Chris Carter: Gallery of the Dead

Kevin White’s stare stayed on his agent for a couple more seconds before moving to Hunter and Garcia, who were standing to his left. He already had a pretty good idea of what he would find inside that freezer. His weight shifted from one foot to another before he finally took a step forward and pulled open the door.

‘Oh... Jesus Christ!’

The shock in White’s voice was real. There was no question that he was expecting to find the victim’s missing body parts stashed away in that freezer. But he was wrong. He was very wrong.

Hunter and Garcia had followed White and what they saw as he pulled the freezer door open added a whole new layer of cruelty to an already over-sadistic crime scene.

Two of the freezer shelves had been removed to create more vertical space. In that space, frozen in place, was a black and gray cat.

It was coming up to a quarter past one in the morning by the time Hunter finally got to his small one-bedroom apartment in Huntington Park, southeastern Los Angeles. Kevin White and his forensics team had stayed behind at the house. Despite how fast they were working they were still at least three to four hours away from processing it all, and that was only if they failed to stumble upon any more surprises. Hunter and Garcia had waited until Linda Parker’s body had been taken to the county coroner’s office before leaving the crime scene, but as Hunter closed his front door behind him, he wondered why he hadn’t stayed with the forensics team. It would’ve at least kept him busy, since he could already tell that tonight, falling asleep would be a real struggle.

Insomnia is a highly unpredictable condition that affects one in every five people in the United States. It can manifest itself in a variety of ways and intensities, none of them kind. The disorder is usually linked to stress and the pressures of being an adult in modern society, but not always.

Hunter was only seven years old when he first started experiencing sleepless nights. They began shortly after cancer robbed him of his mother. Back then, with no other family for him to rely on other than his father, coping with such loss proved to be a very painful and lonely affair for the young Robert Hunter. At night, he would sit alone in his bedroom and lose himself in the memories of when his mother could still smile. Of a time when her arms were still strong enough to hug him and her voice loud enough to reach his ears.

With her death, it didn’t take long for the ghastly nightmares to follow and they were so devastating, so psychologically damaging that insomnia was the only logical answer his brain could come up with. Sleep became a Russian roulette for Hunter — a luxury and a torment all rolled up in one. For a seven-year-old boy, his coping mechanism was as brutal as a battlefield amputation, but Hunter faced it the best way he could. To keep himself occupied during those endless, lonely, sleepless hours, Hunter took to books, reading everything and anything he could get his hands on as if reading somehow empowered him. Books became his sanctuary. His fortress. His shield against the never-ending nightmares.

As the years went by, Hunter learned how to live with insomnia instead of fighting it. On a good night he would find three, maybe four hours of sleep. On a bad one, not even a second.

Hunter had just finished pouring himself a glass of water in the kitchen when he heard his cellphone vibrate on top of the small dining table that doubled as a computer desk in the living room. He checked his watch again — 01:17 a.m.

‘Detective Hunter, UVC Unit,’ he said, bringing the phone to his ear.

‘Robert...’

For a moment the female voice threw him. At that time in the morning, especially after just coming back from a crime scene where the forensics team had stayed behind, Hunter didn’t even check the display screen, already fully expecting to hear Kevin White’s voice, bringing him even more bad news.

‘Robert?’ the voice said again, this time as a question.

Hunter had completely forgotten about his unfinished UCLA lecture. He had completely forgotten that he had promised Professor Tracy Adams that he would call her.

‘Tracy,’ he said, his voice low and apologetic. ‘I’m so sorry I haven’t called you. I...’ Hunter saw no point in lying, ‘... forgot.’

‘No, don’t worry about that,’ Tracy replied, her tone sincere.

Hunter and Professor Adams had met for the first time a few months ago at the twenty-four-hour reading room of the historic Powell Library Building inside the UCLA campus. The attraction on both sides had been immediate and though they’d been out on a few dates where romance had certainly threatened to blossom, Hunter had chosen to keep it just a little over an arm’s length away.

‘Is everything OK?’ Tracy asked, and instantly regretted the question. She knew Hunter’s LAPD unit dealt solely with extreme violent crimes, which meant that every time he received a call where he had to drop everything and just go, everything was never OK.

‘I’m sorry. I mean...’ Tracy tried to think where to backpedal to.

‘It’s all right. I know what you mean,’ Hunter said, hoping Tracy wouldn’t pick up on the concern in his voice, but knowing that she was way too attentive not to.

Hunter never discussed his cases with anyone outside the realms of the investigation, no matter how close to him they were, but he had to admit that he had come close to confiding in her more than once before. Not only was Tracy one of the most grounded people he had ever met, she was also a very well-respected criminal psychology professor at UCLA. If there ever were a civilian who would understand the pressures of what he went through with the Ultra Violent Crimes Unit, Tracy Adams would certainly be that person.

‘I’m so sorry about the lecture last night,’ Hunter said, moving away from the subject. ‘I was actually looking forward to it.’

‘No you weren’t,’ Tracy replied, the quirkiness in her tone giving away the smile on her face. ‘Did you forget that I was the one who spent weeks trying to convince you to do it?’

Hunter said nothing.

‘But admit it, Robert. You were having fun, weren’t you? I saw it. You felt that teaching bug bite.’

Hunter nodded to himself. ‘It was a lot less painful than what I’d expected.’

‘Well, I do love what I do,’ Tracy said. ‘But I’ll tell you this, I’d give just about anything for the attendance numbers and the level of undivided attention you got in those few minutes. Everyone in that room was completely transfixed by everything you were saying. Including me.’

Hunter laughed. ‘And the really interesting part was still to come.’

‘Yes, I can imagine.’

Hunter walked over to the large window in his living room. Outside, clouds had started gathering up in the sky, slowly ridding the night of all its stars.

‘Robert... are you still there?’

Hunter caught a glimpse of his reflection in the window. He looked tired.

‘Yes. I’m here.’

‘Are you at home?’

A short pause.

‘Yes, I just got in about five minutes ago, but I can’t help thinking that I should’ve stayed. CSI is still at the scene, and they’ll be there for at least another two to three hours.’

‘Wow, is it that bad?’ Tracy’s question ran away from her and for the second time in less than a minute, she found herself regretting her choice of words, but before she had a chance to apologize, Hunter surprised her.

‘Worse, Tracy,’ he confirmed in a heavy voice. ‘A lot worse.’

Tracy’s initial impulse had been to ask Hunter if he wanted to talk about it, but this time thought finally preceded action and she quickly rephrased the question in her head before actually asking it.