The scream ended as abruptly as it had begun. So abruptly, in fact, that the intruder guessed no one else in the house had really even heard it. He tossed his victim back on the couch, swiped a hand across his mouth and stared, with obvious adoration, at the blood smeared on his knuckles; a vicious grin broke over his face.
He moved on. Silent. Swift. Deadly.
Vampire.
****
Officer Gentry entered the basement of the Mitchell home and was immediately hit by the scent of decay. No one had heard from the Mitchell family in almost a week, and eventually a concerned neighbor phoned the station. Gentry arrived to find the front doors locked and the windows shut, blinds drawn – but on closer inspection he’d found the basement hatch slightly ajar. He radioed for his rookie partner who was still sitting in the squad car out front. He just couldn’t go in alone. He didn’t know why. After all the horrible accidents he’d witnessed, the aftermath of domestic violence, the shootings he’d been called to, all the blood he’d seen in his 21 years on the force, something about this one made his toes curl even before he gained entrance to the house. Miller arrived in short order and the two of them crept into the basement, guns drawn.
Cautious. Eyes darting this way and that. On alert.
Miller called Gentry’s attention to how the earthen basement floor seemed churned up, like someone had made a hasty attempt to bury something. In fact, Officer Gentry thought this wasn’t really much of a basement, more like a root cellar; a strange sight in this suburban neighborhood of concrete slab, cookie-cutter houses. Gentry and Miller let their eyes adjust to the blackness and then made their way over to uneven wooden steps that they could only guess led to the main level of the house.
Wanting to get out of this odd basement, with its heavy, dry smell, Gentry and Miller mounted the steps and ascended. Just a few short steps later, they arrived in the kitchen. Neat. Tidy. Someone obviously took great care to maintain it; not a dish out of place. Gentry wondered if his own, small, bachelor kitchen would ever look this good, finally deciding that it would not.
On the far end of the kitchen was another doorway, an arch leading into a dim hall. At the end of the hall Gentry could see the front door; muted sunlight filtering in through the sheers hung on either side of the door on the long floor-to-ceiling accent windows. Something wasn’t right and Gentry knew it.
Miller felt it too. He laid a hand on Gentry’s shoulder and after a quick glance at one another, and a curt nod, they crossed the kitchen to the hallway. Almost as soon as they left the kitchen they were assaulted by the scent of death. Gentry knew it instinctively and Miller would soon learn. Putting a hand out to stop Miller from proceeding any further, his first instinct being to protect his partner, Gentry gestured for Miller to stay put.
Gentry could smell it. He didn’t really need to see it. But, he needed to know. He needed to have something to report when he radioed HQ for assistance, the mobile crime unit, the ME, the coroner...whomever.
The simple, yet somehow lonely, staircase to the second floor was on his right. A solid wall of framed family photographs was on his left, and Miller was behind him, crouched low to the polished hardwood floor in the doorway between the hall and the kitchen. Gentry, too, crouched low and proceeded forward in an awkward waddle, occasionally finding it necessary to touch the floor with his left hand to steady himself and avoid falling over. He needed to lose this gut; it was getting in the way of his police work.
At the front door, the dining room was to Gentry’s left and the living room was to his right, just past the landing of the staircase. It was to the living room Gentry now turned. He could see no one immediately, so he straightened up from his crouch, groaning knees thanking him creakily, and put his back to the wall at the bottom of the staircase. Slowly, oh-so-slowly, Gentry peeked around the corner into the living room and saw, splayed there on the couch in a jumble of gray and sagging flesh, was Mr. Mitchell.
Gentry stood straight and walked back to where Miller was still crouching.
“It’s not good, Miller. Go back to the car and call it in, I’m going to search the rest of the house. There are four people in this family and Mr. Mitchell is the only one in the living room. Where the other three are, I don’t know. And, Miller? Don’t go in there, eh?”
Gentry unlocked the front door and let Miller out, leaving the door open for air, then he turned to the staircase and started up.
It was a simple house. Kitchen, living room, dining room, and half bath on the first floor, two bedrooms and a full bath upstairs; same as every other house in this neighborhood. And it was neat as a pin. Not a picture crooked, not a speck of dust to be seen. Peering into the bedroom at the top of the stairs, Gentry saw two small forms, splayed in a similar fashion to Mr. Mitchell downstairs; skin gray and hollow. Poor kids, Gentry thought. He couldn’t tell how old they were, but was sure they were both under ten; brothers sharing a room.
In the small master bedroom, everything was tidy. The bed made, the curtains perfectly spaced, the items on top of the dresser arranged meticulously, closet door closed tight. He didn’t see Mrs. Mitchell and Gentry breathed a sigh of relief. He really didn’t want to see her body splayed and gray like her husband and kids. As soon as that sigh escaped his lips, however, he heard a low moan from the far side of the bed. Gentry’s head snapped in the direction of the sound and in one leap he was across the room, holstering his weapon and crouching down toward Mrs. Mitchell who lay in a heap, pale and bloody, between the bed and the window. She was unconscious, as far as Gentry could tell, but still had a weak pulse. He radioed Miller in the squad car and told him to get an ambulance here right away.
TBC...
(c) JMS - May 2009
