The White Angel Murder

64

Stanton turned his cell phone off. He pulled to a stop a block from the house and put the phone and his wallet in the glove compartment. Last he had checked, the surveillance team was following the van and the street was quiet and empty. The type of place where neighbors could live ten feet from each other for thirty years and never know each others’ names.

It wasn’t quite yet dark but he had little time. After Brady realized that Hunter wasn’t coming, it would take him about forty minutes to get home. The variable was how long he would wait there without Hunter answering his phone. Stanton’s guess was not long. He probably had somewhere between an hour and ten and an hour and thirty minutes in the house.

He stepped out of the car. The air was warm and there was no breeze, the trees still as glass. He looked at all the cars in the driveways and guessed this was a lower-middle class neighborhood. At the far end of the street two kids were playing on the sidewalk.

The house appeared old and the windows were tinted so dark it was difficult to see through them. Stanton looked around one more time and then went to the front porch. The mother, he had been told, was bedridden in a room on the top floor. The surveillance team had only seen her come to the window once to empty an ashtray onto the driveway and then go back to bed. He guessed she wouldn’t be a problem.

He looked at the lock. It was a simple pin and tumbler. None of the windows had alarm stickers and Stanton had checked all the major alarm companies and they didn’t list this address as a client.

Stanton took out a pin and a tension wrench. He inserted the pin until he heard a click and then put the tension wrench into the bottom portion of the lock. The problem was that he didn’t know which way to turn the cylinder and he had to try both directions several times before it clicked and turned over.

He quickly got inside and shut the door behind him.

The house was cool and he could hear an air conditioner going. There were stairs just to his left leading to the second floor. Past those was the living room. To the other side was a hallway that led into the kitchen.

He leaned against the door and let himself adjust to the house. He observed the decorations on the walls. Mostly, they were just plants; their long vines strung up with thumb tacks along the ceiling and walls. It reminded him of an abandoned house in a jungle that nature had overtaken again. He glanced into the living room and saw a large painting of Elvis on black velvet. The sofa and love seat were wrapped in plastic and in the corner was a basket filled with yarn and crocheting needles. The television was outdated by at least fifteen years and still had the dial channel changer and bunny ear antennas.

Stanton walked softly on the shag carpet and went into the kitchen. He could see a table with only two chairs and place mats with silverware already laid out. The centerpiece was a bowl of plastic fruit with a thick layer of dust over it.

The linoleum was clean but the sink was filled with dirty dishes. Bowls and plates and filthy glasses covered the countertops and the garbage can was overflowing. A large butcher’s knife lay by the sink on a cutting board.

Past the kitchen was another small hallway. He walked into it and saw a bathroom on the left. It was filled with men’s products. Shaving cream and aftershave and hard, unscented soap. He continued down the hallway and came to a bedroom. It stunk of body odor and sweat. He went around the bed and then looked underneath. There was a dresser-drawer against the wall and he began to open the individual drawers. Socks, underwear, loose change … but in the far right drawer was a stack of pornography.

They were magazines and Stanton flipped through them. Some dated back to the eighties. They were all bondage and rape and gangbangs. He placed them back and closed the drawer. Research showed that violent pornography didn’t make people violent, but if they had a predisposition to violence, it was like throwing gasoline on a forest fire.

On the nightstand next to the bed was a lamp and alarm clock and tucked underneath the alarm clock were some papers. They were envelopes and he took them out and saw that each one had papers in them. He looked at the return address on the envelopes: they were from the Pelican Bay State Prison.