The Darkness Inside: Writer's Cut by John Rickards Read Free Book Online

rancid sweat cloying beneath his prison uniform, the faint whiff of body chemistry gone badly wrong. His eyes were rheumy, but sharp, although his movements weren't as fast. A couple of small sores next to his bitten lips. Yellow teeth.
    “Okay. Where do you want to start?” I asked him.
    “I’ll tell you about the girls.”
    “The four that haven’t been found yet?”
    He smiled and shook his head. “All of them.”
    “I don’t need to hear about them all,” I said, trying to work out what he was up to. “I told you I didn’t want you to waste my time, Cody.”
    “Have you sneaked a microphone or some shit in here, Agent Rourke?”
    “No. What would be the point?”
    “No?”
    “No.”
    “I guess that’s a shame, some ways.” He shuffled in his seat. “You see, I never told anyone my story, how I did what I did, or why. I wanna do that before I die, y’know?”
    “If you want me to get a tape recorder in here for you, it’s no problem.”
    “No. I don’t want to do that whole ‘memoirs’ shit. I’d like this to be just the two of us, what with all the history between us. What we’ve both done.” Williams smiled again, inhaled noisily. “That way, you can listen to it all, and then you can decide what you want anyone else to know. Like an editor, right?”
    “Or a priest.”
    “Yeah, exactly,” he said, and I finally thought I understood why he was doing this. He wanted to get back at me in the only way available to him.  
    If he told me everything he could remember about the killings, every time I had to speak to one of the girls’ relatives, telling them where the authorities were going to find the bodies, I’d have to keep the rest of what he’d said buried. Every sordid detail would be kept forever fresh for me, and everything I didn’t reveal meant another half-truth, another lie. I didn’t know if Williams was aware of the protesters outside the gates, but whenever I heard someone calling for his release, the full knowledge of his crimes would surface in my mind, knowledge no one else possessed. Not only that, but some people would see him as co-operating with the authorities and he’d win extra perks as a result.  
    Son of a bitch.
    But I’d been down this road before. Williams apparently didn’t know that I was no longer an FBI agent and that once our interviews were over, I’d have nothing more to do with him or his case. All I had to do was find out where the last four of his victims were buried, then I could walk away.
    “Okay, let’s get this over with,” I told him. “How about we start with Katelyn Sellars? She was the earliest victim we haven’t found.”
    “I’d rather start with the Abblit girl. She was the first of all.” He smirked, coughs again. Another gob of rancid mucus hit the floor. “Funny, I only know the names because I heard them on the news. And in interviews with you and the cops, of course. Names don’t matter. Who they were don’t matter. Only thing that mattered was what they could be, y’know?”
    “No, I don’t.” I sighed, crossed my arms. “I guess we’re talking about your fantasies here, right?”
    He laughed, phlegmy and wet, his shoulders shaking and his lank hair dancing. “Yeah, I guess we are. You wanna hear about them? Do you? I could tell you all about them. You got kids yourself?”
    “No I don’t, and forget about trying to get a reaction out of me. I’ve talked to more freaks like you than I care to count. Assuming any of the other cons here would even give a child-killer like you the time of day, you must’ve heard plenty yourself. Do they shock you anymore? Or are you just bored by the stories and the people who tell them?” I leaned forwards, rested my elbows on the table, looked Williams in the eyes. “So you’re a sick fuck. You know it, I know it. Big deal. Let’s get to the point here, Cody.”
    “But that was the point for me, Agent Rourke,” he said, smiling. He leaned in closer and I could see a