Brian Freeman - The Voice Inside

“I know, you keep saying that. He’s a killer. Are you sure? I thought a dirty cop framed him or something.”

“A police detective did something wrong, but that doesn’t change who Cutter is.”

Magnolia shrugged, as if she didn’t want to face the close call she’d had. “Well, he didn’t seem like a bad guy.”

“He is. A very bad guy.”

“Whatever. If you say so. Look, if you want to come inside and make sure the bogeyman’s not in there, knock yourself out.”

“I want to check the street first,” Frost said. “Wait right here, and don’t go into the apartment until I get back.”

He walked down Sutter past the lineup of parked cars and examined the porches and doorways of the other buildings. The hiding places were empty. Most of the apartments on the street were dark, with their blinds shut. He continued to the end of the block, seeing no one else around, and then retraced his steps. Magnolia leaned against the shop window at her building with her legs squeezed together, her arms crossed, and the fedora pushed high up on her forehead. Her eyes kept blinking closed, and she shivered.

“You done?” she asked.

“Let me take a quick look in back.”

“I’m telling you, Rudy’s not here. He probably hooked up with somebody else.”

“This won’t take long,” Frost said.

He walked to the corner and turned right, leaving Magnolia behind him. The cross street was deserted. He followed the sidewalk beyond the streetlight, where the building butted up to a narrow alley, barely wide enough for cars. It was a dead end that didn’t go all the way through to the next street. He walked into the alley past the rear walls of the apartments. His shoes splashed in standing water. It was pitch-black here, and he grabbed a penlight from his pocket. It cast a weak glow, enough to surprise a rat foraging at a dumpster. The smell of trash wafted in the damp air. A handful of cars were parked below the balconies and fire escapes, and he peered inside each one.

Nothing.

Maybe he and Jess were wrong.

Frost retreated to the street. He walked quickly back to Sutter and turned the corner. Twenty feet away, the sidewalk outside the Victorian apartment home was empty now.

Magnolia was gone. She’d headed inside alone.

He took the steps of the apartment building two at a time. The heavy front door was ahead of him under an arched portico. He grabbed the doorknob, and the door spilled inward. It wasn’t latched. He bolted into a hallway lined with musty carpet and fading yellow paint on the walls. Stairs wound upward to the next level of the building.

There was only one apartment on this floor. One door.

It was open.

Frost reached for the holster inside his jacket and slid his pistol into his hand. Through the crack in the door, he saw lights. He took a step closer, his movements muffled by the carpet. When he reached the door, he nudged it wide with the toe of his shoe. The only thing he saw was the fedora lying in the middle of the floor.

“Magnolia?” he called.

There was silence for a long moment.

Then the woman’s face popped around the kitchen doorway. “Hey.”

Frost started breathing again, and he holstered his weapon. “I told you to wait outside until I got back.”

“I was cold.”

He didn’t argue with her. “I want to check the place out, okay?”

“Sure, go ahead.”

The apartment wasn’t large. It didn’t take him long to confirm it was empty. He checked the balcony and the alley below, and then he locked the sliding door. When he was done, he returned to the kitchen. Magnolia, still wearing her black dress, sat at a small table. She’d kicked off her heels; her feet were bare. She’d poured a glass of white wine from a half-empty bottle.

“You want a drink?” she asked.

“No, thanks.”

She took a large sip of wine. “Rudy was cute, you know.”

“He murdered seven women, Magnolia.”

“Yeah, I know what they say online, but I still can’t believe it. He didn’t seem like the type.”

“There is no type,” Frost said. “You can’t tell by looking at someone.”

“You really think he’ll come back here?”

“I don’t know, but it pays to be safe. I wish you’d go somewhere else tonight.”

“Sorry, I can’t. I’ll nap for a couple hours, but then I have to get to work. You sure you don’t want a drink?”

“No.”

“Okay.” Magnolia finished the glass and stood up, wobbling. “Anything else?”

“Be sure to lock the door behind me when I go. And never leave the front door of the building unlatched.” Frost slid a card from his wallet and put it on the table. “If Rudy contacts you, call me immediately. Don’t meet him anywhere. If he shows up at your door, don’t open it. Call nine one one. I’m not kidding.”

Frost left Magnolia in her apartment. He checked Sutter one more time and did another survey of the alley in back of the building. Nothing had changed, but he was still troubled. He found a dark doorway on the corner where he could see the front of the building and the entrance to the alley, and he waited there. It was late, but most of Cutter’s dirty work was done in the middle of the night. He might still show up.

He texted Jess: Found the girl Cutter was with. She’s safe.

And then a minute later, he sent another text: No sign of him, but I’m staking out the neighborhood.

He shoved his phone back into his pocket.

He tried to understand Cutter’s plan. Jess said Cutter always had a plan; he knew what he was doing. First, he hooks up with a stranger at a bar, and then he brags about it to Jess and leaves a trail a mile wide. He was practically begging her to chase him. Then Frost hunts him down inside the Fillmore, and Cutter disappears.

He was beginning to suspect that this was all a diversion. A head fake. While Frost cooled his heels outside the girl’s apartment, Cutter was somewhere completely different.

Where?

Frost grabbed his phone and texted again: I think he’s playing us.

That was when he noticed that his earlier texts to Jess had been delivered, but not read. She hadn’t checked messages on her phone, which was normally like an extension of her arm, day or night. He felt a tiny chill of anxiety, like a pinprick on the back of his neck.

He texted: Jess?

And again: Jess? Where are you?

He punched the speed-dial number for her phone. On the other end, the phone rang without being picked up, and it shifted to her voice mail. He heard her message, which was the same as it had been for years. He listened to the impatient voice he knew so well. This was the woman he’d been with less than an hour earlier, the woman whose face he could see in his sleep.

“Jess? Are you there? Call me as soon as you get this.”

In the brief silence before he hung up, he added, “Are you back at your apartment? If you’re not, don’t go home. Go to my place. Meet me there.”

Frost stepped out of the darkness of the doorway. He realized that he’d been right all along. Cutter had set up the events at the theater as a ruse. Magnolia was the distraction, and the man’s real target was someone else entirely. Something washed over Frost like a wave, but the rain had stopped. This was something else. This was terror. This was every instinct, every intuition, screaming at him to run .

He did.

He sprinted for his truck, his chest hammering.

But he knew that his closet of horrors, the closet where he kept the memory of Katie, had a new monster inside. He already knew that he was too late.

Two uniformed officers, a man and a woman, met him at Jess’s apartment building. He’d called for backup from the Suburban.