Read Online The Darkness Inside: Writer's Cut by John Rickards - Free Book Online

was off work with flu that day,” a stocky guy with a beard and big glasses said, voice a nasal whine. “Must’ve been like that for three or four days, I think.”
    A small apartment near a river.
    “You should ask my neighbors. I see them pretty often. They might remember seeing me.”
    A blocky family home with wooden siding in need of repair.
    “I was driving roofing supplies out someplace near Beckett.” A bald man with a prominent nose. His shrewish wife was waiting in the kitchen for us to finish. “I’ve got the work schedule; the customer might be able to say when I was there, if that’s any help. I heard about what happened. You any closer to catching the guy?”
    Dreary apartment building that smelled like old coffee.
    “So am I suspect or something? Shouldn’t my lawyer be here?” Stick-thin guy well into his fifties. He shrugged. “It doesn’t matter, I guess. It’s not like I’ve done anything. Come on in.”
    A scruffy little office above a thrift store.
    “No, I was at my sister’s place in New Hampshire. But I’ve seen this case on the news, and I’ve got a theory you might be interested in…”
    An anonymous small house in Fall River.
    “Yeah?” said Cody Williams. “What do you want?”
     His home was a narrow two-story house with a square patch of slightly ragged greenery that passed for a front yard. A few shrubs, some flowers, all starting to grow rampant. An unmarked white van sat on the driveway. When Williams — a pale, wiry guy with long curly hair tied back in a ponytail, wearing a grey T-shirt and jogging pants — opened the door, a wash of warm stale air, moist and acrid, flowed past him. The slick skin reek of old sweat. Older scents embedded in the fabric of the house itself. My nostrils recoiled, but I tried not to show it.
    “Mr Williams, I’m Special Agent Alex Rourke and this is Agent Jeff Agostini.” We held up our badges. “We need to ask you a few routine questions if you have a few minutes.”
    One side of Williams mouth twitched into a smile. “This is about that kiddie thing, right?” His choice of words jarred. “I’ve seen it on the news. Then someone from the cops called about the van, asked where I was.”
    “That’s right, Mr Williams. All we’re doing is asking people a few standard questions, just to eliminate them from our lists.”
    “You guys the only two they got working on that? I’d kinda figured there’d be more of you. I mean, where’re we at now, four of them girls gone? Five?”
    “There’s a lot of cops working on this too, Mr Williams.”
    “A lot, huh?”
    “Yeah.”
    “And all they’ve got for you two to do is ask ‘routine questions’, Agent Rourke? With all them pretty young things still missing?” Another twitch of the mouth. A thin strand of spittle stretched between his lips.
    “That’s not all we’ve got.” I shook my head slightly, but kept my eyes fixed on his. I had the cold sweat adrenal feel that came when you got close to the jackpot. If this guy couldn’t give us any answers, I told myself, if he was still a potential suspect by the end of today, I’d make him for the abductions. “This is just what we’re doing today. Just talking to people.”
    Williams shrugged. “How long’s this going to take?”
      “A few minutes, nothing more. Can we come in?”
    “We’re best talking here, Agent Rourke. I’ve been doing some work on the house. Place is a mess and there’s dust all over.” I couldn’t tell if he was lying or not.
    I looked at Agostini and he took out a notebook. To Williams I said, “How long have you owned your van, Mr Williams?”
    “A couple of years.” He sniffed. “I use it for work mostly.”
    “What do you do for a living?”
    “I deliver parts for Drill Hall Collectors’ Autos.” A defiant tone in his voice. Like we were kids playing ‘twenty questions’ and he wanted us to hit the limit without guessing right.
    “Is that here in Fall River?”
    He nodded.