by Andrew Mayne
“Tell me something, Robert. Tell me something so that when you look your god in the eye, you can convince yourself you’re a good man.”
He’s struggling with this.
“Let me put it to you this way: soon the whole world is going to know about Mr. Christian. What do you want your part of the story to be?”
He scratches the back of his neck, wrestling with what to do. “All right. All I can say is that there’s a place we know not to send our children.”
“The summer camp? I was there. There’s nothing there.”
“That’s all I can say,” Robert replies. “Maybe you didn’t look close enough. Now if you don’t leave, I’ll call the police.”
“Well, that’s ironic.”
He waves his hand in the air and walks away with his shoulders slumped. Clearly this got to him.
I decide not to chase after him. He’s at the point now where he doesn’t care how much I harass his clients. He’s more concerned with his own safety.
CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX
INSIDER
I peer across the dark field from my hiding spot in the trees, waiting for Oyo to show up. Both the sun and the moon have already set, and the only illumination in my night-vision goggles comes from the light of the stars.
His children’s camp is deserted with the exception of the occasional possum that takes a stroll across the grounds, looking to see if the humans have returned and brought with them their offerings.
I parked my car a quarter mile away and walked the distance here, clinging to the tree line so Oyo couldn’t spot me from the road. I’ve only seen four cars pass in the last hour. None of them pulled into the retreat.
I don’t know if Robert’s clue was intentionally misleading or if I misinterpreted it. Right now I’m at my wit’s end, trying to figure out what to do next. I’m not sure what I expected to see: Oyo pulling up and opening the door to a secret cellar? Dragging a child into one of the camp buildings?
I took a walk through the woods behind the camp. The trees are fairly spread apart and the trails well marked.
It’s not some sinister forest from a dark fairy tale. It would be hard to hide anything in there. I can imagine a few moonshine stills and some squatter shacks years ago, when the area was less developed. Now it’s the kind of place day hikers walk through on a regular basis.
It also doesn’t feel like the kind of place a predator would feel comfortable. Much as humans have an aesthetic sense of a safe space—small bodies of water surrounded by trees, long, open vistas—predators have environments in which they feel comfortable.
For serial killers it’s usually their home or their car. Gacy had his crawl spaces. Bundy had his mobility.
What does Oyo have? His double lives, living side by side? The ability to be a man of God to the public and a servant of evil in private?
There’s something masterful about how he intertwined the two worlds. His past atrocities put him in a position of power that was useful to intelligence agents looking at what they thought was a bigger problem.
After my encounter with Cold War Bill, I suspect that Oyo isn’t simply an informer: his ministry may be one of those mysterious enterprises that clandestine parts of our government use to funnel guns and money to parts of the world where we’re fighting secret wars.
That means the people calling the shots are literally on the front lines. They look at my interference as an act of treason—maybe not in law, but in spirit.
While I find it hard to believe they really know what Oyo is up to, I suspect that nobody wants to dig all that deeply. It’s collateral damage in a greater conflict, from their point of view.
I check my watch. It’s getting late. Not quite witching hour, but Oyo probably has given his victim his sleep juice by now.
Wherever they are.
I could be back at his house in an hour, but I am certain he’s not there.
I’m also kicking myself for not inspecting his church. While I seriously doubt he’d bring a victim back there, it still could have some clue to his whereabouts.
I decide he’s not showing up and crawl from my hiding spot. This was a bust. Best-case scenario: Oyo got worried and decided not to pull anything tonight, and I’m just working myself into a frenzy.
I don’t know that he was going to kill tonight. It just seemed right—but how things seem isn’t the proper way to do science.
I have to work on logic and facts.
Fact: Oyo hasn’t shown up at the retreat.
I walk through the camp, peering into the windows with my night-vision goggles. Empty buildings waiting for children to return and fill them with their voices.
Right now the only sounds are crickets and frogs …
I close my eyes and listen more closely. There’s another sound. Almost like dripping water.
I move closer to the source, trying to understand what it is.
There’s something random about it.
It’s a kind of “ploink” noise.
There’s also something familiar.
It’s not a natural sound—it’s an imitation of one.
I cock my head to the side and place the sound somewhere in front of me.
My eyes still closed, I walk toward the source.
Something metal rattles as I bump into a barrier.
When I open my eyes, I’m looking at a foliage-covered chain-link fence—the one standing between the camp and the old, overrun nursery.
Carefully, trying not to rattle the fence any more than I already have, I pull myself up and peer over the edge.
There’s an overgrown wilderness of plants and small trees. At one end there’s a small house with an open glass door in the back. The inside is lit by the glow of a large television.
A cartoon frog is jumping from one lily pad to another.
A child’s laugh pierces through the night air, and chills run through my body.
Before I climb the fence into the wooded lot, I have a realization: I should have looked more closely at the other homes on Wimbledon …
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
LAIR
My feet touch the wet soil, and I’m in a different world. The dark leaves of the wild ferns and saplings are black cutouts against a dark-gray sky. It’s a mini jungle that reeks of a thousand scents. Rotting vegetation, blooming flowers left unattended, and, underneath it all, the sickly sweet smell of decaying flesh. I’m reminded of Amorphophallus titanum, the so-called corpse flower, which resembles a giant loaf of french bread emerging from an inverted bell. But that’s not the source of these scents.
The flora are too densely packed for me to gauge the size of the nursery, other than what I recall from the Google Earth view. The lot is at least as deep as the retreat’s, although it’s nowhere near as wide; with the thickly spaced plants and trees, it might as well be the Amazon.
I can barely spot the glow of the television in the house from my new vantage point, but my feet find small flagstones, which I presume meander their way to the front of the property. Even though my curiosity is calling me toward the back, I have to go check and make sure the child playing the game is still unharmed.
I thread my way through branches and thick ferns, trying not to make scraping sounds or upset any of the dozen cracked statues and fountains that lie on either side of the path.
As I draw closer, the “ploink ploink” sound of the game grows louder. I hope this means the child is still conscious.
The foliage begins to thin out, and I find myself on a concrete patio. The house is directly before me. To my right is a passageway lined with trellises. This may have been the customer entrance back when this was a functioning business.
Through the open sliding glass doors, I see the back of a small brown head sitting on a couch facing the television. Occasionally he bounds up or down as his frog reaches some level.
I remain motionless, looking for my prey.
The game pauses, and the boy’s head moves forward. I take another ste
p and see him reach for a glass of grape-colored liquid.
I’m about to run into the living room and slap it out of his hand when I hear the basso of a voice. I can’t make out the words, but from somewhere else in the house, an adult is speaking.
I have my gun. I could go in there now …
What if it’s not him?
What if it is?
Unless my plan is to shoot him in cold blood, I need more. I need something I can point to if I call the cops. I can’t just tell them my gut says they should dig up the backyard.
I’m a trespasser.
Suddenly I understand how those detectives felt as they watched Ted Bundy wash away the evidence in his car. Powerless within the law.
I tell myself that this child’s fate will be similar to Artice’s—he’s safe until Oyo brings him to the killing room.
The killing room is somewhere behind me. Somewhere in this twisted garden.
I retreat back into the overgrowth and follow the path the other way, deeper into the dark. My night-vision goggles give me a narrow field of view—so claustrophobic that I’m tempted to simply feel my way by touch.
I use the goggles to keep an eye on the small flagstones and watch for anything that could trip me. One clumsy move and I could let him know I’m here.
The path winds left and right but never backtracks. I assume it was set by the gardeners who previously owned this property, and was meant to give visitors a leisurely view of all they had to offer—and not some demented labyrinth meant to deceive a person trying to escape.
Oyo is a clever opportunist, not a landscaper, I tell myself.
The trees and shrubs give way to another open space. It’s a small clearing with a broken fountain in the middle. Tilted at an angle, the peak rises to a sharp point. Dead leaves and brush fill the basin, while vines wrap around the cement, strangling the spire.
A shed stands on the other side, its wooden walls even darker than the sky. A window on the side is covered with newspapers, concealing what’s inside.
The only source of light is the reflection on the gleaming padlock mounted to the sliding door.
It’s unlocked.
I walk around the fountain and listen for a moment. I can still hear the distant sounds of the game.
Artice’s account of the shed at Wimbledon is forefront in my mind, along with the forensic details the LAPD was able to pull from it after the fact.
The stench of decay is even stronger here, plus there’s some acidic smell I can’t quite place. A cleanser? I can’t see the point of that. Toy Man’s murder scenes can’t be cleansed.
I grab the door handle and pull as gently as possible. The wood makes a small squeak as it slides from the ill-fitted frame.
I hesitate, waiting for an immediate reaction, but none comes.
I pull the door open wider, and it begins to slide open on its own accord.
The first thing I notice is a black tarp on the ground. As my gaze drifts upward, I see row after row of wooden shelves on the back wall.
Filled with glass bottles and metal cans, the shed’s interior doesn’t seem that out of place for a nursery. This would be where you’d keep your seeds, fertilizers, and pesticides.
I step forward for a better view. My grainy night vision begins to resolve details in the darkness.
These aren’t seeds. The bottles are filled with murky liquids. Most are impossible to interpret, but the ones with human ears and eyeballs are unmistakable. Other jars contain parts I don’t even want to acknowledge.
The urge to throw up is so sudden and visceral, I can barely control it.
I’ve smelled dozens of corpses and even participated in human dissections, but I feel a different response now. This is the body’s reaction to evil.
I take my phone from my pocket and take a photo. The flash goes off and I panic, afraid that the light will somehow be visible from the house.
It’s unlikely, but still sends a shudder down my spine.
I slowly back out of the shed and push the door into place. I almost lock it, then remember this was how I found it.
When I let go of the lock, I realize that the video game has stopped playing.
I pull my gun free and step away from the door. The wind is blowing, stirring the leaves.
I walk around the fountain and take a side path leading to another side of the nursery.
One careful step at a time, I try to find my way back to the house. Occasionally I catch the glow of the television through the branches, giving some indication of direction. Thorns claw at my clothes, and vines threaten to trip me. I stoop to remove one from my ankle. When I stand again, the television is no longer visible.
Did he just turn it off? I squint, trying to make out any detail in the dark. I can see a faint glow thirty yards in front of me, but it appears that it’s being blocked …
The television flickers back into view as the eclipse passes.
Someone else is out here in the undergrowth.
CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT
MAZE
I move even more cautiously than before, trying to discern the difference between the breeze rattling leaves around me and the sound of another man moving through the brush.
Attempting to keep as low a profile as possible, I put my gun at hip level and sweep it back and forth as I move to the next stone.
There’s a crack beneath my feet. I glance down and see the image of a child’s jaw through my night-vision goggles.
A jointed skeleton of a finger sticks out of the earth nearby, hauntingly pointing to the sky.
This confirms what my nose had already told me: this is a garden of death. God knows what else is out here. I already saw his trophy collection in the shed.
My ears twitch as I hear something scrape against concrete. He’s now moved to my rear, flanking me from behind.
He has home-field advantage. I’m just blindly moving through his snare.
I weigh the risk of simply firing my gun but discount the foolish notion immediately. The chances of hitting someone are almost zero—but that someone could be the child.
The child, I remind myself. I can’t fail. It’s all about him.
I keep moving toward the glow. I can hear the sound of movement getting closer to me.
I could kneel down and lie in wait, ready to fire my gun …
But my feet keep me moving forward. The television is getting larger, and I can make out a score on the screen.
Footsteps.
I definitely hear footsteps behind me.
I run forward, leap through the brush, and emerge onto the patio.
The child is no longer visible on the couch, but I see a foot in a white sock poking out over an armrest.
The noise behind me is much louder—like a wild animal running through the brush.
I race into the house, rip off the goggles, and slide the glass door shut. The first thing I see is the bright image of my own reflection.
I press my face against the glass and see a shape standing out there. Tall, powerful. Right at the edge of the patio.
I lock the glass door and run around to the couch. The boy looks to be about twelve. He’s passed out with his head on a pillow.
The cup of purple liquid is gone.
Still gripping the gun and casting nervous glances at the back door, I peel open the child’s eyelids. Yellow eyes look up at me.
His pupils are dilated.
I give him a slap on the cheek. “Wake up,” I whisper.
“Are we gonna go see the fort now?” he asks dreamily.
“Kid, you don’t want to go there.”
I pull him into a seated position and take out my phone. I dial 911 and blurt the address to the operator, then set the phone down but leave the line open.
I ignore the dispatcher’s pleas for more information as my entire attention focuses on the glass door.
He’s out there …
What are you going to do now, Oyo? I have the kid and found this place.
I get an answer a moment later when a statue comes shattering through the glass.
Broken shards fly at me. I duck down and protect the kid. The stonework crashes into the glass coffee table and falls to the floor.
I stick my gun over the edge of the sofa and fire into the darkness.
BANG.
BANG.
BANG.
I squint through the opening and can see only the tops of the overgrown plants against the night sky.
If this were Joe Vik, I’d be worried that he’d be coming in through the front door.
But he’s not.
He’s something else entirely.
The Toy Man knows when to run.
In the distance I can hear the sound of sirens. I wait until they’re right outside, then put my gun back into my holster.
I won’t be needing it again tonight.
CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE
SURROGATES
I’ve been inside a holding cell for four hours, and nobody has even come to talk to me since the police brought me in.
The cops on the scene did their job. They treated me with an appropriate amount of suspicion, got the kid to the hospital, then let me lead them through the bone-strewn garden and the little shack of horrors—which was even more horrifying the second time.
Oyo must have freaked out and started ripping shelves from the walls.
There were body parts and noxious fluids everywhere.
One cop puked. I wisely kept my distance from the door.
When we arrived at the police station, I wasn’t in handcuffs. But a lieutenant was waiting outside for us.
He said something to the cops who brought me in, and the next thing I knew, I was in bracelets and escorted to this holding room.
Somebody spoke to someone.
Now the question on my mind is who is going to be the next person to walk through that door?
Will it be Bill with a pistol and a silencer?
Will it be some rough ex-con “randomly” placed in my cell?