J.A. Konrath / Jack Kilborn Trilogy - Three Scary Thriller Novels (Origin, The List, Haunted House)

by J. A. Konrath

  Directly above them was Butler House. At this time of night, it should have been quiet.

  But it rarely was.

  “I wonder if monkeys have ghosts,” Forenzi mused. “Perhaps your friends Laurel and Hardy will visit you tonight, Gunter. And they probably won’t be pleased with the whole murder-dismemberment-cannibalism debacle. But then, that wouldn’t scare you, would it, Gunter? Nothing scares you at all.”

  Forenzi wondered if he should mention Gunter during his Nobel Prize acceptance speech, since the animal had been essential to his research.

  If so, perhaps the multiple killings should be downplayed. Or left unsaid.

  “Goodnight, my friend. And don’t eat so quickly. You’ll choke.”

  Forenzi left the lab, turning off the overhead florescent lights so his experiment could dine in the dark.

  Chicago, Illinois

  Tom

  After four hours of troubled sleep, Tom reached for his cell phone next to the bed and hit redial.

  It went straight to Roy’s voicemail.

  Peering at the nightstand clock, he judged 8am to be late enough to call Roy’s ex-wife. Tom located the number in his address book, and she picked up on the second ring.

  “Hi, Gladys. It’s Tom Mankowski.”

  “Is Roy with y’all? Fool missed his visitation time with his daughter.”

  Hell. Tom went into cop mode. “Does he do that often?”

  “Not without calling he don’t. And he didn’t call. She was really upset, Tom. I was, too. I had plans. Tell him we’re both extremely disappointed in him. He hook up with some hoochie mama and lose track of time? Now he’s playing you to smooth things over?”

  Hoochie mama? “I don’t know where he is, Gladys.”

  “Really? This isn’t a game?” Glady’s voice had shed its ghetto attitude, and Tom sensed the concern.

  “Apparently he’s been missing since last week.”

  “A week? Oh, Jesus, Tom. I… what do we do?”

  “I’m going to look for him, Gladys.”

  “Thank you. Please keep me posted, okay?”

  “Sure thing. And if you hear from him, please call.”

  “I will. What should I tell Rhonda?”

  Double hell. Rhonda just turned five. Old enough to wonder where her daddy was.

  “I don’t know, Gladys.”

  “You think it’s one of his old cases? Or a new one?”

  “I don’t know. Did he mention going anywhere to you?”

  “No. Nothing. He usually calls the day before he picks up Rhonda, which was supposed to be Wednesday. But he didn’t. His phone goes straight to voicemail.”

  “Did he say anything about a haunted house? Or a reality show? Or getting some money?”

  “I haven’t heard from him since he took Rhonda to a Cubs game, over two weeks ago. Do you think… do you think he might be…”

  Then he heard it. A sniffle.

  Gladys was crying.

  “You know, Tom, that son of a bitch makes me angrier than anyone I’ve ever met. But if anything has happened to him…”

  “I’ll find him, Gladys.”

  “Rhonda needs her father.”

  “I’ll find him. My love to Rhonda.”

  Tom hung up. Listening to women cry was almost as bad as informing next of kin that someone close to them had died. And Tom had to wonder if that’s what he just did with Gladys.

  He found the FedEx invitation and dialed the number, using his land line. A machine picked up, the voice synthetic. One of those text-to-speech generators that just missed sounding human. Futurists called it the uncanny valley. A sense of revulsion that people felt when they experienced something that was almost human, but not quite. It was thought of as a survival mechanism, to help people avoid those who looked or sounded strange. Tom could understand how that worked, on a genetics level, because procreating with those who had some sort of defect meant potentially defective children, and avoiding someone who was odd decreased the chance of getting whatever disease they had. At least that’s how the futurists explained it.

  But listening to the voice, Tom realized it could help humans survive in another kind of way. By helping them avoid things that almost looked human, but weren’t.

  Things like ghosts.

  “Please say or punch in your reservation number, followed by the pound sign.”

  Tom used his phone keypad.

  “Hello, Tom Mankowski,” the creepy robotic voice said. “You are invited to spend the night at the haunted Butler House in Solidarity, South Carolina, where you will participate in a fear experiment. The house is located on 683 Auburn Road. You are expected to arrive on Saturday, before noon. You can bring whatever items you’d like, including weapons, religious paraphernalia, and ghost detecting equipment. If you take any prescription medication, please bring it along. The experiment will end Sunday at 4pm. Informing others about this experiment will disqualify you from your million dollar participation fee. Polygraphs will be administered to ensure compliance. Have a nice day. We’ll see you soon.”

  Tom held the phone, trying to understand the weird feeling that had come over him. The instructions were straightforward and polite, but the call hadn’t left him with warm, fuzzy feelings.

  Quite the opposite, he was experiencing something that only happened rarely. like when a perp ducked down an alley, and Tom had to follow. Or the second just before he had to kick in a suspect’s door.

  Fear of the unexpected. Also known as dread.

  He shook his head, trying to brush off the feeling. But the dread clung there like cobwebs.

  Tom startled when the off-hook tone began to beep from the handset.

  “If you’d like to make a call, please hang up and dial again. If you need help—”

  He hung up.

  Tom considered calling Joan, but the two hour time zone difference would have meant waking her up. Instead, he padded over to the shower and turned it on, hot as he could stand it. Then he stared into his bathroom mirror and began to scrape the stubble off his face. His beard, like the hair on his head, was turning prematurely gray. He also needed a haircut.

  The mirror began to steam up, and Tom raised his hand to wipe it off, but stopped before his fingers touched the glass.

  The fogging had revealed words, handwritten on the mirror.

  I’M WATCHING YOU

  THE NEXT DAY

  Mililani, Hawaii

  Josh

  Fran was in a bikini, sitting on their porch, stripping and cleaning one of their AR-15 semi-automatic rifles. She had a look of intense concentration on her face as she ran a cleaning rod through the bore. If there was anything sexier than a woman in a bathing suit with a firearm, Josh didn’t know what it was.

  He set the lemonade he’d brought for her down on the table, and took a sip of the one he’d kept for himself. It was a perfect Hawaiian day, sunny and hot and smelling like paradise, and the lemonade was cold and sweetened just enough to take the edge off the pucker.

  Mathison was perched on the seatback of Fran’s chair watching damselflies. Though Josh had never seen him do it, he had a suspicion that the monkey liked to catch the bugs and eat them.

  Mathison chittered when he saw Josh. He hopped down, ran into the house through the dog door, and returned a moment later with his plastic infant cup. He held it out to Josh, who poured in some lemonade. Mathison chirped a thank you, took a drink, then made a face and stuck out his tongue.

  “I like it tart,” Josh said.

  Mathison set down his cup, ran inside again, and came out with a packet of sugar and a spoon. As the monkey mixed his drink to taste, Fran spoke.

  “Are you sure about this?”

  “Didn’t we discuss it? I thought we agreed.”

  “Can it hurt to discuss it some more?”

  “No,” he admitted.

  “So are you sure?”

  Josh took another sip of lemonade. Mathison did as well, then made a sound like he was throwing up
. He put his tiny hands on his own throat to emphasize his displeasure.

  “So get more sugar,” Josh told him.

  The monkey ran off. He came back a moment later with five more packets.

  “You’re going to get diabetes,” Josh said.

  Mathison gave him the finger.

  “Did Duncan teach him that?” Josh asked his wife.

  “What?” She was absorbed in her cleaning.

  “Mathison flipped me the bird.”

  “No. I think it was South Park.”

  “The TV show?”

  “Yeah. He has a few DVD box sets.” Fran squirted more solvent on the patch holder.

  “You bought South Park DVDs?”

  “No. He grabbed them in the store while I was shopping, put them in the cart, and paid me. He also bought The Untouchables. He’s watched it seven times. I think he wants to be Sean Connery.”

  Mathison nodded at Josh, then added more sugar.

  “And how did the monkey get money?”

  “He was doing tricks in front of Walmart with his cup.”

  “Huh.” Maybe the monkey had an organ grinder heritage. “How much did you make?”

  The capuchin held up three fingers on his right hand, five on his left.

  “Thirty-five dollars? Seriously? How long did it take?”

  One finger, and five fingers.

  “Only fifteen minutes? Fran, that’s a hundred and forty bucks an hour.”

  “Josh, can you get back on topic? I asked you if you’re sure.”

  Josh sipped more lemonade, then thought about the invitation to Butler House. The whole concept of it, from the way they were approached in the wee morning hours, to the dial-in number with the weird voice, failed to pass the sniff test.

  “It’s bullshit,” Josh said. “The military is trying to hoodwink us. Those weren’t feds.”

  “I agree.”

  Josh settled back in his chair, putting a foot up on the table. Mathison added a fifth sugar packet, took a sip, and gave Josh a thumbs up.

  “Brush your teeth when you finish,” Josh said.

  The monkey replied in sign language. “Woof ate my toothbrush.”

  “The dog ate it? When?”

  “A week ago.”

  “I watched you brush your teeth last night.”

  “That was Fran’s toothbrush.”

  Josh frowned. He’d just kissed Fran less than an hour ago.

  “What did he say?” Fran asked, looking up from her bore cleaning.

  “We need to buy everyone in the house a new toothbrush. Maybe I’ll let Duncan drive. He’s getting his permit next week.”

  “And Butler House?”

  Josh swirled some tart lemonade around his tongue, then swallowed.

  “Fuck Butler House.”

  Chicago, IL

  Tom

  There weren’t any homicides in Tom’s jurisdiction in the last few days—unusual for Chicago—so it gave him time to work on Roy’s disappearance. After arriving at the office and getting his cup of burned coffee, Tom went to his partner’s desk and fired up his computer. While it booted he snooped around, finding nothing of interest.

  As expected, Roy didn’t have a computer password. Detectives preferred that, so if anything happened to them in the line of duty, their last actions could be easily traced.

  Tom checked Roy’s email, finding a confirmation for a rental car at the Charleston airport dated last week. He dialed the number and pretended to be Roy, reading off the confirmation number.

  “What can we help you with, Mr. Lewis?”

  An odd thing to say if the car hadn’t been returned.

  “Can you email me all the details from my rental, for tax purposes?”

  “Certainly.” The woman repeated Roy’s email addy.

  “Also, can you remind me when I returned the car?”

  “You returned it last Sunday, at 11:35am. Anything else I can help you with?”

  Tom declined and disconnected. Next he called the airline Roy used and said he lost his return flight ticket. Did someone else possibly use it?

  “No, Mr. Lewis. That ticket hasn’t been used. Would you like us to book a return flight?”

  Again Tom declined, and hung up.

  Either Roy had returned the car at the airport, and something happened to him to prevent him from boarding his flight. Or something happened to him earlier, and someone returned his rental car for him to tie up a loose end.

  Tom got on the Internet and began calling hospitals in the Charleston area, asking if Roy or any African American John Does fitting his description had been admitted. He also checked the morgues, and Charleston PD.

  No luck.

  Next he checked Roy’s browsing history, and saw he’d been on the same Butler House site Tom had been on. Roy also had been on the Ghost Smashers website. Tom recalled reading that they’d shot an episode of their TV show at Butler House, but it never aired and the host quit TV immediately afterward. Tom went back to Roy’s email, checking the Sent folder.

  Roy had several exchanges with Richard Reiser, the host of the show. The last one ended with Roy asking if they could Skype. Skype was a VoiP—a voice over internet protocol. It allowed two people to talk to one another using computer webcams and headsets. Tom accessed Roy’s Skype account, and sure enough Richard Reiser was listed as a contact. Tom found Roy’s headphones in his top drawer and plugged them into a USB port. Then he video called Reiser.

  As it rang, Tom accessed the National Crime Information Center and searched for Dr. Emil Forenzi. He didn’t find any info. Apparently Forenzi didn’t have a criminal record.

  “You’re not Roy.”

  Tom looked at the Skype window. He saw the profile of a man’s head, obscured by shadows. Richard Reiser was Skyping without any lights on.

  “I’m Roy’s partner, Detective Tom Mankowski.” Tom raised up his badge, holding it to the webcam embedded in the monitor. “When was the last time you spoke with Roy?”

  “Is Roy missing?

  “Do you know something about that, Mr. Reiser?”

  “Rich. Call me Rich. I told him not to go to the Butler House. But he went, didn’t he?”

  Rich’s voice was slurred, and Tom wondered if the man was drunk.

  “No one has heard from him in seven days,” Tom said.

  “I warned him. I practically begged him not to go.”

  “When did you last speak with Roy?”

  “Eight days ago. It was Thursday. He said he got some sort of invitation to Butler House.”

  “Why did he get in touch with you?”

  “He wanted to know what happened on my show, Ghost Smashers. Why I quit show business.”

  “Did you tell him?”

  Rich paused for a moment before continuing. “The network did a good job of covering it up. They paid me off not to talk about it. I signed some non-disclosure agreements.”

  “So you didn’t tell Roy?”

  “No. I did. I did so he wouldn’t go. But I guess he went anyway.”

  “Can you tell me as well?”

  “He didn’t listen to me.”

  Tom lowered his voice. “Mr. Reiser, please tell me what you told my partner.”

  Another pause, and Tom began to wonder if Rich was going to balk. But then he began.

  “It was nearing midnight. I was doing my intro in Butler House’s great room—this huge space in the front of the house when you walk in. Two story roof, curved staircase, weird tapestries on the walls. It looked like the set of a Roger Corman Poe flick from the sixties. We’d gotten there in the daytime, did some establishing shots, set up our equipment. EMF, IR, EVP, full spectrum motion cameras.”

  Tom didn’t know what any of those abbreviations were, but he didn’t want to interrupt the story to ask.

  “During set-up, one of the camera guys caught an RSPK on tape. That’s recurrent spontaneous psychokinesis. Poltergeist activity. A painting fell off the wall, right in front of us. Portrait of that
serial killer, Augustus Torble. We checked the nail it was hanging on—a big, thick, six inch nail. Bent right in half. We’d never gotten footage like that before. In hindsight, we should have left right then.”

  Rich grabbed something and lifted it to his face. A bottle. Beer? Whiskey? He tilted it and swallowed, and then began to gag and cough. More evidence of being drunk.

  “At midnight, I’m set to do my first piece of the night. Explore the basement of Butler House. We were using the dual head cam. Have you seen the show?”

  “No.”

  “It’s a two way camera, mounted on my head. One lens is pointed ahead of me, where I’m looking. One is pointing at my face, so the viewers can see my reactions. It’s mounted on a helmet, and with the batteries… it’s pretty heavy. So… we had a… a… thick strap around… my chin… to keep the rig steady. Right after I started my segment… the batteries…”

  Rich’s voice trailed off.

  “What happened to the batteries, Rich?”

  He didn’t answer.

  “Rich?”

  “They… exploded.”

  He reached off to the side, and then the lights in his room came on.

  Rich’s face looked like it had strips of half-cooked bacon glued to it. Eyebrows burned off. No nostrils, just a gaping hole for his nose. Part of his upper lip missing, showing his teeth, which explained his slurring. He wasn’t drunk. He was Frankenstein’s goddamn monster.

  “Lead batteries contain sulfuric acid. So my helmet was both on fire, and leaking acid down my face. And because of the chin strap, I couldn’t… I couldn’t get it off. I couldn’t get it off…”

  “I’m sorry,” Tom said. It took everything he had in him to not turn away from the screen.

  Rich lifted the bottle—a water bottle—to his face and took a sip, gagging again, some of the water running down his ruined chin.

  “The network sued the company that made the camera. But when they took the rig in for testing, no one could find anything wrong with it. No faulty wiring. No bad parts. It’s like it exploded for no reason at all.”

  Tom felt terrible for the guy, and he didn’t like making him talk about it. But for Roy’s sake, he had to ask. “But you think there was a reason.”