AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Fuck.
Where was the pattern?
Two years ago, a man had washed ashore in Tampa. To any regular observer, he’d fallen overboard off of a luxury cruise and been mauled to death by sharks. It took an act of God to have the coroner declare it a homicide.
But it wasn’t the nature of the death that got me. It waswhohe was.
A Louisiana Senator, Richard Higgens. Well known playboy and philanderer, and rumored pedophile. If it wasn’t for the rapid fire spread of the rumors in the underground circuit, I wouldn’t have even noticed his death at all.
I pulled another picture free. This one from last year.
Jonathan Loren. Professor of Antiquities at USC. Renowned for his research and contributions to his field of study, but a documented child abuser. His death had a little more grit to it. He’d crashed his car over the side of a mountain, catching fire and incinerating his corpse to a crisp. But there were signs of torture that weren’t consistent with a fire.
However, there’d been no other evidence to suggest any foul play. So, the coroner dismissed the distressed bones to the fire and the crash.
The most recent case drew my eye. Now this one was the game changer.
Randy Bergen, jack of all trades and master of a construction conglomerate that made millions. Someone who, I’d recently learned from Sullivan, had partaken in an illegal prostitution ring. The man had been great in business, but shit at covering up his tracks. He probably never imagined he’d be bludgeoned to death by a beautiful, delicate beauty.
Although…there was something I was missing, because the woman couldn’t have used that kind of blunt force, which was why she must have been some type of accomplice.
Then again, my unsub would never have left the body there like that in such a blatant, sloppy manner. No, there was something here, and I just needed a little more time to figure out what it was.
Tossing the Rubik’s cube on the chair in the corner, I stood up and stretched, cracking my neck from side to side.
My phone buzzed on the desk, and I bent closer to see who it was, my heart thumping heavily. This number was for work only. Work associates I’d met along the way that I’d asked to keep me in the loop on anything—any-fucking-thing—that smelled of this unsub.
“Morgan,” I clipped, answering the line, hoping there wasn’t a slur to my words.
“This is Officer Holiday. I met you two years ago while working on the Young case.” There was a pause as the earnest, sweet Holiday waited for me to acknowledge who she was.
I never forgot a face. She had a particularly memorable one, with legs for days and a double D bust. Not that I fucked her. I didn’t shit where I worked. All the same, she was rather impressionable and aspired to bigger and better things than the low man on the totem pole.
“I remember exactly who you are. Tanya Holiday,” I said in little more than a purr. The woman had had stars in her eyes anytime I spoke to her, so who was I not to play into that fantasy?
“I can’t believe you actually remember me,” she said through a giggle.
“Of course,” I responded, almost feeling her ego puffing up down the line. “What’s going on? A similar case?”
“Nothing similar in regards to the victim, but the body recently found is suspected of being connected to the local crime organization. I know you’re really only interested in similar cases, but I thought this might be of value to you. Someone like this has to be connected to other, more serious crimes.” Her voice lost its school girl giddiness, but gained a level of excitement that only came with discovering something substantial in a case.
From what she was saying, she hadn’t actually discovered anything other than a rumor, but fuck if I wasn’t getting excited too.
“What’s the name?” I balanced the phone between my ear and my shoulder as I grabbed my shoes and slipped them on. I was already in slacks and a button down, so loafers it was.
“Danny Lions. I heard Cap saying this man has been photographed with some of the well-known criminals in the area. From looking at the crime scene, it was clearly an execution.”
With an extra pep in my step, I snagged the sports jacket off the back of the chair and then left my room. Tanya worked in a small suburb about two and half, maybe three hours from where I was currently camped out. I could get there before dinner and check out the crime scene. Suddenly, I was feeling like it was my lucky fucking day.
“You did good. Text me the address and I’ll come check it out. If there’s any connection, I’ll make sure you get the appropriate credit.” Shit. I needed to clear my desk before I could leave. Pivoting, I raced back to my room.
“Just one thing,” she said, her voice wobbling slightly. From fear, or maybe nerves?
“And that is?” As quickly as I could, I reorganized the pictures into a neat stack and stuffed them in the folder I’d been carrying them around in. I had a much more elaborate system at home, but this set of copies was for traveling and there was only so much I could do to keep them separated and in a specific order.
“Don’t tell Cap I called you. Unless this pans out to be something greater, let him think you caught wind of this from some other source.”
I grinned at my feet, propping one fist on my hips. A rogue detective. Exactly what I needed to keep this investigation going. If left up to the local departments, they’d never call in the FBI, and then so many unsubs would end up walking because the fucking idiots couldn’t pick up on the pattern.
