I didn't go straight to Kasagi. First, I headed to the centre of Seika, where I knew Chad normally patrolled. I left my car near the park and got out. There was an ice cream van near the children's playground, so I bought two cones, then found a bench where I could sit and wait.

I know it sounds weird that I knew Chad would be passing through any time soon, but trust me; it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out why. There was a group of girls from the local college that always came jogging this way through the park before their classes started at ten o'clock.

I'd picked up on this during hours of morning stakeout round this area when working a previous case. Unsurprisingly, Chad was also familiar with this information and had purposely gotten his patrol route changed. Where there were teenage girls in little shorts, Chad would undoubtedly be there too.

I didn't have to wait long. Reliably perverted, Chad ambled round in less than ten minutes. He looked surprised when he saw me. Bless. He may have been a good cop, but he wasn't exactly the brightest crayon in the box. If any other police officer had seen me there, obviously waiting for them, they'd have been running in the opposite direction.

Not Chad obviously. He plonked himself down next to me. "Hey, Gee. What are you doing here?" See what I mean? That's one dull crayon.

"Hey, Chad," I said brightly, handing him the ice cream cone I hadn't started eating. Was it a total bribe? Definitely. Would he see through it? We'd have to wait and see. "I'm just hanging out, I guess."

"Err, thanks," said Chad, happily taking the cone. Looked like he didn't see through the bribe. I couldn't say I was surprised. "So are you not working right now?"

"No," I sighed, trying my best to look forlorn. I knew Chad was a total guy and a sucker for the whole damsel in distress thing. "There's no cases for me. It's so boring!"

"Aww, cheer up, Gee," Chad reassured, clapping me on the back so hard that I nearly dropped my ice cream. "You'll get a case eventually. You've never been out of work for long."

Three days felt like way too long a time for me. "I know." I lowered my voice. "If only I could get onto the Kasagi killer case..."

Chad's eyebrows pulled into a frown. "Hey, you haven't mentioned that to Gibs, have you? 'Cause he'd totally know I told you." I didn't blame him for being worried about that. Gibson could be scary when he wanted to be.

"Of course I didn't," I lied, glad I'd bought him an ice cream for compensation. "I was actually hoping to do a little investigating myself... Then if I come up with any evidence, I can act like I found out about the killer on my own."

Chad was still frowning, though this time in concentration. "I guess that could work," he said, looking happier. He obviously couldn't see the zillions of holes my plan would have if it had been true. "At least it would keep me out of trouble."

"Exactly," I agreed, acting as if that had been my primary motive the whole time. Okay, I really didn't want to get him into trouble... But my real reason was that I still needed more information.

Our conversation was interrupted by the college joggers passing through. Jeez, everything was bouncing. Didn't they know that sports bras were invented for this kind of thing? No wonder Chad changed his police route.

"Morning, girls," he greeted them cheerfully.

They all started giggling and a few of them said 'hi' in response. Huh. Guess they didn't mind him being a total pervert. That aside, I guess he is a good-looking guy. He's the stereotypical build for a cop – tall and not too muscled, but definitely toned. And with his floppy dirty blonde hair, bright blue eyes and stubbly but perfect face, he could totally pass for a friggin' model too.

"Earth to Chad!" I said pointedly.

"Oh. Sorry, Gee," he grinned sheepishly, pulling himself out of the clouds. "So you're gonna do some investigating on your own?"

"I'm hoping to. But I actually need some more information first," I hinted, not too subtly either.

Chad frowned again. "Is that why you were waiting here for me?" Wow, maybe he wasn't such a dull crayon after all.

"Of course not," I lied again. "I just needed a friendly face. You know I hate not being on a case."

"Well, it's true; you couldn't ask for a better face than mine," joked Chad. I rolled my eyes and he laughed. "So what exactly do you need to know? Though I'm not saying I'll tell you everything."

That seemed fair. Damn, the guy really couldn't resist a compliment. "Just the addresses of the first two murders," I said quickly before he could take back the offer.

"I dunno, Gee," said Chad hesitantly. "It's probably not even worth you going there. Both crime scenes were totally cleared. The one victim's sister is even staying at his place for now. The other one is empty, but I don't think you'll find much now that forensics are finished with it."

"It can't hurt to look around," I insisted. "That's all I need – just these two addresses. Then I promise I'll leave you alone."

"Well, I don't mind you bugging me as long as you bring ice cream again," he grinned. Nevertheless, he pulled out a notepad, jotted down both addresses and ripped the page out for me. "You didn't get these from me."

"Yes, sir!" I gave him a comic salute and he laughed again. "Thanks, Chad. I owe you one."

"You bet you do," he smirked.

I'd probably regret that later. But right now, I was just grateful. I had my lead. I took the last bite of my cone and got up. "So what are you up to now then?"

"Back to work," Chad sighed theatrically, though he still didn't bother moving.

I laughed. "It's a hard life, isn't it?"

"Terribly," he grinned and gave me a lazy wave, seeing I was ready to leave. "Later, Gee."

"Thanks again. See ya!" I called over my shoulder as I started off towards my car.

The address of the second murder victim, Carter Burnham, was closer, so I headed there first. Chad had said that Carter's sister was temporarily living there. Good. It meant I wouldn't have to break in to have a look around. I parked round the block from the address. I prefer to keep most people from seeing what my car looks like. You never know who you may piss off into chasing after you.

I made sure to fish out my crime scene bag. It looks like a normal shoulder bag, but it's full of all my important goodies – plastic gloves, graphite powder, evidence bags, scissors, scalpels, notepads and pencils... Anything that I might need for investigating.

I made my way up to the front door and rapped loudly on the glass. A young blonde woman answered – Carter's sister presumably. She kept one hand on the open door and the other on the door frame. She wasn't gonna let just anyone in. I couldn't blame her. Her brother had been murdered in this house just over than a week ago.

"Can I help you?" she asked cautiously.

I glanced once at her left hand on the door frame. No rings. Hopefully that meant she still shared the same surname as her brother. I'd look like an idiot if I didn't even know her name. "Miss Burnham?" I tried tentatively. She nodded. Great!

I pulled my old police badge out of my shoulder bag. Okay, technically, we're not supposed to keep these when we're not on the force anymore. But they make you look so much more professional than just saying you're a detective. Which makes you more trustworthy. Plus I didn't want any of the police to find out that a female detective had been asking questions. They'd know it was me for sure.

"My name's Rin. I'm a police officer." I flashed the badge at her. There's a trick to doing it so that the person's eyes see enough for their brains to accept it's official, but quickly so that they don't catch the name. I never use my real name on cases, except within the police department. "I'm here regarding your brother's murder. Please accept my condolences."

"Oh." The woman paused, as if she was uncertain how to phrase her next words. "The police have already been over everything and they haven't managed to catch my brother's killer yet. Do you really think you can make a difference?"

"I sincerely hope so," I said truthfully. "I promise you I'll do everything I can."

I felt kinda selfish. I'd been so desperate to get onto this case for my own gain, to satisfy my own boredom... I'd forgotten that the people who were affected the worst by this case were the victims' loved ones. I now felt even more determined to solve this – with or without the help of the police force.

Miss Burnham looked happier with my promise. "Thank you. Please come in."

"Thank you." I nodded graciously and followed her inside. My eyes darted back and forth, taking in the whole room and picking up as many details as possible.

The heavy duty bolt on the door was shiny and brand new. It could only be days old – there were no marks on it at all. There was a thin line of glue around the edge of the window in the door. The glass must have been smashed on the night of the murder. It had obviously only just been replaced.

There were five candles in this room alone. The disfigured shapes of them and the pools of wax on their plates suggested they'd been burning all day long for the past few days. Was Miss Burnham superstitious or did she just like the smell? Not entirely masked by the candles, there was the strong underlying smell of disinfectant. Seemed like she was trying her best to cover the scent of death and loss that forever lingers after a murder.

Loud music was coming from one of the other rooms. I guessed it would be more comforting than the silence of an empty house.

I was pulled out of my analysing thoughts by Miss Burnham asking, "Can I get you anything to drink?"

"No, thank you, Miss Burnham," I declined politely, still glancing around the room.

"Call me Melissa," she smiled.

I met her gaze and smiled back. "Melissa." I couldn't see much else of use in this room. "I'm aware that you've already spoken to the police regarding this, but in your opinion, which rooms were disturbed the most from the break-in?" It was probably easier for her if I referred to the night as a break-in rather than a murder.

"This room obviously. And... it happened in the stairwell. None of the other rooms were touched," Melissa described. "But there isn't any evidence now. Everything was fixed and tidied up."

"Were the rooms in question cleared by the forensics team?" I asked.

"The forensics team cleaned everything and got rid of anything that had been broken," Melissa replied. "My dad came and helped me to fix the door and replace some of the spindles on the stairs."

I nodded. "Is it okay with you if I have a look upstairs?"

"Yes. Please feel free to check whatever you need to," said Melissa. I saw the desperate look enter her eyes again. She wanted this case solved. "The stairs are through there. I won't get in your way. Please tell me if you need anything; I'll be in the kitchen."

"Thank you," I said again before she disappeared through to the other room.

I made my way halfway up the stairs before settling into a crouch so that I could inspect the stair rail. It was easy to tell which of the spindles had been replaced – they were several shades lighter than the rest of them. Four of the spindles were new. Another two above those were cracked and one of the lower ones had started to splinter.

The murder had apparently happened here in the stairwell. From the looks of it, Carter and the murderer had had an altercation on the stairs and one, or both, of them had crashed through the banister.

There wasn't any point in trying to dust for fingerprints. What with Melissa and her dad starting on renovations – not to mention all the police officers and forensics workers that had been in and out – any trace of the murderer would likely have been eradicated by now. Hopefully, forensics had managed to cover everything before the house had been disturbed.

I carried on upstairs and found what was sure to be Carter's bedroom. Bedrooms were a good place for clues. If there was anything at all that would suggest the motive for Carter's murder, then the most likely place it would be was the bedroom. Bedrooms were telling for all kinds of secrets.

I spent a good hour searching through every drawer, every cupboard, every paper tray... You had to hand it to Melissa – I'd been in the house unsupervised for a long time and she hadn't disturbed me once. She either had a lot of faith in me or she just didn't care as long as Carter's murderer was brought to justice. I was betting on the latter.

After I'd searched every nook and cranny, I could see I pulled up the mattress. I hit the jackpot. Stuffed between the wooden slats was a wad of paper. I pulled the pieces out and skimmed through them. Yeesh. They were technically love notes, but I could hardly call them that. Love was supposed to be something good and pure. This was barely borderline porn. No wonder he'd hidden them.

I sighed. My one find wasn't particularly useful. Guess that was a sign for me to go check out the next address and hope I had better luck there. I shoved the smut notes back and replaced the mattress before making my way back downstairs. What looked like the door to the kitchen was closed, so I politely rapped on the wood. "Melissa?"

It took her mere seconds to pull the door open. She looked too hopeful. Damn. "Did you find anything?"

"Nothing concrete," I hedged, not wanting to lie, but not wanting to disappoint her either. I didn't think she'd particularly want to read her brother's 'love' notes.

Unfortunately, Melissa caught my evasion and narrowed her eyes. "What did you find?"

I had to give her more credit. She was sharper than I thought. "Nothing of great help. Just some letters from his girlfriend."

Melissa looked surprised. "Girlfriend? Carter didn't have a girlfriend. His last relationship ended almost two years ago."

I frowned. The notes definitely hadn't been from that particular relationship or any earlier, for that matter. They'd been written on pages ripped from a notebook – the bottom of each page had been watermarked with the year and the name of the company. They were all dated from this year.

"I found love letters hidden in his bedroom. Can you think of any reason why he'd hide his relationship? Has he had any history of doing this in the past?" I questioned.

"No, not at all," said Melissa, as if the idea was ridiculous. "Quite the opposite actually. He was always very proud of all of his past girlfriends. He'd show them off at any opportunity and talk about them to anyone who'd listen." She laughed softly. "Some of them really didn't deserve it. But he still treated them all like princesses."

I bit my lip. Where was the justice in a nice guy like that getting murdered? "The notes were all signed with the letter 'S'. I don't suppose you have any idea who that could be?"

Melissa shook her head. "As far as I know, none of his girlfriends had a name beginning with 'S'. We were pretty close, so I'm probably the one most likely to know."

I nodded then ran a hand through my hair. "Then I think I'm done here. I've checked everything that I can."

"Can I see the letters?" Melissa interrupted. "Maybe I can help shed some light on them."

I hesitated. "I wouldn't recommend it. I put them back where I found them, but they're not exactly for innocent eyes."

"Enough to make a nun blush?" Melissa smiled.

I couldn't help but laugh at the analogy. "Something like that." I then struggled to make my face serious. "Melissa, I've done all I can here... But it's not over yet. I still have another crime scene to check out."

Melissa nodded solemnly. "You're trying your best. That's all I could ask for."

I felt an odd urge to salute her, but I resisted. No need for her to know she was laying her hopes on a crazy woman. Instead, I said, "I hope we meet again soon. When this case is solved, I'll be the one to tell you personally."

Melissa smiled, giving me her thanks again, and showed me out. I made my way back round the block to my car, then drove on to the next address. I parked a little closer to this house, though still out of sight. No one was living at this address, so this was the one I was going to have to break into. I wanted my car close enough in case I needed to make a sharp exit.

When I got up to the house, I took several good looks around to make sure no one was watching. Once I was certain the coast was clear, I shimmied up the wall so that I could pull myself over the back gate. It's practically a rule that it's easier to get into a house from the back rather than the front.

I tried the back door first. Locked tight. Obviously. I'd give a few of the downstairs windows a try before I came back to it. Fortunately, the second window along was stiff, but not locked. It reluctantly opened after a few fervent shoves.

I clambered in and found myself in the kitchen. The room looked like it hadn't been touched in well over a week. It looked like Elizabeth Montgomery, the first murder victim, had barely even been living here before she was murdered. The kitchen was obviously no help, so I carried on through to the living room.

I could tell straightaway that this room had barely been disturbed either. Forensics always left telltale signs – it looked like they'd hardly done any work in here at all. There was next to no graphite powder left from checking for fingerprints. The furniture didn't appear to have been moved around at all. I couldn't see any indents in the carpet that you can sometimes spy when furniture hasn't been put back where it's supposed to live.

The lock on the front door was old and worn, but definitely intact. Unlike at Carter's house, the murderer hadn't needed to break in here. He'd been let in. Had Elizabeth known who he was? Or had she been the trusting type that would let anybody in?

The rest of the rooms downstairs showed no signs of upset, so I carried on upstairs. One of the pictures on the wall in the stairwell had been knocked crooked. The impact had shaken the one corner free of the dust that covered the rest of the frame in a thin coat. That was the first possible sign I'd seen of there being an intruder in the house.

It could have just been Elizabeth herself, but I didn't think so. The place may have been dusty because she obviously hadn't been home much in the last few weeks, but other than that, it looked like she was a bit of a neat freak. All of the other photos on the wall were lined up in perfect proportion with each other and to each stair. She wouldn't have put up with knocking one out of balance and not fixing it. The murderer had obviously come up this way.

Of course, this was all speculation. But this was my job after all. I'd learnt that my hunches were right around ninety-something percent of the time.

I sought out Elizabeth's bedroom first. The room smelt clean. Too clean. Like the weird smell you get at hospitals that's obviously trying to mask germs and disease. Forensics had definitely been in here. But after a good once-over of the room, I still wasn't left with many clues. The forensics team had cleaned and covered virtually everything here. The only sign of any altercation was the tiny hairline crack in the small photo frame on the bedside table. And who was to say it hadn't already been cracked for ages?

I sighed, turning the photo frame over in my hands. This wasn't going well. I'd barely gotten anywhere. I needed some damn good ideas before I could go back to Gibson. I gazed at the photo. Elizabeth and a guy who was presumably her boyfriend. She was only young – early to mid twenties at a stretch. She was mousy blonde and fairly plain. Said boyfriend was quite tall, handsome and of obvious East Asian descent. Now if I could find a name, then he'd be the next person I wanted to check out...

I unhooked the back of the photo frame so that I could pull the photo out. Unfortunately, there wasn't a date or a helpful caption written on the back like I'd been hoping. Typical.

Going through the desk was my next step. It didn't take very long. She had surprisingly little stuff for a young woman. No diaries, no photo albums, no letters, next to no useless but obviously sentimental knickknacks... But I did find something handy. A small strip of photos of her and her boyfriend taken in a photo booth. This time, Elizabeth had been unknowingly helpful. Written on the back in small neat print was 'Me and Shou', followed by a date that showed they'd been taken about eight months ago. I wondered how long they'd been together.

At least I had a name for the boyfriend now. Without a surname, it still wasn't particularly useful, but it was better than nothing. I combed the room one last time, but I didn't find anything more. Time to move on. I checked through all the other rooms upstairs. I didn't spend much time on it – it was obvious straightaway that these rooms hadn't been disturbed in a while.

I leant against the wall and pondered the idea. The only rooms that left any possible mark of an intruder were Elizabeth's bedroom and the stairway. Which suggested the murderer had been let in and followed Elizabeth straight upstairs to her bedroom. Sounded dodgy to me.

Had it been her boyfriend? Could the motive for all of this really have stemmed from some sort of lover's tiff? Very possibly. But then how did Carter's murder fit into this? Did he know Elizabeth too? Had he been secretly involved with her somehow? Had the two of them been killed in a fit of jealousy?

Or maybe these two murders weren't linked after all. It could have just been a coincidence that there were two murders in Kasagi on the same night. The scenes didn't exactly match. Carter's house had been broken into, they'd fought and he'd been killed. Whereas Elizabeth had let her murderer in and possibly had some kind of rendezvous in the bedroom.

I chewed my nails absently. So what was my next move? I wanted to check out this Shou guy, but I couldn't get an address without a full name. I'd have to look into Elizabeth's direct family first and see if I could get any information from them.

What I really needed was to get access to the national database at the police station. Though I obviously had no chance of that when Gibson was unaware I was doing my own investigating on this. So instead, I'd have to settle for looking through the personnel records at the library and hoping I struck lucky there.

It wasn't a particularly thrilling next step, but at least I had one.

I went back out through the kitchen window and pulled it into place behind me. As if no one had even been there... I hoped. I scuttled back over the gate, pausing only to smooth my clothes down, and made my way round to my car, pulling my keys out as I walked.

I'd only just stepped off the curb when I sensed somebody behind me. I whirled around in an offensive stance. I didn't have time to go for my gun, but I was sure I could do some damage with my car keys if I needed to.

Fortunately, or unfortunately depending on how you looked at it, it wasn't the Kasagi killer ready to take me out of the picture since I'd been snooping around. It was Kenichi Takano. That was the unfortunately part.

"Dammit Kenichi, you scared the hell out of me!" I complained, lowering my keys and trying to act as if I hadn't been ready to use them as a rather poor weapon. "What are you doing here?"

"I could ask you the same question," he said pointedly.

Oh, great. This was the part where I was very likely to get into trouble. "Would you believe me if I said I was visiting a friend?"

"No."

"Admiring the scenery?"

"Definitely not."

"Well, it's actually because there's a little convenience store round here that sells the nicest hazelnut..."

"Gee..."

"Yeah, okay," I agreed. Kenichi knew me too well. There was no excuse I could think of for why I was here that he was likely to believe. "Didn't think you'd go for that."

"Gibson told me you were asking to join the Kasagi killer case," Kenichi stated.

"Right," I hedged.

"But he obviously didn't think you'd take matters into your own hands," Kenichi continued.

"Obviously. Well, if it's any consolation, I haven't really found anything," I said grumpily, kicking at the gravel.

"That's no consolation. What's the point of jeopardising our police work if you can't even find anything?" said Kenichi.

"Hey, I did find some stuff out," I defended quickly, changing my tune completely as I so often did. "I'm just not sure how relevant any of it is yet."

Kenichi smiled, obviously happier with that answer. "That's more like it. Now talk to me."

I had to hand it to Kenichi. He's used to how pessimistic I can sometimes be. One minute, I can be feeling pleased with my progress, then the next, I'll have changed my mind and be thinking it's all a waste of time. Kenichi normally knows how to goad me into thinking positive again. Exactly like he'd just done.

"Okay, in the first house – well, the second murder – there was a lot of disturbance. Carter and the murderer fought on the stairs before he was killed," I described. "Yet Elizabeth's house was barely touched. It wasn't broken into. The killer was let inside and he went with her straight up to her bedroom, where she was then murdered."

"And what does this tell you?" Kenichi prompted.

"Two possible things," I replied. "Either Elizabeth already knew the murderer... or we have two killers on the loose."

"You think that could be it? Two killers?" asked Kenichi sharply.

"I hope not," I said frankly. "Having one killer waltzing the streets is bad enough. We don't need another."

"It wouldn't help," agreed Kenichi. "So what else have you found out?"

"Carter Burnham may have been involved in an affair," I said.

Kenichi's eyes widened. Now this was obviously something the police didn't know about. Plus one point for me! "What makes you think that?"

"I found love letters hidden in his room," I explained. "And they were definitely recent. His sister was real close to him, but she didn't know anything about it. Apparently, he was real showy about his relationships. So why hide this one? There must have been a good reason for it."

"You think this could be linked to Elizabeth's murder?" asked Kenichi.

"Possibly... I don't know. I couldn't tell you yet," I said. "But I'm definitely not ruling it out."

Kenichi looked thoughtful. "I think you should go and talk to Gibson again."

I groaned at the thought. "I don't think so. He'll have my ass if he knows I've been investigating this by myself."

"Did you really think you'd get away with investigating for long without him finding out?" Kenichi pointed out.

"Well, no," I admitted. "I was going to go back to him anyway and ask again to be put on the case. I just wanted to go back with more information than this."

"You've got enough," Kenichi reassured. "Stop being so pessimistic. None of us knew about the letters, so you already have that over Gibson."

I couldn't help grinning. Now that was quite a nice thought. "Thanks, Ken."

His expression changed to one of irritation. "Don't call me Ken. Now get going."

"You got it." I moved round to the driver's door. As fun as he was to annoy, I definitely didn't need to be told twice on this occasion. This time, I was just grateful for the help.

"And for the record I don't think your car keys would do much damage as a weapon," Kenichi added, a hint of a smirk on his face.

I scowled. "Want me to try them on you and find out?"

He laughed. "I think I'll pass. Good luck, Gee."

"Thanks!" I resisted the urge to call him Ken a second time and climbed into my car. As he waved me off, I could feel a grin spreading across my face. Now this was definitely better than going to the library.