People say that love is the best feeling, but I think finding a toilet when you have diarrhea is better.
—Eddy to Nettie
Eddy
Four months later
“You want me to what?” I asked.
Deputy Ryan and Sheriff Black exchanged looks.
I knew they were thinking that I was losing it.
And I was.
I was having to pretend to love my father and mother when I’d lost all respect and love for them when I’d witnessed what was happening in their basement four months ago.
And they wanted me to keep playing the fucking game.
I was tired of the freakin’ game!
“You need to try to slip into that room. Find it.”
I was already shaking my head. “I’m not going to do it. I have nightmares. I just…can’t.”
Sheriff Black studied my face. “What can you do?”
I thought about it for a few moments.
“I can let one of you in,” I said. “Give you the grand tour. But I won’t do it by myself.”
“Got a friend that’s an electrician and lineman,” Deputy Gentry Ryan suggested. “Maybe Eddy pretends like she’s having electrical issues at their house. Tries to do a favor for her parents. Maybe Eddy calls him in, gets him to fix something, and they stumble upon it together. He feels obligated to call it in. Mandatory reporter and all that. Which gets us in.”
“Borderline illegal,” Sheriff Black said. “But it’s looking like our only option.”
I was thinking that, too.
I couldn’t do this anymore.
I couldn’t pretend like I hadn’t seen something so fucking disgusting and disturbing that murder sounded better.
I’d given Sheriff Black the video four months ago, and they’d been using their time wisely, looking into everything.
They’d found plenty of stuff, of course.
Fraud. Embezzlement. Tax evasion.
All stuff that a church should not have in their records.
But none of that was what they really wanted.
What they wanted was what I’d shown them in that video.
That’s what I wanted, too.
“Get your friend in on this.” Sheriff Black leveled his deputy with a stare that could peel paint. “Give him everything that he’ll need to go in there and do this willingly. If he knows, he can prepare.”
I didn’t think you could prepare for something like this…
