“9-1-1. What’s your emergency?”
The old woman’s mind flashed to the little boy who had once been learning how to walk . . . who nursed on her breasts for the first couple of years. She recalled the joy in his innocent little chubby face when he’d see her upon waking.
The trust.
She could almost even smell his warm, milky baby breath.
She remembered all the hours of rocking him to sleep. The first time he told her that he loved her when he was barely nineteen months old. The curiosity in his eyes when shown new things.
He always ran to her when he was hurt or needed to be protected—which is what she thought she’d been doing at first.
Protecting him.
But then she slowly began seeing the truth. She hadn’t been protecting him really. She’d been enabling him. She’d been enabling the person she loved the most in the world to do some of the very worst deeds.
No one had ever come even close to him in her heart. Or ever would. But he needed to be stopped . . . for his own good and the safety of others. She only wished that she didn’t have to be the one to stop him.
She glanced at the car and saw Allie staring back at her, her eyes as big as saucers. The girl looked terrified.
“9-1-1. Is anyone on the line?”
Wet hair plastering the sides of her face, she tried to get the words out, but they were thin.
“Ma’am, I can’t hear you. Please speak louder.”
Bitty took a deep breath and spoke up. “I’ve got information about the murders,” she croaked. “I know who the killer is.”
For the briefest of moments, Bitty questioned whether she was really doing the right thing. Maybe she had it wrong. Maybe he hadn’t committed these murders. After all, nearly anything was possible . . . right?
Maybe if I act fast enough, I can call and warn him. Save him before they get there, she thought suddenly.
But then something bigger than her took over.
“His name is Louis Thibodeaux. He lives in a rental house at 68 Norfolk Street in Grand Trespass. You’d better . . . you’d better come quickly for him,” she stammered and hung up the phone.
Not two seconds after walking away from the pay phone, two sheriff’s cars sped quietly down Main Street. The reaction seemed surprisingly fast to her.
They were going after him.
After Louis.
“Oh God. What have I done?” she whispered.
Making her way back to the car, Bitty motioned for Allie to move into the driver’s seat. Then she sank into the passenger’s seat and wept as they headed back to the house.
Her life as she knew it had just come to an end. Everything had just come full circle.
She’d brought her son into this world.
And now she’d taken him out.
CHAPTER 61
LOUIS STARED AT the massive oak, the odor of copper filling his nostrils. The scent of blood.
His blood for once.
Grinding his cigarette out, he sat in the plastic lawn chair, removed his glasses, and ran a small cloth over the lenses. Then he leaned deep into the chair and laced his fingers over his head.
His back immediately spasmed. “Shit!” he cried and tumbled to the ground. On his side, he studied the yard and the woods bordering his rental house. Angry rain clouds had gathered over the last hour, bathing everything in ghostly shadows. A storm was on its way and it would be there soon.
As he struggled to stand up, his life flashed quickly through his mind: Stabbing the kid with the pencil in elementary school. Stabbing another kid with scissors. Living a peaceful existence alone with his mother and being homeschooled. Meeting a beautiful, playful young thing named Dariah in the waiting room of a psychiatrist’s office, then following her to Louisiana. He knew from the beginning that she suffered from depression, but he had no idea her sickness was as bad as his.
Two months after arriving in Louisiana, they killed two random truck drivers and disposed of the bodies in the pond behind the house. Then, as if by silent agreement, they never breathed a word about the truck drivers or their fantasies again. The hunts had been disappointing, so he decided from there on out to only hunt solo. Also, if he could help it, he would never again hunt men.
Not long after, Dariah became pregnant. First, with a bright but cautious sandy-haired boy. Next, with a breathtakingly beautiful raven-haired girl. When the little girl was just a few months old, Dariah’s personality darkened. She was no longer accepting of him . . . the quality he had been most attracted to in the first place. She screamed at him and raged at every little thing imaginable.
He’d wanted so incredibly badly to take a knife to her, to prove to her that he was the more powerful of the two, but he managed to resist the temptation.
He knew the children would need one of their parents. He also knew that he wasn’t up for the job. So when the children were still very young he said he was going out for a case of beer but instead went to California, back to his mother.
Through everything, his mother had steadfastly stood by his side, hopeful that if she loved him enough he would never kill again. She loved him so much that she bought into his lies. Then a year ago, she insisted they pick up their lives and move back down to Louisiana so he could finally make things right with his daughter, the only good thing that had ever come from his existence.
His mother had hoped that with the responsibility of raising the girl, he would find some peace. That everything would miraculously come together and be fine. He hoped so, too, but it hadn’t exactly worked out how they had wanted it to.