I drop the kids at Sonja's with their sleepover things and then Lumen to her work. There's a tangible layer of silence when the car is empty. Just me and my shadow, I grin to myself.
The thoughts of last night are replaying in my head. Lumen wasn't weird with me when she woke up, the opposite in fact. She kissed me gently and hugged into my arm until the alarm, and the noise from the kids, said we had to go. Between us, I felt we had taken another step. How many of these steps to the new me will there be?
I am conscious of the people around me as I drive to the station. Truck drivers, bus drivers, moms taking their kids to school, joggers, old people, dog walkers, all harbouring, hiding their inner monster. I listen to them shouting at each other in traffic, yelling at the kids to shut up, pulling along their pets and something clicks. I'm right aren't I? They could all do what I do, if they let themselves.
"Does this mean you don't want to let go of those urges, Dex?" Harry asks me, his mouth barely moving like he doesn't want to own the words. I glance at him as I swing the SUV into the police parking lot.
"I don't know," I sigh and sit back in my seat, watching Quinn and Deb enter the building without seeming to notice I am there. "It'd be nice not to have this internal countdown, the fear of being caught but..."
"But then there'd be no thrill either, would there Dex?" Harry turns to me and he frowns. I frown too, imagining a life without that thrill, that exhilarating sense of being utterly wrong. I nod. I hear him sigh as I grab my bag from where he was sitting a second ago.
Masuka is in the little lab, his head down over a microscope when I get out of the elevator. He glances up at me, smiles thinly and goes back to the work he is studying. Angel waves me over before I can get to my chair.
"Hey, Dex! Socio, will you try to talk to Vince? I am worried about the little guy." He purses his lips and shakes his head sorrowfully. "I had to swing by and pick him up this morning, Maria sent me to fetch him. I think even she is worried." I glance to LaGuerta's office where she is sitting at her desk, looking over at the forlorn figure of Vince Masuka. I nod and pat Angel on the shoulder. He puts his hand over mine. "Gracias, Dex."
I make my way to the workstation, careful to let Vince know I am approaching, he looks jumpy.
"Hey, Vince! Good morning! Wasn't that victory last night just great? Did you see that blonde girl from 'Filing Foxes' checking you out?" he glances up, again the pale smile.
"Yeah, but I thought it would be best not to attract any attention to myself, you know, with Su Lin about?" He actually mimes slashing with a sword. I wince. Vince Masuka turning down female company? This is bad. I scoot my chair over to him.
"Hey, if it's her, we'll find her. I promise. But I have to say, Vince, that I've been through all those samples and none of them come up as a match for her." He looks up at me and bites his lip. He bends towards me and lowers his voice to a theatrical whisper.
"Look, I'm only asking you because you're a friend and... well, you're the best blood guy in the state." I look at him, eyebrows raised. "You are, I've said it before! Anyway, in that plastic bag are some... DNA samples, from Su Lin. Will you run them against the evidence from the crime scene? Deb said you had some samples which were not identified by the tests from witnesses." I nod again and glance nervously at the bag Vince is pointing to. What the fuck is in there?
Cautiously I pick up the bag, it feels light but that's no indication of safety. I pat Vince on the shoulder and he nods morosely. I take the bag into my little lab and turn on the lamp, close the blinds.
I shake the contents of the bag onto a sheet of paper. To my relief it seems to consist of nail clippings and some long strands of hair. I prepare the nail clippings and go to the rack to find the samples from the night club, remembering, when I'm halfway through looking, that I downloaded the findings and I can just use the Mac to find the matches, if there are any.
The nail clippings are ready by the time I get the witness samples up on the screen. A commotion outside makes me prise open the blinds with my fingers. Deb is rushing to the elevator, calling behind her to Angel and Quinn, waving her arm in my direction. It looks urgent.
I'm just saving the nail sample data onto the Mac and grabbing my bag when Angel comes through the door, blinking from contrast of the bright sunlight out in the office to the gloom of my lab.
"Dex, compadre, there's been another samurai murder, Biscayne Point. Another Asian male, or so it seems. So, gotta go." He passes me my bag off the back of the chair and I put it over my shoulder and grab the coffee cup which I've hardly touched since I got in. I take a sip and grimace, ugh, cold.
"Don't worry, Dex, there's a great place for coffee down on Biscayne Point."
"Is Vince coming?" I look to the empty seat where Masuka's jacket and work seem to testify to the fact he hasn't left the station. Angle shakes his head.
"Nope, Maria has him running through the samples from the little girl killer from a week or so back, remember?" I nod. Yes, I remember, I know exactly what happened to him. It's a pointless task for Vince but it might keep his mind off things.
As we drive to Biscayne Point, Angel insists he comes with me this time and comments on the spacious interior of the SUV as he settles himself into the passenger seat; I turn over the new events in the beheadings. Angel throws his hat onto the dashboard and winds down the window.
"So, surely this means Vince's girl is off the hook for these killings? She can't think both men were Masuka, can she?" Angel makes a face to say he doesn't know, he shrugs too. "Surely she'd notice the second guy wasn't Vince, after she fucked up the first killing, she'd notice, right?" Angel nods slowly, sighs.
"It looks that way to me, Dex, but who knows how the female mind works." He sounds tired.
"Things still bad with Maria?" I ask him, astonished at my own interpersonal skills, all this thinking I have been doing seems to be really affecting me. He glances to me, sighs again and nods.
"You know, Dex, I sometimes wonder if man is meant to spend all his time with a woman, you know?" He looks at me and smiles. "Of course, you won't agree, being in the first flush of romance." I smile and shrug a shoulder. The rest of the journey is silent as we both think our own thoughts. Another companionable silence, they seem to be happening more and more often these days.
The area of the beach is fluttering in yellow tape and fenced off with police cars, uniformed and plain clothes cops. In the distance I can see Deb and Quinn, she has her hands on her hips and he's looking down at something. Angel and I walk over to them. Angel flashes his badge and I show my laminate to the cop keeping back the crowd and we duck under the tape.
The body is lying in a gulley made by sea water as it sweeps back to the sea. The gulley weaves and meanders a snaking path to the ocean. The corpse would be lying with its head towards the ocean, if it had a head. There's a deep incision either side of the neck where the blade from the weapon embedded into the sand as the killer swung his or her weapon down.
"Dex, thank fuck! More weirdness. What do you make of this?" Deb points to the stream where it snakes off down the beach. The sand is red, brown red, like rust.
"The blood's run out to sea, well, where it hasn't sunk into the sand." I kneel down and scrape a sample into a jar and put it in my bag. I squint into the sun to where Deb stands over me, her mouth in a thin line, those sunglasses high on her nose as the breeze ruffles her fine hair.
"Is this a pattern? Is this guy, girl, whatever the cocksucker is, killing where the blood runs away?" I stand up and cover my eyes from the sun's glare, tracing the line of red down the beach.
"When's high tide?" I ask and Quinn looks over.
"In forty minutes, you've not got much time to process the site." He looks at his watch and frowns. I nod and kneel down to examine the body.
"Asian male, probably about the same age as the last victim. He's been dead about..." I poke about the body, checking the lividity of the flesh, the discoloration. "Three hours? Was that when the last high tide had just gone out?" I look at Deb; she looks at Quinn, who nods.
"Yep, just as this place was uncovered I'd guess. Do you think the killer knew that?" Quinn looks at me like I'd know inside a killer's mind. I frown.
"Well, it sure looks that way doesn't it? The flushing toilet and now this." Deb waves her hand at the body dismissively and then raises her voice. "Right people, let's get this fucker processed before the goddamn tide washes us all out to the ocean. If my brother wants something, he gets it. Is that clear people?" Various uniformed cops and lab geeks look at me and nod. I put up my hand, Deb cocks an eyebrow.
"Can I get a coffee?" She sighs and rolls her eyes but then trudges over to the nearest uniform and I see her pointing at the coffee stand. I go to work with the camera.
"See this?" I poke the victim's wrist with the tip of my pen, there's a small black mark over the join where his hand meets his arm. Angel and Quinn bend low to have a look.
"A tattoo? Prison tattoo?" Quinn crouches over the red sand, wobbles and falls on his knee, he curses. "Fuck! Sorry Dex." I look up at him, his pants are dyed red and the crime scene is disturbed.
"Hey, what's this?" Angel is pointing to the sand which has been dislodged by Quinn's fall. I stand up and move down the body to see what it is Angel is pointing at.
It's a cross, a small silver crucifix to be exact and, for a moment, my mind wanders to the prayers I've heard Sonja saying to Harrison before he goes to sleep. I hook the cross out with my pen; it's attached to a snapped silver chain.
"That's not Asian," he says, frowning and squinting at the jewellery as it twirls in the sunlight. "Well, I don't think so." He looks at me and shrugs. "It looks like one my mother used to wear, very Catolica." I nod, it makes sense, but nothing else in this crime scene makes any sense at all. Angel and I watch the cross spin on the end of its broken chain. He holds the evidence bag and I drop it inside.
"So, the tattoo? Is Quinn right? Is it a prison job?" I ask as I look back at the body. The stained sand gives the disturbing impression that there is a long red snake attached to the stump of the neck. It's like something out of those medieval European pictures of hell. Angel purses his lips.
"Maybe, it doesn't look like any prison tattoo I have ever seen though. What about you, Dex? Any ideas?" I don't have much experience with prison tattoos, only the ones I've seen on my victims and on my bio dad, Joe Driscoll. This doesn't look like them, although it is crudely done. "What is it?"
"It looks like a bowler hat with a feather in the brim. Who gets that drawn on their body forever?" I quirk an eyebrow and look up at Angel, who just shakes his head.
"Some people are crazy, amigo. I'm going to see where that coffee got to, ok?"
"Right, I'll get some more shots and meet you by the car. Not much more for me to do here when the guys have already taken sand samples. Is Deb having the body moved to the morgue?" He nods and wanders away across the beach. I stand, head cocked, looking down at the body.
"What happened to you, huh?" I mumble to the dead man but he's not telling. I snap some shots of the angle of the body, a few of the wound in the neck and the strange tattoo on the inside of his wrist. Then I pack the camera carefully back into my bag and make for where Angel is standing with Deb.
"Anything new?" Deb asks as I take the coffee from Angel with a nod of thanks.
"Well, there's that symbol on his wrist and the crucifix." Deb's eyes go wide.
"The what? Did you say a fucking crucifix?" She is standing up straight, all her body alert. I look at Angel but he doesn't seem to know anything, I nod. "Mother of fuck!" Deb paces a few steps away and then is back in my face. "This crucifix, fancy? Detailed?" I nod again and reach into my bag and show her the evidence. She shakes her head.
"What is it?" Angel asks, looking at her and then me when she doesn't answer. Deb glares at him.
"I found one of those, outside the night club. I didn't think anything of it, it was way over where we parked the car so..." she reaches inside her shirt and pulls out the same cross on a silver chain.
"You stole evidence?" I say, shocked. Deb punches me hard on the arm, I wince. "Ow!"
"Fucker! I didn't know it was evidence, Dex! I just found it on the ground. I asked the night club owner if it was his. Shit!" She unclips the cross and holds it up. We all look at it; the sun catches the twisted form of Jesus as he dies in agony. Nice. I hold up the evidence bag, the crosses are identical.
"We'll have to test this one for prints," I say, shaking the bag. "Yours will be too clean by now to find anything but your own." Deb nods, she looks annoyed with herself. I don't blame her.
"Ok, I'm done here," I say, closing up my bag and drinking my coffee. Deb nods morosely and Angel smiles.
"Hey, have fun at that thing you're going to tonight, Dex." Deb perks up when she remembers my engagement this evening. I frown and then realise she thinks I'm off to some bondage party. I grimace.
"Oh yeah, thanks Deb. I'll tell you all about it tomorrow, huh?" She shakes her head vigorously, I laugh.
All the way back to the station I think about the body on the beach, the one in the nightclub. Both decapitated, both with the blood washing away, crosses, tattoos. I need to research that image of the bowler hat and check if the nightclub victim had anything similar. There is something niggling in the back of my head but I can't pin it down.
Masuka isn't at the lab when I get in. There's a note from him saying he went home early so he's 'not following a pattern anyone can trace'. I sigh; this is getting out of hand. We've got to solve this crime before Vince goes completely insane.
I look at my watch, no time to process the crucifix right now; I put it on a rack next to the sand samples and run my shot of the tattoo through the police database. It looks like it's going to take all night to sift through all the gang symbols, icons and esoteric alphabets. I wish we had access to the FBI records. Agent Lundy would have had this information in minutes.
I leave the Mac running and turn off the lights. I'll check the results in the morning. I'd better hit traffic or I'll be late for my evening with Lumen. The thought of us out, stalking, together, gets my blood pounding, makes me feel lightheaded and giddy. I wave cheerily to LaGuerta as I get into the elevator. She waves back, laughing, obviously amused to see me so perky.
When I pick Lumen up outside her apartment she has a bag with her and she's holding a pair of strappy high heeled sandals. It's not her usual footwear and I raise my eyebrow and she laughs as she leans over to kiss me.
"They're part of my outfit, so I blend in tonight." She grins at my startled expression. I suppose I hadn't realised that this would be so different for her. I'll be wearing my checked shirt, my baseball cap, baggy pants and sneakers, an outfit which will help me blend in at 'Judy's Bar and Grill', not the most salubrious of venues. But Lumen will have to fit in too. Her clean, respectable, kindergarten worker look is not going to ease her entry into the confidence of Tina DiMarco. Female Serial Killing 101, I'd never imagined it could be so complex.
"What else is in there?" I ask, raising an eyebrow in mock alarm. She laughs and holds the bag to her chest.
"You'll have to wait and see." I look ahead at the road but all I can see are those sandals and I'm wondering what she might wear to accompany them.
Thanks for all the reviews and votes of confidence! You guys are fab! It's great to know so many people are still enjoying 'Season 6' with me. Keep letting me know what you're enjoying, it makes this more fun to write. Thanks for the vocab for Angel, Lostie17 and thanks for the commas, caps for Angel and keeping me sane VB, love you! Cx