Killing Roses

5__Another target

04:10 pm

The car swerved wildly to the side of the road and angry hoots filled Valerie’s ears along with her own screams.

“Oh, my God!” she shouted as she brought the car to a stop and quickly got out. Valerie watched with wide eyes as the kid came out of her back seat, looking at her over the top with eyes full of guilt.

“You!” she snarled breathlessly, pointing at him over the top of the car. “You were really trying to steal my car this time, weren’t you?!”

She couldn’t believe it. This tire slasher kid had been inside her car!

“No, no, I swear I wasn’t!” the kid said shaking his head quickly.

“What were you doing in there?” Valerie demanded with narrowed eyes. “Who are you? Are you stalking me?”

The kid made a face. “Hell no. I’m not!”

Val jerked back and put a hand to her chest. “Why do you sound like you’d rather stalk a tortoise? Am I not stalk-worthy material?”

She was totally serious, but to her surprise, the kid put his hand over his mouth and laughed.

“What?” he asked laughing.

“Stop laughing!” Val barked and he straightened, the laughter disappearing from his face.

She squinted at him and put both hands on the top of her car, leaning over so he could see how serious she was. “Since you were crouching in my car, I’m sure you heard that nice cop put his number on my phone. I happen to like him a lot, so I’ve already got it on speed dial. Talk.”

The teenager gulped and put his hands together, pleading. “Please, Miss. I wasn’t tryna steal it. I told you I lost something when…”

He trailed off and Valerie raised a brow. “When what?”

The kid sighed. “I’ll be honest. A while ago, we found your car unlocked round the back of the building and… we didn’t wanna do it, but we hadn’t eaten for days, Miss, we got hungry. So we went through your car. Found some money—”

“That was you?!” Valerie was shocked. She thought she’d lost her money and chocolate snacks all on her own. “You robbed me? You little…”

She darted around the car to catch him only to find that he’d run away to the other side of the car.

“Come back here,” Valerie ordered following him, but the kid went running back around the car and before she knew it, Valerie had started chasing him around the car.

“Get back here, you chocolate and change stealing iguana!”

“I’m so sorry, Miss!” he cried but Valerie could hear the laughter in his voice as he ran around the car. This kid had the guts to laugh after stealing her chocolates? She’d make mincemeat of him!

Valerie put off her plan to grind him into nothing when she ran out of breath. Leaning on the car as she panted, she waved her hand at him. “If you come over here now… I promise to smash you to pieces gently.”

He grinned at her, safe on the other side of her car. “Sorry, miss. I’m really sorry.”

Like hell he was sorry. She hunched over, catching her breath.

She huffed, looking at him with the eyes of the Wonder Woman she aimed to become. “You’re just a kid. What are you doing stealing from cars?”

The amusement died from his eyes and she watched him rub his jaw nervously.

“Uhm… I guess things just turned out this way.”

He shrugged and Val tilted her head at him. Walking over to the post box on the pavement, she waved him over.

“Come over here.”

Slowly, the kid came from around the car, cautiously approaching her. Valerie looked at his clothes and felt her chest constrict. His jeans were faded and worn through and holey on the knees. His t-shirt was too large and hung on his thin body like a rag. He was rather tall. At least 5’10’’.

When he reached her, Valerie looked into the beautiful grey eyes she’d failed to properly notice last time.

“You’ve got unusual eyes,” she commented.

He shuffled his feet and shrugged. “I guess.”

He was ashamed of them. He kept his eyes lowered and Val wondered who’d made him feel like his eyes were hideous enough to hide.

“What’s your name?” she asked.

He lifted his head and gave her a skeptical look. “Why? So you can call your cop boyfriend?”

Valerie scowled. “If I was going to call my cop boyfriend I’d have done it the moment I found you in my car. Don’t you think so?”

He lowered his eyes and she saw him thinking about it. He looked at her. “Jake.”

“Your real name,” Valerie demanded flatly.

His shoulders hunched and Val clearly read the mistrust.

“Hey…” she called. He looked up at her. “I won’t call the cops. Chill.”

He studied her face for a minute and slowly exhaled. “Michael. My name’s Michael.”

*****************

05:30 pm

“I’ll be waiting.” Roman hung up and returned to the conference room.

“What she say?” demanded Davis.

Officer Stark and Detective Cooper were also in the room, as well as Detective Tanaka, the Forensics Detective who’d combed the murder scene with a fine-toothed comb.

Roman had been speaking to a member of their Forensics Department. Kacey Louis was the best Medical Examiner around and that was the only reason Roman was glad to have her on the case. It had nothing to do with the fact that he once had her draped over his naked body on most nights of the week.

“Well?” pressed Davis as Roman sat.

“Female victim. Thirty-one years of age, five-foot-five in height. So far, we know that the victim’s time of death is on Tuesday night, between 08:30 pm and 09:00 pm. KC’s working round the clock on this autopsy.”

“COD?” Davis asked looking over the notes Detective Cooper had passed him.

“She doesn’t know yet. Getting a victim like Miss Crawford with that many injuries can make it difficult to pinpoint which exact injury caused her death. Bastard cut her up badly.”

Davis looked carefully at Roman, taking a second to appreciate how quickly he’d overcome his fear and adapted to his new role. He turned to Tanaka. “Well, Adam?”

The detective nodded and began to pass images of the crime scene around. “Firstly, there was no sign of forced entry into the victim’s apartment. Neither were there any signs of struggle on the carpet surrounding the door nor further on into the apartment.”

“The victim either knew her killer…” said Roman. “Or he followed her… forced himself into her apartment.”

“He didn’t give her a choice,” said Cooper in a daze. “It’s the exact same.”

Roman raised his gaze to look at him. “What’s the exact same?”

“The way he took her life,” said Davis, hardening his voice. “It’s exactly like the Rose Killer.”

Roman looked at both of them with a frown, his body tensing. There was no way it was the same killer. No way. “We don’t know that. Just because the victim had flowers over her body, doesn’t mean we can assume this is the Rose Killer.”

“Not every killer randomly puts rose petals over his victims. Might be a copycat,” said Cooper, studying the images. “But these cuts, these injuries… I’ve seen this before… too often and too closely. It’s hard to copy something this precisely.”

Roman rubbed his forehead, turning away from Cooper. “Let’s just work with what we have for now. Adam.”

“Right. The victim was found on her bed, unbound, neither did we find traces of restraints, which is another indication that she had not struggled, it is possible that she may have been drugged. If you look here,” He indicated a point on the victim’s neck in the photographs. “There’s a tiny detail captured by the camera. The marks along her neck.”

“I’d been wondering about those,” murmured Roman as he studied the images.

Stark looked at Tanaka. “A syringe?”

“Unlikely. These marks are much larger than a syringe would make. But they’re definitely significant.”

“Her sister denied any possibility of a date that night. The victim didn’t even have a boyfriend,” Roman mentioned, making note of it. “We’ll know if the victim even slightly fought back when KC’s through with the autopsy.”

“So she likely didn’t fight back, neither was her apartment broken into, nor did she have a boyfriend,” Davis said twirling a pen. “Y’all question her neighbors?”

“Most of them are old ladies,” said Cooper. “None of them heard a thing, since most of them are getting ready for bed, if not already asleep at 08:30 pm. This was either someone who was already in her apartment or followed her home.”

“I’m betting on the second,” Roman murmured, feeling sick in his gut. “He could’ve been a stalker.”

Lieutenant Davis leaned forward. “What makes you think so?”

“Valerie Quinn,” said Roman. With her name, an image of her instantly popped into his head and he fiercely ignored the warmth that seized his heart. “Co-worker of Miss Jennifer Crawford. On the night of the murder, Miss Quinn thinks she saw a stranger standing in the underground parking lot when she was headed home. She says, she saw the figure of a man standing behind her car which was parked in a corner.”

“And you think he’s our possible perpetrator?”

Roman tapped his fingers on the table. “I have a feeling. I saw Miss Quinn safely in her car that night and Miss Crawford left the building a little after that. She could have been down there alone with a killer watching her. “

“What were you doing there?” Davis asked curiously.

Roman shrugged. “I got called out on Monday morning and it happened to be Miss Quinn who made the 911 call, I accidentally left the scene with her cell phone that morning. I returned on Tuesday night to return it.”

“And you didn’t see anything strange that night?” Stark asked, his usually mischievous blue eyes completely sober and serious.

“Nothing,” Roman said regrettably. “It’s now clear that Miss Quinn saw something because when I walked up to her, she looked scared out of her mind.”

Davis sighed. “Luckily, she was safe, thanks to you. Miss Crawford wasn’t so lucky. Bastard must have followed her home and attacked her. Footage?”

Officer Stark looked up from the notes and shook his head. “None. The building owner said he’d been meaning to put in CCTV but hadn’t gotten the time.”

“Shit.”

Stark leaned onto the table. “Parker, you sure Miss Crawford was his target?”

Roman tilted his head. “What? You think he could have been after Miss Quinn?”

“That’s a possibility,” said Davis.

“Yes,” Stark nodded. “I mean, if he’d been waiting by her car in the dark, he could have been targeting her. And then you arrived and he had no choice but to remain hidden. When both of you leave, Miss Crawford comes out to go home and the perpetrator decides to hurt her instead.”

“s**t, that’s possible. He could have…” Roman looked up at Stark. “He could have been after Miss Quinn.”