Chapter 3
Deputy Hawkins is still manning the front door when I toss my booties into a trashcan by the foyer door and step out into a drizzly warm night.
“You look like a mannequin standing under the porch light,” I say, smiling and wishing him a goodnight.
“f**k you, Ballinger,” he retorts, a hint of humor in his deadpan delivery.
I laugh and wave a hand over my shoulder at him. I cross the spongy front lawn and reach the sidewalk.
The street looks like a scene in a horror movie, as I walk through a thick blanket of fog to get to my car. It is as if smoke is being pumped from a machine, obscuring the leafy limbs of sycamore trees around me.
The group of four sorority girls that were outside the apartment when I arrived earlier is still waiting on the sidewalk. I walk a few feet from
