Unique - Act I (ii) - Arsonist
Act I (ii) - Arsonist
Friday
Crime scenes lose their ambiance in the light of day. They become just one more morbid sideshow, not threatening or thrilling or anything interesting. Just another mess to be cleaned up. Of course, my colleagues don't see it that way. They don't already know. For them, it's still a mystery. They haven't yet forced it to give up its secrets.
It's going to be a pain in the ass to write up a report without giving too much away.
"Hey, Morgan! We need you over here!" Angel yells, and I dutifully jog over to one of the bodies. Whatever the third man had brought, it had done the trick. Well-done didn't do it justice. He looked like Rita's last attempt at barbecue.
Barbecue. I should buy some steaks for this evening.
A pointed question brings my attention back to the body. I take a few pictures and slowly look around the scene, as if seeing it for the first time.
"The fire was discovered just past midnight,” Angel tells me. “Bartender on his break called it in; the fire department arrived, discovered the bodies, and called us. What do you think?"
The burning was just as important to him as the kill. He didn't care about the evidence - he walked out of the alley covered in blood.
"Well?" Detectives can be so impatient.
"Can't say for sure, but it looks like when the head was cut off, this one was still alive." I gesture to the blood on the wall, which mostly survived the inferno.
"Sick fuck. Anything else stand out to you?'
I shake my head. "I'll need to go over some things in my lab before I can say anything with any certainty." I don't want to accidentally let anything slip.
"Alright. Thanks, Dexter." He looks down at the body. “I just really want us to catch this hijo de puta.” He pauses for a second and adds, "You know, I am glad I'm not the medical examiner."
"No kidding," I say.
I take the rest of my photos, then get out of the way. Hanging around here is setting my teeth on edge.
* * *It takes time to process everything from a crime scene. Time for autopsies, time for DNA tests, time to collect fingerprints...time to do forensic reports.
Which is why I've spent the last few hours finding out the answers to questions I don't need to ask, and not finding the answers to the questions I want to ask. I need more to go on. Internet searches based on the little I do know turned up 50,000 useless results. There were several websites that referenced both 'Sam' and 'Dean' and beheading, but they were all related to an obscure and forgettable series of books. Nothing on ‘Cass’ or 'Cas', but it’s probably a nickname, and it’s one too short to be of any use on Google. There are 191 places in Miami that go by the name "Seven Seas"; one of them I know well- it's the place I first witnessed my brother's work. But personal significance rarely translates into actual significance. I've gotten nowhere.
I close the browser, giving up on that avenue, just as my sister bursts in.
"Dex! You were working the scene out at the nightclub this morning, right?" She doesn't wait for me to respond, just throws open the door and starts speaking, gunfire-fast. My sister loves gossip. Not for spreading rumors- she likes the secret aspect of it. Something she knows that someone else doesn't, if only for a minute.
"You're gonna wanna fuckin' hear this. It's fuckin' nuts. So the bodies- motherfucking crispy critters I heard - they took them to the ME's. And the guy doing the autopsy- he went bugfuck big time. He did something to one of the bodies- it's fucking disintegrating-"
"They were burned pretty badly," I say.
She shakes her head. "Not like this. But that's not even the real goddamn crazy part- He's claiming it's like, a fucking alien mutant or something."
I'm not quite skeptical, but gossip isn't always reliable. "Really?"
"Oh yeah. Like the goddamn motherfuckin' X-Files."
"Which of the butcher shop’s finest was it?"
"Jim Bellocq. Can you believe it?"
"He always seemed so..." I don't actually have the right words. Jim had a morbid sense of humor, an appreciation of artistry in death that few normal people do. But he was otherwise as unimaginative and fundamentally stable as bedrock.
Her eyes gleam. "Yeah. Exactly."
"So what are they going to do?"
"Not much. He's being carted off to the loony bin. The body was fucked, anyway. Identifying it's going to be a bitch. But the other one- guess."
I put on an "I give up" face and shrug at her. "What?"
"It's a woman- and they think her throat was torn out. "
This is getting interesting. "Are they sure?"
"That's what's being said. It's not in any reports yet." She grinned. "We're gonna nail that bastard to the wall."
I have my doubts. The fake agent- Dean - didn't kill the girl. Could the dead man have been the killer at the Canary factory? If so- how could my mystery man have found him before I did?
"They find any prints?" I ask her.
"A few full prints. Several dozen partials. We're running them now."
"Let me know?"
"You think you're gonna get one of your hunches?"
I shrug. I think my search for any of the mystery fed’s fingerprints here in the office was spectacularly undermined by the fact that the only things I'm sure he touched were also the things touched by fifty other people a day, and that I’m hoping he was more careless in the alley. But that’s not something I’m going to tell her.
"Don't you dare tell anyone but me. You're the best." And then she's gone. She'll be back...with the details I'll need to find my answers. I'm lucky to have her. She sees a brother with insight into the minds of mass murderers as a bonus, rather than disturbing.
My brief Deb-free respite gives me the time to check my report. I'm good at my job, and not just because of my- personal experience. Too good, Harry might have argued. No one would notice if my report is a little better than it should be, unconsciously colored by what I know, because that's the standard I've set. They've come to expect it. But I read through it anyway and add a few vagaries and false interpretations, because the worst thing would be to leave something that could come back to haunt me.
Deb comes back as I'm making the last few tweaks. She's carrying a file, and doesn't seem happy. She tosses it down on my desk, huffs out a sigh, and drags a hand through her hair.
I raise an eyebrow at her.
"The prints," she says. "I thought we'd finally gotten a fuckin' break."
I pick up the file and begin to flip through the report.
The problem with looking for prints in a place like a nightclub- or the alley next to it - is the sheer number of people who will have passed through. The techs had tried to focus on those areas most likely to have been touched by the victims and the killer - and even then, there had been so many. None of them would be mine; gloves are a wonderful invention. I scanned through the list. The first two pages are from the IAFIS, the national database. There are too many possible matches on the partials for them to be of much use, especially considering how unlikely most of them are, and the full prints are all from local crimes. On the other hand, page three shows promise. It’s the report pulled from Miami-Dade’s local database. My Russian mobster made the top of the list- though that seemed more to be out of the hope to pin something on him rather than credible evidence he'd been involved. There were a couple of drug dealers, and DUI, and a couple of unknowns. Probably the victims, as none of the others fit the profile. Then there were all the hits on the partials, some of which were almost certainly wrong. Down at the very bottom of the list, an entry with a line through it catches my attention. It's the name that forces me to take a closer look - Winchester, Dean.
I can see why there's a line through it. He's listed as deceased as of 2008. I feel a tingle run down my spine. He's a match for the fake Fed. Height, weight, DOB fits with his age. I close the file with a snap, and hand it back to my morose sister.
"Sorry," I say. "Nothing."
"Yeah," she says glumly. "That's what everyone's saying."
"Look," I say, as if scrambling for some flimsy consolation, "Let me finish these workups. Maybe- maybe there'll be something you can use." Or that I can use.
She twists her mouth into something approaching a smile, thanking me for making the effort, and shrugs. She's unconvinced, but that's good. The last thing I need is for her to get too interested in my report. "Yeah, sure," she says, and then she leaves.
I shut the blinds, all of them, then bring up for the elusive Dean Winchester's record. He was busted for grave desecration back in the late 90s. He skipped bail, and that was the last Miami-Dade county had heard of him...until the real feds put him on the most wanted list a few years ago.
The photo confirms it: he's the fake Fed. It seems that reports of his death were greatly exaggerated, and not for the first time, either, at least according to the news reports. The first attempt involved a body that was his spitting image...that not only was declared dead at the scene, but was also autopsied and buried. It's unknown how he pulled that off; the few theories given each seem more improbable than the last. I'm impressed, but grudgingly. It would take talent to slip out of the hangman's noose so many times. But he's sloppy. If he's as good as he seems, he could have avoided getting caught in the first place. Maybe he wants to be caught. But if he does, why go to such lengths to ensure they stop looking?
My contempt is far exceeded by my curiosity. He's a contradiction, different from anything I've ever come across. Novelty. Everything I've been craving. It's an invitation, practically hand delivered and wrapped in a bow.
To: Dexter,
Love,
The World.
***
I submit my initial report that afternoon. It's maybe a little faster than it should be, but nothing extraordinary. It won't be noticed. Besides, I promised Rita I would relieve the babysitter, which gives me the perfect reason to head out early. And like all the best camouflage, it's true. I stroll out into the afternoon sun. I smile and nod at the beat cops coming in the building. A detective getting out of his car calls out, "Ditching again, Dexter?"
"Hey, Luis. Gotta get the kids," I say. I shrug and shake my head, and keep on smiling. It's all in the body language. What can you do?
"Kids," repeats the detective. He shakes his head fondly. "They'll take over your life. Christ. My wife calls me the other day, asking if I can pick up our daughter from school. Got a fever, she said. In the middle of a goddamn crime scene. I'm standing in the middle of a fucking gang shoot out. Bodies everywhere. Blood. Flies. All that shit. Worrying about chicken pox."
It's such a strange ritual, this. I know this detective in the same way I know most of the detectives. I see him at crime scenes. I given him reports. I've chatted about baseball on the elevator. I was just another face in the crowd, and that was fine. But now, with the kids- and more, the soon-to-be baby - I've been inducted unknowingly into this fraternity of parents, all dying to share the latest news about their precious darlings. I'm a person to him now. He thinks we're the same. I don't understand it.
"What can you do?" I smile again and look down at my watch. "I really gotta go, Luis," I say, artfully adding a iota of apology to my tone. "The traffic's going to be murder, this time of day."
The detective waves me off. "Yeah, I bet. Take care." I open the car door, and he walks off as I do.
It's too hot in here. I turn up the air conditioning and let it blast until I can almost believe that I'd be able to see my breath.
I pull out of the parking lot, but I don't turn on to the freeway. I head down towards the beach. There's an itch at the back of my mind, and I let it drive me down half a dozen streets before I realize where I'm going.
The Seven Seas is exactly as I last saw it, its brush with infamy apparently forgotten. Nothing about this place has changed. The working girls at the corner are different, but their painted smiles and calculating eyes are the same as ever. I'm not sure what whim has carried me here. I need to be across town in less than an hour, and this little side trip makes it more likely I'll get stuck in traffic.
I've pulled up to the opposite curb and let my gaze rest on the motel. Why have I come here? It's not nostalgia for my brother.
"Sure about that, Dexter?" Harry questions. His eyes are watchful.
"I don't regret-" I stop. "It had to be that way. He would have gotten caught. He almost got me caught. He wanted me to break the Code." I flex my fingers and grip the steering wheel tight. I don't turn to look at Harry.
"And you weren't tempted? Tempted to go with him, out on the open road- free? No consequences?" His eyes are boring into the side of my head. Test time.
"There are always consequences," I say, and it's the right answer. He nods approvingly. "Like your sister."
"He would have killed Deb," I echo.
"And?" he prompts.
I stare ahead. "I'd... regret her absence," I admit. Then: "She's my sister," which is the socially acceptable answer, at least. Just as Harry taught me.
Harry nods. "Good, son. Good. You remember that."
I look back over at him, but he's gone, as much as he ever is.
I glance back at the motel. But Brian was my brother. It goes unsaid.
Traffic moves, and for one second I have a clear view of the motel's parking lot. Serendipity: Whatever whim brought me here was a good one. That black behemoth is unmistakable. Traffic moves again, hiding it from view. I wish I could linger and get a better sense of my quarry. But as it is, I can't stay here. I'll soon be noticed. When the light changes, I pull the car forward, leaving the motel behind. I don't want to. I want to stay and play, but it's not time. There's work to be done.
Watching the kids should be uneventful. It'll give me time to do some my homework. I glance over at the files I've got on the seat. I have some reading to catch up on.
Traffic is getting tight, but soon the motel is beyond sight, keeping its secrets for another day.
Whatever Harry says, the instinct that brought me here was a good one.
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