The Fourth Monkey: A twisted thriller you won’t be able to put down. J.D. Barker

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       18

       Porter

       Day 1 • 11:30 a.m.

      Although only two weeks had passed since the last time Porter stepped into room 1523, deep within the basement of Chicago Metro headquarters on Michigan Avenue, the space seemed dormant, lifeless.

      Sleeping.

      Waiting.

      He flicked on the light switch and listened as the fluorescent bulbs hummed to life, sending a charge through the stale air. He walked over to his desk and shuffled through the various papers and files scattered across the surface. Everything was just as he had left it.

      His wife watched him from a silver frame at the far right corner. He couldn’t help but smile at the sight of her.

      Sitting on the edge of the desk, he pulled the phone over and punched in her cell number. Three rings, followed by her familiar voice mail message:

      You’ve reached the phone of Heather Porter. Since this is voice mail, I most likely saw your name on caller ID and decided I most certainly did not wish to speak to you. If you’re willing to pay tribute in the form of chocolate cake or other assorted offerings of dietary delight, text me the details and I’ll reconsider your position in my social roster and possibly —

      Porter disconnected and thumbed through a folder labeled Four Monkey Killer. Everything they had learned about him fit in this single folder, at least until today.

      He had chased the Four Monkey Killer for half a decade. Seven dead girls.

       Twenty-one boxes. You can’t forget about the boxes.

      He’d never forget the boxes. They haunted him every time he closed his eyes.

      The room wasn’t very large, thirty by twenty-five or so. Aside from Porter’s, there were five metal desks older than most of the Metro staff arranged haphazardly around the space. In the far corner stood an old wooden conference table Porter had found in a storage room down the hall. The surface was scratched and nicked; the dull maple finish was covered with tiny rings from the hundreds of glasses, mugs, and cans that had sat upon it over the years. There was a large brown stain on it that Nash swore resembled Jesus (Porter thought it only looked like coffee). They had given up trying to scrub the discoloration away a long time ago.

      Behind the conference table stood three whiteboards. The first two held pictures of 4MK’s victims and the various crime scenes; the third was currently blank. The group tended to use the last one primarily for brainstorming sessions.

      Nash walked in and handed him a cup of coffee. “Watson hit Starbucks. I told him to meet us down here after he checks in with the lieutenant upstairs. The others are on their way too. What’s going through that head of yours? I smell smoke.”

      “Five years, Nash. I was beginning to think we’d never see an end to this.”

      “There’s at least one more out there. We need to find her.”

      Porter nodded. “Yeah, I know. And we will. We’ll bring her home.” He had said the same thing with Jodi Blumington just six months earlier, and they didn’t find her in time. He couldn’t face another family, not again, not ever.

      “Well, there you are!” Clair Norton hollered from the doorway.

      Porter and Nash turned from the whiteboards.

      “This place has been like a morgue without you, Sammy. Give me some sugar!” She crossed the room and wrapped her arms around him. “If you need anything at all, you call me, okay? I want you to promise me,” she whispered at his ear. “I’m there for you, twenty-four/seven.”

      Any attempt at affection made Porter nervous. He patted her on the back and drew away. He imagined he appeared as uncomfortable as a priest returning the hug of an altar boy with the eyes of the congregation upon him. “I appreciate that, Clair. Thanks for holding down the fort.”

      Clair Norton had been on the force for nearly fifteen years. She became Chicago Metro’s youngest black female detective after only СКАЧАТЬ