Bad Boy Soldier (Bad Boy 3)

Inside the closet, at the back, behind a box of clothes, was a locked cupboard. That was surely where the goods were kept. I easily broke the lock and checked inside, where I found row upon row of cassettes, old reel-to-reel tapes, and newer CDs. Boxes filled with Polaroids of young girls just pubescent, their eyes blank, their faces pale, some with makeup on, red smears on their lips, bodies in obscene poses that made sense only when assumed by adult women.

I felt my guts roil, my gorge rise, as I sorted through them, looking for Celia among the faces—for the black hair and chocolate-brown eyes. Spencer and his group of perverts were meticulous, documenting each child, the name, age and a little comment on each. One depicted a little girl doing something little girls shouldn't even know about, let alone perform on an adult. The label read, "Penny. 8."

There was nothing in the box showing Celia—thank God. Perhaps these predated Spencer's time with her. They were older, taken in the 80s, the color fading.

I started sorting through the cassettes, reading dates and labels. I sat on the edge of the bed and held the tapes in my hand, considering whether to watch then or not. If I did, I'd be witness to horror I knew I could probably not forget, but I wanted to see him and know he deserved to die. I'd know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that killing him was completely just. I knew that already, but I needed to see what the worm did so I could look him in the eye and exact a confession, forcing Spencer to admit to his crimes.

When I killed Spencer, and I would kill him, I'd make him say the words.

I slipped a tape into the VCR and watched it. On it, the most devastating scenes I could imagine for a little girl—any little girl. As I watched, I thought about Celia and about our encounters when she was a teen. Was Spencer doing this kind of thing to her back then?

It made me ill to even consider it.

I'd seen and done shit that would make most people's skin crawl. I'd been in firefights where I'd blown off the heads of enemy fighters; I'd been in the aftermath of car bombings, seeing body parts strewn around the road, bodies burnt beyond recognition.

I'd never seen anything like this.

The men I killed were all enemies—soldiers or insurgents. They were terrorists. They were adults, they were hardened, they knew what was going to happen, they had been prepared for it.

When I made them bleed, the blood was justified. When I made them cry out in pain, inflicting the pain was legitimate.

The only response to witnessing a video like this was to kill the man. Death was the only justice possible. All that kept me from losing complete control were thoughts of killing him in as slow and deliberate and painful a way as possible.

Witnessing the anonymous child's abuse made me feel a need to purge myself through violence. I could kill the man today, when I returned to Boston. That would give me immediate satisfaction.

However, I wanted to do it right. I wanted to do it legally. On top of that, I wanted to make sure all his perverted associates went down with him.

In public.

I put the tapes back into the cupboard and then left the basement, left the cabin through the window, and went to my car.

Before I reached it, I stopped and bent over, emptying the contents of my stomach on the leaf-strewn forest floor.

I stopped on a side street in downtown Alexandria and called Millar on my burner, using a secure line he'd given me for when I needed to contact him.

"I'm coming back early," I said, a feeling of exhaustion hitting me now that the adrenaline had burned off.

"What's up?"

"I've been snooping around Alexandria, and found something. I think your boys need to check out Grant's old property in Chesapeake Beach. He or his fellow perverts are using it as a fun house. There's material there that could put him and his associates away."

"You broke into his property?"

"I saw a young girl leave and then an older man. I stopped him and got his name and cell. You better have someone go there quick before he alerts Grant and they go and clean the place out."

"What's the address?"

I gave him the address and I heard him flip through a file.

"We haven't got a warrant to do a search."

"You better get one, and quick. I'm ready to go kill the bastard myself," I said, remembering the images I'd seen.

"Don't do that," Millar said, his voice firm. "It won't do anyone any good to have you in jail for murder for real."

"Don't worry," I said. "I got control of myself. I'll leave the rest up to you, but I'm warning you. If nothing happens because of this, I can't promise anything."

"I'll call my contacts in Alexandria and get to the cabin as soon as we can. As for you, lie low until I have things in place. Then we'll take you in."