Margaret drove slowly on Sunset trying to spot where Charlotte Goode lived. It was two thirty in the morning.

“I think this is it,” Margaret said, pulling the car to the curb and hopping out. Sheryl Ann Gold sleepily followed her, probably trying to will herself into the right state of mind for the potentially dangerous situation before them. As soon as Charlotte’s phone had gone dead, Margaret called Sheryl Ann and pleaded for her company.

Goode’s house sat behind a row of palm trees. The front door, beneath a brick porch, was bracketed by lanterns, now dark.

“I can’t see anything,” said Sheryl Ann.

Margaret took out her cigarette lighter and held it in front of her; she could make out a stairwell leading to a cellar door.

“This must be it,” she whispered.

She walked slowly down the steps, at the bottom of which the door was ajar. Margaret looked back at Sheryl Ann, then slowly pushed it open and felt around on the wall for the light switch.

The room inside had been turned upside down: pillows gutted, cushions torn apart, papers strewn, drawers open. Margaret and Sheryl Ann cautiously stepped through the small living room. The kitchen was just as torn up—cabinets emptied onto the floor and the oven and refrigerator left open, casting light onto the disarray. Margaret kept walking, quietly, to the bedroom; she steeled herself before turning on the light, glancing over her shoulder and feeling a reassuring pat from Sheryl Ann.

Margaret turned on the light.

Charlotte Goode lay on her bed, her eyes and mouth open. Her shirt and the sheets were smeared with blood.

“Je-sus,” exclaimed Sheryl Ann, jumping back.

Oh no, Margaret thought. Oh God, no. Her heart began to race. She ran to the bed and felt Charlotte’s neck for a pulse.

There was none.

Margaret felt as if her insides were being torn out. She started to cry. Sheryl Ann put her arms around her, attempting to comfort her. After a minute had passed, Sheryl Ann patted Margaret on the shoulder to bring her back to the urgency of the moment, not just its tragedy.

“We should call the police,” Sheryl Ann said. “Where’s the phone?”

Margaret looked around the room, then back at Goode. “It’s around her neck,” Margaret said, pointing to the cord that circled Goode’s throat and trailed onto the floor on the other side of the bed.

Sheryl Ann walked around the bed, picked up the receiver that dangled at the end of the cord, and lifted it to her ear. “No dial tone,” she said.

Margaret looked down at Charlotte. She noticed weird blood smears on the sheet near her right hand. Circles and lines. She ran around to the far side of the bed to take a closer look.