving. In truth, it was absolutely enormous. The walls had been pushed back so they extended an extra six to seven feet, at least, in every direction. Most of the walls had been drywalled and wallpapered with the tacky purple paper I’d found in the garbage bag, but the wall in the back was not finished. Loose insulation hung from it; some pieces lay on the floor in front of it.

  The first bedroom I came to in the hallway had to have been downsized to absorb this monstrosity. Probably a new wall had been built.

  There were three dressers along the finished walls of the closet. Each one was four drawers high, finished in a deep, glossy stained wood. Above each of the dressers were clothing rods filled with girls’ clothes. These were not doll clothes. They were very expensive clothes from high-end children’s stores. There were dresses, frilly and casual; small pantsuits; skirts, silk tops; and jumpers all in various colors. The dolls themselves wore these clothes.

  I opened the drawers and saw underwear neatly folded, socks sorted by colors, and T-shirts folded so neatly they looked like they had just come out of a package. Children’s books were stacked on top of each dresser.

  Then there were the ribbons and shoes. One dresser held two drawers full of red ribbons, and the other two drawers held My Size shoes in assorted colors. I grabbed a few ribbons and one shoe and stuffed them in my pocket, along with a piece of insulation.

  I kept looking at one doll in the middle of the front row. It wasn’t like the others. It was scary and disturbing. It was dressed in all black, with a long black wig, black fingernail polish, and dark makeup painted on its face. It was gothic. There was something else different about this doll, and I picked it up to examine it closer.

  Feeling the objects under the doll’s black shirt told me everything before I even pulled the shirt up and looked. The doll was modified with breasts. Crude circles of flesh-colored plastic had been glued onto the chest area. Pink cone-shaped pieces of plastic had been glued onto those, giving them the appearance of nipples. Not even able to imagine what was do
wn below, I pulled the pants of the doll down. In the genital area, a yellow sponge cut into a triangle shape was glued to the doll. What looked like black hair netting was glued to the sponge to give the appearance of pubic hair.

  I checked the other dolls. The gothic doll was the only one with modifications. There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that this was his favorite doll, so I was going to take it.

  Getting ready to leave—I had been gone well over three hours, so Michael probably had the National Guard out looking for me—I saw a small hole I hadn’t noticed before back by the unfinished wall. As I bent over to peer inside, I heard the door slam downstairs. My nerves went into high alert.

  I ran as quietly as I could back into the room and shut off the light. Someone was coming up the steps, so all I could do was go into the closet. I was shaking again and sweating. On the verge of hysterics, I pulled the string in the closet to turn off the light. I started to back up, but kept knocking over dolls, so I finally inched along the wall to the crawlspace I’d seen. I backed into it as far as I could go.

  I put my hand down into something wet. I had taken my gloves off when I inspected the gruesome doll, an action I now regretted. By instinct, I raised my hand to my nose to smell it and started to gag. It was old urine. Through the crack in the door, I saw the light in the room go on. I used my clean hand to cover my mouth, trying to keep from breathing hard. When I tried to back up farther, my right hand brushed the cell phone attached to my belt.

  I had to call Michael. By this time, I didn’t care how I would explain being in here, but I needed help. When I opened my phone and turned it on, the light from the screen lit up the entire closet. My hands were shaking so hard I had a difficult time dialing. I could hear the person, who I assumed was Jim Carlson, our killer, moving around the room on the other side of the door.

  When I finally was able to dial, Michael didn’t let me down. He answered on the first ring. The time on the phone display showed I was almost four hours overdue.

  “Michael!” I whispered loud enough for him to hear me.

  “CeeCee, where the hell are you—”

  “Michael, listen to me!” As much as I tried, it was impossible not to sound hysterical. “I’m in trouble and I need help, I’m at—”

  The person in the room began to open the closet door. I had no choice but to close my phone, hanging up on Michael before I was able to give him the address. I could stand up and take Carlson at gunpoint, but I would probably go to jail, none of the evidence would be admissible, the killer would go free, and Brooklyn would die.

  Light flooded the closet, and I crawled farther into my hole, praying he wouldn’t find me.

  “Oh, dear, how’d you fall down, darling?” The man spoke in the familiar-sounding, gruff voice I’d heard on the phone.

  At first I thought he was talking to me, but after hearing him set the gothic doll upright, I realized he was talking to it.

  “My beautiful girl, I missed you. I know Daddy’s been gone, but I’ll make it up to you.” He paused. “Oh, no, please don’t cry. I promise I’ll be back soon. It’s almost over, my love, don’t worry.”

  I wished I could get a look at his face, but if I tried, I risked getting caught.

  “I have to go now, my love. I had to come back to see you, but I’ll be back again soon. I love you now and forever.”

  I heard him kiss the doll, a loud exaggerated smack.

  The man turned the light off and closed the door. I breathed an enormous sigh of relief. But he didn’t leave right away. It was another half an hour before I heard the door shut and the truck start. I waited yet another fifteen minutes before I felt safe enough to leave the closet. Michael was probably beside himself.

  I hoped I hadn’t left too much evidence of myself in the closet. The clothes I had on were going to burn as soon as I got home, and I couldn’t wait to scrub the urine from my hand. Urine from one of the recent victims, no doubt. The killer had kept them in the closet for a short time. Unfortunately, Brooklyn wasn’t there, which wasn’t a good sign.

  Outside, the night air felt wonderful. I was literally soaked with sweat, my hair dripping. With the gothic doll tucked under one arm and my retrieved bag of tools in the other, I quickly made it back to my car.

  I threw the doll and my bag in the trunk and took off. Just as I turned the corner to drive home, I was unnerved to see the black pickup truck pulling back into the driveway. My headlights were still off, so I drove away quickly.

  The killer had come back for something. Whatever it was, he’d discover his favorite doll gone and it would push him over the edge. I hoped he’d be willing to make a trade.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Once I was far enough away, I began to relax. I had found the killer, no doubts. But I wasn’t going to call Michael until I had gotten rid of everything I needed to.Back at my house, I took a long shower, feeling as if I could not get clean. Then I bagged up all my clothes, threw them into the backyard fire pit, and lit it. I had removed the photo, ribbons, insulation, and shoe.

  These I placed in the bag of garbage I had taken earlier, crumpling up the photo before throwing it in. Then I put in the children’s catalog photo and paper with fingernail polish on it that I had legitimately found in the bag earlier. I tied the bag again, shook it, and put it in my trunk. Now it was time to deal with Michael.

  I assumed he wasn’t at the hotel, so I called him first. As expected, he was extremely upset and worried.

  “CeeCee, oh my God, are you OK? Where are you?”

  “Michael, I’m fine, OK. I’m sorry I scared you earlier, my phone cut out and I didn’t have any service.”

  “Scared me? We’ve got most of your department out looking for you! Where are you right now?”

  “I’m headed toward the hotel.”

  “I’ll let everyone know you’re OK, and I’ll be there in fifteen minutes. I’m glad you’re OK, Cee. You scared the shit out of me.”

  When we hung up, I couldn’t wait to see him. I had been terrified in that closet, and now all I wanted was to be safe in Michael’s arms. I knew I would have to listen to a horrific verbal lashing from him, but I would sit through it patiently. I held my hand in front of me and saw it was still trembling. I shook it, as if that would make any difference at all.

  I was sitting on the bed at the hotel when Michael came barreling through the door and grabbed me, almost lifting me off the floor.

  “Cee, I can’t tell you…” His head was buried in my shoulder, and it was hard to hear him. “I haven’t been that worried since Murder Mountain. Where were you? You’re shaking!” He pulled away and looked at me. “CeeCee, I keep begging you. Please tell me where you’ve been and what happened!”

  He kept me close, his arm protectively around my waist. I told him the truth, at least up until the part where I broke into Jim Carlson’s house. I also omitted the break-in at Carl Malone’s house.

  When I got to that part, I simply said I had been on surveillance, watching Jim Carlson’s house, and I was so upset when I called because while I was taking the man’s garbage, the truck came around the corner and I thought the driver saw me. Of course I doubted Michael would believe this story, but it was worth a shot.

  Michael did look skeptical. “How did you know Carl Malone had rental properties?”

  I anticipated this question. “When I looked into Carl Malone further, I checked with the auditor’s office to see if he owned any properties. That’s standard in investigations.”

  I told Michael about the neighbor’s statements and the dark truck.

  “It’s him, Michael. I know it. I haven’t had a chance to look through the garbage bag yet, since I had to get out of there, but there might be something. Believe me, he’s our killer.”

  “You seem awfully confident.” He eyed me even more suspiciously. “You don’t have to lie to me, you know. If you think I would ever turn you in for something you did wrong—”

  “I didn’t do anything wrong, and I’
m not lying.”

  I wasn’t lying. What I did was illegal, but if you asked anyone whether it was wrong, you’d probably get differing answers. Wrong was only a matter of opinion.

  By then, it was only a couple of hours until morning. I paged the crime lab and told them to be in first to open and process the garbage bag. Then I ran out to my car to grab the information I had put together on Jim Carlson. I handed Michael the thin file.

  “You didn’t find much on him, did you?” He flipped through the pages and looked at the photo I found from the Bureau of Motor Vehicles.

  “Very inconspicuous. There’s an Indiana driver’s license, and, as you can see, it still has his old Indianapolis address. The photo matches the description his neighbor gave—tall, brown hair and a mustache, but that doesn’t fit with other witness descriptions. This guy’s very good at changing his appearance.”

  “There’s also no pickup truck registered to him, Cee.”

  As Michael looked attentively through each page, I found myself in deep admiration of him as a professional. Of course, his stunningly handsome looks didn’t hurt either. It took him a while to get through what little information there was, and I found my eyes getting heavy. The emotional letdown suddenly left me weak and exhausted.

  The next thing I remember was waking up briefly to Michael covering me with a blanket, then lying down beside me, his arm tight around my waist. We had only slept a little over two hours before he was shaking me to wake up. I was drained, but knew it was vital we get to the garbage bag.

  While driving to the department, I went back to thinking about the letter the killer had written to me. Under any circumstances, the letter was frightening, but there was one thing that stood out and bothered me most.

  “Michael, did any of the agents come up with anything regarding the letter?”

  “Not as far as I know, why?”

  “We need to focus on the lions’ den.”