She started walking.
Lets see how tough she is now, she heard one of the men murmur. Her back stiffened. They had no idea what tough was.
Tough was walking through that wide-open doorway and entering an entirely different world, a world full of blood and body parts thrown around, a world of overturned furniture and broken glass and death. A world where the walls themselves seemed to vibrate with horror, still in shock at what theyd been forced to witness.
Holy shit. Bile rose in her throat; stars exploded before her eyes. What she was seeing? How many people had been killed there, how many bodies made up the clutter of lost mortality strewn across the oat-colored carpet?
A chuckle from behind her managed to penetrate the roaring in her ears. Right. Right, they were watching her, waiting for her to break down. She wouldnt give them the satisfaction.
Jillians hand on her arm. Something in her eyes, something not quite sympathy but not quite pleasure, either. More like curiosity, maybe? Annoyance. You okay?
Chess nodded, forcing herself not to pull away from Jillians presumptuous touch no matter how much it made her skin crawl. She was trying, she was getting better with that, better every day, but it still sent discomfort skittering along her skin, down her spine. Im fine.
Jillian paled as she looked at the mess. Damn. They werent kidding when they said it was awful.
What happened? I mean, what do
These people were murdered, thats what happened. Trent stood in the doorway; as he spoke he started walking, essentially shoving Chess and Jillian further into the death-chamber. Sunlight made his hair a brownish halo around the shadowed oval of his face, so she couldnt read his expression. She bet she knew what it was, though. See, when people get all torn apart like that, they usually cant live anymore.
Chess stared at him. A long, even stare, one that told him exactly what she thought of him and his patronizing little games.
Vaughn cleared his throat. Neighbor called this morning, screaming, saying shed come over to pick up the womanMrs. Waring, Shannon Waringto go shopping, found them all like this. She said she didnt enter the house.
Any confirmation on that? Jillian asked.
Still working on it. Vaughn flipped a page in the little notebook he carried. Nobody heard anything, nobody saw anything, everyones horrified, the Warings were such nice people, you know, the usual shistuff neighbors say. Doors werent locked, garage door was open. Theres a tire track off the driveway, but we have no idea when it might have been made.
I guess we should Jillian started, but Trent cut her off.
I think we should ask our new recruit what she thinks we should do. Amusement glinted in his eyes as he looked at Chess. She can learn by doing, right?
Was he always this much of an asshole, or was it something personal?
Not that it mattered. Fine. He wanted to be a dick, he could go right ahead. One benefit of an upbringing like hers: nobody could make her feel worse about herself than she already did. His attitude, his dislike, was just another raindrop hitting floodwaters.
There was a pause; in it she felt them all waiting for her reaction, Jillian and Vaughn torn between wanting to stand up to Trent and wanting to see what shed do.
So she looked around the room, thought for a second. What about the weapon? Do you know what kind of weapon was used?
A knife. Trent had moved, so she could see his face, the glint in his eyes. What did it feel like to be so smug all the time? Not that she cared, really; it was just idle curiosity.
But wait. He did look smug, didnt he? And he wouldnt be looking so smug if she wasnt missing something, if there wasnt something big she should have figured out but hadnt.
She stopped and inspected the scene again, trying to separate the bloody limbs and lumps of flesh from what they meant. It was so grisly. What did thatwhy was that? Why had the bodies been chopped up and left lying around like that? Usually when killers chopped up bodies it was to make them easier to dispose of, right?
Well, she didnt know that for a fact, but shed known a few people in her life who would have. And it justit just seemed like if a killer was going to go through all the trouble of slicing and dicing a corpse, there ought to be some purpose to it aside from making the biggest possible mess.
But. There was one type of killer who might very well chop people up just for fun and discard the individual parts like peanut shells tossed on a barroom floor. There was one type of killer who had the kind of rage that would drive a person to destroy another like that; one type of killer who felt nothing but hate.
Chess lifted her chin, looked right into Trents oh-so-clever eyes. Ghosts did this, right? You found ectoplasm?
His face fell. She managed not to smile.
Vaughn shifted uncomfortably on his feet. We did, yes. And this isnt the He stopped himself. The three Squad members exchanged looks.
Thereve been others? Chess asked.
Pause. Long pause, while the others had some sort of silent conversation. Chess didnt watch them. Now that her initial shock had passed she was more interested in the room, in the house itself.