Hello, Little Sparrow by Jordan Jones (ebook audio reader txt) 📗

that would be his answer, so they both smiled.

Chapter Fifty-Eight

“Ahhh….Roisman, should be number fourteen,” said the small, round man with an ill-fitted jacket.

The storage facility was massive and had white aluminum siding with orange garage doors at the entrance of each unit.

“Here he goes with Roisman again,” Harlow said under her breath. “It’s like a ghost at this point.”

The man unlocked the unit and threw open the garage door and turned to us.

“I’ll need to run a copy of that warrant to give to the boss. He usually doesn’t care who comes poking through here, warrant or not, but better safe than sorry.” I handed it to him and shoved my hand back in my pocket. “All right then,” he continued. “I’ll let you two get at it.”

There were items strewn to both sides of the unit, with a narrow pathway through the middle. I started down the path and turned on the light that dangled in the center of the ceiling.

“This is just stuff,” Harlow said, insinuating it was valueless.

“This ‘stuff’ belongs to a serial killer,” I reminded her. “Let’s have a look around.”

I opened a large wooden trunk and picked up a few picture frames. One of which was a family portrait where they were all dressed up in stale Christmas sweaters and faces draped with forced smiles.

I turned it around:

Ingram Family Christmas 1992

Garret age: 44

Marcie: 33

Jody: 11

Brooks: 8

“This picture was taken a few decades back,” I said holding it up for Harlow. “The author of the letters is Marcie Ingram. She started receiving chemotherapy around this time. The medical records showed she would’ve died only four months later.”

“It must’ve been aggressive,” she said taking a closer look. “She was so beautiful.”

Yes she was.

It’s cliché to say that a smile was ‘infectious,’ but that’s exactly what it was. Seeing her face light up, even in all its facade, radiated positivity and beauty.

Harlow looked at the other members of the family, caressing the picture with her fingertips.

“This bastard must be Garret Ingram, the one who abused all those girls.” She took a deep breath and understood my silence for agreement. “He spent a lot of time in prison for that. I read in your file that he’s up north at a nursing home.”

“That’s Jody,” I chimed in, pointing at the young girl with piggy-tails, smiling woefully at the camera. Her expression was painfully plastered on her face as if she had only enough energy to muster the faint smile for a second. “She died sometime after, though we haven’t found the official death certificate yet. I’m sure the FBI has it. I’d like for them to show some transparency like I did.”

“You were forced,” Harlow responded, shoving her hip into me. Her smile faded as her eyes traversed down to the boy. “This is our killer.”

“Looks that way.”

“How does someone so handsome and put together end up slaughtering a dozen people?” She shook her head in disbelief. “I can’t wrap my head around it.”

She wasn’t alone.

The boy’s smile was the only one in the picture that looked genuine, as if he knew what his future held and he was at ease. The calmness posed across his face was that of a child who got an A+ on a tough science test.

But, with Brooks, it was different.

I knew that smile meant a long life of inflicting pain and misery.

“Where did you get this?” Harlow asked. I pointed to the trunk below us.

“I’m going to call this in.” I called Benjamin and he immediately answered. “Torrey, Harlow and I have found a treasure trove of evidence against The Sparrow.”

“John…” Harlow said, standing back up.

“Yes, Benjamin. It’s a storage unit.”

“John,” she said again, her voice growing louder.

“The one out on West Perch Ave.”

“John!” She screeched, getting my attention.

“I gotta go…see you in a few.” I hung up the phone. “What is it?”

She held up a small notebook with some pages tore out. The front cover read:

Hello, Little Sparrow

I grabbed it from her hands and studied it. The texture of the cover was porous, and showed signs of wear. The pages inside were stained with a yellow film and matched that of the letters found at the scenes.

“This is the notebook Marcie used to write all the letters, isn’t it?” I asked, knowing full well what the answer was.

Harlow nodded and flipped a page. The last past was the only page with writing. Letters were less fancy than we were used to, and they matched that of the writings at Wellpock’s house.

It read:

You found me.

 

Boo.

We both turned the pages together, but all the other pages were blank.

“The back page has some writing on it,” Harlow suggested. “If found, please return to 5775 South Palm Road.”

“It’s written in pencil in the original handwriting,” I responded.

“That’d tell us this was written by Marcie at the fallback house.”

“I knew Brooks had another place to hide,” I said, shoving the book in my jacket pocket. “This has to be where he’s hiding out.”

The short man wobbled his way back into the entrance of the door.

“Excuse me officers,” he said. “My boss wants to know how much longer ya’ll are gonna be out here.”

I took another look around and met his eyes again.

“It’s going to be a while longer,” I said. “We have an entire team of forensic experts that are about to clean this place out.”

Chapter Fifty-Nine

Brooks staggered through the back door after parking the small yellow Volkswagen in the back yard.

His feet were muddy and shirt was bloody, though no one saw him driving back. The falling sun provided enough cover to keep him free