by Paris Morgan
Everything was ready, but that coffee I’d had was really starting to bother me. First, I went to the door and dragged in what I needed and set it all up, then headed into his bathroom. I put down the seat, knowing that I had a few minutes before he regained consciousness.
Washing my hands, I was about to dry them when I realized my mistake. The toilet seat being down would have alerted the police that I’d been here. No single man kept the seat down unless he had a female visitor. With a sigh, I flipped it up, used some toilet paper to wipe off any prints and rewashed my hands, just as a moan from the other room signaled that my assignment for today was almost done.
“Why, hello there. You thought that you were safe, but as I’ve demonstrated, that isn’t the case, and it’s time you pay for the sins you have committed.”
I felt a sense of satisfaction that justice was being served as I pulled the rope tight and instructed him to stand on the chair, or I would do the same thing to his mother. It was an idle threat, but most men couldn’t stand the thought of someone hurting their mother. They just gave orders that hurt others without thought; as long as it didn’t affect their families, then it didn’t matter.
“No, don’t hurt her. I’ll do it.” He tried to balance on the chair, but twisted the wrong way, causing it to tip over. He clutched at his neck as realization hit that he needed to breathe to survive.
I stood back and watched until he twitched for the last time, then walked to the front door and let myself out. I was genuinely sorry that Detective Burns was going to have a busy Monday, but it was the profession he’d chosen.
Now, I was going to go enjoy the rest of my evening, knowing that I’d done my job well.
Chapter 2
Jesse
Monday mornings just plain sucked, no matter what kind of job you had.
It all started when I walked into the small office area that was reserved for detectives.
“Hey, Burns, we just got two separate calls from worried families that their loved ones aren’t responding. The first patrol car just arrived at this address and suggested that you might want to head that way. It looks like there’s an epidemic of suicides this week.”
“Great,” I muttered, turning around to head back out the door and into the cold morning. This was going to be a multi-coffee day, and I’d just managed to get my happy back after a weekend with the kids. Dealing with more suicides wasn’t what I needed to keep the depression at bay.
Both calls turned out to be suicides, practically identical to the two from last week. Four was an extremely large amount in just a few days. We normally had more than our share, but having these bunched up like this was causing me to wonder if we had some sort of cult suicide thing going on.
Neither crime scene appeared to have any signs of foul play. It was making my head hurt. I needed a different perspective, and my boss needed to be updated as well.
“Don, you got a minute?” I stuck my head inside his door as I gave it a light knock.
“Sure. Is this about the cases you’ve been on the past few days?” He motioned me in with a wave, without turning from his computer screen.
“Yes, sir. They appear to be suicides, but I have this feeling that there’s something else at play here.” I took a seat and waited for him to answer.
“Hmm…” he hummed, distractedly. “There.” He turned to me. “Sorry, I had to get that over to them before the deadline. Red tape always gets me. Now, you were saying that these could be a new trend?”
“Yes. Four men, all of whom are dead, were in the financial industry, and so far, I haven’t found a reason that they would suddenly decide to end their lives.”
“Did you leave them as open cases? What makes you think there’s more to it?” He stared at me thoughtfully.
“These men all died by the same method. Normally, you’d have something different, but these are almost identical. Each man had a noose. No one else lived there, and they all worked with numbers. Why haven’t there been any women? No one took pills or slashed their wrists. They all hung themselves.”
“No signs of forced entry? Who called in the deaths?”
“Each house was completely locked up, and their mothers, or concerned neighbors, have been the ones reporting them so far.” I shrugged, unable to explain why it was bothering me.
“Jesse, you’re one of my best detectives. It doesn’t matter that you’re one of a few at the moment, either. So, if you think this is something that needs some investigation, I’ll agree on one condition. That you go home and take the afternoon off before you start tomorrow. You’ve been looking a little tired, and this needs a clear mind.”
“Sir, I just got off a weekend with my kids. I’m good,” I protested.
“Jesse, these cases are essentially closed. Take the time to relax. If it is a cult, then you’re not going to get a break for a while. We’ve been overworked for months now, and I know that you have tons of comp time, so take the afternoon. If you protest, I’ll make you take the week,” he warned.
I couldn’t help the shiver that went through me at the thought of a week without anything to do, but hallucinate that people were watching me.
“I’ll take the afternoon, sir. This is too important to wait for a week. I can just feel that something isn’t right,” I reluctantly agreed.
“Which is why I’m giving you this chance to turn up some sort of connection between them. Even if they are suicides, someone may be pushing them toward this type of end goal, and we need to know what that is.”
“Thank you, sir. I’ll let you know if I find anything, starting tomorrow.” I stood, knowing I’d been dismissed when he returned to glaring at his computer screen.
Finding myself on the other side of the door, I stood there, trying to figure out what I was going to do for the day. He hadn’t said that I couldn’t work from home. I reached for anything that would be a loophole that I could use to keep working.
My phone rang, interrupting my thoughts. “Jesse,” I answered automatically.
“Sir, there’s been an incident and your son may have sprained his arm. Is there any way that you could come and take him to the hospital?”
“Yeah, sure, but why wasn’t his mother contacted?” I demanded, already on my way to the car.
“She was, but we’ve only been able to leave a message. You’re the backup contact. If she calls, I’ll let her know that you’re on the way.”
The voice on the phone didn’t seem to have a panic button, because she was calmly relaying all of this in an even tone. “I’ll be right there.” I wanted to scream, but took my cue to remain calm from her.
“We’ve given him some aspirin to ease the pain. He’s watching cartoons at the moment, so I think he’ll be all right. There’s no need to panic. If it was more serious, we would have taken him to the hospital ourselves.”
“Right, sorry. Their mom normally deals with catastrophes. I’m sure he’s doing fine. Thank you.”
At least I knew how to spend my afternoon now. The ER and a fight with my ex were suddenly first on my to-do list.
***
Hours later, it was determined that Charlie had a fracture. My ex had finally shown up with Patti about the time that school would have gotten out, just as we finished having a small cast put on his wrist.
“Lucy, he’s all fixed up.” I met her in the hallway, motioning Patti into the room where the nurse was showing Charlie how to put it in the sling. “Don’t be mad. The school couldn’t get a hold of you, and I had just closed a case, so it worked out.”
She looked as if she was ready to rip me a new one, when she noticed Charlie showing off his cast.
“Thank you. I was tied up and didn’t get out of my meeting until it was time to pick up the kids. I appreciate it.” She went inside to help reassure Charlie.
I scratched my head in bewilderment. Lucy had never given up a chance to start a fight with me. Why was she being so agreeable now?
I followed them into the room, jus
t in time to hear her say, “This is going to change your plans for the weekend. You won’t be able to go to the sleepover at Trey’s house.”
“Mom, the doctor said that as long as I don’t get it wet, it’ll be fine,” Charlie added hopefully.
“Honey, I know that it would have been fun, but it’s going to hurt for the next few days, so you won’t feel like playing.”
“Ma’am, the doctor has just given him some inflammation reducers. He’s perfectly able to go back to school tomorrow. It’s all here in the paperwork.” The nurse held out the discharge papers.
“Oh, well. Thank you.” She seemed miffed that he was going to be able to go right back to normal.
“I don’t want you somewhere you could get hurt, but I do have plans this weekend. I was counting on you being able to go to Trey’s house.”
She was having an argument with herself. I hadn’t planned to interrupt her, but I couldn’t help the offer that came out of my mouth.
“I’ll keep him this weekend. Patti, too, if she wants. We can have a movie marathon and play games all weekend. It’s supposed to be cold anyway. What do you say?”
Two little faces waited to see if she was going to put a stop to it.
“I guess that would work. Just for this weekend, though, since I already had plans, and you’ll keep him from jumping around,” she conceded.
We all held our breath, not wanting to get too excited because she’d been known to change her mind before.
“Sounds good. Now, Charlie, listen to your mother and take it easy. It scares us when one of you gets hurt. I’ll see you both after school on Friday.”
I quickly kissed their foreheads and left. Something was going on with my ex-wife, but I wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth. There would be enough time for that later. Since Charlie was safe, I was going to go home and crash. Worrying about the kids always made me tired, even if things had turned out okay this time.
***
Reality set in again when I walked through the door to my house much earlier than normal. I was going to have to spend some time doing research to keep my mind from coming up with reasons that my ex-wife was hiding stuff.
The steak I’d set out to thaw earlier went into the oven. I cracked my knuckles as I sat down to start looking for cults and rituals that matched my unexpected deaths.
There were three in the Green Bay area that fit the criteria and were labeled as cults. Two of them were on the FBI watch list, so I looked into the third one first.
Justice’s Warriors was considered to be a group of people that were involved in helping people who had been hurt, deal with letting the past go.
They didn’t really accept members unless something tragic had happened to them. There wasn’t really any proof of an appeal for money with this particular cult. They were known for sitting with members during a trial and helping to picket or harass those who had wronged others for months or years after the event had occurred.
It seemed to be a local chapter, but there was no mention of ending their lives or comments from family suggesting they were responsible for loved one’s deaths. Since the FBI had looked into them, it made the material much easier to search since I could use my police ID as an access code to sort through their information.
Night of the Living Sacrifice’s motto was more about being a vampire sacrificing your life to follow the night. Daytime movement was restricted, and those in the cult could only have jobs that started after the sun went down. It just so happened that we had longer nights for about nine months of the year, but what did they do when the sun didn’t set until after 10 p.m. in the summer?
I marked them off, because while the word ‘sacrifice’ had been used, it didn’t seem that they were killing themselves to be a part of this particular group.
The FBI had labeled the last group as a potentially worrisome one on their list. Their main leader, Simon, had the motto, “Simon says…” His members simply walked off a cliff if he said to.
Now, this sounded more like it. He had a large following and lived in a fairly nice home. Those who lived with him changed on a regular basis, but the amount of comments concerning deaths pointed in his direction.
The timer dinged on my food before I could dig any further, so I set it aside while I watched the basketball game to help clear my head.
I must have been tired, because when I opened my eyes it was one in the morning, and something brushed against the screen of the window.
Without a thought, I grabbed my gun and raced out the front door, but all I could see was the wind blowing. Nothing else moved in the night, and I was beginning to think I was losing my mind when I saw what I thought was a footprint in the dirt under my window.
Whoever had been watching me was gone. I wouldn’t say that I was overweight, but the older I got, the harder it was to move as fast as I did when I was ten years younger.
Back inside, I locked the door and turned most of the lights off as I went to the kitchen. Even if they were only watching at this point, it was still creeping me out, and there wasn’t any reason for it except that I was the lead on all the suicides that had been cropping up over the past few days.
Fully awake, I made a pot of coffee and sat at the table, ready to dive back into my research. There wouldn’t be any sleep for me tonight.
***
Unsure if what I’d seen the night before had been real or not, I double checked all the locks and windows before heading into work. We’d had snow again, and any evidence was gone, but I was willing to bet that I was right. They hadn’t made me a detective based solely on my good looks, and I was going to trust my gut on this one. It was time to call my friend, who would hopefully believe me.
“Ryan, this is Jesse. I know we haven’t talked in a while, but I’ve got a case that’s really bugging me. I hope that you get a chance to holler at me soon because I need to try some ideas out on somebody. Anyway, when you get this, just give me a call.”
I put down the phone, frustrated. I really needed someone to vent to, and now it was going to have to wait while I went on some interviews for follow-ups.
Visiting the mothers of the men wasn’t going to be easy, but it had to be done since there had been another body discovered after I’d gone home, which the Chief hadn’t notified me of until I got there this morning.
I figured I’d work backwards and start with the the man that died on Sunday. Mrs. Kim was waiting for me when I arrived.
“I’m Detective Jesse Burns. I’m so sorry for your loss. What can you tell me about the last time that you talked with your son, David?”
Mrs. Kim’s face barely moved as she held herself together. “He didn’t seem weak when he was talking to me Saturday. We discussed the plans for his birthday, like if he wanted to have a party or a family dinner. That’s why I knew that something must be wrong because he wanted a family meal, and he didn’t even show up.”
“I know how difficult this must be for you, but did David have any financial problems? Anything that might have caused him to take his own life?” I tried not to move on the small sofa that she’d gestured to for fear that I would break it.
“No. David was always the strongest of my children and never showed any weakness when difficult things came his way. He would have found a way to fix the problem. He wasn’t poor. He will be missed, but he was just too weak for this life after all.” She tightened her lips after speaking.
Maybe I was missing some important part of their culture, but it seemed that she was trying to keep something from slipping out.
“Now, Mrs. Kim, we don’t normally suggest this, but could he have any enemies that would have wanted him dead?”
“My David? He didn’t have enemies. He was always so helpful to others. Why, everyone in the neighborhood was so sad that he got his own place a few years ago, but he came back every week and did the little things that others couldn’t do for themselves.”
“Thank you for your cooperation. If we find out anyth
ing else, we’ll let you know.” I stood and showed myself out, wondering what I was missing.
Getting into my truck, I had the nagging feeling that someone was watching me as I completed some of the interviews and went back to the station to do some more research. Each of the possibly murder/ suicide victims had a healthy bank account, and showed no signs of previous traumas that would send them into a spiral that would cause them to commit this kind of act. Each of the men were model citizens who were more inclined to help others and be artistic than they were to become financial giants. They did seem to be a little clingy, which might account for the fact that they all seemed to be Momma’s boys. There were no medications that they were taking that would cause these side effects either.
Each of their family members that I’d interviewed so far had answered the questions in the exact same way. No one was out to get them. They hadn’t shown signs of depression or deviated from their routines in the least.
I scratched my head in bewilderment. So far, none of them had a serious girlfriend that I could find, but most of them were still in their early twenties and thirties.
After a late lunch, I decided that I should check in on Charlie to see how he was doing with his arm.
“Hey. Charlie going stir crazy yet?” I asked Lucy when she answered.
“Not yet, but he might be soon. He’s already adjusted to playing video games with just one hand, though.”
“Didn’t take him long,” I chuckled. “Are you sending him back to school tomorrow?”
“Yeah. He wants to get back and show his friends the cast and have them sign it.”
“It makes sense. He’s got a badge of honor. He can tell all his friends about the horrors of his injury. I’m looking forward to having them again this weekend. We’ll do something fun that doesn’t require two hands.”
“Well, just make sure that you don’t do anything that could be considered dangerous, okay?”
“Sure. We’re going to take it easy. Call me if you need anything.”