Chris Carter - An Evil Mind

Taylor bit her bottom lip and looked away, clearly debating if she should say what she was thinking. She decided that there was no point in being coy. ‘I know he was your friend, and I’m sorry to say this, but junkies don’t get a lot of sympathy from me. I’ve worked on too many cases where someone, high on some cheap fix, or trying to get some cash to buy some cheap fix, committed the most atrocious murder, or murders.’ She paused for breath. ‘He could be lying, you know? He could still be hooked on something, and he could’ve killed those two women while under the influence.’

Hunter picked up on something different underlying Taylor’s tone. Hidden anger, maybe.

‘Your lab tests showed that he was clean,’ he said.

‘Certain drugs exit your system in a matter of hours, you know that,’ Taylor came back. ‘Plus, those heads had been preserved in ice containers for who knows how long. Those two women could’ve been murdered months ago.’

‘That’s true.’ Hunter couldn’t counter-argue her point. ‘And certain drugs do exit your system in a matter of hours, but you’ve seen junkies before, right? They just can’t stay away from drugs for too long, and they all show typical psychological and physical signs of dependency — skin, eyes, hair, lips. . paranoia, anxiety. . you know what to look for. Lucien showed none of it.’ Hunter shook his head. ‘He isn’t hooked anymore.’

This time it was Taylor who couldn’t debate Hunter’s argument. Lucien really showed no physical or psychological signs of dependency anymore. But she wasn’t ready to let it rest quite yet.

‘OK, I agree, he does appear to be clean, but he still gets no sympathy. According to what he told you, nobody forced him to take any drugs. He decided to do so of his own free will. He could’ve just as easily walked away from it. People all over, and of all ages, are offered drugs every day. You know this better than most, Robert. Some go for it, some don’t. It’s a choice . In his case, it was his choice, no one else’s. No one but Lucien should feel guilty about him becoming a junkie.’

Hunter said nothing for a long instant. The plane hit a spot of turbulence and he waited until it was all clear before speaking again.

‘It’s not quite that simple, Courtney.’

‘Isn’t it?’

‘No.’ Hunter sat back in his seat.

‘I was offered drugs many times,’ Taylor said. ‘In school, in college, on the streets, around the neighborhood, at parties, on vacation, everywhere really, and I still managed to stay away from them.’

‘And that’s great, but I bet that you also know people who weren’t as strong as you, right? People who didn’t manage to stay away from them. People who got hooked?’

Something seemed to change inside Taylor’s eyes. ‘I do, yes.’ Hunter could tell that she was struggling to keep her voice calm. ‘But I don’t feel guilty because of it.’

For some reason that sounded like a lie.

‘We’re all different, Courtney, and that’s why we all react differently to any given event,’ Hunter said. ‘Our reactions directly depend on the circumstances surrounding that event, and on our psychological mood at that particular time.’

Taylor did know that. She’d seen it before — someone who’s feeling happy — things are going great at home and at the workplace — gets offered a highly addictive drug at a party or somewhere else. That person says ‘no’ because he/she sees no need for it. At that particular time, that person’s feeling naturally happy, naturally high. That same person, just a day later, gets laid off, or has a bad argument at home, or something that bumps his/her mood down a notch — gets offered the same highly addictive drug. This time the person says ‘yes’ because his/her mood has changed, the circumstances have changed, and right at that particular moment that person is psychologically, and maybe even physically, very vulnerable. Drug pushers have some sort of sixth sense when it comes to picking those people out of a crowd, and they really know how to sweet-talk a person into believing that if he/she takes whatever drug they are being offered, all their problems will be gone in a flash. Paradise awaits.

Taylor began chewing on her bottom lip.

‘You know that there are many drugs out there that all it takes is a single hit, don’t you?’ Hunter continued. ‘Like Lucien said: “instant hook stuff”. Even very strong people can’t be very strong all the time, Courtney. It’s a fact of life. All you need is to be approached when, for one reason or another, you’re not so mentally strong, you’re feeling lonely, or depressed, or neglected or something, and they’ve got you. We don’t know all the facts. And we also don’t know how many times Lucien walked away from it before he finally failed.’

‘I’ll admit,’ Taylor said. ‘You fight a good argument on behalf of junkies.’

‘I’m not trying to defend junkies, Courtney,’ Hunter said calmly. ‘I’m just saying that a very large number of addicts out there know that they’ve made a mistake, and all they want is to find the strength to kick the habit. Most of them can’t seem to find that strength on their own, they need help. . help that most of the time isn’t very forthcoming. Probably because so many out there share the same thoughts as you do.’

Taylor’s blue eyes honed in on Hunter intensely before darting away.

‘So how do you think you could’ve helped him?’ she asked. ‘What would you have done?’

‘Everything I could,’ Hunter replied without missing a beat. ‘I would’ve done everything I could. He was my friend.’

An hour and eight minutes after taking off, the Phenom 100 jet touched down at Western Carolina Regional Airport. The weather outside had started to change. Several large clouds were now lurking around in the sky, keeping the sun from properly shining through, and bringing the temperature down a few degrees. In spite of the lack of sunshine, Taylor put on her sunglasses as soon as they stepped out of the plane. It was basic FBI training — once in public, always hide your eyes.

Outside the airport, Hunter and Taylor met a representative from a local car-rental company she had spoken to on the phone. He delivered them a top-of-the-range, black Lincoln MKZ sedan.

‘OK,’ Taylor said, flipping open her laptop as she and Hunter got into the car. She took the driver’s seat. The car looked and smelled brand new, as if it had been purchased that morning just to accommodate them. ‘Let’s figure out where we need to go from here.’

Taylor used the laptop’s touchpad and quickly called up a satellite-view application. In a fraction of a second, she had a photographic bird’s-eye-view map of the city of Murphy on her screen.

‘Lucien said that the house was at the end of a wood’s edge,’ she continued, angling the laptop Hunter’s way.

They both studied the screen for a long moment and, as Taylor used the touch pad to drag the map from left to right and top to bottom, her demeanor changed.

‘Was he kidding?’ she finally said. Her voice was still calm, but it now had a sliver of annoyance to it. She lifted her sunglasses and placed them on her head before pinning Hunter down with a concerned stare. ‘This place is surrounded by woodland. It’s everywhere, inside and outside the city. Just look at this.’

Her gaze returned to her screen as she used the touchpad again to zoom out on the map. She wasn’t joking. The city of Murphy looked like it had been built slap-bang in the middle of a large, hilly forest. There seemed to be more woodland around than buildings.

‘What are we supposed to do? Find a house at the edge of every woodland we come across and go see if any of his keys fit?’