The Dead Room

She kept twisting her foot, her entire body shaking. ‘Do you remember a boy named Jackson Cooper? He lived in Charlestown.’

‘I don’t know him.’

‘Yes, you do. You molested him. Repeatedly.’

‘I WANT A LAWYER!’

Darby released her foot.

The priest curled into a foetal position and started sobbing.

She raised the gun. ‘Look at me.’

His lips quivered. ‘You can’t,’ he said, and started to cry. ‘I’m a man of God.’

‘Not my God,’ Darby said, and shot him in the head.

67

The gunshot had startled the woman. Her head shot up and she started coughing up blood.

Darby moved next to her. ‘You’re safe. They’re all dead.’

The woman trembled against her restraints. Blood trickled down her chin. She was trying to speak.

‘Say that again?’ Darby moved her ear close to the woman’s lips.

‘Kevin… ah… ah…’

‘Reynolds?’

‘Yes.’

‘I cuffed him downstairs. He can’t hurt you.’

‘Babies,’ she wheezed.

‘What babies?’

‘Sons… ah… Michael. Carter.’

‘They’re here? In the house?’

‘Hiding. Michael…. ah… hid brother. Safe.’

‘Where are they hiding?’

‘Dead… ah… room.’

Dead room? She must have meant bedroom.

‘Safe,’ the woman said. ‘Hiding underneath… ah… bed.’

‘I’ll go get them.’ Darby opened the door.

‘Ma-Ma-Ma-Michael!’ Russo’s scream was a wet, crackling wheeze. ‘Come… ah… out.’

Darby ran across the dark hallway.

‘Come. Ah… ah… safe. Okay.’

Darby stepped up to the door with the broken lock. Almost pitch black in there; the light-blocking shades had been drawn. She searched the wall and found the light switch.

Dried blood screamed from the walls. Pools of it covered the carpets and valance.

‘Bed,’ Russo wheezed. ‘Un… ah… Un… der… ah… neath.’

Darby got down on her hands and knees and gripped the valance. Dust blew into her face as she leaned forward and looked underneath the bed.

Nobody was there.

68

Jamie forced an eye open. Everything was blurry. She could see light down at the end of the hall, in the dead room. One of her boys was scrambling out from underneath the bed – Carter. She could make out the Batman mask hanging around his neck.

They’re safe. My babies are safe.

Jamie started to cry. ‘Okay… Carter. Okay, ah… now.’

Carter’s tiny feet thumped across the hall. The woman detective didn’t bother to try to stop him.

Michael was fast. He scooped up his brother before he reached the doorway. Carter tried to fight. He kicked and screamed. Michael turned him around and gripped him fiercely against his chest so he couldn’t turn and see the bedroom.

But Michael was staring, his wide-eyed gaze locked on Father Humphrey’s corpse and what little remained of the priest’s head.

Jamie drew in a deep breath, the feeling like razor blades slicing through her lungs, and tried to scream.

‘Go, Michael!’ she cried. ‘La… ah… ah… Go!’

He didn’t leave. He whisked his attention from Father Humphrey to her and kept gulping air. Carter kept wailing and the goddamn detective kept standing at the end of the hall not saying or doing a goddamn thing.

Jamie looked at the detective and tried to scream the words: ‘Take… ah… them.’

The woman didn’t move, just stood there staring back at her with those piercing green eyes.

Jamie bucked against the rope, almost tipping over her chair.

‘TAKE…’

Her lungs burned with a crackling sound.

‘TAKE… AWAY…BABIES.’

Darby heard the policemen running through the downstairs rooms. Heard them shouting orders as doors slammed open and shut. She didn’t move or speak. Stood in the hallway frozen, watching in horror as the woman tied to the chair had an imaginary conversation with her two children – two boys the woman believed had been hiding underneath the bed of a room covered in dried blood.

‘Take… ah… please,’ the woman begged in her fractured speech. ‘Take.’

A shadow moved across the wall near the stairwell. Darby saw a young male patrolman standing on the stairs aiming his handgun at her.

‘Freeze.’ He crept up another step.

Darby raised her hands slowly. Then she clasped her hands behind her head and spoke in a loud, clear voice.

‘My name is Darby McCormick. I’m a special investigator for Boston’s Criminal Services Unit. My wallet and ID are in my back pocket.’

‘On the floor. On your stomach.’

Slowly she dropped to her knees. ‘I’m armed. Shotgun and a SIG tucked in my right pocket.’

Darby lay against the floor, hands clasped behind her head. The patrolman did what he was trained to do. He grabbed her wrists, yanked them around her back and cuffed her.

She rolled her head to the side. ‘The woman in the master bedroom is tied to a chair,’ Darby said. ‘She has a punctured lung. Don’t move her. When the ambulance techs come, make sure you tell them.’

Knee-high black tactical boots tucked inside dark blue trousers rushed up the steps. A pair stepped up next to her and three more rushed inside the bedroom.

‘Don’t untie her,’ the young patrolman called out. ‘She might have a punctured lung.’

Darby felt a muzzle pressed against the back of her head. Heard someone trying to unclip the strap for the