Chapter 2: The Search Begins

They arrived at the campsite and there was about 10 people standing around. Agent Goings took charge and introduced Ellie Mae as a Reserve Deputy who was a dog handler.

Ellie Mae asked what tent the boy was sleeping in and was told by a very distraught mother that it was the pup tent next to his parents’ big tent. “He wanted to sleep in his own tent,” she said as she started to cry.

Ellie Mae walked over to that small tent and crawled inside. In seconds she was back with a sleeping bag. She showed it to Skillet and he began to sniff.

“Find him boy.”

The dog immediately began to sniff the ground and soon let out a bawl and began to pull her towards the woods. He was howling like ... well like a bloodhound on a trail when he suddenly stopped and sniffed a place on the ground. Ellie Mae got on her knees and ran her fingers through the wet dirt, then raised them to her nose.

“He stopped here to pee,” she said then stood up.

Skillet was again bawling and going off in a different direction.

“The boy got up to pee, then got turned around and walked off away from camp. Skillet will find him.”

They followed Skillet for over an hour until they came to a cabin deep in the forest.

As Agent Goings swatted another mosquito trying to drain the last of his blood, he asked, “Who lives here?”

“No one,” replied one of the deputies.

“It’s a hunting cabin used by people who deer hunt these parts in the winter.”

The Sheriff, along with Agent Goings and a couple of others, walked up on the front porch and knocked on the door. A man opened the door and they stepped inside while Ellie Mae and another group circled the house. Skillet bawled again and led them into an old barn. There under a tarp, lay the boy’s body. He was naked and it was obvious to all who saw it, the boy had been sexually abused. The marks on his neck, along with the blood in his eyes showed that he was choked to death!

Ellie Mae left Skillet with the agent who had radioed Goings to tell him what they had found. As she walked back to the house agents and deputies raced past her to see the dead body. She walked in the front door where the Sheriff was handcuffing the man while Agent Goiings was reading him his rights.

The man was crying and begging them to understand.

“It was the voices in my head that told me to do it. I swear! I need to go back to the hospital. Ask the doctors there! They will tell you. I am sick. The doctors know it. They’ll help me.”

“You’re sick alright, you piece of shit!” Ellie Mae screamed.

“That little boy came here asking for help. He was lost! You fucking pervert! He needed help! Instead, you sodomized him then strangled him and dumped him in the barn like garbage!”

She pulled her pistol out of her holster before anyone could stop her and fired three shots into the man. All three shots hit their target!

He was dead before he fell to the floor.

Special Agent Goings walked over to Ellie Mae and gently took the pistol out of her trembling hand. He released the magazine then cleared the round in the chamber as a number of Agents and deputies came in the front door. He leaned down and whispered in her ear, “Do not say a word. Let me handle this.”

She nodded.