‘I’m having an affair with Rodriguez. We were on the second floor that night.’
Marshall opened his mouth but no words came out.
‘She was supposed to be on a stake-out with Rodriguez.’ Marshall wondered if Pete was telling the truth.
‘Yeah, she did go, after. We left, nearly together, past McCluskey at the desk. I went home and she went to work.’
Pete was a handsome man, with fair red hair, and a thick moustache. He was still army fit, but had lost it a little, around his belly.
‘How is Nancy about all of this?’
Pete straightened up and started laughing.
‘I haven’t seen her for a week. She kicked me out a month ago and I’ve either been in motels ever since or staying with Rodriguez.’
He patted his blondish, red-tinted moustache across his upper lip.
Marshall was quiet. He had known what that felt like, when it had gone sour for himself and Samantha.
‘All over the moustache?’ Marshall joked. The lip fur had started their first fight. Marshall had known about it then, but less so as the days passed by.
‘Even more of a reason to keep it.’
They both laughed together.
Pete's wife had left him on the account, of the moustache, or so he had said. The long hours, overtime and high stress, which had meant that Pete was rarely ever home, was more of a deciding factor. No wife of a Metro City Cop could leave their husband because they were committed to being a better Cop. So they had excuses, like an expanded gut or in Pete's case, a slightly raspberry blonde moustache.
‘How about Samantha?’ He asked.
‘Same as before, Pete.’ Marshall had shared everything with Pete, and he had been there since the very beginning. Since before Emma was born. He knew better than to ask about Emma.
The two Detectives remained silent for a few moments longer before Pete asked the question that Lance Marshall had dreaded.
‘Why did you do it, all those years ago?’
Cop on Cop.
‘I always thought that we didn’t have a choice, you know. You were, assigned a case, so you investigated it.’ Marshall opened up.
‘But IA, Lance. That’s more than just a case, and you couldn’t even tell me?’
‘Internal Affairs, yeah, and it had been a lifetime worth of bad cases, wrapped up into one real shitty case and some good scotch.’
Lance remembered the exact moment when the IA officer, had approached him in Rooney’s bar. He had hoped that she was about to start hitting on him when she came over, but no way would someone that stiff looking have been in Rooney’s looking for a good time.
She brought with her, exotic tales of speedboats full of Heroin and a vicious street war that she was trying to prevent from erupting out onto the streets of Metro City.
What has all of that, got to do with IA?
It was that crucial question, that had turned Lance's life to shit.
‘So how did they manage to hook you in?’
Pete asked, as he brought Marshall back to the present day.
‘They told me that Samantha had been seeing a DEA agent who was taking money from the Narcos, but that this DEA agent was running a team of bent Detectives in Metro City. They assumed that I was one, but when they saw that I wasn’t one, they asked me to try and root out the real ones.’
‘So you went after Cops? Cop on Cop.’
‘That’s what they called it.’
‘But why couldn’t you have just told someone in here about it and gotten some help. We would have helped you, Lance. I could have helped you.’
‘After I was shown a couple of pictures of what happens to people who cross the Narcos in Metro City, I knew that I had to go it on my own, for the sake of Samantha, and Emma, and you Pete.’
‘So, it was true. She had been seeing this DEA guy.’ Pete asked.
Lance shook his head.
‘It didn’t matter in the end. IA had wanted to root out some dirty cops, and they didn’t care whose lives that were ruined in the process.’
‘So, Samantha left, and that was that. She couldn’t take it, that you had believed IA over her.’
‘She took Emma too, and when Cop on Cop broke in the media, I was honestly glad that they weren’t around to see it.’ Marshall dropped his head a little.
Pete stood up and put his hands on his hips.
‘But you nailed a few dirty Cops. It wasn’t all in vain.’
Lance heaved a sigh of despair.
‘Hardly. One poor bastard was a few days from retiring and suddenly confessed that he had pocketed a few thousand from a drugs bust back in the late '80s,’
Lance stood up.
‘Word got around that I was investigating Cops with ties to the Narcos, and then this silly bastard, Phillips, stands up and catches the flak for everything.’
‘He died then, a year later.’
‘Yeah, he had a massive heart attack one morning. He died in his living room, killing the family chihuahua when he landed on him.’
Lance recalled the crudely drawn effigy of his head in a noose and an ominous saying underneath the poster that appeared everywhere inside the station for a few months.
Dead-Rat.
‘So that was when IA left you out to dry?'
Lance raised his hands out by his side.
‘It was still an ongoing investigation, so I couldn’t tell anyone about it.’
Pete walked towards the door.
‘And now, you can talk about it?’
‘The investigation wrapped up after a year, but nobody was interested in my side of the story, not after what had happened to Phillips.’
‘I will be honest Lance, we kinda believed it for a spell, but Lindsay kicked our asses back into line.’
Lance smiled and hoped that the Senior Detective was making some headway into getting a sample from those masks.
‘Yeah. She is a hell of a Detective.’
The old friends shook hands and parted ways.
Pete went inside, back into the bullpen as Lance walked down the stairs.
It was time to go back to the morgue.
BLOOD WORK
Before Lance Marshall stepped into the examination room and saw the look of abject horror on the face of Metro Cities Chief pathologist, he received a quick phone call from Lindsay Dawn, that had tipped a bad mood into a horrible one.
The Detective never got a chance to question Officer Tomlinson, as when she had gone to unofficially interview him, he was gone. An order had come, from up high that he was to be turned loose. Knowing that your every move was being scrutinized from up on high, was nothing new for Lance, but even Officer Tomlinson's efforts to infiltrate an ongoing investigation were something of a surprising development. Lance hung up on Lindsay, massaged an incoming migraine from a thunderstorm, into a tsunami, and walked through and into the restricted area.
‘I need more than you got Alvin.’ Lance asked the man, leaning over a desk, writing into a brown folder.
‘You don’t need any of what I’ve found, Detective Marshall,’ Alvin put his pen down on the table. ‘Besides, I have finished up on my examination, so if you don’t mind, I can give you a full run through without seeing the body?’
Lance made a special note to thank Dr. Randall with a bottle of scotch when this messy affair had all concluded.
‘That’s what I like to hear. I can think a little better when I don’t have to look at a dead, naked person.’
Alvin opened the second drawer beside his knee and lifted out a half bottle of Tullamore Dew and two small tumbler glasses.
‘Quite.’ He replied.
‘Before you start, at the end of this, I have a special favor to ask.'
‘No problem Detective, I am here to help in whatever way that I can.’
Lance looked at the empty glasses as Alvin Randall began to read from the folder on the desk.
‘How did he die?’ Lance drove straight in.
‘A mix reall
y. The same type of incision as before, plus a blunt force trauma to the head, that caused a massive bleed and a swelling of the brain and damage to the spinal cord.’
‘As before?’ Lance asked.
‘As before, Detective. This was an identical cut to the one that was sustained by Annie-Ann Richards.’
‘How can you tell? The killer couldn’t have made the exact same cut, not possible.’
‘Though what you have said is inaccurate. A precision cut could have easily been made a second time. In part, you are correct.’
‘Which part?' Lance replied as Alvin handed him a piece of paper from the file.
‘Blood work. Traces of Annie-Ann Richard’s blood were found in the wound of Alan O’Riordan. They had been cut with the same blade.’
Two-murders.
One-killer.
Lance felt that similar throbbing sensation and again tried to massage the pain away with his fingers.
‘The ferocity though, of the trauma, to the head and neck is something very new,’ Alvin looked down, below his spectacles and asked.
‘Was there a similar disturbed earth pattern near the body this time?’
‘Close by, near the gate that the park shares with the Precinct.’
‘Then it is clear that the attacker grabbed his victim and lifted him over the gate and dropped him on his head and neck.’
‘Doc, if you think that is what happened, then you think the attack originated on Police land?’
Lance thought about it, that Alan O'Riordan was nearby the precinct when this had happened, but, yet,
his father hadn't seen him the night before-hand. Was Alan, on his way towards or away from his father?
‘Was there anything out of the ordinary found on the body? Like a note?’
Alvin Randall squinted, wondering if now was the time to talk about the more obvious oddity from the crime scene.
‘Just the cigarette that was placed in the throat, post-mortem.’
Marshall had remembered this oddity from the crime scene, and it stood out as extreme macabre.
‘Doc, two years ago, I investigated three murders in the City, and at each murder scene, the killer left a tiny little porcelain cat beside the body,’ He continued. ‘We wasted one week alone on looking through CCTV footage outside of stores nearby, that sold these porcelain cats, and you know what happened when we caught the guy? He produced a small box of porcelain cats that his mother had given him. The cats were an oddity, not a clue.’
Alvin Randall closed the file.
‘So I take it, you don’t want to see the masks then?’
‘Creepy as shit, Doc. Show them to me.’
The two men got up from the desk and walked through a door at the back of the lab and into a separate, darker room at the end of the building.
‘Excuse the light, but I am about to run a separate test on the masks. Step this way,’
Alvin walked ahead towards the center of the room, where a line had been suspended, five feet up from the floor. On the front, was a large picture frame and inside it, the two masks, and both appeared to be reflecting light, despite the lack of light in the room.
‘The masks have both been covered in a special polymer that is designed to seep into the very pores of the paint that covers these masks. Anything that's not painted on will fall to the bottom, as the polymer makes its way down the surface of the mask,’
Alvin Randall asked.
‘Detective, do you realize the significance of this animal and this insect?'
‘I told you Doc. Nine times out of Ten, crazy like this is a distraction from the real science of the clues that you are about to find for me,’
The sheen from the cow and the ant, tracked slowly downwards, bringing the reflection of light with it.
‘I take it, that you didn’t find any prints on these masks?’
‘No, Detective.’
Lance let that theory go and reminded himself to call Lindsay back and tell her to cull that particular theory.
The polymer fell from the ends of the masks and dripped a clear white substance like honey onto the base of the frame.
Alvin stood nearby, and upon seeing the drips that had stopped to fall, unhinged the lower part of the frame and took, the entire base away.
‘Under the light, any particulates in the fluid will show up, and then I can analyze them,’
He brought the base to a desk by the west wall, and placed it in the center, between himself and the Detective, who now stood alongside him.
‘Hit that button on the desk, and look closely at the fluid.’
Lance pressed the button and saw that the entire box had become transparent, just as the liquid inside seemed to be glowing from within. Small little lights,
hidden from view had begun to shine from the base of the box, just as the walls of the inside of the box, mirrored the fluid inside.
‘The box is coated with tiny mirrors that work, just like your shutter door, and as they reflect the fluid inside, the light from below should mark anything that’s not the polymer, as black.’
The two men looked at the clear fluid for any signs of any particulates.
Nothing.
‘Great test Doc.’
‘I don’t think that you understand Detective. These masks should be showing even a minimal amount of dust and dirt, from general wear and tear. That they are not, is troubling.’
‘Why is that Alvin?’
‘It means that whoever painted these mask’s, used a water repellent, anti-static, based paint. They wanted you to test them, and to see how obsessively detailed that they were in the planning of these murders.’
‘Everybody thinks that they are great until the first time they fall on their ass, Alvin. This psycho is the same as the rest of them.’
‘Well there is one more thing, but you don’t want to hear about it.’
‘The masks, right? Go on, tell me.’
Marshall shook his head and cleared out the logic and the examples of every other case that he had worked on. The mantra had always been to work the clues, no matter how obscure, or insignificant that they appeared to be. But, a lifetime of working homicide in Metro City changes all of that. Especially when you come across the crazies who kill for the joy, and leave chaos where there should be a pattern. They have all watched the same crime scene shows on T.V, and they all think that they can outwit the stereotypical dumb Cop.
So, Lance had started to ignore the oddity and focus on the motive, means, and opportunity.
‘In the spirit world, these two creatures have very significant meaning. The cow is a spirit that might represent motherhood and the mother goddesses, whereas the ant, his greatest successes come with persistence. They have a strong sense of community.’
‘So, the killer wants us to work together?’
‘I am saying that with the murder of Alan O’Riordan, the killer is defining in his own ant spirit, that he wants to tear us apart.’
‘So, what does this mean for Annie-Ann? Is she a mother? The killer's mother you think?'
‘I am saying, that this seems to be a pattern Detective.’
‘I see the pattern in one man, killing two people for somewhat random reasons. The reason is going to be in these clues Alvin, and we need to find one,’
The pathologist shook his head as Marshall spoke, and looked again at the cross sections of light and fluid.
‘Oh, and one more thing Alvin. If you find a print, can you run it through the database of Cops? I want to start ruling people out.’
The pathologist shrugged a little.
‘Detective, I fear that you may have an incoming problem with regards to that little errand.’
‘What is it?’
‘Well, I have been fielding calls, just before you arrived actually, from the victim’s father,’
Marshall was surprised that it hadn’t happened sooner.
‘He wanted to be immediately made aware of any positive identification of DNA sampling from
the body of his son. He was furious and also very insistent.'
‘I had a feeling that he might have called.’ Marshall had hoped that O’Riordan would have given him a day, at least,
‘He also spoke of colleagues of his, that would be along to collect any updates that I might have. I certainly felt the threat of what he was saying, Detective Marshall.’
‘I’m sure that he is just angry and letting off some steam Alvin, but I will have a Detective on standby, just in case.’
Alvin Randall bowed his head.
‘Thank you, Detective.’
Marshall walked away after saying goodbye, and sent a text message to Pete Brandt, asking him to call him.
Motive.
Means.
Opportunity.
Lance Marshall left Alvin Randall’s office, eager to connect Annie-Ann Richards to Alan O’Riordan
GENERATIONAL GROANS
Marshall pressed the small white bell and heard the buzzer sounding off into the distance. The glass on the window was heavily frosted and from behind it, were shapes that moved around, uncaring to the sound, that they had no doubt grown accustomed to over time. It wouldn't have been polite to knock and grab the attention, so Marshall just patiently waited until one of the forms began to walk towards the door purposefully.
The shape was busy and flustered and was having great difficulty in selecting a key from the oversized bunch in her hands. Different keys had been tried, and different keys had been failing. Finally, one succeeded, and a door was quickly opened.
‘Come in, quickly.’ She said.
Lance moved through the threshold as the door was then quickly closed again behind him.
The retirement home was on lockdown.
Marshall walked away from the door as some elderly men and women began to make a severe dash for the door. The woman with the keys turned towards the clanking sound of zimmer frames and held her two hands up in the air.
‘Until we receive the all clear, no one is to be allowed to leave the building. I am sorry folks. Everybody, back to your rooms.’
Generational groans and curses came from the less than mobile army of able-minded people. They couldn't turn quickly enough to fence her in and get what they wanted. She gave a quick burst of pace and squeezed in beside Marshall, and held his elbow, leading him along the corridor, away from the angry residents.
Marshall Law Page 8
