Risk

by Jaime Johnesee

  “One vamp for every human?” His eyes widened as he took in the fact I’d given him.

  “Yeah, just about, 1:1.3, it says.”

  “That is terrifying.” His sudden blanching let me know he’d estimated the fanged population to be much lower.

  “Could be worse.” I shrugged.

  “How?”

  I would take care of that skepticism he was showing.

  “Add in other supers. Now, imagine how the humans would react to the news that they’re the minority, and a food source.”

  Quinn blanched even whiter and looked frightened. “There’d be rioting.”

  “Most likely.” I’d been expecting this for some time.

  So many humans already knew about us because of their positions within emergency services.

  Hate groups had begun to gather steam since the vamps had come out. They went on spreading lies about spreading the virus through touch and turning us into giant mutant killing machines.

  My biggest fear was that they would weaponize the virus as it was originally intended or modify it to create the sci-fi super soldier they purported us to be.

  They’d recruited shifters to do their dirty work, so why not save time and just create an army of them?

  I shuddered.

  “Why aren’t the guys up top doing anything to smooth the vamps coming out, out?” Alex asked as he walked back up to us.

  “I think they’re doing the best they can. Think about how they will look when it comes out monsters exist and they’ve always known and hid them from society.” The more I talked the more uncomfortable Quinn looked.

  “If this bill passes, there’ll eventually be a war, won’t there?”

  “It’s possible. I sure as hell hope not, though.”

  “Damn.”

  “Pretty much sums it up as good as any word.”

  “This will make the crazies seem less wacky.” Quinn nibbled at a hangnail.

  “Yeah, but we do have some well-known and well-respected folks coming out and speaking about how we aren’t dangerous or evil. So, hopefully the general public will pay attention to that.”

  “Are you actually expecting for people to be logical and reasoned?” Quinn scoffed.

  “I need to be hopeful. Besides, sometimes people will surprise you.”

  “Fair enough. Is there anything we can do to prevent a war?”

  “We need to educate people, just being read in on the existence of supers. Make sure they know the truth; that we’re not mindless slobbering machines bent on annihilation.”

  “That, I think we can do.”

  “Good. If we can get people to see the truth about us maybe less of them will be afraid when we come out from under the bed.”

  “First thing’s first, let’s catch the AWFA Killer and go from there. As much of a pain in the ass as it’s been for us having to protect AWFA, making them admit that you, a shifter, saved their lives, is kind of amusing.”

  “It’d be more amusing if they didn’t follow it up with a rant about how the Devil often uses kindness to break in and steal your soul.”

  “Jaguars can’t change their spots I guess.”

  “Rosettes. Cheetahs have spots; jaguars and leopards have rosettes.”

  Quinn, being a smartass, hummed The More You Know theme.

  “Have we heard anything from ERT?”

  Evidence Recovery Team usually sent their preliminary reports in promptly. They were the grease that kept the FBI wheel moving and they were good at what they did.

  Sometimes they backed up a little during the in depth reports.

  “Not yet. Grace says there’s an unidentifiable substance on the first female’s lower jaw. They’re getting together a prelim report and sending it over, but the full report will have to wait for tox. She also said they grabbed the vacuum bags from the scenes and are running the contents.”

  “Damn. Good on the bags, though. Maybe we’ll catch a break.”

  “I hope so. I honestly don’t think I will ever get those scenes out of my mind. Grisly was bad, but it was more animal. This guy, man, he made them eat each other.” Quinn gagged and paused to recover.

  “I’m hoping it’s the worst thing I ever see.”

  “I’ve seen cannibalism before in serials—I’ve even seen them feed the ones they kill to their other prisoners—but I’ve not come across one that made them eat themselves and their partner alive like this. It’s … I don’t know, beyond evil.”

  “Is there anything ERT had for us to start on now?” Sometimes Grace will be able to give us a starting point before she writes up her full report.

  “No. There were no prints aside from the building manager and neighbor who discovered their separate scenes.”

  “So, would you say that the killer is organized?” I tried to shake Quinn out of it and get him doing what he does best, read psychopathic behavior.

  “Yes. The fact they found no prints suggests he cleaned up after himself.”

  “Why do you say he?”

  “Well, it’d take someone with some strength to take out Councilman Roberts and his wife. The Councilman did a tour in the Navy. He knew how to fight, and I don’t see him sitting there while some psychopath forces him and his wife to eat each other. That says man to me, probably larger than Roberts, or more than one unsub.”

  “What else?”

  Quinn closed his eyes and I could see him going over the scene again in his mind.

  “He used a plate and utensils when he forced them to eat each other.”

  “Yeah?” I wondered what that meant.

  “He’s probably from an upper middle class or wealthy background.”

  “Because he used plates and cutlery?”

  “Poor folks would’ve just made them eat it right from their hands. It’s not about enjoying the food, but humiliating and forcing them to comply. People put their food on nice plates and decorate the tables to enjoy the experience of dining.”

  “So our guy wanted to enjoy himself, or wanted our victims to enjoy themselves?”

  “I don’t know; I suspect the former.”

  Alex walked back in. “What’s up?”

  “Vamps are being forced to register, what’s up with you?”

  “I got a call from Ben.”

  My jaw hit the floor. “What?”

  Al motioned for me to step aside. Quinn nodded that it was okay and closed his eyes. I could tell he was running through the scenes and trying to figure out why our nutter had been so nutty. I stepped off to the side with Alex.

  “Okay, so, why did Ben call you?” I was curious.

  “He wanted to tell me he wasn’t going to stand in the way of our happiness. He also apologized for any doucheyness on his part and wished us luck. Why didn’t you tell me he left?”

  “I hadn’t found the right time yet.”

  “Is it bad that I’m glad he’s gone?”

  “No, I get that he’s a temptation for me, and that it has to be hard dealing with the fact your girl is attracted to someone else, even if that attraction is purely metaphysical.”

  “I’m glad you get it. Mostly, I’m glad he’s gone.” He smiled at me, turned, and walked back to Quinn.

  To be honest, part of me was going to miss Ben, the other part of me was relieved he was gone. The way he constantly tried to play our attraction off as something more had been getting annoying. I would miss his advice on Jix—he’d been right on with the dominance thing—but I didn’t like how he kept trying to make everything so heavy.

  I rejoined my partners.

  “I think the guy we’re looking for is in the justice system, somehow,” Quinn blurted as I approached.

  “Like a cop?” I kept thinking about how AWFA had cops on their payroll.

  “No, he had access to the cops—and their evidence—but he has more range than a cop would have. He hid those scenes for quite some time, and I have a feeling we will find even more of them as time goes on. Danvers had lists of supers that were
sold into the sex trade, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “We know Danvers got his names from local officers and arranged the kidnappings with them, but what if there are judges involved, too?”

  “Someone has to have the files on these missing supers. Most of them were high risk, right? Isn’t that what Ginger said? They were street rats like her?”

  “Yeah.”

  “So what if a judge, or someone with access to those files, are handpicking the ones being sold?”

  “You really don’t think it’s a luck of the grab sort of thing anymore?”

  “Nope.” Quinn was sure and that was good enough for me. My partner had an amazing gift for behavior patterns and how they fit certain people.

  “So, we just have to find out if any of the vics in the recovered files had records. If they did, then hopefully there’s a name in common.”

  “Don’t you think he’d be smart enough to remove his name from everything?” I asked.

  “It’s not about smart, it’s about ego. He doesn’t think anyone will ever catch him. Having that thread dangling is a turn on for him.”

  “Alright. I’ll call and have someone start cross referencing the files we found with justice system files.” Alex held up his cell and moved off to make the call and start the referencing.

  Chapter 24

  AL CAME BACK with an even more somber look on his face. “James and a few others are working on cross referencing.”

  “Okay. Well, isn’t that a good thing? Why do you look like they just shot your grandma?”

  “There’s been another murder.”

  “Fuck.”

  “This one was a guy that we believe was another VP of AWFA. We think he was the VP of their national chapter.”

  This case was difficult for me in many respects. The first being the fact I had to protect people that were calling out for my blood. The second being the fact I had to hide—and felt really guilty about—my elation at the deaths of these assholes. The third being that this organization was so freaking disorganized.

  Even though they’d screamed loudly for my death, tried to kill me, tried to frame me, and had twisted people enough to kill in the manner Grisly had, these deplorable assholes didn’t deserve to die like this. Watching the upper echelon of their organization be slaughtered brought the grim irony of their hatred to light. Their hate had inspired somebody else’s, and their own vehemence had written their death warrants.

  “It gets better.” Quinn patted my hand.

  “How the hell can shit like this get better? These people are being tortured before they’re slaughtered and thrown away. There is no better to something like that.”

  “There was a list of three shipping containers. They were sitting at port in Mobile. Mobile police and FBI opened them this morning. They found a bunch of the shifters who have been kidnapped. Some vamps and humans, too.”

  “How many?”

  “Huh?”

  “How many were recovered?”

  “Not as many as we would’ve liked.”

  “Give me a percent, O’Reilly!” I growled, I hadn’t meant to, but this case had been hard for me to watch

  “Probably thirty to forty percent of the missing shifters have been recovered.”

  “That’s higher than I’d thought, but fuck.”

  “I know.” Quinn gave me a hug.

  While it was awesome we’d recovered so many, the ones we didn’t recover would never be seen again. They were being taken to places where their lives would most likely be ended after even more horrific things befell them.

  Some would wind up like the AWFA Killer’s vics. Torn to pieces and broken. Some would have it worse. Some would live a good long life of servitude in Hell on earth.

  “So the killer left us a trail of breadcrumbs to the shifters, why?”

  “Maybe he thinks he is doing the right thing?” Quinn shrugged.

  “I don’t know; the whole justice killer thing doesn’t fit those scenes. That was the work of a pure sadist. Someone who enjoyed the pain they were causing because they felt their victim deserved it. Imagine if they believed innocent humans deserved it?” Something about this just felt off. I felt like I was missing some important piece of the puzzle.

  “I agree completely. Those scenes aren’t the work of a justice warrior, but I never saw this guy as a justice warrior. I saw the justice, as you’re calling it, as a byproduct.”

  “So, is it safe to assume the killer wanted something from those AWFA members?”

  “Yeah. That’s most likely why he tortured them the way he did.”

  “Have we been monitoring that bank account we were able to tie AWFA to?” Inspiration hit and I wanted to see if I was right.

  “Yeah, why?”

  “No attempts at withdrawals or even any deposits?”

  “Yeah, nothing. Why?”

  “The killer wants the bank account. Think of it, millions of dollars in a tax free shelter that nobody will complain about if it goes missing, because it’s only there through illegal means.”

  “Jesus, you’re right. We were so focused on it being an anti-hate crime we missed looking for other motives.”

  “Why do you think he left the addresses of the shipping containers?”

  “To keep us thinking it was about the shifters.” I opened my laptop and shoved Al’s computer chair aside. Quinn stood next to me as I pulled open all of our notes on the case.

  I ran the bank account we’d been watching and when the info hit my screen my stomach dropped. The account balance was zero.

  “Who the fuck? How? Impossible!” I slammed my hand down on my desk.

  The account was supposed to be frozen and any attempted transaction was supposed to send an alert. How the hell had the killer gotten around the FBI’s trip wire around the money? Quinn called Gerry and told him the news and what we suspected. I dialed my old boss at Computer Crimes and got them on recovering the data.

  The humans will be okay? The ones who had been stolen?

  Yeah, the ones we found will be fine. I really need to catch this asshole.

  Remember, jaguars like to hide in the trees and scare predators away.

  You think he’s someone in law enforcement?

  I do not know, but it’s a good way to stay close to what the boss is doing.

  How do you know all of this?

  I am able to read your mind and learn from you. I wish you good luck. I am taking an extended nap, but will wake if you call me.

  “Hey, Q?” I asked as he returned to me.

  “Yeah?”

  “You know how we thought this guy had a LEO on his side?” Having a law enforcement officer on your side was an imperative cliché for all bad guys these days.

  “Yeah?”

  “Is it possible he is a LEO himself?”

  “Yeah, I mean, if not a cop, he’s definitely had some training; he’s also had training in medicine. We got the forensics report. He used a surgical paralytic, vecuronium, to subdue his victims, and ketamine to keep them dissociated and pliant. They also found samples of sodium thiopental.”

  “He’s using the truth serum to get info on the bank account. It makes sense, but then, why the torture? If he has truth serum, he wouldn’t need to cut them up—”

  “He doesn’t need to. He wants to.”

  “Jesus.” I felt sick.

  “I hope like hell we can find this guy. This is insane. How the hell did he get past our blocks on the account?” Quinn looked as shaken as I felt.

  “I’ve got my old pals at CCD checking on that.” In the meantime, I opened the account info and dug through the history. I wasn’t a hacker but working in the Computer Crimes Division had taught me some skills.

  Not enough, though. The guy was a ghost. One second the money was there and then, bam, gone. There was no withdrawal showing at all. It was like a glitch.

  “Did I really just see twenty million dollars go poof?”

  “Kind of like David Co
pperfield and the Statue of Liberty, ain’t it?”

  “Yeah, except with Copperfield the statue was still there.”

  “Quinn, you’re a genius!” I called the CCD. “Guys, I think the money is still there. I think we are getting a smoke screen. Dig into it, hard. Thank you!”

  “What’s going on?” Quinn leaned back in his chair.

  “I think our guy did what Copperfield did. He put a mirror in place and made us think the money was gone so we’d dial back security and he could come in and grab it when it suited him.”

  “Is that possible?”

  “I have no fucking clue, but let’s see.” If I was wrong, no harm done. If I was right, we could find this asshole and lock him up tight. Whether he was the AWFA Killer or not, he was in deep shit.

  Quinn and I decided to go find and let Gerry in on what we’d come across. As we headed down the hall, Alex came our way. I read him in on what we’d learned and suspected.

  “Damn. That’s good thinking.”

  “Thank you.” I smiled at him.

  “Here’s hoping you’re right. This guy is a sick fuck and he needs to be caught.” Al shook his head and it looked like he was trying to shake the memory of the horrific remains we’d been left by our virtual magician.

  I knew that pain. I realized with my first serial case that those sights, smells, and sounds never go away. They become imprinted so deep in your brain that it becomes a part of you. For me, it’s motivation to do better.

  Alex was more the type to lament not being able to save everyone, whereas I was the type to soothe my lament with the knowledge that we’d saved future victims from a terrible fate. I knew the odds in this job were stacked high against me. But I’d learned early on to ignore the odds and focus on the case in front of me.

  Sometimes we stopped them before they took another victim. Sometimes we were too late. If we could stop them before they ever even took the first victim, then maybe we’d be able to do some serious good.

  Until that time, victims mean evidence, and evidence can show us everything we need to know.

  “I need to see the pictures of the latest body found. Sam, if you’re up for it, I’d like to go there and check out the scene. See what the killer did.” Quinn was asking me to go with him.