by Elle Gray
“No, I don’t have friends because people are petty, ridiculous creatures, and most of them don’t have the intellectual capacity to hold my interest for more than five minutes at a time.”
“I suppose I should feel special then, considering the length of our friendship,” she replies with a smile.
“Yeah, you probably should.”
While it’s true that I don’t need people in general, I do need Brody and Blake. They are, as all the cool kids say, my fam. Aside from Veronica, they’re the only two who’ve ever genuinely gotten me. They understand and accept me as I am; faults, flaws, warts, and all. And really, that’s all I need. They’re all I need.
“So, what are we going to do about Hayes?”
I shake my head. “I don’t know yet. The ball’s unfortunately in his court.”
“I hate waiting for him to make a move,” she says. “I don’t like being on the defensive.”
“Same. I’d rather be playing offense. But we don’t know what we’re doing or who we’re looking for yet,” I sigh. “The answer is going to be found in his early kills. Not the three names he gave me, but before that.”
She nods. “If we can figure out who his original victim was, we may be able to put some more pieces into the puzzle and figure out who he is.”
“Exactly.”
“So how do we do that?” she says with a loud sigh. “He most likely didn’t tag his first kill with the flaming cross.”
“Probably not,” I nod. “So putting them in order by year won’t solve our dilemma. I guess I have to hope he calls me again. And that he lets something slip.”
“Great,” Blake groans. “What a promising plan.”
She’s not wrong, but until he slips up or we find another clue, we’re dead in the water. This is his show, and unfortunately, we’ve got no choice but to dance to his tune.
Nineteen
Downtown Seattle
“What’s he doin’ here?”
“Good to see you too, Matty,” I say. “Looks like the nose healed up fine.”
“That’s Detective Sergeant Schreiber to you,” he spits. “And my nose healed up a lot better than your career.”
I flash him a grin. “It was so worth it.”
“Screw you, Arrington. Get off my crime scene.”
“If you boys can’t play nice, I’m going to have to put you both in time out.”
“He started it,” I crack with a smirk on my face.
“Stow it, Arrington,” Blake replies, though I hear the laughter in her voice.
I grin as she steps over to us. She looks up at Schreiber, who towers over her by six inches, and yet somehow, it’s Blake who seems to be the larger of the two. She’s just got that presence about her.
The crime scene is buzzing with activity as uniformed cops bustle about, a couple of them jostling us as they tape off the area and hold back all of the rubberneckers. It makes me think about my own time working in that line. By far the least enjoyable part of the job. There are several blue and whites parked at the scene, as well as a couple of unmarked cars, all of their bubble lights spinning, adding to the chaotic energy of the scene.
Blake called me before the sun was even up this morning to tell me patrol cops had found a dead hooker in an alley who’d been cut up pretty bad. I didn’t know she’d set up a Google alert system within the SPD, but it shouldn’t surprise me. She can sweet talk people, and with a little well-practiced flirting, I have no doubt she can get the cops to tip her off about almost anything. It’s just another one of those things she’s got in her toolbox that she uses so well. She’s definitely got a finesse and grace about her I’ll never have.
“Who are you?” Schreiber growls.
In one smooth, obviously well practiced motion, Blake flips open her creds for him to see. I see Schreiber’s eyes tighten and his mouth pucker as his face darkens. It’s always a territorial pissing match when the Feds show up. No self-respecting cop likes to have the Feds bigfoot their way onto a case. In this case though, I’m glad she is. If for no other reason than to screw with Schreiber.
“This ain’t a federal case,” Schreiber says. “It’s local. We don’t need you—”
“Relax, Detective Sergeant Schreiber. I’m not here to take your case away from you,” she cuts in, her tone placating. “This is academic on my behalf.”
“This is a crime scene, not a classroom,” Schreiber declares. “You can walk yourself back to Quantico if you want to learn something.”
A malicious smirk crosses Blake’s face as she looks at the angry, red-faced detective. I just stand back, grinning as I watch the show. Schreiber really doesn’t know the pile he just stepped in.
“That’s Special Agent Wilder, to you,” Blake says, her tone harder than steel. “And if you would rather get into a jurisdictional pissing match rather than being reasonable and giving me ten minutes, we can do that. I guarantee though, if I bring the force of the FBI to bear, it’s not going to go your way. You will not like how that one ends.”
I open my mouth to add my own two cents but close it again when Blake shoots me a withering glare. I slip my hands into my coat pockets and remain silent, looking up at the sky filled with patchy clouds overhead just to make sure I swallow down my remark. When I finally turn back, I see Schreiber’s practically turned purple, his face twisted in anger. He’s absolutely apoplectic, weighing his options and coming to the realization that he has none. The Feds will win every single time, and he knows it. I enjoy seeing this harsh, brutal side of Blake.
“Fine. You’ve got ten minutes,” he snaps, then points at me. “But he needs to get out of here. He ain’t welcome on my crime scene.”
“He’s consulting for the Bureau,” she replies dismissively. “He stays.”
Schreiber mutters darkly under his breath and waves us off as he turns and storms away. Blake cuts a glance at me, a grin on her face.
“He’s charming,” she says. “I don’t know why on earth you would have punched a nice guy like that in the face. You really are a monster.”
I laugh as I pull out a pair of black nitrile gloves and pull them on. As Blake is gloving up, I look around the alley, feeling a sense of déjà vu washing over me. I wonder if it’s hitting her as well. Though for Blake, I know it would be far more visceral and powerful. This place is just like the dank, dingy alley where they found Teresa Reyes.
This time though, the vic is Caucasian, with blonde hair and blue eyes that are wide open and staring at some fixed point beyond this world. Pretty girl, but with her short skirt that barely covers her intimate parts, a midriff-baring top, thigh-high stockings, and high heels trashy enough that they’d make a stripper blush, her profession isn’t a question.
Blake is standing over her, staring down into the girl’s blue eyes, a dazed expression on her face. I can practically read the thoughts going through her mind, and her emotions are clearer to see than the clouds in the sky overhead.
“You all right?” I ask.
She nods. “I’m fine.”
She squats down next to the body, studying the dead girl closely, her face a mask of focus and concentration. The hooker had her throat slit— just like Teresa Reyes. And also just like Teresa Reyes, she’d suffered a frenzy of stab wounds. There’s so much blood and destruction of this woman’s body; I can’t even begin to count the number of wounds on her body. She’s lying in a pool of dark, viscous blood, the whole scene looking like something out of some gory slasher flick.
“What do you see?” I ask, squatting down beside her.
“Overkill. A frenzied attack,” she muses. “If I had to guess, I’d say he cut her throat from behind, then went to work on her. It’s personal.”
I nod. “Sounds right. And it’s a show for us.”
“Yeah, I had the same thought,” she agrees. “Doubt we’ll get a copy of the case file, so our observations are going to have to be good enough.”
Standing up, I look around, and it doesn’t take me long to
find what it is I’m looking for: confirmation that this one is meant for us.
“On the dumpster,” I point. “Lower right-hand corner.”
Blake stands up and sighs. “Yeah, I see it.”
“You tourists done yet?” Schreiber growls and walks over to us. “Can I do my freakin’ job now?”
“I’m pretty sure you couldn’t do your freakin’ job before,” I mutter.
“Always got a smart answer, don’t you, Arrington?” he spits.
“It happens when you’re smart,” I reply. “Hence, your lack of—”
“Pax,” Blake admonishes me. “Cut it out.”
“You really should listen—”
Blake rounds on Schreiber. “And you can shut up too, Detective.”
He actually does what she says and bites off his words. There aren’t many people in this world who can get that guy to shut up. My respect for Blake just shot up another hundred points.
“Do you have an ID on the vic?” Blake asks.
“Melanie Woods,” he replies grudgingly. “Twenty-seven. Obviously a hooker.”
“Detective Sergeant Schreiber, you are dealing with a serial killer,” she says.
“How do you figure?”
Blake points to the insignia painted on the dumpster. “That flaming cross has been painted at multiple crime scenes I’ve been investigating,” she explains. “Either somewhere close to the body, or on the victim themselves.”
“If that was true, why haven’t I heard about it?” he frowns. “Surely, somebody would have put it together before now.”
“Look, I can’t account for what did or didn’t happen before. I’m telling you now though, that there are a lot of bodies on this guy,” she says.
“She’s not wrong, Schreiber,” I add. “We have thirty-six confirmed cases all across the country. Thirty-seven now, including Melanie here.”
“That’s bull,” he sneers. “If that was the case—”
“Forget about what should or shouldn’t have happened. It’s irrelevant at this point,” I say. “All that matters is what we do right here, right now. And I’m telling you that we have a guy with a pile of bodies running around out there.”
Schreiber turns to Blake. “If that’s true, why hasn’t the almighty FBI tracked this guy down yet? Why haven’t they even acknowledged that a monster like this exists?” he says with a feral grin. “Oh right, I guess you guys are having enough problems of your own right now.”
“Detective Schreiber—”
“I’ll tell you what I see,” he cuts her off. “I see one dead hooker, probably cut up by her john. And I see a bit of graffiti that for all we know, has been here for ten freakin’ years. Could be the logo for some band for all I know.”
“Top-notch police work,” I roll my eyes. “As always.”
“Now, if you two are done playing lookie-loo, I’ve got actual work to do,” he growls. “My good humor is done, as is my professional courtesy. Get off my crime scene.”
Blake looks like she’s going to argue further but seems to think better of it and storms away from the body instead. I shake my head.
“Look up the name Teresa Reyes, Schreiber. Compare the crime scene photos,” I urge him. “Do your job.”
“Hey thanks, Arrington,” he sneers. “But when I want advice about how to be a detective, I’ll ask an actual detective. Now get out of here.”
I shake my head and turn away, following Blake out to the car. He’s not going to look into any of it just to spite me, and out of his own ignorance and laziness. All he sees is a dead hooker, and that’s good enough for him. Schreiber has no intention of going below the surface. It’s part of the reason Hayes has been able to operate so freely for two decades— apathy and laziness on the part of the SPD and all the other local departments.
I jump into Blake’s car and shut the door behind me. She doesn’t say a word as she speeds away from the crime scene with a squeal of tires, her face a mask of rage.
I know just how she feels.
Twenty
Arrington Investigations; Downtown Seattle
“That bastard,” she seethes. “He’s going to let people die because he won’t do his job.”
“Now you see why I punched him.”
“I now wish you’d punched him a few more times,” she growls.
We’re sitting in my office after our trip to the crime scene. Brody swept the office earlier and didn’t find any new surveillance equipment. His office and my office were the only ones that didn’t have any bugs in them originally, but I had him sweep them anyway.
Blake takes a drink of her water and sits back in the chair, physically doing her best to calm herself down. She looks at me, and I can see the frustration in her face.
“I’m hoping that once he cools off, he’ll do his job,” she says. “I’m hoping he isn’t going to sweep this under the rug just because he’s got a hard on for you.”
“Knowing Schreiber like I do, I’m pretty sure he’s going to do the bare minimum,” I sigh. “He just doesn’t care. Hasn’t as long as I’ve known him. To him, a dead hooker is a dead hooker, and doesn’t deserve a lot of consideration.”
Blake’s face darkens, and she takes a drink, doing her best to control herself. She’s furious. If she were less professional, she probably would have punched Schreiber herself. A few times.
“Okay, so we need to assume that we’re not going to be getting any help from SPD,” I start. “We’re on our own.”
“I agree,” she says.
Blake sits up, seeming to finally have come back to herself. She puts the cap back on her water bottle and sets it aside as I watch the anger drain from her face. She ties her hair back, and just like that, the steely resolve I’m used to seeing from Blake is back. She’s focused, and she’s determined.
“Alright. So where do we start?” she asks.
“We need to figure out when his first kill was,” I say. “And given the fact that his kill map covers a number of different states, it’s going to be hard to pinpoint where it was.”
Blake purses her lips, and I can see the wheels in her head turning, and I can tell she’s got an idea. But I’ve known her long enough to know it’s best to let her play this out on her own and to avoid pushing her. I take a drink of my coffee and give her a minute.
“Of the thirty-seven kills we know of, how many of them were in Washington?” she asks.
“Just the six you mentioned,” I reply. “Why do you ask?”
She looks off into the distance, a faraway look on her face as she seems to be trying to figure something out in her head. Blake seems to have come to an answer and looks back at me.
“Read off the kills by state. Just the numbers,” she says.
“What are you thinking?”
“Just do it,” she orders. “Give me the breakdown by state.”
“Okay, we’ve got the six here in Washington. Seven after today. We have sixteen in California, seven in Oregon,” I say. “Three in New Mexico, three in Arizona, and one in Idaho.”
She uncaps her water and takes another long swallow, processing all of the information I’ve just given her. But the raw numbers like that, with no context, don’t mean much. Which means we need to give it some context.
“We need to set up a timeline,” I say.
She nods. “We do.”
“Okay, you do that, and I’ll dig for more.”
She arches her eyebrow at me. “You haven’t deleted the back doors into the databases yet; I take it.”
“Did you really think I would?”
She grins ruefully. “I suppose not.”
For the next few hours, we work on our separate tasks. I use every trick I can think of to tease out more information, more potential victims, then study the crime scene photos carefully, searching for the flaming cross. And by the time we’re done, I’ve found three more victims: two in Idaho, and one more in Oregon, bringing our running total to forty, including Melanie Woods.
; Blake and I sit at the table, looking at the timeline she’s put together on the whiteboard, and it’s simply staggering to behold. Forty names. Forty lives snuffed out. The black and white photos and notes written on the board don’t even convey the actual scope of what we’re looking at. It doesn’t do it justice. And for what? For one man’s twisted sense of morality?
“It’s monstrous,” Blake whispers.
“To put it mildly.”
As I stare at the board, at those forty names and the years they died, I feel the most profound sense of grief. I didn’t know these people, but looking at the names on the board fills me with an overwhelming sense of loss. It feels like a fist made of ice punched its way through my chest, grabbed hold of my heart, and squeezed it so tight I can barely breathe. The last time I felt like this was when Veronica died.
“That look on your face right there?”
I look over at Blake, who’s looking back at me pointedly. She points her finger at me to emphasize her point.
“That look on your face right there is proof, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that you are nothing like Hayes,” she says. “That sorrow you’re feeling, painted so clearly on your face right now, proves once and for all that you are capable of empathy and compassion. So next time you doubt yourself, remember this exact moment. You hear me?”
“Yeah, I hear you.”
I give her a tight smile. I know that should make me feel better— and to some extent, it does. But at the same time, any sort of relief I derive from knowing I can finally put away those thoughts of being just like Hayes is immediately blunted by sorrow for those whose lives were snatched away and snuffed out by this absolute monster.
I sit up and push all thoughts from my mind. There will be time enough to unpack it all and analyze it later. Right now, we need to— I need to— put all of my focus and energy into catching the man who has taken forty lives. I take a long swallow of my coffee and sit back in my chair.
“So, what does the timeline tell us?” I ask.
“That so far as we know, he started killing in 1998,” she replies.