He was on his way to the interrogation room, one foot landing on the second step down, when he heard his own phone ring. How he knew it was his desk phone was a mystery to him, as he knew that it would take a trained Labrador retriever to distinguish one phone at the station from another, but he knew it was his. Turning back, growling, he dodged a uniformed officer and that damned detective who always wore a yellow shirt and got back to his desk before the fifth ring and voice mail picked up.

"This is Detective Lassiter."

"Carlton? This is your mother."

Oh dear God.

"…s desk. I can't come to the phone right now. Please leave a message and I'll call back as soon as I can, or whenever I feel like it," he said in a pleasant voice. "Beep."

"I hear you're shacking up with some blonde floozy!"

What?

"I'm sorry, your message could not be understood. It is recommended that you speak English. Detective Lassiter's mother was opposed to him learning other languages, as it would be 'just a sign of weakness'. En dépit de cela, je n'ai encore apprendre à parler français dans un collège."

"Booker!"

"And Detective Lassiter also does not answer to childhood nicknames, such as Booker or Binky, much less threats of being disowned or comments about his choices of lifestyle, hairstyle, clothing, entertainment, relationships, or firearm. If this is Detective Lassiter's mother, she will be aware that when her eldest son requires her thoughts, opinions, ideas or sentiments on any subject, he will draw a pentagram on the floor and chant 'I summon thee' until she appears!" He hung up, swung around and almost collided with Spencer, who eyed him with curious interest. "I don't have time, Spencer."

"Way to talk to Mommy Dearest, Lassie."

"What an apt description – and oddly enough, she had a lot of hangers, too - and I have to go. I'm interviewing Cvitković in five minutes."

"Oh." Spencer swallowed. The man had creeped the psuedo psychic out as much as he had Lassiter, and for once he didn't seem terribly interested in being in the same room with a perp. Carlton wasn't too thrilled about it, either, but it had to be done. "Uh…maybe I'll just…watch from the observation room…see if I pick up anything?"

"Whatever."

"He does have more vowels in his name than you'd expect," Shawn shrugged, keeping up with him as they headed downstairs. "Ever been to Croatia?"

"Nope."

They reached the observation room, and Carlton was surprised to see Melissa Hardwicke already there, drinking coffee and chatting pleasantly with Juliet. He looked over the details of the coroner's report for the last victim, and what he read made his gut wrench again. "You're kidding…please tell me you're kidding…"

"No. We found semen on the body," Hardwicke said grimly.

"On the body?" Carlton asked. He absently handed the folder to Spencer, who read it and actually shuddered.

"Yes. They're doing DNA testing right now." Juliet said. "We could have this case wrapped up soon."

"All right. Are you ready, O'Hara?" Carlton asked, looking at his partner, who nodded.

"Yep. Let's go."

Cvitković had his hands folded on the table, and stared straight ahead, barely even glancing at Lassiter or O'Hara. He just stared straight ahead.

"Mr Cvitković, why do you have scars on your hands?" Carlton finally asked.

"I cut myself working in my yard."

"On what?" Juliet asked.

"I was cutting back my rose bushes."

"In January?" Carlton shook his head. "You cut them back in early February. Not January, and those cuts look fresh."

Juliet looked at her partner, surprised. How did he know anything about roses?

Carlton opened his folder on Cvitković and read through his information. "You live in Little Zagreb, right?"

"Yes."

"You were seen at the mall a few days ago, carrying that same bag, and you were talking to a teenaged girl, and you were doing the same thing tonight." He took a photograph out of the folder and slid it across the table to Cvitković, who barely even glanced at it. "Do you recognize this girl?"

Cvitković only glanced at the photo and swallowed. "I have never seen her."

"Okay. So let's go to the lightning round, shall we? Why were you carrying a knife in your bag?"

"I work in a factory. I use the knife to open boxes."

"Hm."

Juliet glanced at her partner. That 'hm' meant so many things, and she was accustomed to him making that little sound. It usually meant 'enough with the BS – tell me the truth I'll get out the tire iron'. He was writing on his notepad, and she saw 'avoiding eye contact' and 'swallowing'. She waited. Carlton tapped the end of his pencil on the table.

"So you carry this bag with you everywhere? Even to the mall?"

"I ride the bus home from work," Cvitković told him. "I often stop at the mall to walk."

"And talk to the young folks?" Carlton raised an eyebrow.

"I used to be a school teacher."

"Used to be?"

"I…lost my job, in Croatia."

"Why?"

For the first time, Cvitković looked nervous. "I…fondled the breasts of a twelve-year old girl. It is in my police record. I served my time…"

Juliet winced. Carlton just glared at the man.

"That was in Croatia, sir," Carlton finally managed to strangle out. "And as disgusting as that is, it's not murder."

Cvitković still would not meet Lassiter's eyes.

"Where do you work?" Carlton finally asked.

"Horne's."

"Automotive parts, right?"

"Yes."

"And what position do you have there?"

"I am the purchasing agent."

"Do you have to travel a lot for that job?"

"Sometimes."

"Outside Santa Barbara?"

"Sometimes."

Carlton closed the file and stood up. He gestured toward the observation room, and a few moments later McNabb, looking uneasy, came in. "Take Mr Cvitković to a cell."

"Am I under arrest, Detective Lassiter?" Cvitković asked him.

"Should you be?" Carlton asked mildly.

"I would like to contact my lawyer, please."

"Sure."

Carlton was surprised when he saw Cvitković's lawyer – he was a partner in one of Santa Barbara's most prestigious firms. He watched the man walk by, with two lackeys at his side, and head downstairs toward the interrogation room. He looked across at O'Hara, who had recognized the man as well, and she raised her eyebrows.

"He's got Peterson?"

"Looks like it."

"He can afford an attorney like that on a factory workers' salary?"

"I found my divorce lawyer at a strip mall and he still cost me and arm and a leg."

A few minutes later, Vick came out of her office and gestured for Carlton and Juliet to come in. They trailed in, Carlton loosening his tie and Juliet clutching a short stack of folders. Whitestone was already in her office, looking…disgusted.

"We have to release Cvitković."

There was a cold silence in the room as Carlton's back straightened and his eyes narrowed as he thought of General Lee. Karen Vick knew that look, and she glanced at O'Hara, who looked no less pleased.

"Why?" Juliet finally asked, looking at her partner.

"He has…connections."

"Yes. To seven dead teenaged girls," Carlton snapped, his voice hard.

"The semen test came back negative. It's not a match to his blood type." She threw the report on her desk.

"So?" Carlton snapped. "Semen and blood types don't always match."

"The evidence is entirely circumstantial, Carlton. He has connections very high in city government. His sister in the mayor's wife," she said, looking as disgusted as Whitestone, who was now standing beside Carlton.

"You're joking!" Carlton snapped. "Tell me you are joking, Karen. How many people have we put in jail that were mafia members, politicians…which are pretty much the same thing, by the way…and we didn't give a damn who they were?"

"This is far deeper. Cvitković's family is very prominent. They have money, and lots of it. Even more, the Santa Barbara City Council is going to set up a task force to catch the killer..."

"Who is Cvitković," Carlton snarled.

"…and you'll be meeting with the leaders of the task force tomorrow. They will be coordinating neighborhood watches, phone centers for witnesses to call, and so on. Carlton, we don't know he's the killer," Karen said carefully. "It may look obvious, but we tested the knife and it was not in any way connected to any of the girls' stab wounds. Not one."

"So he bought a new knife!"

"Detective, we are releasing Cvitković. Period. Now get back to work!"

Juliet saw her partner's eyes turn black, if only for a second. He drew in his breath, fists clenching and unclenching as he fought to rein himself back in. Finally, he turned on his heel and stalked out of the office, not even slamming the door behind him.

"Can you keep him under control?" Vick asked Juliet.

"Yes. I can."

"Good."

"So what now?"

"We keep looking for the killer," Carlton said. "We don't have a choice. We have to follow process and procedure. Operate within the law." Only O'Hara appeared to pick up on his mock loftiness, however, and she gave him a sympathetic smile. Her partner was no rogue cop. He didn't even like the Lethal Weapon movies.

"Ah, for a post-apocalyptic world," Whitestone said with a wry smile, sipping his margarita.

"So I'd be Mad Max and you'd be…who, exactly?" Carlton asked.

They were eating dinner at a Mexican place a few blocks from the station. Whitestone had never had authentic Mexican food before – his comment about liking Taco Bell had made Juliet stagger away from him, shocked, and had even made Carlton snicker – and so they were treating him. The mild picante sauce was bringing tears to the South African's eyes, and the queso had cleared his sinuses wonderfully. Right now, he was between bites of a burrito grande, his face getting a little redder by the second.

"Uh…the guy who flew the makeshift chopper? The nutjob…?"

"Who looked like that guy from Eureka? The old crazy scientist who had an affair with Jo?" Juliet queried. Chicken taquitos made her stomach protest as loudly as those Occupy Wall Street nitwits, but jalapenos made her happy as a clam. A clam with blistered lips, anyway. Carlton tossed her packets of honey and she started opening them up, unselfconsciously smearing honey on her burning lips. Whitestone watched her, momentarily distracted from his own burning throat and dripping nose.

"Okay, this is getting out of hand," Carlton said. "We're mixing movies with TV shows. And I can't blame him for sleeping with Jo. She's pretty hot, and she has a thing for guns, as I recall."

"You watch Eureka?" Juliet asked, looking astonished.

"Yet again, you seem surprised that I watch anything but Cops. I even sat through Ghost Whisperer once. Granted, the remote control batteries were dead and I couldn't change the channel…"

"Oh my God! You liked it, though, didn't you?" Juliet giggled. He gave her a narrow look. She was clearly a bit tipsy.

"Who let her have a margarita?" Carlton grouched. "I did not like it." No way in hell would he admit that he also liked that show, much less the Twilight novels (not the movies – he had tried one of them and had come close to digging out his own eyes). He thought briefly of the thumps and bangs that were still occasionally heard at his condo, and how Marlowe would wake him up for every one of them, as if expecting him to go through a play-by-play, but he had not yet yielded to Ghost Hunters, nor had he called Jay and Grant for a consultation.

"So Lassiter would be Mad Max, I would be the guy in the chopper, and Juliet would be…" Whitestone offered. "Were there any women in that movie?"

"His wife was killed at the beginning, as I recall," Carlton said. "He was a cop."

"No, she wouldn't be her," Whitestone shook his head.

"Wait, I could be Tina Turner!" Juliet crowed. She was clearly more than a little tipsy, and when she went for her margarita glass, Carlton snatched it away and put it out of reach. She pouted, folding her arms. Had she been standing, she would have stomped her tiny feet and held her breath.

"That's Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome," Carlton pointed out. "And you're not tall or scary enough to be Tina Turner. And we need to get her home. She needs to dry out before we meet with that stupid task force."

"Yeah. Uh…I could take her home. It's on my way," Whitestone said. Carlton eyed the profiler for a moment, wondering. Hell, she could do a hell of a lot worse. In fact, she was doing a hell of a lot worse, dating Spencer.

"Yeah, well…all right. O'Hara? Hey, are you in there?"

"I like martagitas," she burbled happily.

"We know. But martagitas don't like you. Don't let her break her neck, 'cause if you do, I'll shoot you," Carlton said, getting up. Whitestone helped Juliet out of the booth, and she collapsed against his chest, giggling happily. Lassiter rolled his eyes, paid for everybody's meals before Whitestone could object, and left.

"Maybe after you catch this serial killer and I finish my parole, we'll go somewhere, for a vacation," Marlowe said, as he turned off the light and settled in beside her. She had been reading a book – some romance novel that was evidently giving her pointers – and stealing glances at him while he read through the case file for about the millionth time, making notes on a yellow pad.

He yawned and stretched, like a big, rangy cat. "Hm."

She glared at him. He was lying on his back, staring at the ceiling, lost in his own thoughts, and she touched his cheek, which made him jerk, startled.

"You're a little off tonight," she told him, with an affectionate smile.

"What, three times isn't enough?" he grinned at her, and she cuffed his shoulder.

"Did you hear what I said?"

"Something about a vacation."

She moved onto her side and propped herself up on her elbow, looking down at him, her hand on his chest. "Where would you go, for a vacation?"

He finally looked at her, softly illuminated in the moonlight. God, she was beautiful. A beautiful woman, in his bed, perfectly willing to not only lie down beside but let him touch her and love her and care for her, and even seemed to enjoy taking care of him. For some reason that still utterly baffled him, she loved him. She loved him. She even said so, every morning at breakfast, and every night before he fell asleep.

"Well…before, I would go to the station for a vacation. Or…Alcatraz."

"Please tell me you're joking," she said softly, running her fingers through the silver hair at his temple.

"It is a bird sanctuary. Not that I actually looked at the birds a lot, I admit." He shrugged. "I also go to Civil War battlefields, whenever I'm forced to go on any extended leaves."

"That's not quite so…odd, but still, rather…depressing. All those dead young men. All those lost futures, lost dreams. Almost an entire generation, wiped out. The only good thing that came of it was the end of slavery, of course…and the South being the source of America's great warrior class, rock and roll, and wonderful food." She traced the line of his jaw with her fingertip, smiling, catching his raised eyebrow. "Try something a little more cheerful."

"Okay. Okay. Don't tell anybody about this, but…I went to Bimini once."

"Bimini?"

"Yep. Teeny little island in the Caribbean. About seven miles long, seven hundred feet wide. Capital: Alice Town. Lots of shops and bars and several friendly, closely-related dogs. Form of government: vague. Loose goats: yes. Great fishing."

"So you fished in Bimini?"

"No. I sat on the beach and watched the tide roll in and out. Got a nice tan, but it faded away."

"When was this?"

"About eight years ago. Shortly after my wife walked out. The chief of police kind of…demanded I take a vacation, since I was really stressed and had started to get particularly trigger-happy. So I went there, on his recommendation. He had a friend with a little beach house down there and so when I wasn't sitting on the beach, I was sleeping." He let his mind go back to that two-week vacation – the incredible blue of the water, the sea breeze, the complete lack of having any responsibilities or having to think about anything, including his broken heart and his wounded ego. "I'd get up and walk on the beach for a while, then I'd go to Alice Town and eat lunch. Conch. I ate a lot of conch."

"You hate shellfish."

"I like conch."

"Ah."

"I can imitate a conch."

"You can?"

"Mm." He pretended that someone was cracking his skull, then pulled a blank face before finally asking "Now what?" She giggled. "Anyway, I ate a lot of conch and this highly addictive bread that is only made on Bimini. Breakfast, lunch, dinner…sweet, delicious, warm bread. Almost like donuts, really, except better."

"Did you do any sightseeing?"

"Well…there's Bimini Road, and the Fountain of Youth, of course."

"Bimini Road?"

"Yeah. It's just a lot of blocks in the water, at the northern end of the island. They actually seem to form a big 'J'. The theory is that the island was, at some point, Atlantis. But I can't imagine how that would be, because Atlantis was – allegedly – a very busy sort of place and Bimini is not busy. You don't get busy in Bimini. You sleep a lot, and eat a lot. It's not exactly your bustling metropolis. The busiest you get is beating an overly friendly dog off your leg. My theory is that somebody – a giant, maybe - was starting to write a huge phrase out there under the water. Maybe something like 'Just Do It', but he got sleepy and overfed on sweet bread after he finished the 'J' and so he went and sat on the beach and drank banana daiquiris and just kind of…forgot about it. Bimini is the island of sleep and getting up for a nap. Then you eat lunch and take another nap, and before you go out to the bars, you take a nap, then you get back home and take another nap before bedtime. Seriously. I don't recall sleeping so much in my life."

She was laughing in earnest now, amazed. "And what about the Fountain of Youth?"

"Well, I started to go there, but I got so sleepy I took a nap instead. In fact, every morning, I'd wake up and feel so good I'd take a nap. Maybe I should have gone to see that fountain. I wouldn't have half as many of these wrinkles."

She smiled. "So that's a perfect vacation," she said, snuggling against him, slipping her arm across his chest and her leg between his thighs. "Doing nothing at all. Becoming so relaxed you practically melt. Just have somebody come along every now and then and pour a banana daiquiri on you, to keep you alive."

"You know, I'd see the drug dealers sail by in their speed boats that looked like huge marital aids and I actually didn't care. I started to. But I had eaten a bunch of bread and some conch and had a strawberry daiquiri and thought, 'To hell with it. It's not even my jurisdiction'."

"Isn't Bimini owned by the British?"

"I didn't care. The police down there were all asleep. Only a few hundred people live on that island year-round and I don't think they had the wherewithal to hold up a gas station. Okay. It's a deal, Marlowe. When this is all over, we'll go to Bimini. Eat a lot, sleep a lot…"

She smiled into his chest. "Make love a lot."

"Sounds like a plan."

"I love you, Carlton," she whispered.

"…love you…"

The moment Carlton saw the task force – given the lofty title of The Serial Killer Search Unit – he knew things were not going to go well. They were all, to a man, bureaucrats with no experience whatsoever at searching for lost cats, much less murderers. He took a seat in the chair set before the long conference table, and opened the folder. O'Hara and Whitestone took their seats on either side of him. He glanced at his partner and saw she was pretty well alert. Whitestone also looked alert. They also stole brief glances at each other and Carlton wondered what the hell might have happened last night.

"Detective Lassiter, Detective O'Hara, Agent Whitestone," one of the men said, standing up. "You know me – I'm Mayor Ronaldson. This is the City Councilman for the Little Zagreb area, Milos Stanish."

Juliet looked confused, and Carlton felt a flash of annoyance. He knew O'Hara had a headache and wanted to ask for a clarification. Did you say Miles Standish?

The mayor was droning on, introducing other task force members, including what sounded like a neighborhood watch captain for the area in and around Little Zagreb. He wanted to point out that the best thing to do was follow Cvitković around until he slipped up. But since that was clearly not allowed, they had to pursue all other leads, turn over every stone, and slowly go insane as more bodies piled up. He opened the packet of papers and began reading, ears tuned to the mayor, mind skimming over all the evidence that wasn't helping so far.

January faded, gray and wet, into February, and two more bodies were found in fields on either end of Santa Barbara, both within just a mile of malls. Carlton wasn't sleeping well, but at least he wasn't drinking (Marlowe's orders) and his worst vice was too much coffee during the day. He and O'Hara went over every crime scene with the CSI's, and stood in the morgue, listening while Woody told them about every tiny piece of evidence that was found on or around each body. Tiny fibers. Ligature marks. Stab wounds. Semen. Definite signs of rape on some of the victims.

The phone ringing at his desk. Coroner's reports. Woody looking depressed. Spencer and Guster both subdued, unable to make jokes about anything any more, both staring, aghast, at the crime scene photos beside his desk. O'Hara looking haggard, constantly reloading and unloading her pistol, looking haunted as she methodically performed that task over and over until he would tell her to please for the love of God stop.

Standing in the living room of a sobbing couple who had just learned their only child had been murdered. Not having a clue how to comfort them. Waking up in the middle of the night, sweating, gasping for breath.

The nightmares were getting to him. When he did sleep, he saw those girls, or more accurately, what they all could have been and how it was his fault they were all dead, ultimately. Awake, he found that his hands shook sometimes from a combination of cold and nerves. He and Whitestone and O'Hara had formed a solid team, though, and he was relieved to have them both to rely on.

When his own energy flagged, he could count on them both to hold up the slack and keep going. He envied their youth. He also noticed that they stood a little too close to each other sometimes. He wasn't good at nuance or social cues, but he knew at least a little about the rules of attraction: those two were crushing on each other and it was kind of interesting to see, but he wondered sometimes about Spencer.

Even Spencer noted that Lassiter was showing signs of sheer exhaustion. The older man had bags under his eyes, his gait was slow and sometimes a little shaky, and he had a lot more gray hair. He looked almost like he was sick, and even though Shawn enjoyed pestering the detective – who could give as good as he got in their daily zinger matches – he didn't like seeing him so…off.

To see him sitting alone in a bar after work was a definite anomaly these days. Most of the time, as soon as it was time to sign out, Lassiter was gone, back home to Marlowe and peace. But not tonight. He was sitting there at a table, nursing a glass of Jack and looking defeated, which was utterly depressing. Lassiter was many things, good and bad, but beatable was not one of them. The guy was always back on his feet in a matter of seconds, fighting away, no matter what. Doing his duty. Warhorse, indeed, Spencer thought.

There were nine girls now. Nine teenaged girls, all with promising futures, their lives snuffed out by a monster. Shawn knew every one of them was like a dagger through Lassiter's soul, dragging him down and into a dark place he never wanted to see the other man go. He ordered a cup of coffee and took it over to Lassiter's table, took the shotglass and replaced it with the cup.

"Hey, Lassie…enough with the alcohol, eh? Drink some coffee." He sat down across from him, taking in the weariness, the haggard look, and the total lack of light in those startling blue eyes. He was starting to look much, much older than he really was.

Lassiter glared at his bete noir for a moment, eyes not focusing completely. "Marlowe's parents are in town," he said.

"Oh…so that's why you're not at home?"

"Right. She's having dinner with them tonight, and they're all visiting her brother tomorrow."

"Did you meet them?"

"Last night."

"And what happened?"

"They actually…actually liked me. I think they must both be crazy." He took a sip of the coffee, wincing.

"Well, they'd have to be, right, bud?" Spencer grinned, taking the sting out of the statement. "Listen, man, you need to get some rest or you're just gonna fry."

"I don't sleep and I don't rest until that bastard is caught," Carlton snapped. "Don't you see? It's my job to protect the people of this city. Whether I like them or not or if I know them or not, or whatever. It's my job, and I'm not protecting them. Nine of them are dead. Nine."

Shawn nodded. "I know. I know you'll catch him, Lassie. You will."

Lassiter ignored him. "With every body, we get another clue. Another tiny piece of the puzzle that will lead us to the killer, with an airtight case. If it's not the first suspect, then a clue will lead us to the right one. I'd rather find two bodies than none at all, if it will just lead us to the killer."

Shawn glanced around the bar. He knew the place was a well-known cop hang-out, and he didn't recognize anybody there, but still, such a comment could be potentially dangerous.

"Listen, dude, you need to go on home. Let me call you a cab, okay? I'll call Marlowe, too. Tell her to go back to your place, eh?"

"No, she needs to see her family. I suspect they're trying to figure out what she's doing with a guy like me, whether they liked me or not." Carlton rubbed his face. "God I'm so tired. I've never been so tired in my life."

"Then get some rest, dude."

"Can't do that, Spencer. We had a suspect. Andrej Cvitković. I know he's the killer, but he's got the whole damned Santa Barbara city government protecting him, namely, the mayor. He's just a purchasing agent for an auto parts factory and his sister is the mayor's wife…or something…"

"Hm. Well, as I'm not really an actual police detective, I could…uh…keep an eye on Cvitković, right?"

"No one in the SBPD is allowed to even approach him. Not even consultants. The second anybody saw you, you'd be thrown right into the pokey." He snickered. "You could do the hokey pokey with your cellmate, Butch. Nice guy. Into macramé and dismemberment."

Shawn sighed. "Well, then, we'll just keep working, won't we, Lassie?"

"Work, work, work," Carlton nodded. He took another sip of his coffee. "Couldn't you get cream and sugar for this?" he asked wearily. He rubbed his eyes. "Don't worry, Spencer. I'll call my own cab. Go on home, try to sleep, though I know I won't. I've got to meet with that task force again tomorrow. Another report on our 'progress'. Another exercise in futility."

For once, Shawn Spencer was at a total loss as to what to say. He got his cell and called for a cab anyway, watching the depressed detective drink his coffee.

He had a strong, miserable feeling things were only going to get worse.

TBC