Chapter 1
Every night after his bowl of cereal, he would take the van and scout for young people. How he enjoyed watching boys while they romped and played. As a child, Father required his services at home. Father had never allowed him to participate in any sport activities. There were always chores to do, and Father did not like him talking with the other boys. Even after all these years, Gordon hated his father, maybe now more than ever. He remembered the terrible pain associated with those awful afternoons in the barn. After all these years, he could still remember the smell of the cows and trodden hay.
Gordon had two unforgettable memories of the barn. First was the first time Father sodomized Gordon’s tiny body. He remembered the pain. It was a compassion-less burning that devoured his inner core. The second memory, which haunted his soul day and night, was the afternoon he had heard the sound of three gunshots from the direction of the old ramshackle wooden building. He had been drying dishes for his mother when Sister came running through the kitchen. She had not even stopped to speak as she ran past Gordon and his mother. Sister ran up the stairs and into the bedroom. Gordon looked back on that day and remembered Mother dropping her dishrag into the pan and following Sister up the stairs. He could hear Sister sobbing and telling Mother something. Then Mother came down the stairs and went to the hall closet, where she took out the rifle. Stone faced, she walked past her youngest son, carrying the rifle in both hands. She used the rifle barrel to push open the screen door and disappeared from sight.
He recalled how he had been frightened. He had run up the stairs to Sister’s room. When he opened the bedroom door, Sister was hanging from a rope tied to a rafter. She dangled in death as the afternoon sun cast lingering splashes of gold on her blue face. He walked to her and touched her muddy leg. Looking up, he saw that she wore no panties. Sometimes at night he still woke, dripping with sweat and gasping for life as images of Sister’s exposed body arrived crystal clear in his nightmares.
He counted the shots; one, two, three. Then he waited, dreading Father’s return to the bedroom. There was no question in his mind. He just somehow knew that Mother and Sister were both dead and that he and Brother would be next. When his mother came into the bedroom, he was relieved. Mother stood in shock as she watched her only daughter swing gently around the room, suspended by a death noose. She propped the gun against the wall and got a chair. He helped his mother lower his sister’s lifeless body. They put Sister on the bed and covered her with the sheet. Gordon then watched as Mother picked up the rifle and poked the barrel into her own mouth. Looking straight at Gordon, she pulled the trigger. In slow motion, he could still see every glob of blood, bone, and brains as they were spewed from Mother’s head. The red covered the walls and stuck to the ceiling.
That night when the sheriff left, a woman from the children’s shelter took Gordon and Brother away. They were placed in separate foster homes. The last he heard, Brother was in the penitentiary somewhere.
Gordon had missed his childhood. He had known only pain, death, and destruction. The only enjoyable thing he could remember about his youth was baseball. He had been an all‑city pitcher and still loved to go to the games.
“Tonight’s final score, Dodgers fourteen, Roadrunners eight.” The announcer faked excitement and quickly started to roll up the mike cord. The field lights were turned off while the spectators were hunting for their cars. Tonight the twilight of dusk was hot and the color of taupe. Dust boiled, as a stream of station wagons and minivans filled with mothers and children rushed for exits. Noise and dust covered the quadruplex baseball center near San Pedro Street and, as the car lights illuminated a path away from the Little League games, Gordon took a long sip from his Coke can.
“Hi, I’m Father Gordon. You played a swell game tonight. What’s your name?”
“I’m Alex McCoy. I play third base.”
“Yes, I know. I’ve been watching you. I played for the Los Angles Dodgers a few years ago. When I hurt my knee, I had to quit.”
“Really?” the excited boy probed.
“Sure, really. I think that with just a little coaching, I could have you hitting five hundred. Yes, I’m sure you have what it takes to be a home run hitter,” he assured the boy.
“Man, I want to hit a homer,” Alex exclaimed to the priest. “I know I could if our coach, Mr. Fry, would just let me bat more.”
“I could see that. I wondered why he didn’t let you play. Really, I did!”
“Oh heck, there’s my mother, I’ve got to go. Thank you, Father, Bye.” Alex rushed to meet his mother.
Gordon clinched his jaws as a frown swept over his face. What a time to show up. That kid was ready to play, he thought. He forced a smile and waved at Alex, as the young man scrambled into his mother’s protective white car. Alex turned and waved goodbye to Gordon.
“Jim, why’d anyone throw away a kid? Every time I see one of these it makes me…”
“Let it go,” Lieutenant Grimes quickly answered, wiping the sweat from his glasses.
“Juveniles, just little lads. That’s what they call them. Teenyboppers. They call them little tykes in the movies,” Sergeant Slore continued to ramble, as he went methodically about the job of putting together the jigsaw puzzle of death and wasted potentials. Chatter is what Slore did when he was nervous or upset. “Emergency room doctors, morticians, and cops see it all.”
When Slore stood and began to dust the soil from his pants, he seemed to be a million miles away. He began to roll up a well-used, hundred-foot tape, “Did you know ER doctors won’t ride motorcycles? They’ve seen too many smashed heads.”
Slore looked at the body and thought, No matter how you prepare yourself, you’re never ready for a call like this. Who’s this kid lying here naked for all to see, wide-eyed and dead? Look at the terror in those eyes that will never sparkle again.
“Come on, people wrap this one up. Cover the body before the sun… Lieutenant, here’s the kid’s underwear,” Slore continued, as he scribbled in his folding notebook the location of the white Jockey shorts.
Flat-faced with Santa Claus hair, Lieutenant Jim Grimes had investigated too many violent crimes. He knew too well what a dead child looked like. “Any blood?”
Slore shook his head. Most people thought Slore handsome. Women looked and called him a hunk. His blond hair contrasted a dark tan and he worked out every day. The first thing they noticed about him was his clear, green eyes. Carefully, he took a stick and lifted the boy’s underwear into a clear plastic bag marked EVIDENCE.
“What’s that over there?” Grimes asked as he pointed to something shining, half-buried in the dirt.
Slore called out to Officer Mark Carter, “Carter, check that out. What’s that?”
“It’s nothing, Sergeant, just a snuff lid,” Carter answered, as Slore stuffed more Vicks up his nose to mask the stench of death. The smell of death stays with you for days, he thought.
“Come on, Carter, mark it and tag it. You never know.” Slore felt a bead of perspiration roll down his neck and evaporate into his collar. The afternoon sun showed no mercy. Not even one cloud could be seen in the vastness of the Texas sky. It was just plain hot and dry. A horrible summer. No rain and temperatures near a hundred degrees every day. The mayor was already talking about water rationing. Slore forced the tape into his hip pocket. He thought, If there was just something to work with here besides dust. Crime scenes are tough anyway. I’ve just got to let my mind do the work.
He looked for more signs and reminded himself, You’ve just got to be there. You’ve got to see it, feel it. “Carter, take three officers and start a grid search. Spread out for about three hundred yards.”
Turning to Grimes, he said, “Lieutenant, I’m going to do another quick look about, then I’m ready.” Slore was more than ready to go.
The rape and murder of a twelve, maybe thirteen-year-old, yet unidentified white male was ready for the computer. Now it was time to type and file. The