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I had no place getting personal with her.
And I damn sure had no right to be plagued with thoughts of her as I went about my work the next few days. But it didn’t seem to matter what I was doing—going over forensics, working on other cases, chasing down leads—she was always right there in my mind with her pretty face and her easy smile, despite her trauma.
I didn’t have a savior complex.
I’d seen it time and again over the years, cops who got involved with women from crash sites they’d been at, or robberies they’d responded to, even detectives who got with women on cases they’d closed. They got off on knowing they were the ones who’d ‘saved’ the girls.
The problem was, that wasn’t a solid foundation for a relationship. I’d watched all of them fizzle out eventually.
I wasn’t looking for someone to save. I wanted someone to build a life with. As equals.
So I really didn’t understand my sudden nonstop thoughts about one of the victims of an active investigation I was working on.
“Wells, you’ve been looking for me?” a voice called, snapping me out of my thoughts of walking down the rows of dog pens at the pound with Mari at my side.
Swiveling my chair, I saw Gawen striding down the line of desks toward me.
It was Gawen, our resident profiler since he somehow managed to get a bachelors in psychology while working his way through being a beat cop, then eventually becoming a detective as well.
Gawen was tall and fit with neat, wheat blond hair, green eyes, and a more relaxed carriage than most cops you came across.
“You’ve been a hard man to get in touch with,” I said as he dropped down on the other side of my desk.
“The chief volunteered me for doing some sensitivity training,” Gawen said, shaking his head. “I’ve fallen behind on everything. I hear you have a lead on the Sadist case.”
“Well, a survivor,” I said. “She did give us some information we haven’t had before. But since no one has survived an encounter with him before, I wanted you to try to update the profile to let us know if Mari, the victim, is at risk for him coming back.”
“Give me the details. I’ll see what I can do,” he said, leaning back, and listening as I launched into it.
When I was done, he sighed.
“You know, it’s hard. Serial sex crimes are, unfortunately, common enough that there are a lot of variations of outcomes. The profile stands as it is. Mid-to-late thirties, Caucasian, someone likely in a thankless, frustrating, middle-management sort of job. Not powerless, but likely answering to a brow-beating type of boss. Possibly a woman.
“If not a female boss, likely a domineering mom. Someone he cows to. So he takes out his frustrations toward those women on these victims.
“Given the violent nature of the crimes, and his meticulousness about it, I am leaning toward him being pissed that this job isn’t complete the way the others were.”
“So… you think there’s a chance he wants to come back and finish the job.”
“You said he takes pictures, right? All during?” Gawen asked.
“Yeah. Even though he was stabbed twice, he managed to grab the camera on his way out.” It was really frustrating when criminals were smart enough to cover their tracks. How easy it must have been a few decades ago when the general public’s knowledge of forensics was so sparse.
“I think that he looks over those images a lot. Likely while masturbating. And having the last photo series unfinished is going to sexually frustrate him to no end. He’s going to feel compelled to finish it, even if his logic will tell him not to.”
“Why not just go for another victim?” I asked.
“Because he put work into this one. A process. An obsession. He would have picked her, stalked her, and then plotted his attack. For weeks, maybe even months. A new, random woman won’t provide the same release as coming back and completing his plans for this victim would.
“But because of the interruption, and because she got the better of him, he would be even more violent with her.”
“It’s… hard to believe that is even possible,” I said, thinking of the torment Madison and Ashley had endured.
“If there’s one thing I’ve learned over the years, it’s that the depravity of human nature truly knows no bounds,” Gawen said with a dark look in his eye. “To answer your question, yes, I think your survivor is in danger. Is there any chance of putting her somewhere safe?”
“She’s not a witness, not really,” I said, shaking my head. “I’ve been advising her on how to set herself up to safely return home. Monitored security system, a dog, flood lights, that kind of thing.”
“You have, have you?” Gawen asked, brows raising. “I missed the news, but can I assume she’s as pretty as the others?”
