The Tower Condos looms over the port, a high rise that caters to people with the cash to throw away. A buffet line for the Moonlight Killer.
I pass through the lobby that’s crowded with reporters and freelance journalists. Good thing cops are here to keep the jackals at bay. Its times like this is when I’m glad I’m not a uniform anymore. I shove through the flock of reporters and flash my badge at the uniform by the elevator. “Go on up, Detective,” he says. I board the elevator, and then I hear the reporters start screaming. “Detective Lobos!” Like a bunch of braying hyenas. Those fucking idiots on the TV got the press pecking at us like starving vultures.
Patrol officers have the room blockaded with yellow tape. I snatch a pair of latex gloves from a crime scene tech’s case. “Where’s the body, officer?” I ask.
He winces. “Hell, which Part?”
“Never mind. I’ll find it for myself.”
I step into the living room and see the victim’s severed head facing the TV in a pool of blood on a glass table. He changed his MO as well, but not much has changed there is still silver rammed in the mouth of the victim strolling to the dining room there is an axe buried into the oak table. An axe? He’s definitely changed his methods. I walk over to the balcony doors and see two severed legs sitting upright. Sullivan sees me and motions for me to come into the bedroom. Joining him, I find the rest of the body a torso sitting in a puddle of blood on the bed with white sheets. “Who was he?”
“The victim was Charles Donnelly, a Neurosurgeon at Tampa general. Single, no kids. He emigrated from England last year.”
“Any next of kin to notify?”
“We’ve already notified his parents they’re coming down to the station to confirm the victim’s identity.”
“Who found the body?”
“Apartment manager, Deidra Robins. She found him after she came upstairs to look into the barrage of noise complaints she received. But, don’t bother talking to her right now, she’s in shock. We’ll have to leave her be until she is ready to talk.”
“Was forensics able to recover the passports?”
“No, they were too burned up in the explosion, but one thing that’s strange this guy had several different passports all with fake names just like Drake did. I have to admit, Lobos. I don’t like where this case is going, David Drake, MI6, and two people with fake passports with fake names on them. What the hell have we stepped in here?”
“Sir, can I speak to you in private?”
“Sure.” He turns to the forensics team. “Hey, guys, can you give us a minute? They all leave the room, and he closes the door and locks it. “What’s up, Devi?”
“What I am about to say, you cannot tell Jason or anyone else.”
“My lips are sealed.”
“The people Drake has been killing are not innocent, Robert Stetson was a corrupt businessman who cost thousands their jobs and Jason’s wife she was an international arms dealer who sold weapons to various terrorist groups, her restaurants was just something for the books. Now, I am willing to bet if we looked into the other victims, we will find they weren’t so innocent either.”
“Do you have any hard evidence, or is this something else Drake told you?”
“I did.”
“You did? What does that mean?”
I let out a sigh. “I destroyed the thumb drive.”
“You what! Goddamn it, Lobos!”
“It wouldn’t have helped us catch Drake anyway, besides do you really want to send Jason over the edge? That poor bastard has one foot in the nuthouse as it is.”
“You know if you weren’t such a good cop, I’d can your ass for that shit. But I understand why you did it. I probably would’ve done the same for my partner.”
“Do you think Jason knows about his wife’s past?”
I shake my head. “Doubt it. He seemed pretty oblivious to who she really was.”
“I’ll keep it hidden for now, but you’d best hope you didn’t destroy any vital evidence that could’ve broke this case.” He calls the forensics people back in.
“So did Drake leave his insightful bullshit on walls?”
“No, strangely.”
A uniform steps into the room and says, “Sir, we found this DVD addressed to Detective Devora Lobos.”
“Did you check it for prints?”
“Yes, no prints were found.”
“Slip the DVD in the player,” I say. The officer puts the DVD in, and the song Staying Alive by the Bee Gees begins blasting in the background as Drake appears on the television screen, wearing a plastic suit and hair net moonwalking and singing to a severed human head like he’s singing to a person.
This guy has really lost his shit.
He leans into the camera giving us the finger.
Sullivan shakes head in disgust. “Cocky bastard.”
“This is one deranged fuck,” Amber adds.
He does a twirl in the video and kisses the severed head on the mouth. “Crazy or not, he’s got some moves I’ll give him that.”
She slaps her hand over her mouth, trying to hold back laughter. “You’re fucked up, Lobos,” she says.
He stops dancing and throws the head on the couch like a child bored with a toy. I glance behind me, and there is a smear of blood on the back of the sofa.
Well, that explains the blood smear on the wall.
I turn back to the TV, and he’s playing a blood-stained axe like it’s a guitar. He stops dancing and drops down on the couch and slams the head on the table, and starts carving a cross into the head. He throws his hands up. “Brothers and sisters, his soul has been purified.” He boastfully mimics a southern accent. “By the way,
