[In Progress] [8k] [Adult Supernatural Crime-Horror] It's Not Just Evil - Chapter One feedback

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I'm not sure on Chapter One....how does it feel to you? Title: It’s Not Just Evil Chapter: Chapter One - Dark Places, Dark Souls Genre: Adult supernatural crime-horror / gritty police horror / body horror Word count: approx. 8k Content warnings: implied child endangerment/abuse, adult body horror, strong language, sexual grime, violence Opening extract below: Chapter One Dark Places, Dark Souls Rain hit the flats hard enough to turn the windows white. It ran down the concrete in dirty sheets. Over stained balconies. Broken guttering. Satellite dishes. Hanging bags of rubbish. A kid’s bike with one wheel missing. The street outside had flooded at the kerb. Kebab wrappers floated in the gutter. A single trainer lay on its side under the bus stop sign. The block stood ahead of them with half its lights dead. Detective Sergeant Harris sat behind the wheel of the Ford and watched the second floor. One curtain moved. Then dropped. Lennon saw it too. “That the flat?” Harris nodded. “The caller saw a kid at the window.” Lennon’s knee stopped bouncing. “Alive?” “Crying.” “Fuck.” “Small. Pale. Only there a few seconds.” Harris kept his eyes on the building. The wipers dragged rain across the windscreen and failed to clear it. Every pass left the block smeared and broken. Concrete. Yellow light. Black glass. Running water. Lennon shut his notebook. “You should’ve opened with that.” “I just did.” “No, you opened with Hendricks.” “That’s the same thing.” Lennon looked at him. Harris’s jaw worked once. “Hendricks finds them. Moves them. Gets them scared enough for other men.” Lennon looked at the second-floor window. “We’ve had him three times,” Harris said. “Three chances. Every time, something goes missing. Statement. File. Warrant. Someone tips him off. Someone buys him time.” “And tonight?” “Tonight a neighbour saw a child.” Lennon breathed out through his nose. “Right.” “Don’t get angry yet.” “I’m not.” “You are.” “I’m getting ready.” “That’s not different.” Harris killed the engine. For half a second, the car was quiet. Then the rain filled it. He opened the door. Cold hit his face. Lennon got out after him, collar up, notebook shoved into his coat pocket. They crossed the road fast. The entrance smelled before they reached it. Piss. Damp concrete. Weed. Old bins. Something sour in the drain. The kind of smell that got into the back of the throat and stayed there. The intercom casing hung loose, wires exposed behind cracked plastic. Harris pressed the button for the second floor. Static spat back. A voice answered. Male. Half-asleep. Angry. “What?” “Police. Open the door.” A pause. “You what?” “Open the door.” “Fuck’s happened now?” Harris leaned closer to the speaker. “We can come through it, or you can press the button and stay warm.” More static. Then the voice said, “You lot are a fucking disturbance, you know that?” Harris looked at Lennon. Lennon looked back. The buzzer rasped. The door clicked open. “Community relations,” Lennon said. “Move.” They stepped inside. The heat in the stairwell was wrong. Not warm. Damp. The air felt used. Paint peeled from the walls in long strips. Someone had kicked through the plaster near the mailboxes. The floor was sticky with old spills and rainwater tracked in by shoes. They climbed. First landing. A pram frame without wheels. A split bin bag by the lift. Boiled food. Stale smoke. Behind one door, a woman shouted. A man shouted back. Something hit a wall. Lennon slowed. Harris kept going. “We’ll be back for that,” Lennon muttered. “We probably already have been.” Second landing. The smell changed. It sat under the damp at first. Then it came through properly. Sweet. Thick. Meat left wrong. Lennon stopped talking. Harris stopped outside the flat at the end of the corridor. The door was swollen in the frame. Cheap wood. Old damage around the lock. Yellow light under the gap. No movement inside. From somewhere in the flat came the sound of a television. Canned laughter. Bright. Loud. Wrong. Harris knocked hard. “Police. Open up, Hendricks.” Nothing. The television laughed again. Lennon looked at the hinges. “Cheap door.” “Take it.” Lennon stepped back and kicked. First kick shook the frame. Second split the wood. Third sent the door in with a wet crack. The smell came out first. Lennon put a hand over his mouth. “Fuck me.” Harris went in.

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