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Secluded at the outer edge of the city, surrounded by trees with no neighbors for miles.
Of course, that alone didn’t mean he was guilty, but I couldn’t help noticing it as we stepped out of the Rover and onto his freshly paved driveway. AJ shared a look with Rook and I knew she was thinking the same thing I was.
Ava Jade stormed ahead of us, rushing his front door. She kicked it in with one long heavy stroke of her leg.
Now was not the time to be getting turned on, but…
I cleared my throat, jerking my head after her. “Let’s go.”
We followed her inside, down a narrow hall that broke off into three directions. Up the stairs. Into a living room to the left, and a kitchen to the right.
Rook stormed up the stairs, where it looked like Ava Jade had gone if the boot prints on the off white carpet were any indication. Corvus went through to the kitchen, and I went the opposite way into his living room. My nose wrinkled at the smell of the place. It reminded me of the group home. Musty with an undercurrent of microwaveable food.
I tossed the couch cushions first, then moved on to the coffee table, tugging out both drawers to tip their contents onto the carpet. Nothing.
The bookshelves.
I tipped the spines, flicking each one out of its place until they were all in a pile on the floor at my feet.
A corner of white paper stuck out from one and I bent, lifting the heavy tome, a copy of a book called I’m Not Sam. I lifted the paper from the pages, but found it blank. Though, beneath were words that jumped out at me. I grimaced, reading a small part of the page the makeshift bookmark had been stuck in.
Was his taste in fiction enough to condemn him? I was starting to think it might be when I heard AJ call from upstairs. “Get up here,” she shouted, and I let the book fall closed, dropping it to the pile at my feet with the others.
Corvus and I met in the hall, and I followed him up the stairs. “Anything?” I asked Corvus.
He shook his head. “You?”
“Super fucked up book. Not enough to be sure.”
A door was open at the end of the hall when we got to the top of the stairs, bluish light bleeding onto the carpet.
The sound of a girl crying filtered past my ears and my stomach tightened as we went into the room, finding AJ sitting at a small desk in a small room, Rook hunched over her, his face a twisted mask. The heavy blackout curtains were drawn so tightly over the window that the entire room was black save for the light of the monitor screen.
AJ suddenly pushed away from the desk, knocking Rook back in her haste. “I can’t watch anymore,” she growled, shoving past me as she left the room, thudding back down the stairs.
I went to Rook, still staring at the screen like he couldn’t peel his eyes from it even if he wanted to, the murderous intent in his stare deepening.
I didn’t need to see it, didn’t want to, but I needed to know what we were dealing with.
On the screen a video played. Recorded on a shitty camcorder in what looked like a dingy basement type of space. Mr. Williams wore a mask while he fed his cock to a little boy, but there was no mistaking it was him.
Behind the still-playing video was a wide finder screen with hundreds of tiny little video files. Each one labeled not with names but with ages and sexes.
I didn’t want to believe the smallest number was accurate.
“Turn it off,” Corvus roared.
Rook clicked over to another video instead, his body rolling with rage.
Corvus shoved Rook back and grabbed the entire monitor from the top of the desk and smashed it on the floor, stomping on it for good measure, his breaths sawing in and out through his teeth.
“In our fucking town,” he hissed. “Right under our fucking noses.”
Guilt pooled in my stomach like acid, and I swallowed back the taste of bile rising in my throat. I’d always known Williams was a bit of a creep, but this? I’d been in his class for months now, and I hadn’t seen this. I should’ve.
Corvus’ turned his fury on me. “Want to tell me how this fucking slipped your notice, Grey?”
A muscle in my jaw ticked. I shook my head. I had no excuse to give.
