Arsonist

by Victor Methos

  “You know what, Jon? You gotta get more fun outta life, man.”

  They took exit 239 to Palameno Street and found an old bar and grill named Ex-Wife’s Place. The exterior was brick and worn brown wood and there were neon beer signs up in the windows. After parking, Stanton checked his firearm’s safety and then stepped out of the car, following Gunn into the building.

  The interior was as depressing as the exterior. It was dark and smelled like cigarettes and spilt beer. The only customers here were a few drunks sipping away their hours at the bar. Stanton felt for them; they couldn’t escape.

  In the corner booth was a woman with chocolate skin and ruby red lips. Her hair was straight and fell over her lean shoulders. She was strikingly beautiful and didn’t fit in with this environment. Gunn sat across from her in the booth and Stanton stood by, pretending to keep watch. CI’s, particularly females, were jumpy and didn’t talk freely in front of strangers.

  “How you doin’, sugar?” she said to Gunn.

  “Good as can be. How ‘bout you, Nicky? You gettin’ by?”

  “I’m always gettin’ by, sugar. Just a matter a how well.”

  “You still with Pauly over there at Sherman Oaks?”

  “Pssh, that broke-ass nigga couldn’t keep a job much less a woman such as The Nicole. I kicked his ass to the curb and sent him packin’.”

  There was a pause and Stanton looked back and saw Gunn smiling.

  “Is that what really happened?”

  “Yes,” she said. “Why? You don’t believe me?”

  “Well it’s just weird ‘cause I heard Pauly was doin’ twenty for armed robbery.”

  She shrugged. “Well I don’t know about all that. All I know is I threw his ass out. I can’t keep track of what he doin’ when I ain’t there.”

  “So no more Pauly. Who you got protectin’ you now?”

  She reached into her purse and brought out the handle of a pistol. “I got Mr. Browning watching my back.”

  “That’s good. But you need someone out here watchin’ your back, makin’ sure you’re not left alone with the sick fucks.”

  “I got my girls; I ain’t need no man lookin’ out for me.” She rubbed his hand. “But you sweet for worryin’ ‘bout me.”

  “So what’s the info you got for me on the body in the dumpster.”

  “Cisneros? I was with this john the other night. We was in the Wal-Mart parkin’ lot up there on Treemont and he started talkin’, right. I was blowin’ him and he just started talkin’ and callin’ me bitch and sayin’ all sorts a crazy shit. Then he said, ‘I’m a shank you like I shanked Mike’s ass.’ And he went off after that ‘bout all the shit he was gonna do to me. Cuttin’ me up and hangin’ me, all sorts a ignorant shit.”

  “Did he try to hurt you?”

  “No, he was just talkin’. Once he bust a nut he just paid me and be on his way. But I remember that ‘cause I remember Cisneros was shanked.”

  “Yeah,” Gunn said, “you could say that. He was stabbed over twenty times.”

  “Yeah, so I took down this dude’s license for you.”

  “Well, it could be nothin’, but I’ll take it. How much?”

  “Six hundred.”

  “Shit, I ain’t no rook out here tradin’ blow jobs to not cite you, Nicky.”

  “Three hundred then. I gots to pay my rent.”

  Gunn pulled out three hundred dollars from his wallet. “How’s your son?”

  “He good. He’s in first grade now.”

  “No shit? Time just flies, huh?”

  “Believe that,” she said, taking the cash and stuffing it into her bra. She handed him a slip of paper with a license plate number on it.

  Gunn rose. “If you need anything, you call me.”

  “I will, sugar. Thanks.”

  Gunn slapped Stanton’s shoulder. “Let’s go. We got a john to discuss his pillow talk with.”

  CHAPTER 13

  Stanton sat in the passenger seat of Gunn’s sedan while they called in to the precinct and ran the plate number. The day was boiling hot and he could feel sweat dripping down the back of his neck and soaking his collar. He turned on the air conditioning as Gunn finished his call.

  “Tommy’ll call us right back,” Gunn said. “He’s away from his desk, whatever the fuck that means.”

  “He’s probably having lunch.”

  “You hungry?”

  “No.”

  Gunn waited a moment before saying, “So, the shrink. How was that?”

  “What’d you mean?”

  “Like what’d you guys talk about, is it helpin’, you know?”

  “It’s fine. I’ve been to a lot of psychiatrists. My dad was one too. Whenever something happened at school, like I got into a fight or something, he thought it was a psychiatric emergency and I would have to go to his office and take Rorschach tests.”

  “Man, I thought my old man was bad for givin’ me beatings when he had one too many.” His phone rang. “Hello?…Tommy, what’d you fall into the crapper?…yeah, oh yeah?…well we can talk about that later. You got a hit for me?” Gunn grabbed a pen and started writing on his hand. “Uh huh…uh huh…got it. Thanks.”

  “Where is it?” Stanton asked.

  “La Jolla. Maybe half an hour from here.”

  Gunn started the car and pulled away. The freeway was relatively clear and Gunn had the radio turned to a rock station blaring Metallica. It was giving Stanton a headache and he knew most of his headaches turned to migraines.

  “You mind if we turn this off?”

  “No,” Gunn said. “So what kinda music you like?”

  “Not this.”

  They rode in silence the rest of the way and as they pulled off the La Jolla exit Gunn folded a piece of gum in half and stuck it in his mouth. They followed the off-ramp down and turned right, getting into a residential area that was packed with apartment complexes and single family homes. It was middle-class and the cars, though not luxurious, were freshly washed and waxed and the lawns were well maintained.

  They came to a home with a large tree on the front lawn and a mini-van in the driveway. Silently, they sat looking into the house and could see a woman in a long-sleeve shirt and khaki pants vacuuming as two children ran around.

  “You gotta be kiddin’ me,” Gunn said. “She must’a given me a fake plate.”

  “I don’t think so,” Stanton said.

  He thought of the victim in this case, Michael Cisneros. A young homosexual male with no known gang affiliations or criminal history. Cisneros had only his mother who was suffering from Alzheimers and was unemployed. He was the type of victim a monster might think could disappear without anyone noticing.

  “You tellin’ me the dude that put twenty holes in Cisneros is married to fuckin’ June Cleaver?”

  “One or two wounds to the internal organs or throat is enough to kill a person within minutes. When there’s that many wounds, it’s pure rage. It wouldn’t be some drug dealer in the ghetto who got ripped off or something like that. They don’t hide what they are. This person hides himself to the world.”

  “You can tell all that about our perp from some body in a dumpster?”

  “It’s not just a random attack. Victims are always chosen and they’re chosen for a reason. Sometimes it’s unconscious. A lot of mass murderers when they’re confronted with photos of all their victims are surprised how similar they all look. They didn’t even realize they were being driven to find a certain type of person.”

  Gunn threw up his hand in a dismissive gesture. “Get the fuck outta here. Nicky fed me a bogus plate for cash. I’ve had CI’s do it before.”

  “Cisneros’ mother told us he was gay, right? And semen was found in the anal cavity during the autopsy.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Can you think of a better cover for a homosexual psychopath than living in suburbia with a wife and kids?”

  Gunn looked back to the house, watching the woman as she wrapped the electrical cor
d of the vacuum up and put it back in the closet. “I still say it’s gangland.”

  “Only one way to find out.”

  Gunn exhaled. “You’re gonna miss your arson investigator.”

  “We’re not doing anything tonight, right? Just watch the house and get a profile on him when he comes home. We’ll run his history and ask around about him before we pull him in.”

  “Ask around where?”

  “Gay bars and clubs that Cisneros went to.”

  “Fuck. We just got off a stakeout. I hate this shit. It’s bad for my bowels. I can only go at home.”

  “You’ll be fine. Drop me back off at my place and call me as soon as he gets home.”

  Gunn pulled away from the curb, glancing one more time into the house.

  CHAPTER 14

  Stanton parked in front of the Yazzie’s burnt-out home and turned off his engine. Some kids were playing nearby and they saw him and immediately turned and began walking away. He could see them toss the rocks in their hands onto the sidewalk. A house that was nearly burnt to the ground and barely standing was simply too much of an enticement for them to resist.

  When he was a kid, there was a man that lived in a rundown home by a friend’s apartment complex. Stanton and his friends would walk by every day on their way to a nearby soccerfield or to the rec center. If they got near the yard, the man would sick his dog on them.

  When he was ten, he tripped on the uneven sidewalk and the dog got ahold of his calf and wouldn’t let go. The man stood over him and laughed and then finally pulled his dog off when neighbors began looking out of their windows at what was going on. Stanton’s father tried to speak with the man to discuss what had occurred. Rather than calling the police or beating the guy to a pulp as any normal father would, he just knocked on his door and tried to discuss the situation. They spoke for a few minutes and his father shook the man’s hand.

  He came back to Stanton and explained that he wouldn’t be going on the man’s lawn anymore and that he was actually a nice fellow and that he was married but recently gotten a divorce. But Stanton didn’t hear any of it. The image of his father shaking hands with the man that had terrorized and wounded him cut so deeply, that he never looked at his father the same way again. He didn’t do it consciously or even want to, but he knew that was the day that his connection with his father had been severed.

  An FJ Cruiser came to a stop across the street and Emma Lyon hopped out wearing jeans and a tight black shirt. She held a red case with a white handle and had a badge—issued to her by the county with the emblem of the San Diego Fire Department emblazoned on it—clipped to her belt. Stanton got out of the car and met her in the street.

  “Detective, glad you came.”

  “To be honest, I haven’t worked too many arsons before. I’m interested to see what you do.”

  “Same thing you do. Fire speaks to you. It tells you things, it breathes, it reproduces, it follows the easiest routes in a house. If you know what you’re looking for, everything is right there. I’m guessing murders are the same.”

  “More or less I suppose. I do envy you one thing; no hospital visits to the live victims.”

  “Yeah, I could never do that. I don’t really want to know what people are capable of.” She turned to the house and took a deep breath. “You ready?”

  “After you.”

  They walked to the sidewalk and then to the front lawn. Emma put down her kit and took out a small camera. She began taking photos of the house from all different angles as Stanton stood quietly and watched. Then, as Benny had done before her, she diagramed the house on graph paper. Without a word she replaced the camera and the clipboard with the paper and went inside the house. Stanton followed but didn’t say anything. She stood at the doorway a while and then began slowing going from room to room. She put on latex gloves and ran her hands over some burn impressions on the doors.

  The room that the body had been found was the one she spent the most time in. She measured burn marks on the walls and took photos of the puddle marks on the baseboards. She slowly went over every inch of flooring and would occasionally stop and snap a photo of a certain section.

  A chair was in the bedroom that was covered with soot. Stanton leaned against its back and folded his arms, staring out the window as Emma finished what she was doing. After a long while, she stood up and turned to him.

  “Fernando didn’t do this.”

  “How can you tell?”

  “The fire started here. Probably from that portable heater that’s been melted to the floor. There’s something called flashover, it’s a term of art in arson investigation. It’s when the radiant heat in a room transforms it. Instead of a room with a fire in it, it becomes a room on fire. It’s the point when the fire gets out of control. It creates almost a fireball. The fire shot up the wall and then raced around. As it went lower to the ground it reached somewhere around eleven hundred degrees Fahrenheit. At flashover, the fire consumes every piece of fuel source in a room and then searches for more. It shot out of this room and down the hall. What we call puddle configurations can happen naturally from flashover because the fire’s darting around everywhere.”

  “What about the spiderweb patterns on the broken glass?”

  “That’s more likely caused by rapid cooling than rapid heating. I read your arson investigator’s report. The V marks he claimed indicated an accelerant also happen during flashover, whenever a new fuel source is ignited.”

  “How certain are you of this?”

  “Ninety-nine percent. I’ll be a hundred percent after a few days in the lab. The only way to tell the difference between puddle configurations caused by accelerant and those caused by flashover is to analyze samples in the lab. I’ll know in two days for sure, and I’ll write a report and submit it to your office.”

  She began placing samples onto small circular dishes and then started packing up. They walked outside into the sunlight together and Stanton stood next to her as she placed her kit back in the car.

  “I’ll give you a call in two days, maybe less,” she said, climbing in and starting the car. “Congratulations, Detective. You probably saved an innocent kid’s life.”

  CHAPTER 15

  Monique Gaspirini sat up in her bed. She had been moved here by the man last night so that she could have access to her restroom and sleep on an actual bed rather than the kitchen floor. The ties around her wrists had been removed but her ankles were bound with a length of plastic and then knotted to the bed. She could get to the bathroom, her television, and a few feet into the hall, but not to the window on the other side of the room.

  Her alarm clock said 5:34 p.m. and she listened for exactly two minutes and didn’t hear anything. Sometimes the man would leave for long periods of time and not come back for hours. He would only leave at night and return at night. So far, he hadn’t been here all day.

  She fell to the floor and pulled on the length of plastic around her ankles. Though it was something she had done a hundred times and knew was useless, something drove her to pull on it with all her strength. She then looked at the knot that was looped several times and wrapped around the frame of the bed. Monique grabbed one of her shoes and began pounding on the knot. She struck it until sweat was pouring down her face and bits of shoe had flown over the floor. Exhausted, she leaned back against the bed, tucking her hair behind her ears. She curled up, her knees to her chest, and began to cry.

  Not long after that she heard the backdoor downstairs open and then footsteps. Every single time it happened, she lost her breath, and her heart would pound so loud in her ears she was afraid it would explode.

  The footsteps got louder and then went quiet; he was coming up the stairs. Her door opened and the man stood there. He was wearing a suit now. He wore a white button-down shirt underneath with no tie. He was clean-shaven. But there was an odd smell to him. It was like paint thinner or nail polish.

  “Are you hungry?” he said. She didn’t respond. “You know,
it’s hard for me to look after you if you don’t—”

  “Are you going to kill me?” she said, looking him in the eyes.

  “Ah, it speaks. Am I going to kill you…what do you think?”

  “I hear you laughing and talking to yourself at night. I thought there were two of you at first but I know that you talk to yourself now. I think you’re crazy and you’re going to kill me.”

  He sat down in the chair that was against the wall and leaned forward on his elbows. “You’re a very beautiful girl. Why no boyfriends coming over to check up on you? Oh, wait,” he said, snapping his fingers, “yes, yes he did.”

  She felt her heart sink into her stomach. “What did you do to him?” He laughed as he rose to leave the room. “What did you do to him? WHAT DID YOU DO TO HIM!”

  The door slammed shut and her scream echoed off the walls. She heard noises downstairs for a few minutes and then a door open and close before a car engine started. It was her car, and she tried to stand up and watch it out the window but couldn’t see that far. She collapsed back down to her knees. She would’ve cried again, but no tears came this time.

  CHAPTER 16

  Stanton sat in the waiting area of his psychiatrist’s office and listened to the low mumble of the patient she was finishing up with. The patient was crying and asking her if he could come back later this evening. Eventually the door opened and a man walked out with tissues to his eyes. Jennifer waited until he was gone and then motioned for Stanton to come inside.

  When he sat down, she poured herself a cup of water from a tray on her desk and offered some to him. He took it politely and drank down a few sips.

  “How have you been?” she said.

  “Good.”

  “You have a little bit more stubble than when you came last. Are you growing a beard?”

  “No, I just haven’t shaved in a bit.”

  “So tell me what’s going on in your life.”