Thanks to my wonderful beta team of ShowtunesJesus and Ragsstone. Enormous hugs to Rags for saving my bacon at the ninth hour. Thanks also to Bower_of_Bliss for her continued support in all things.

SMeyer doesn't read this stuff, so I don't know why I bother thinking up something different to put here each week :P

Chapter 35

Edward

Monday & Tuesday

I stuck the latest picture up on the whiteboard before standing back to survey the composite effect. There were now seven photos there. I didn't even really need to look at the board any more as every single fact was permanently etched in my memory. I knew their names, histories, and characteristics, as well as how some of them had died and where their bodies had been found.

I was upstairs in the Detective Division, where a friend of Jasper's had kindly given us some space to set out our investigation findings. Maria had been his senior and partner before she was promoted. She still had something of a soft spot for him, and although it was totally one-sided, Jasper was not beyond using the awareness to aid our little sideline. Maria seemed content with the arrangement, too, since she and her partner, Stefan, would gain a heads-up on our progress and potentially be assigned to the case if it proceeded to anything more. During our trips to update the board, Stefan would often drift over for a chat. Nearing retirement age, he had a never-ending supply of fascinating anecdotes about famous cases he had seen and played a role in over the course of his long career. More than once, he nostalgically commented how our investigation reminded him of the hunt for Ted Bundy, who had also targeted young women he found on campus.

Of the pictured girls, Bella was the only one still alive. I had a file full of missing girls who fit the loose parameters we were using to narrow down our search field, but there would be no way to link them to the other women on our board unless they turned up dead. I was more than happy for these cases to remain as "maybes." At least that way, there was still hope for them.

When I started searching the ViCAP database to look for crimes similar to Bella's, there had been were so many that I had been swamped with cases for comparison for a while. Then I remembered something from a seminar I had attended a while ago. The speaker had spoken of how serial killers and pedophiles selected their victims. Availability, vulnerability and desirability.

Thinking about it helped focus my attention and allowed me to start finding similarities between the victims.

Of the dead girls, the most immediately noticeable thing was how similar they all looked. They shared a slight build and were all quite petite. That body type in itself wasn't unusual; assailants rarely chose a target bigger or physically stronger than themselves. It was much easier to intimidate and subdue someone when the physical advantage was yours.

Every one of them had long hair. Although the exact shade varied slightly from victim to victim, their hair color stayed within a range of mousy brown to almost black. All the girls had dark eyes, too, mostly brown or hazel. Those characteristics seemed to be what this perp found desirable.

Each had been described as having a very introverted personality, and "timid" had been attached to more than one. They all had limited family and friends and, as a result, were somewhat socially isolated. That element made them vulnerable to predation and less likely to be immediately missed.

Another striking similarity was that their remains had all been recovered either from water or very close to it. From my research, I had learned that roughly seventeen percent of homicide victims nationwide were dumped in water. It was a method favored by organized killers, as opposed to the disorganized and more impulsive murderer. Running water eliminated a lot of trace evidence, leaving little or no link to the scene of the victims' demise, which in turn reduced the amount of proof that tied a perp to the crime.

In our unique location, there was an abundance of convenient access points to water. With some basic scouting and observation, a suitably motivated person could easily find places that were secluded enough to reduce the possibility of being observed during the dumping of a body. One or two deceased individuals were pulled from various waterways in our vicinity every month, but most were the victims of accidents or drowning rather than homicide. The fact that the bodies of six women had been located in various waterways had caught my attention, especially as we had focused our attention on data from the last three years only. Maria had suggested we restrict our time parameters to more recent crimes to begin with, both as a means of utilizing reasonably fresh information and keeping our workload manageable. This similarity was not flagged as important by ViCAP, though, and to be fair, not all of these cases had come from there. Several bodies were in too poor a condition for a cause of death to be determined, which was a mandatory information field when entering data into the program. Additionally, due to the extensive amount of area surrounding the waterways, there were seven police jurisdictions involved. Each zone, while bound by the same laws and professional requirements, operated in subtly different ways, which reflected on the skill and professional philosophy of its staff and administrators.

Using water as a method of body disposal was notoriously unreliable. In general, corpses could be very heavy. Even a hundred-pound petite woman could be hard to move when the body offered no cooperation. There was an irrefutable truth in the term "dead weight." If tethered to something providing sufficient weight, a body could be successfully submerged in any pool of water deep enough. After that, numerous variables came into play, such as water temperature and depth, tides, watercraft activity, predation by crustaceans and fish, and the condition of the body itself when put into the water. Part of the process of decomposition was the accumulation of gasses within the body. The trapped air created buoyancy. As soft tissue putrefied, rope or chain tethers might loosen or detach altogether. The combined result was that the body inevitably resurfaced, increasing the chance of discovery and the opportunity for forensic assessment.

Several of the victims in our grouping had been recovered in a condition sufficient for further examination. Exsanguination, or excessive blood loss, had been listed as a cause of or contributor to their deaths, but that diagnosis wasn't uncommon in violent death. Being shot or stabbed frequently led to significant and often fatal blood loss. Unfortunately, some of the bodies had been too decomposed to yield much in the way of useful forensic information.

Of the three bodies where an autopsy was able to be performed, all had shown signs of penetrating injury caused by a sharp instrument, most likely a knife of some sort. One victim had several deep wounds to the carotid artery in the neck and both femoral arteries in the inner thigh. The other two had multiple stab wounds, but they were in different patterns across each body and were made by different weapons, which made it more problematic to link the two crimes. Although not unheard of, most established serial killers employed very similar methods and tools in the execution of their victims.

The most significant common factor for me, though, was that each one had a tie to the university−the same one that Bella was due to return to in a matter of days. I was sure this was how the stalker found his victims and how he identified their availability. This link was what kept me searching and examining every detail, desperately trying to find any clue that could identify the protagonist.

Nettie Parker was the first victim and the oldest at twenty-three. She had been a junior accounts clerk in the finance department. Lucy Romano, aged seventeen, was the daughter of a woman who ran a cafe on campus. She had occasionally visited her mother at work, sometimes spending a whole shift there, working on her homework at a table tucked away in the corner. Eighteen-year-old Charlotte Gordon lived with her elderly grandmother close to the campus and walked her dog through the extensive grounds several times each week. Annette Reed had been hailed as an up and coming musician. Although only seventeen, she had played the piano in music eisteddfods in the university's performing arts center at least twice a year. Viktoria Petrovska was the most recent victim, her body having been recovered from a river the previous day, where it had wedged against a pylon supporting the railroad bridge above. The twenty-year-old modern languages student had been on an exchange program from a foreign university. Besides Bella, she had also been the only other current student.

The connection to the university was considered tenuous at best by our sergeant, considering that it had somewhere in the range of forty thousand students, and some thirty thousand direct employees. Many more people passed through the grounds every day. It seemed more than a random coincidence to me, though.

As far as we had been able to ascertain, all the victims had vanished somewhere in the late afternoon or early evening, and most had disappeared late in the week. Five of the seven had disappeared over a holiday long weekend or just before a vacation break. The more I thought about it, the firmer my gut feeling was that the perp was definitely some sort of university employee.

I had also been reading a lot about geographical profiling. Most people were aware of behavioral profiling, especially as so many crime shows on television seemed to use this as their primary method to identify a potential perp. Geographical profiling was another useful investigative methodology where crime locations were analyzed to determine a point of significance for the offender, such as a primary residence or place of employment.

Although we had recovery sites for each victim, aside from Bella, we had no idea where these girls had been kept and assaulted. A large map took up half our board, with little red dots highlighting the sites of recovery, and green circles or dots showing where the victims had disappeared. So far, the site of abduction was merely speculation in almost all cases. That fact still shocked me no end−that in a bustling and busy city, people could just disappear off the streets without any witnesses. I was more inclined to think that bystanders often caught glimpses of events that they did not think were significant, or were too selfish or scared to involve themselves in. Most of our victims had disappeared within a ten mile radius of the university campus−another tie that strengthened my conviction that someone from there was involved.

Despite the parallels between victims, something about Viktoria's death nagged me. While her hair was long and brown, the color was artificial and conveniently provided by a bottle. Her natural color was fire-engine red, a trait she apparently hated and had disguised for some time. Hers was also the only body wrapped. She had been found rolled in a carpet, which had been tightly trussed with rope. She was also fully clothed. While a couple of the others had been partially dressed, the remaining victims had all been naked. Even Bella had been found in a state of undress, clad only in underwear that was not her own. The inclusion of the rug was a bit of a forensic windfall, as it had a thick pile perfect for trapping fibers, hairs and other helpful matter.

That sort of post-mortem behavior—protecting and leaving the victim's original clothing intact—usually indicated that the perp had some tie or familiarity with the victim. It was a development that would be helpful for our investigation, since Viktoria knew very few people. She had boarded with a Russian couple who were both lawyers and apparently were friends of her family. The couple worked long hours and rarely spent time at home. They weren't aware of Viktoria having any regular friends or a boyfriend. The team assigned to investigate her death would be interviewing her classmates over the next few days.

As her case was clearly a homicide, it had been delegated to the detectives. Alec was usually a pretty easy-going guy, but his new partner, Jane, had only recently passed the exam and won her promotion. There was always fierce competition when an opening became available, and being mindful of this, Jane closely guarded every development on their cases, working aggressively and obsessively to apprehend their perps. While in practical terms this meant her efforts would work to our advantage, it would be like pulling teeth to find out any inside information. As Jasper's classmate from the academy, she saw him as potential competition and hated him from the first time they had met. This meant Jasper would have to work his inside contacts in a more circuitous route than he usually took.

The university had been as helpful as they were able. We had lists of employees, class timetables, students, and even the names of every delivery service utilized by anyone connected with the university. It was a never-ending task of cross-referencing and checking, a job that seemed to get bigger and bigger the more we delved into it. All new teaching staff had to undergo a background check as part of their employment, and therefore most had a blemish-free past, criminally speaking. This rule did not universally apply to pre-existing employees, though. Additionally, there were many others coming into contact with students as well, such as in the food and service sectors, who were not as vigorously screened.

The DNA that Bella had managed to collect when she was attacked in the hospital had been a dead end as no match was found, which had been a big disappointment at the time. Although we had more victims, it still felt as if we were no closer to identifying the person responsible.

With a frustrated sigh, I returned downstairs to our workstation, planning to cross-reference vehicle registration and types with the university employee register. The perp had to have some sort of car or van big enough to transport his victims. Just as I was logging onto the DMV database, Jasper approached.

"Hey, man, Garrett on the front desk said we have a visitor. Let's go talk to the guy."

"Who is it?" I asked, not really wanting to be distracted, but curious all the same.

"Dunno, but he was asking for us by name."

We made our way to the interview rooms as Jasper referred to a colored message slip to find the right cubicle number. Through the small reinforced glass window set at the top of the door, we could see a large man, who looked to be in his sixties, as he sat next to a diminutive woman. He was clean-shaven; his hair was combed tidily, and his button up shirt and knit cardigan were both neat and spotless. Despite the change in his appearance, I instantly recognized the man.

"Hey, that's the guy we took to the hospital a couple of months ago for sectioning as an involuntary psych patient. You know? The guy that was stuck to his chair?" I looked at Jasper to see if he knew who I was talking about.

His nose wrinkled unconsciously as if remembering the smell rather than the person.

I pushed the door open, and sitting across from the couple, I introduced us both. The woman spoke, introducing herself as Claire, Mr. Jenks' case worker.

"Omar insisted we come see you. As you may remember, he was very unwell when you first met and has been having extensive treatment for his illness since. As he has gotten better, his memory of a particular event just prior to his hospitalization has come to trouble him more and more. His doctor thinks that it's a valid memory and not a hallucination, and is therefore worth reporting." She turned to her charge. "Omar, would you like to relate to the policemen what you saw that day?"

In a low and gruff voice, the man described watching as a van pulled into the mouth of an alley where he was hiding. He told of a male dressed in black clothing and a cape or flowing coat, who grabbed a young woman off the street before shoving her into the van and driving off. From the pocket of his cardigan, Omar drew out a ripped piece of newspaper. The scrap of paper was a report about the discovery of Bree Tanner's body and included her picture. I looked at it, awestruck with the excitement of a break-through, while Jasper started firing questions.

It seemed Omar had been having very paranoid thoughts at the time, hence the reason he had been hiding in the alley. He didn't intervene because he was scared that the "black angel of death" would take him, too. The van he saw was white with some sort of advertising on the side, perhaps even a store or business name, but he couldn't remember really focusing on that at the time. I felt a brief surge of adrenaline, recalling that a van bearing a similar description had been seen in the vicinity where Nettie Parker's body had been found.

Omar knew the girl he saw by sight, since she lived a few buildings away from his own, and he had often seen her walking to and from school. He found the picture reporting her murder a few days before when using an old newspaper to wrap kitchen scraps in while he was still in the hospital, and was convinced this was the same girl he had seen. It had taken a few days for the doctors to be sure of the authenticity of what Omar was remembering.

Jasper pressed for an address of the scene, which Omar remembered as being close to his home. Omar assured us that it was accurate; he had been a postman for many years and took in addresses and mailbox numbers by habit. It was not far from Bree's home, if I remembered correctly. Best of all, he was able to give us a limited description. The man he saw was of medium build, shorter than Omar, and had shoulder-length black hair. He was quite certain of this, too, recalling being somewhat surprised that the Angel of Death was not built to more impressive dimensions. The abductor's hair had been unbound and obscured his face, so we didn't have any features or an age estimate to work with.

Later, as I sat furiously scribbling notes while Jasper showed our visitors out, I couldn't help but think back to what Bella had told me of her recurring nightmare. She kept dreaming that Professor Snape from Harry Potter was trying to kill her. Like almost everyone else with a TV, I had seen the movie trailer. Snape was a man of average height and build with longish, greasy black hair. It was another piece of information that seemed too coincidental to ignore. The difficulty would be convincing anyone else that information from a man being treated for significant mental health issues was a reliable source.

Regardless of its origin, Mr. Jenks' news was valuable. Although we couldn't discard any possible suspect, we would be paying particular attention to males who fitted those physical characteristics. I had previously separated the list of employees into male and female, and spent the remainder of our shift further dividing the list into men with dark hair by cross-referencing names with license pictures from the DMV database.

When we arrived at work the next day, we found we had been assigned to assist with some basic investigation groundwork. We were to sort through some items Alec and Jane had seized during a search in the hope that they would have further evidence to secure an arrest. It seemed that their questioning of Viktoria's classmates had paid off. Her fellow students had seen her in the company of the same man a few times, the unlikely coupling being somewhat noteworthy, since the other person in question was a campus employee. They had brought the man in to help with their enquires and had managed to obtain a search warrant for his home soon after.

As directed, we reported to the forensic department upstairs, and after signing the numerous forms required to record the handover of evidence, we were directed to an empty lab lined with computer terminals. I opened the box we had been given to find a pile of DVDs labeled in neat handwriting with a number and month. Our instructions were simple. Watch and document every person, and compile a list with the date and number of appearances. We had been given no other information to go by−not the location or venue, or what type of footage we would be viewing. With a sense of trepidation and a little anticipation, I put on a set of headphones and followed the computer prompts to run the DVD as Jasper did the same on another computer beside me.

When the images flickered to life on the screen, it took me barely a second to register what I was seeing−or rather, where I was seeing. It was a restroom, a ladies bathroom, judging by the row of stalls and lack of a urinal. My eyes briefly flickered over to Jasper's screen to see if he was viewing a similar scene. His outlook was from inside a stall, the camera floor level and tilted at such an angle to gain a clear view of whomever would be using the toilet.

It looked like we had a kinky voyeur on our hands.

Turning back to my screen, I watched as a young woman came into view before disappearing into a stall. After a few minutes, she emerged to wash her hands and primp in front of the mirror. She reapplied her lipstick, fluffed her hair, and rearranged her bra beneath her shirt, making sure her cleavage was prominent yet even. I picked up a large notepad and referring to the date and time legend in the corner of the screen, documented the arrival and departure time of subject one, also noting the number of the disc. We continued working side by side in silence for a while until I heard a sharp intake of breath from Jasper.

"Hey, Edward? I think it's her, the latest one."

I looked over to his screen and peered closer at the woman who was resituating her clothing. I asked him to rewind the footage again, wanting to be as sure as I could be.

"Yeah, I think it's her, too," I agreed.

It was Viktoria Petrovska. Jasper scribbled on his notepad and highlighted the entry, firing off a brief text message while I got back to work. As far as we could gather, the number on the disc seemed to identify each particular bathroom targeted by the voyeur. Each disc contained several hours' worth of material, and the box contained about twenty discs. During one of our brief coffee breaks, Jasper disappeared for a while, until he finally returned with an update of Alec and Jane's investigation.

James Davis was in his mid-twenties and worked as a sub-contractor with one of the cleaning crews. It seemed that the suspect had admitted to knowing Viktoria after being confronted with reports of the numerous witnesses who reported seeing them together. The man insisted she was his girlfriend, although he stated it was a secret affair. He had said Viktoria hadn't told anyone about him because his boss had made it clear when he first started working that any relationships on the job were strictly forbidden. The suspect was still adamant that the last time he had seen her, she had been very much alive, and had been leaving his apartment. After questioning his neighbors, the detectives had a confirmed sighting of her entering the building, but she had not been seen leaving. Another resident reported sounds of an argument. Alec and Jane were able to get a search warrant for Mr. Davis' home and had found enough physical evidence there to hold him for further questioning. Jasper said he hadn't lawyered up yet, so he suspected Alec and Jane hadn't yet placed him under official arrest.

Sometime later, my eyes were becoming dry and scratchy, and I had the beginnings of a headache when I saw another familiar face. I paused on the image and nudged Jasper. I had been scanning footage marked July. It wasn't taking as long to forward through that disc, as it was taken during the holiday break when most of the students were away. The girls in this one were also younger than those I had seen on the other discs, and when I recognized Bree Turner, I realized why. Bree had attended a school holiday program for high school students, so this had to have been filmed around that time period. Jasper ducked downstairs to fetch some other photos we had on file to confirm it was her, while I went to sit in his chair to wait. Leaving my own monitor paused on the image of Bree, I resumed fast-forwarding through empty footage on Jasper's computer to pass the time, until the next girl came into view. A hunched woman dressed in beige and browns darted in, her bent head and her long hair masking her features. As she washed her hands after using the facilities, she briefly looked up into the mirror.

Suddenly, my eyes weren't dry and tired anymore. My heart started thundering in my chest and my palms began to sweat. Every hair on my body stood to attention as I broke out in goose flesh.

That sick fucker had been watching her.

There, in front of me, was the shadow of the woman I loved. My Bella.