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  “I sense such deep sadness in you,” she said.

  “I could say the same about you,” I said. “And I’m not a psychic.”

  “I’m not a psychic—whatever that is. I just get impressions. And I have the run-of-the-mill sadness most every human does, maybe a touch more, but you . . . you have a deep, dark overwhelming sadness. And it’s got guilt coiled around it.”

  I nodded.

  “It’s to do with the case—at least partially, but I can’t figure out how exactly. Why is someone like you so interested in the Atlanta Child Murders? What is your connection?”

  “What is yours?” I asked.

  “I go where I’m led,” she said. “I know how that must sound, but . . . it’s the only answer I have. You know what I’m talking about. I can tell you do. You’re feeling your way through life, being led by . . . call it God, your guts, intuition.”

  I shrugged. “I guess.”

  “Everyone has it. Not everyone is sensitive to it—to that still, small voice. Not everyone honors it, really listens to it, trusts it, develops it.”

  “But what you’re claiming to do is more than what your average run-of-the-mill intuition every human has.”

  “Not really. And I see what you did there—repeating my run-of-the-mill sadness thing. I like it. You’re very empathic.”

  “It wasn’t empathy. It was humor—a little light teasing.”

  “But you have to be tuned in to people to pick up on things like that. That’s all I meant.”

  “But you claim to have a gift––something beyond what everyone else has.”

  “Everyone has gifts. This is mine. I don’t claim anything about myself or my gift, but neither do I apologize.”

  “I’m not asking you to.”

  “You’re so open in some ways, so closed in others.”

  “So how does it work for you, your gift? Do you see visions? Hear voices? What?”

  “Hear voices? Really? Maybe I was wrong about you.”

  “Sorry,” I said. “I’m being an . . . I need a drink.”

  “Maybe you need to talk about why you’re hurting so much, what you’re so angry about.”

  “I’m sure I do, but for now let’s stick with how you operate in your gift.”

  “Ooh, I like that. Operate in your gift. That is what we do, isn’t it? It’s just on loan to us. We use it or we don’t. We operate in it or let it lie dormant. I get impressions. Mostly images. Sometimes words. Very occasionally I’ll hear something. I just pick up on stuff in the air. Sense it. Feel it. Try to respond to it. There are these pockets of energy all around us. We can walk toward them or away from them. I try to walk toward them when I can.”

  “Like with this case.”

  “Like with this case.”

  “So what have you picked up so far?”

  “Pain. Brokenness. Disquiet and unrest. There’s an unresolved quality attached to everything.”

  “That’s all pretty vague, general stuff.”

  “I was just getting started, but I can only tell you what I sense. I can’t make it convincing for you.”

  “Sorry. Please go on.”

  “Guilt. An enormous amount of guilt. Rage restrained. Caged. Sex. Sexual . . . acts, sexual . . . Some of it’s just sex, but some of it’s violent, angry, brutal, forced. Death. Sex with the dead. Children still in jeopardy, so vulnerable, so truly helpless. A sick, sick man, trying not to do it again. A truly evil man, soulless, pitiless, without remorse, without any humanity. Dangerous. Not just for kids. For you too.”

  She came out of the trance she had been in and looked at me, her deep, dark eyes delving into mine. “You’re in danger,” she said. “Your . . . drinking makes you vulnerable. Your sadness makes you vulnerable. Your . . . how closed you are right now makes you more vulnerable to . . . It keeps you from perceiving things, threats, motives—help and harm.”

  I nodded.

  “You don’t believe me, do you?” she said.

  “Actually, I do.”

  8

  The next morning I actually managed to make it to class—something all too rare these days.

  Earl Paulk Institute was a ministerial college started by and connected to Chapel Hill Harvester Church—a racially integrated mega church in South Dekalb County that combined aspects of traditional liturgy with certain aspects of the Charismatic movement.

  I had discovered the school and the church as a senior in high school while researching the Atlanta Child Murders. Someone claiming to be the killer had contacted Bishop Paulk and asked to meet with him. Ultimately, the meeting never happened, but that connection to the case and the opportunity to study theology and ministry had led me here.

  Some of the many pastors and support staff of the eight-thousand-member church served as the professors in the college.

  I had biblical Hebrew and New Testament studies with Dan Rhodes, biblical Greek with Jim Oborne, math with Lesley Ferguson, and public speaking with Don Ross.

  In speech class, I sat beside LaDonna Paulk, the daughter of the founding pastors of the church, and someone I had taken out a few times.

  As usual, she was dressed up—long black pencil skirt, silk stockings, and black pointed toe mules. LaDonna, like her family and most of the staff, wore her Sunday best nearly every day of the week.

  Beneath the table, LaDonna had her legs crossed and had slipped the heel of her front shoe partially off and was dangling it out in front of her as we waited for class to start.

  As was his custom, Don Ross, a dwarf with a flair for the dramatic and a great speech professor, said a prayer to begin class. Everyone bowed their heads, reverently, earnestly, solemnly. We were serious Bible students after all. As everyone else was praying, I slid my leg over and kicked the heel of LaDonna’s dangling shoe. When the shoe hit the floor, I pulled it over to me and picked it up. Hiding it in my coat, I secretly dropped it in the trash can when I went up to give my speech.

  When I finished my speech and it was LaDonna’s turn to give hers, she limped to the front of the room on one heel and one stockinged tiptoe and removed her other shoe from the trash as the class looked on in bewilderment.

  “I’m not even gonna try to explain,” she said, then gave a great speech.

  After class, LaDonna said, “You got a minute?”

  “Sure.”

  We remained in the classroom after everyone else was gone.

  “I’m worried about you,” she said.

  “Because of the shoe thing? That was just—”

  “No,” she said. “That was funny. I mean how much class you’re missing, how often I smell alcohol on your breath—first thing in the morning. I mean how down you seem. You have some of the saddest eyes I’ve ever seen.”

  “Sorry,” I said.

  “Sorry? For what?”

  I shrugged.

  “I’m not getting onto you. I’m worried about you.”

  “I know. But I am sorry. In general. I’m sorry I’m not doing better. I’m sorry this is the best I can do at the moment.”

  “What can I do?” she said.

  “There’s always the sweet oblivion of sex,” I said.

  Her reaction was one of surprise but not outrage. She got the humor and the harmlessness of the statement and handled it gracefully—particularly since people didn’t talk like this to her.

  “That statement . . .” she said.

  “Yeah?”

  “Along with the shoe thing. Let’s me know you’re going to be okay.”

  “I’m glad you think so,” I said. “I’m not so sure.”

  I met Frank Morgan for lunch at the food court in South Dekalb Mall.

  We had Chick-fil-A and Orange Juliuses and talked about murder.

  “Been worried about you,” he said. “Was glad to get your call. Should’ve known it was for information on a case.”

  “It was for the pleasure of your company,” I said. “Case info is only an added bonus.”

  “Right.”
<
br />   We ate in silence for a few moments.

  Frank Morgan was a family friend. He had been involved in the original Atlanta Child Murders investigation and then on the task force. He was an honorable, decent man, a straitlaced straightedge who gave cops a good name, so square he was cool.

  He had been better to me than anybody since I had been in Atlanta, and had become a kind of father figure since my relationship with my dad had become so strained.

  “How are you?” he said. “Seriously.”

  “I’ve been better. Not gonna lie.”

  “Here’s the question. Do you believe you’ll be better again?”

  “Not particularly, no.”

  He nodded slowly, and looked as if I had confirmed something for him.

  “How about you?” I said. “How are you?”

  He shrugged. “I’m okay. Always tired. Not enough time in the day. Too many bills. Wife wants more.”

  “Of?”

  “Everything. Me. Money. Things. Time. Most days I’m a rat on a wheel.”

  “Sorry,” I said.

  “It’s life. Whatcha gonna do? Thanks for asking.”

  “Sorry I haven’t more.”

  “You kiddin’? You’re the only one who ever does.”

  We held each other’s gaze a moment, then nodded, then looked away, a little embarrassed.

  We ate some more—just to be doing something.

  A few students from the college came in, secured food, and sat at a table across the way. I waved.

  “Think they think I’m your sugar daddy?” Frank asked.

  “You did buy my lunch, but parole officer’s more likely.”

  He nodded and smiled.

  We were silent a moment, and I could tell he was working his way up to telling me something.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “Not gonna be easy to hear,” he said. “Need you to prepare yourself for . . . some bad news.”

  “I’ve already had the worst,” I said. “Promise this will pale in comparison.”

  “Martin Fisher’s mother,” he said.

  Martin Fisher, who had been like a son to me in many ways, was a speech-impaired latchkey kid who had latched on to me while were both living at Trade Winds. I had found him dead in my room less than a month ago.

  “She’s been pressing for charges to be brought against you,” he said. “Claiming all sorts of horrible things about you.”

  Simultaneously, my stomach soured and tears stung my eyes.

  “I’ve been keeping it from you,” he said. “Trying to let you heal up—and because I knew nothing would come of it. I was making sure of that. But . . .”

  “But what?” I said. “Charges are being filed after all?”

  “No. But when she found out they weren’t, she went out and found herself a lawyer. She plans to bring a civil suit against you.”

  “What’s she gonna take? My VCR?”

  “I’m working on it,” he said. “But I need you to do something for me. Stay way from the mom. Keep clear of Trade Winds. Don’t say or do anything about the case. And don’t visit Martin’s grave. Can you do that?”

  I nodded.

  “We’ll get it straightened out. I promise. Just be smart and lay low. Let me take care of it.”

  “Thank you, Frank. I . . . really . . . Thank you.”

  “Sorry to be the one to break such bad news,” he said. “Ruined your lunch, didn’t I?”

  “It’s okay.”

  “You wanna just forget about Cedric Porter?” he said.

  “Whatta you think?”

  He smiled, and sliding the file folder beside him across the table to me said, “Cedric Porter. Didn’t make the list because he never went from missing to murdered.”

  “But Darron Glass did,” I said.

  “Don’t get me started on that damn list. Why Glass and not Porter? I have not a clue.”

  I nodded and opened the folder.

  “You know in most missing kids cases—especially those who don’t turn up—a family member took them. I’m not saying Cedric isn’t one of Williams’s that wasn’t found, just that it’s more likely a family member saw what a shitty mom he had and tried to give him a better life.”

  “‘Isn’t it pretty to think so?’”

  “What’s that? I know that one. I’ve read it.”

  “Last line of The Sun Also Rises,” I said.

  “Right. Hemingway. I should’ve gotten that one. Thing is . . . we looked at all the family. The mother . . . what’s her name? Ada? And the brother, guy who has the video store . . . Lonnie. They both passed a polygraph. Had nothing to do with the kid’s disappearance. The father, Cedric Porter, Sr., wasn’t as cooperative. Wasn’t in the picture. He and Ada never married, never lived together. I’m not sure they were ever really together for any length of time. Maybe only long enough to . . . conceive Cedric. He wouldn’t agree to take a polygraph, but we looked at him pretty hard and never turned up anything.”

  Ada and Lonnie passing the polygraphs made me recall how Wayne Williams had failed not one but multiple.

  “The mom claims he still calls her,” I said.

  “Really? Maybe he does. Doesn’t say where he is or why he left?”

  “From what I’ve been told just that’s he’s okay but can’t come back.”

  “I think that would be best-case scenario,” he said. “Maybe it’s true.”

  “Best-case occasionally is.”

  “Check out Mr. Optimistic.”

  I smiled as I checked the date Cedric went missing and tried to recall enough to compare it to the dates of the victims on the task force list.

  “The timing fits,” I said. “He could’ve been a victim of one of the Atlanta Child Murderers.”

  “Murderers?”

  I nodded.

  “Could be,” he said. “You think the mom is faking the calls? Think she’s crazy or hiding something?”

  “I intend to find out.”

  “Of course you do, and I would discourage you, but it might be just the thing you need to bring you back and take your mind off all this other shit.”

  “Too bad Bobby Battle’s not here. He’d damn sure discourage it.”

  “I invited him, but . . .”

  “He still blame me for the death of one of his brothers in blue?”

  “Him and every other cop. Do yourself a favor and don’t get pulled over.”

  Something inside me sank—though I thought everything was already as low as it could go.

  Suddenly Frank’s eyes grew wide at something he was seeing over my shoulder and he said, “Oh shit.”

  9

  What is it?” I asked, turning to look.

  “See that guy in the white silk outfit?”

  Just outside an Afrocentric men’s clothing store, a large black man in white slacks, shoes, and short-sleeved shirt stood talking to a smaller white man in all black. Unlike the unadorned white guy in black, the black man in white wore a white pimp hat with a red feather in it, an enormous gold chain, and leaned a little on a red-handled wooden cane.

  “Yeah?”

  “That’s Tyrone Jedediah Johnson.”

  “He looks like a Tyrone Jedediah Johnson.”

  “He’s got like sixteen warrants for fraud and theft. I’ve been looking for him for a while. He’s a possible witness in another case I’m working. If I can get him to testify, I’ll help him out with some of his warrants.”

  “But not all sixteen.”

  He nodded. “Not all sixteen.”

  He unclipped his radio from his belt and handed it to me. “I can’t imagine ol’ Tyrone Jedediah Johnson not wanting to talk to me, but if my, ah, conversation with Mr. Johnson goes south in any way, radio for backup.”

  With that he was up from the table, crossing the food court, then out into the main corridor of the mall and approaching Tyrone.

  As Frank approached, both men looked wary.

  When he held up his ID, the white man in the b
lack outfit bolted, but Tyrone, who didn’t look capable of running, remained.

  Since Frank had no interest in the white guy, my guess was it didn’t matter that he took off. So I waited and watched.

  Based on the body language, Tyrone Jedediah Johnson was apparently amenable to helping himself by helping Agent Morgan with his other cases.

  The two men talked for a few moments, Frank making his case, Tyrone nodding and shrugging, only occasionally shaking his head.

  Then from the opposite direction he had left, the small white man in black rushed up behind Frank and hit him hard with a sap to the back of the head. He did it on the run, jumping up a little at the last second and coming down with all the force of his movement and weight on the crown of Frank’s head.

  As Frank went down, I jumped up.

  I ran toward the two men who were now standing over Frank looking down at him.

  By the time I neared them, the smaller man was tugging at the bigger man’s arm, trying to get him to leave with him, but the bigger man, who had pulled a gun and was pointing it down at Frank, was having none of it.

  He was about to shoot Frank in the face.

  All I had was a radio.

  When I got close enough to the two men, I threw the radio like a baseball at the black man’s head as hard as I could.

  Because I was running and because I was not a baseball player, I missed.

  As the big man moved to avoid the flying radio that wasn’t going to hit him away, I lowered my shoulder and tackled the smaller man into him, all three of us falling to the ground a few feet away from Frank.

  The smaller man began scrambling to get up right away, kicking at me as he did. But the bigger man was by far the more dangerous because he still had the small revolver in his hand.

  Lunging, slipping, sliding, crawling, then gaining ground and lurching forward, I grabbed at the gun, but the best I could do was reach his wrists, which I latched onto with both hands and held on to.

  He tried to break free of my grip, but I was able to hold on.

  He tried to buck me off—and partially did, but I didn’t let go of his wrist.