Fic: A Touch of the Wild, Part 05
Mar. 26th, 2009 10:05 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
wiseheartTitle: A Touch of the Wild
Author: Soledad
Disclaimer: I don't own Criminal Minds or the White Wolfe characters and settings or any of the other shows from which I've borrowed characters for cameo appearances. All I own are a few OCs and a really twisted plot idea.
PART 05
Author’s note: As before, LAPD statistics are genuine, thank Wikipedia.
The Preacher is a character borrowed from the X-Files episode “Sleepless”. He’s a recurring figure in the “Pathways” universe.
Branco Vukovic is modelled after a German actor/singer who, at one point of his career, used to be a model. And I don’t need to tell where Ethan Gold has come from, do I? *g*
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
“We are making some headway,” Hotch informed his team colleagues before the beginning of the next shift. Like many LA police stations, West LA Community Station had a 4 day-10 hour work week schedule, which meant that at least the uniformed cops who’d just come to work had to be debriefed again. “We – that is, Detective Murietta and Dr. Reid – have managed to identify two of the previously unknown victims. It seems that Detective Murietta’s original theory about how the unsub choses his victims has been right.”
“Were these two also talented in some ways?” Detective Barritza asked.
Hotch consulted his notes for a moment, and then pinned two photos onto the whiteboard. He pointed at the picture of a boyish-faced young man on the right; the victim wore a suit on that one and had a violin in his hand.
“This one, Ethan Gold, used to be a very promising young violin player,” he said. “He came from Pittsburgh and was considered extremely talented. Worked for a recording company for a year or so, even produced a couple of CDs of his own concerts… then got into an abusive relationship with an older man, broke his career and ended up on the streets where he used to earn some money with playing classical music on his violin.”
“How old was he?” JJ asked, staring at the photo of the very youthful-looking man in sorrow. It always saddened her when young lives got wasted like that.
“Twenty-five, apparently,” Hotch replied. JJ just shook her head in regret.
“What about the other victim?” Prentiss asked, looking at the picture of a somewhat older but still fairly young, spiky-haired man who had a flawless face and large, soulful eyes. “Was he young enough for the unsub?”
“He was just beyond thirty,’ Officer Wong piped in. “I remember him being a model for the Girard Fashion House – and a very popular one, at least for a while. He also tried to start a career as a singer, but with very little success. Then he tried to compose his own music, for which nobody showed much interest. The last report of him was that he wanted to become a dancer, but that’s all. A typical LA failure: after years on the cover of the greatest fashion magazines, he lost everything, began doing drugs… and ended on the streets.”
“Unfortunately, there are many such young people in LA, especially in the Hollywood area,” Lieutenant Bronowski agreed. “The glitter of Tinsel Town awakens false hopes in them; they grow overconfident… and fall deeply. Very, very deeply.”
“Is there any sign of them having known each other?” Prentiss asked. “Aside from having visited the same homeless shelter for a warm meal, that is?”
“There is one place where at least three of our homeless victims used to work for a time,” Reid answered. “An exotic dance club called the Vesuvius. This Vukovic person tried his luck as a background dancer there. Ethan Gold gave two concerts, joined with a literary evening, two and five months ago. And one of the previously identified victims, Douglas Howser, helped out as an ersatz waiter sometimes. Whenever he managed to stay clean for a few weeks, that is.”
“Could it be a coincidence?” Detective Turner’s voice revealed that he didn’t really believe it could.
Reid shook his head. “Statistically, it’s unlikely. Two of the victims working at the same place would already be stretching the limits of a possible coincidence, but three…”
“Have any of the upper class victims favoured the Vesuvius?” Lieutenant Bronowski asked.
Reid shrugged. “Garcia is still analysing their past-work activities. She’ll tell us as soon as she’s found a pattern.”
“That can take some time,” JJ commented. “Are there any other possible connections between them and the upper class victims, now that we know what they were doing for a living?”
Wong made a quick cross-reference search. “Well, one of those used to work for the Girard Fashion House as a fashion designer,” she said.
The profilers exchanged interested looks. “Two tangents,” Hotch said thoughtfully. “That’s a beginning. I think we have found a pattern. We need to see those places – both the fashion house and the dance club.”
Bronowski looked around his own people. “Anyone has a link to either of those places?”
“I know the owner of the Vesuvius,” Moralez raised her hand. “We helped her with one of her female dancers who got in trouble, a year or so ago. The Summer case, if you remember, Lieutenant.”
Bronowski nodded. “Yeah, I do. Well, let’s hope she’s still in a somewhat cooperative mood. By the way, haven’t you and Murietta investigated in a murder case involving Victor Girard?”
“We have,” Moralez said. “It was the case when one of his Puerto Rican seamstresses was murdered. But that was a simple case; she was killed by her own abusive husband. We got the guy and he’s still sitting in jail.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Bronowski said. “At least Girard knows you and will probably be cooperative. These people don’t like it when their business is connected to common crimes in any way.”
“I thought Fashion District would be my area,” Detective Lochley protested indignantly.
“It is,” Bronowski replied, “but in Girard’s case, I prefer to send someone who already does have the connections.” Lochley huffed but couldn’t fight the logic of the decision.
“Have Morgan and Detective Hoffs checked in already?” Sergeant Elizabeth Cruz, CO of the uniformed cops from the day shift, asked. She was a small, wiry woman in her mid-fifties, with her jet-black hair pulled into such a tight bun that Reid’s scalp started hurting just from the sight of it.
“One of the regular patrols spoke to them,” Bronowski answered, “but they haven’t learned anything yet. It will take time. The homeless people have grown wary and suspicious, even towards their own kind, which is understandable, I guess. It seems, though, as if they were shunning potential future victims.”
“Which is also understandable,” Detective Barritza commented dryly. “They don’t want to be killed just for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“Yeah, but that way they’re endangering potential victims even more,” his partner said.
Murietta shook his head. “I don’t think so. This killer isn’t going after easy prey. All of his victims, without exception, have been murdered in places where he could have been caught red-handed… pardon the bad pun.”
“The upper-class victims have all taken steps to ensure their own safety,” Reid added. “One of them was killed in his own house, with the elaborate security system fully working, and his family sleeping upstairs.”
“And what does that mean for us?” Turner asked.
“It could mean two things,” Reid said. “Either we’re dealing with a severe case of devolution – a process by which the unsub begins to lose control, falling in a downward spiral, unable to control his urge to perform a particular offence – or he’s suffering from the delusion that he can’t be caught because he’s smarter than the police. Personally, I think the latter is the case.”
“Why so?” Lieutenant Bronowski asked. “He sure as hell seems crazy enough.”
“Yes, but he’s also highly organized; or has been, so far,” Reid pointed out. “He commits his crimes in a premeditated manner, leaving few to no clues. Organized offenders also typically choose their victims with precise specifications.”
“That certainly seems to be the case with this bastard,” Turner agreed.
“Which is exactly why we need to know more about the victims,” Hotch said, then he looked at Reid. “I want the fashion house connection checked out first. Speak with this Victor Girard character. Try to find out whether any of the other victims had in any way been connected to his business. The others continue to map the victims’ lives and environment. Send all oh so insignificant-looking detail to Garcia. If there is a pattern, she’ll find it.”
“What about the Vesuvius?” Detective Lochley asked.
“Later,” Hotch replied. “Right now, that seems to be the point where the paths of most future victims have crossed. If that is so, we’ll have to be careful, or the unsub might retreat from there, and we’ll lose the chance to catch him.”
“We should go there as simple customers first,” Prentiss suggested. “Try to get a sense of the environment, get familiar with the hunting ground of the unsub.”
“Or one of his hunting grounds,” Murietta corrected. “We still don’t know enough to be sure about that.”
“I’ll call up their programme in a minute,” Officer Wong typed away on her keyboard with great speed. “Here it is. Tomorrow, Velvet Vellour – that’s the club owner – will read her poetry, and the Blount sisters will perform an acrobatic dance sequence.”
“Sounds interesting,” Prentiss commented. “Morgan will regret to have missed it.”
“He’ll have to try his luck later,” Hotch said dryly. ”We’re not on a vacation here. Anyway, I think the rest of us should go there as a group. Different viewpoints might bring different results, and in the end, a more complete picture.”
“Perhaps if the owner doesn’t connect us with the police, we’ll have more luck,” Prentiss said. Hotch nodded.
“Agreed. If Ms Wong can get us reservations, we’ll go as a group of businesspeople on a working holiday. However, we will need at least one insider with us; someone whom the club owner hopefully wouldn’t recognize.”
“I’m out, then,” Detective Lochley said, clearly unhappy about the fact. “I’ve already butted heads with her a couple of times.”
“I’ll go,” Agent Sandoval offered, looking at JJ with a thin, amused smile. “If you don’t mind coming as my date, that is.”
JJ shrugged. “I could do worse,” she replied.
“But who’ll go with Dr. Reid?” Moralez asked. “I can’t; the regular clientele knows me too well that a different hairdo and a little make-up would fool them.”
“I don’t need an escort,” Reid answered. “Skinny little geeks like myself are usually alone, even within a group of co-workers. Anything else would only raise suspicions.” But there was a sudden bitterness in his voice that made his team-mates wonder for a moment.
Detective Ioki shook his head. “Nobody goes alone to the Vesuvius. But don’t worry, I’ll go with you… assuming, you can pull out the gay boyfriend act.”
“Can you?” Reid returned a little sharply.
Ioki grinned. “I used to be an undercover cop among high school kids and college students. I can play a pregnant woman if I have to.”
Everyone laughed at that mental image – Ioki, while still looking youthful, had absolutely nothing feminine in his features or mannerism and was known as quite the ladies’ man in the precinct – and the general mood lightened a little. Even Hotch’s face softened a little for a moment.
“Very well,” he said. “Now as everyone knows their next target, I suggest that we adjourn the meeting until tomorrow morning.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
According to the previous agreement, Reid stayed with Moralez and Murietta for the rest of the day, and they drove him to the Fashion District to visit the famous Girard Fashion House. Although not very fashion-conscious himself, Reid had, of course heard about Victor Girard – who has not? While not as big a name as Armani, Gucci or Lagerfeldt, the man was nonetheless a celebrity in the world of fashion, and that in the third or fourth generation already. He produced mostly for the French market, for the former French colonies and South-East-Asia, and was considered the most popular French fashion czar next to Dior.
The building in the Fashion District wasn’t his home, of course – or rather, none of his several homes. It was only the main atelier where his designer worked. He had several other ateliers, since he also created costumes for movie studios, accessoirs, perfumes and a dozen or so related items. But this was the main one, and therefore the place where he could most likely be found.
Murietta had called in advance to announce their coming, of course, so they were expected and led directly to Monsieur Girard’s office. It was a fairly large one, with massive, antique furniture, the windows covered with heavy, dark brocade curtains and crystal lusters hanging from the ceiling.
Girard himself, in contrast to his environment, was a rather unremarkable person: a tall, lanky Frenchman of indeterminate age, with a mobile face, animated gestures and slightly long, mousey brown hair that barely reached his collar. He could be in his late forties or early fifties, and with his conservative suit and wire-rimmed glasses he looked more like a book-keeper than a fashion designer. Which was perhaps the truth. As the grandson or great-grandson of the “Grand Girard”, he was probably just the manager of the empire, with young, nameless yet talented designers doing the actual work.
In any case, he was friendly enough to the local detectives, whom he seemed to have known for quite a while; and not just from the one case they had worked on in his atelier. He looked at the pictures, paling slightly when he saw that of Branco Vukovic, commenting that the victim had been ‘a pretty boy, looked good on the catwalk but had little to no personality’ – and then selected another photo, one from the wealthy victims.
“This is Rémy Leblanc,” he said, becoming even more chalky white than before. “He’d used to work for me for two years, before he opened his own small studio. He designed jewellery: brooches and bracelets, mostly, sometimes also rings and colliers. His big breakthrough was an exposition in Madame d’Excavalier’s atelier in West-Hollywood, last month. Since then, he could barely keep up with the demands for his designer pieces. Every star and starlet in Hollywood wanted to wear Leblanc jewellery.”
“I guess the pieces will become collector’s items from now on,” Moralez commented dryly, “for astronomical prices. Who inherits Leblanc’s studio and the already existing pieces now?”
“Madame d’Excavalier and I, to fifty-fifty per cent, respectively,” Girard replied. “We were the ones who’ve financed the start of the studio. Rémy had nothing but his talent, so far. He was just beginning to make money. By the growing interest for his work, he could have paid us off within two years – and considering the amount of money we’d put into this business, that’s saying a lot.”
“What will become from his studio now?” Reid asked.
“That’s over,” Girard answered with a shrug. “His apprentice will probably manage to finish the last pieces – fortunately, Rémy used to make very detailed drawings to each of his designs, so that we can come out of this whole mess with a minimum of financial loss. But without his vision, the studio has no future. We’ll transform it into a prop manufacture or something similar. It’s a shame, really. Rémy could have reached so much, with his talent and his hard work.”
“Apparently, that was exactly what the unsub wanted to deny him: well-earned success,” Reid said quietly. “Just like with the other victims. Mr. Girard, can you tell me whether the ways of Mr. Leblanc and Mr. Vukovic ever crossed? They both worked for you, after all.”
“True, but in different times,” the fashion czar replied. “Branco already lived on the streets when Rémy came to us. I can’t see how they might have met.”
“And yet there seems to be a pattern,” Reid murmured. “Two of the victims worked for you. Three of them had a connection to that dance club, the Vesuvius. I’m fairly sure that we’re going to find more similarities.”
“Why don’t you and Moralez question the designers?” Murietta suggested. “I’ll write the protocol about the interview with Monsieur Girard in the meantime.”
“A good idea,” Moralez said enthusiastically and dragged Reid out, before she could be loaded with the paperwork again.
Once they were gone, Girard looked at Murietta in deep concern, his mannerism changing profoundly at once.
“I don’t like this,” he stated. “The evidence leads to my business… and to others of our people. That could be extremely dangerous… on several different levels.”
Murietta sighed. “I know. Believe me, I’m doing my best to end this… this madness, without revealing ourselves. But it’s not easy. Not only am I forced to drag around with me the perfect bait for the killer, I can also count on Hawk stepping into the game, and that could be really ugly. The possible collateral damage would be extensive.”
“You think one of our people is behind the killings?” Girard asked. There could be little doubt that it was, indeed, his opinion, but perhaps he still hoped he was wrong.
Murietta nodded. “Afraid so… and not just any of us. Someone from an old and very strong bloodline. No one else would have the strength and the skills… or the sufficient insanity to kill like this.”
“But no actual suspect so far?” Girard asked.
Murietta shook his head. “None. I need to speak to speak to The Preacher, obviously – if there are any crazed killers among us, he’d be the one to know. But I don’t think this murderer would be openly, obviously mad. On the contrary.”
“No, it doesn’t seem so,” Girard agreed. “I particularly dislike how all these killings point towards our legal business. As if the killer wanted to expose us all. Our branches are so intertwined that if one of us falls, the others would go under, too. And what that means… I don’t have to tell you, do I?”
“No,” Murietta said grimly. “I’ve seen cases like that.”
“I just don’t understand why any of us would want to reveal the rest,” Girard said. “They must know that they wouldn’t be spared, either, when it comes to the final confrontation.”
“Perhaps thy no longer care,” Murietta said. “Or perhaps they never really cared and just have reached the phase when they feel like actively doing something to provoke the confrontation. I just don’t know who would be mad enough to do that.”
“What about al-Muthlim’s gang?” Girard suggested. “Can the Crypt-Ticks be involved somehow?”
“I don’t think so,” Murietta replied slowly. “They might be homicidal from time to time, but they’re certainly not suicidal. Perhaps I should speak with the Bishop, too… just to make sure we’ve covered all bases.”
“You’d be dead in the moment you entered Crypt-Tick territory,” Girard warned him. “They don’t take intrusions to their domain kindly.”
“I don’t intend to go there,” Murietta grinned. “I’ll invite al-Muthlim to neutral territory… to have a little chat.”
“And you think he’ll come?” Girard asked doubtfully.
“I hope,” Murietta replied. “I can at least try.”
“Good luck,” Girard said sourly. “You’ll need it.”
“We all are gonna need it, if we wanna survive this,” Murietta sighed.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Reid found his interview with the designers… well, informative, if not directly interesting. He had never cared much for fashion trends, to be honest. The only things he wanted from any piece of clothing were that they would be warm and comfortable.
The designers, on the other hand, found him interesting, it seemed… mostly for his looks. In the first hour, already three of them asked him outright if he would like to work for the house as a model. That surprised him a bit, as he never thought of himself as being physically attractive. People usually appreciated him for his brains – and rightly so. Not many people had ever come even close to his level.
He found this sudden interest for his physical attributes embarrassing, to be honest. Moralez, on the other hand, seemed to find his embarrassment cute, which made him blush all the time.
In spite of these highly embarrassing side effects, he found the interviews with Girard’s employees useful. They could tell him quite a few details about the personal lives of both LeBlanc and Vukovic – there is nothing like workplace gossip to gather information – and one of them turned out to know another of the victims: Tom Leatherer, a highly successful young banker… the same one who had been killed with his wife and kids sleeping in the next room.
“He wasn’t one of Monsieur Girard’s usual financiers,” the resolute elderly secretary explained. “But he was one of the sponsors of Rémy’s jewellery exposition… I think his wife talked him into it. The young lady was very fond of designer brooches… only one-of-the-kind pieces, of course.”
Reid exchanged a look with Moralez; it was clear that they had just found another previously hidden connection between the victims. They thanked the well-informed lady and returned to Girard’s office to pick up Murietta.
“It’s strange how more and more victims turn out to have had connections to Monsieur Girard’s business,” Reid commented thoughtfully. “This is far beyond the possibility of being a coincidence. He is likely involved somehow… or someone does their best to make him look involved. In either case, he’s having a problem, I’d say.”
“It might seem so at the moment,” Moralez agreed reluctantly; she didn’t like the direction this case was taking a bit, “but we’ve got no evidence against him.”
“No forensic evidence, you mean,” Reid corrected. “And I’m not saying he’s the one killing all these people. But there’s a definite connection; one that we can’t ignore.”
Moralez knew that all too well. And while she did not believe that Victor Girard would be involved in the killings personally, she knew that if they did not find – and eliminate – the killer very soon, this case could be the end of the Girard Fashion House… and probably the end of Murietta, too. At least the end of his long, successful career as a police detective; but he would probably have to flee Los Angeles entirely and seek refuge somewhere where nobody had heard of him yet.
And Murietta would not be the only one swept away by the waves. Everyone with close ties to him – or to Girard, for that matter – would have to flee or go undercover. There would be a great upheaval, a violent change in the balance of power in the underbelly of LA. With consequences one could not even begin to foretell. All that because one crazed killer.
Only that this one was not your average serial killer. While they did not know his identity – not yet anyway – there could be no doubt about his nature. And should the BAU-team realize what kind of criminal they were dealing with, the consequences would be devastating. Certain government forces were well aware of the existence of things they officially denied… and they would not hesitate to initiate a first strike that would wipe out everyone and everything even remotely connected.
“I don’t know how you intend to do this,” she murmured to Murietta, while they were waiting for Reid to return from the men’s room, “but you must act, soon. Things are getting out of hand.”
“I know,” Murietta replied unhappily. “Take him back to the station and let him work on the statistical analysis. If we’re right, he isn’t in any danger during daytime, surrounded by people. I’ll fetch you shortly before sunset to take him to the safe house if I can. If not, I might ask you to do so.”
“And where are you going?” Moralez asked.
“I’m going to speak with The Preacher,” Murietta replied; then, with a humourless half-smile, he added. “He ought o know more about crazy people than the entire police station counted together.”
Moralez grinned back at him the same way. “That’s beyond doubt, I’d say. All right then, we’ll see each other on the station… or not, however the rest of your day might turn out.”
Murietta let immediately, and when Reid returned, he accepted the plan without argument. He wanted time to think anyway – and to consult with the others, especially with Garcia. So they drove back to the police station and spent the rest of the day with research and paperwork, glad to be able to escape into the virtual world for a while.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Murietta, in the meantime, was visiting a place where few people would go voluntarily, unless they absolutely had to.
It was an abandoned weapons depot of the military, in a little-known part of East LA; a large, ugly concrete building that should have been pulled down decades ago but somehow managed to avoid that fate. Of course, the connections of its current inhabitants played an important role in that.
Murietta waited with forced patience in front of the small steel door that served as the main entrance. He knew that hidden cameras watched the door day and night, and that one of The Preacher’s people always sat at the surveillance monitors. So it was only a matter of time till they would let him in. They had known him for a long time, after all.
And indeed, a few minutes later the door was opened by Duke Fontaine, The Preacher’s second: a big, balding man with cold, dead eyes and a thin smile that sent a cold shiver along Murietta’s spine. He was not easily frightened, but the things people whispered about the former CIA-agent were enough to make even him uncomfortable.
“Detective Murietta,” Fontaine drawled. “To what do we owe the honour?”
“I’m here on official business,” Murietta replied. “Is Augustus in?” He was one of the very few people who knew The Preacher’s real name.
“Sure,” Fontaine moved to the side to allow him in. “He was just about to leave, but I guess that can wait a little later. Come!”
He led the detective to the former mess hall of the facility that now served as their living room… well, sort of. It seemed like a strange mix of library, study and chapel, with a hint of surveillance center… every bit as strange as the people who currently inhabited.
The Preacher was a tall, big-boned black man with short-cropped, grey hair and sharp features. A Vietnam era veteran, he had belonged to a special unit whose members had undergone brain surgery, which eradicated their need to sleep, by cutting out a part of their brains. As a result, they had never slept again and ended up in mental wards upon their return, due to the massacres they had performed in Vietnam.
The following treatment itself and the drugs given to him in the ward gave The Preacher strange mental abilities. He could kill people through mental images, and had used this ‘gift’ to put his former team members out of their misery. Having turned to the Bible in the ward, he considered this salvation, not murder.
Needless to say that the FBI had seen it quite differently. They had hunted the man down, shot him and left him for dead, back in 1965. They had not counted on his self-regenerating powers… and on the intervention of one Brother Bernardus – a poor confused man who considered himself God’s emissary to all ‘lost souls”. Brother Bernardus had found The Preacher, whisked him away before the return of the FBI and cared for him until his recovery. In exchange, The Preacher took Brother Bernardus under his wings and protected him ever since… even from himself if necessary.
They had gathered a small group around themselves, consisting mostly from equally unstable individuals, with the possible exception of Angheliki, a scholarly Greek woman of regal carriage, who simply liked Brother Bernardus, and seemed to cope with their troubled past as well it could be expected. However, the fact remained that most of them were insane in one aspect or another, so Murietta hoped that they could help him hunt down a crazed killer.
To his disappointment, both The Preacher and Fontaine shook their heads.
“We’ve heard about the killings, of course,” Fontaine said, “but if one of our people would be the killer, we’d know it.”
“What about Skin?” Murietta asked quietly, knowing that he was touching a very sensitive topic.
Skin was The Preacher’s progeny, the only other survivor of their unit, of whom The Preacher had hoped to join his case. But Skin had refused to ‘see the light’ and joined one of the nomadic packs instead, to the great regret of the others.
The Preacher shook his head again. “He’s not in town,” he said in that deep, rough voice of his. “Hasn’t been here for a long time.”
“Are you really sure?” Murietta asked. “Think about it, Augustus; we can’t afford mistakes in this. You all know what’s at stake… for us all.”
“I am sure,” The Preacher replied simply. “Were he here, I’d feel his presence. I could always sense him.”
With his abilities, a declaration like that practically counted as hard evidence, so Murietta did not push him any further.
“All right,” he said. “But if you hear something…”
“I’ll call you,” The Preacher promised solemnly.
The audience very obviously ended here, and Murietta found it better to leave as long as Malkav’s Childer were still in a cooperative mood. One did not put crazy people with Special Ops training under pressure… unless one had a death wish.
Another trail that had not led anywhere… well, at least he knew now that the Malkavians were not involved. Not as a group anyway; although the possibility that one of their people was involved somehow could not be refused out of hand. Not all of them accepted The Preacher’s authority, and in a city as huge as LA could even be some of them operating without his knowledge.
Murietta sighed. He’d been exposed to daylight for many long hours since that morning, and the hunger in him grew stronger. He decided to play safe tonight. Moralez could bring Reid back to the safe house without him.
He grabbed his cell phone and discussed the matter with his partner. Moralez promised him to be extra careful and wished him good hunting. He laughed and told her that it was exactly what he was planning.
He pocketed the phone again, and for a moment he stood still in the middle of the dark, silent street, allowing the hunter to emerge.
************************
Jesús Ramirez folded his newspaper and set it aside to begin his next control round in the safe house. He did not need to check the clock to know it was time; like all nocturnal predators, he could feel the moving of the moon across the sky, even if he couldn’t see it. Like tonight. It was a new moon, and it was dark outside, very dark, despite the light pollution of the big city, in which he now lived. He liked these dark nights. They reminded him of the years he had spent alone in the jungle, trying to find his identity, with his master gone.
He had never been so free like in those years. Not that his current life would have been bad – but it was more complicated, full of duties and responsibilities. Like tonight, when he had to protect an outsider from one of his own. But that was all right. He might not be as boundlessly free as he had been in the jungle – but now he belonged. Salvador and Carlyle and Valeria and the others had become the family he never had, and that was worth everything.
He almost finished his round when his acute hearing picked up the soft, whimpering noises coming from the guest room. Jesús tensed in mid-movement, opening all his senses, sharpened by his years in the jungle, widely. He could not sense anyone else in Dr. Reid’s room. Perhaps the young man was having a nightmare. It would have been understandable. Like many people who tended to hang out online, Jesús had seen Reid’s ordeal as displayed by his torturer on the internet, and was surprised that the young man seemed to have recovered so quickly.
But again, he had also heard that Reid had shot his torturer in the end. So perhaps there was more steel behind that seemingly fragile exterior of his than one would have thought.
Deciding to take a look at the guest he had been ordered to protect, Jesús slipped into Dr. Reid’s room, quietly like a ghost, mentally berating him for not having locked the door. The young man either did not take the potential danger seriously enough, or he did not care anymore. Which, again, would have been understandable enough… to a certain extent. But even if he was so eager to commit suicide with the help of an insane murderer, he was not doing it on the watch of Jesús Ramirez!
Jesús allowed his eyes to adjust to the near-darkness of the room; like his entire kind, he did have night vision, but needed a moment to complete the switch. As soon as it happened, he could see the young man, sitting in the middle of the large bed, bony knees hugged to his chest, shivering with the memories of a recent nightmare. He seemed so lost and so hopeless that Jesús’ dead heart contracted painfully in his chest with the memory of similar feelings.
“Dr. Reid,” he said in a low, even voice he had once used to calm down frightened animals, “is something wrong?”
To his surprise, the young man was not startled by his voice. As if he had felt his presence. Drug addicts sometimes did, and Jesús already knew their guest was using. Dr. Reid could perhaps fool his boss and his colleagues, but not Jesús’ nose.
“What are you doing here?” Reid asked in a strangely monotone voice.
“I was making my rounds and heard noises from your room,” Jesús explained. “I wanted to see if you’re all right.”
“No,” Reid said blandly, “I’m not all right. Perhaps never will again. But you don’t need to worry. It was just a nightmare.”
“Those can be bothersome,” Jesús agreed, knowing them from first-hand experience. “But shooting yourself up with drugs won’t help. Been there, done that – made everything only worse.”
Reid turned to him at that. Mere humans wouldn’t be able to make out his features in the darkness, but Jesús’ night eyes saw clearly the deep, dark circles around his expressive eyes, making them unnaturally large in his pale face.
“What makes you think I’m using drugs?” he asked. It wasn’t exactly a denial – just an evasive maneuver.
“I can smell them,” Jesús replied simply. “I don’t blame you for seeking escape, hombre; I know what happened to you. I also know what it’s like being tortured… but believe me, that shit isn’t gonna help you a bit.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Reid’s first reaction was to snap at him, for how could he possibly know…? But the he remembered the scars he’d been glimpsed under the older man’s shirt and realised that yes, it had to be true.
“I guess you do know,” he answered tiredly. “And I know the drugs won’t help. It’s just… it’s just so hard to remember…. And with my cursed memory, I’ll never have the chance to forget, you know? It’s not fair.”
To his utter mortification, he felt the tears prickling in his eyes. He was just about having a breakdown in front of a complete stranger! He fought viciously for control, but in the end it was futile, and he knew it.
Ramirez sat down next to him on the bed and sighed.
“No, it ain’t fair,” he agreed. “Nobody should ever go through that; and those who’re unlucky enough to do, should be able to forget. I guess you got that perfect memory thing, eh?”
Reid nodded, his throat too tight to speak right now. The older man’s solid presence was strangely comforting, considering how hard he usually found it to trust people. Perhaps the fact that Ramirez didn’t ask any questions, that he seemed to know what it was like to be a torture victim, helped. That he, apparently, had gone through the same thing and came out of it stronger than before. Strength – that was what he radiated, with every movement that stretched the blue cotton shirt over the wide expanse of his broad back and heavy shoulders. Strength that was as solid as the earth itself, as the stems of ancient trees…
Suddenly, Reid felt the irresistible urge to lean against that strength; and in that precise moment, he lost it completely. Great, wrecking sobs shook his thin body, and the more he tried to hold back, the more they tore at him. As a strong, hard arm came around his shaking shoulders, at first he stiffened in panic; he never liked to be touched. But then he let himself being drawn against the older man’s broad chest, half-lying in Ramirez’ arm, while a large, rough hand was rubbing his back soothingly.
“Let it out, let it all out,” Ramirez murmured. “You’ve bottled it up inside your for way too long, muchacho. Everyone has a breaking point, and you’re way beyond yours, it seems. Let it go. I’ve got you.”
Reid couldn’t have stopped, even if he‘d wanted – but he didn’t, not really. As embarrassing as it was to cry like a baby in front of someone he had just met - he never cried in front of anyone, period, and hardly ever even if he was alone – it was very liberating at the same time. He had no idea how long it took him to calm down… long, he guessed, as it had been a lot to let go. But he did calm down gradually, and just stayed as he was, nestled in the stranger’s arms, hiccupping a little.
“I’m sorry,” he finally said. “I’ve never broken down quite this spectacularly – and certainly not in front of complete strangers.”
Ramirez shrugged. “Perhaps it was the time to do so. Perhaps the fact that I am a stranger you’ll probably never meet again did help. You can go home and pretend it never happened, and there will be no one to remind you.”
“I dunno,” Reid said doubtfully. “I’m not really big at the denial thing.”
“Then admit yourself that you had a moment of weakness and accept a little help,” Ramirez answered. “There is no shame in that, no shame at all.”
“Have you…?” Reid trailed off, uncertain how to continue.
“Needed help?” Ramirez clarified. “Oh yeah, and how I needed it! Accepted it? Yeah, after the obligatory phase of manly stubbornness, I did, gratefully.”
He fell silent for a while, still rubbing shooting circles on Reid’s back, as if trying to decide whether he should tell more.
“I’ll tell you a story,” he finally said. “You see, I was born in Nicaragua, as the only son of a poor serving woman on the hacienda of a very rich and cruel landowner, Don Christian de León. All people who worked for him were poor and superstitious… and deadly afraid of him, for often people who were called to his house, never returned. They were hardly more than slaves, labouring sixteen hours a day, and were not allowed to leave his lands. They believed in all sorts of strange, evil creatures, from the chupacabra to los vampiros. So, when I started getting my permanent teeth and happened to sprout longer and sharper eye-teeth than most other kids, people said I was a monster.”
He grinned bitterly, showing said eye-teeth, which were indeed a little longer than the average, although not overly so.
“They attacked our hut, driven by fear,” he continued after a while. “When my mother tried to protect me, they beat her to death. Then they tried to prove what they called my ‘true nature’ by testing me with red hot iron,” he opened his shirt, revealing the scars on his chest. “Look at them. I know you’re curious. I’ve caught you watching earlier.”
“Do they still hurt?” Reid whispered.
Ramirez shook his head. “It was a long time ago. Needless to say, whatever they did to me, I didn’t turn into anything monstrous. So they brought me to Don Christian, complaining that my evil nature was too strong, even for the old methods. Don Christian promised them to keep me in his house – to keep a close eye on me, so that I won’t harm anyone.”
“Did he?” Reid asked.
Ramirez nodded grimly. “Oh, yes, he did. He made me his eternal servant; his personal slave. He broke my will and brainwashed me until I lost my identity completely; until I barely had an independent thought. I did terrible things for him; things I’d never have done on my own – and when he was finally killed by the Sandinistas, back in nineteen-seventy-eight, and I was finally free, I knew they’d kill me, too. So I fled from the only place I knew and spent several years in the jungle, alone, living like an animal. Those years made me realize who and what I truly was.”
“How did you get here, then?” Reid asked. “You must still have been a child… or barely more.”
“Oh, I was more,” Ramirez said. “I’m a lot older than I look – whether it’s a blessing or a curse, I don’t know. I came to LA alone. A court might say that I wasn’t fully responsible for my actions – nobody would stay sane, going through what I went through in the hands of my master, day to day, week to week, year to year – but that doesn’t change the fact that I, too, did hurt a lot of people. Here, in East-La, is quite a large Nicaraguan community, and there is where I usually live. Those people don’t know who I once was; they’re poor and need help, and I do help them, wherever I can. That’s my atonement and I hope that will be my salvation one day.”
“What… Reid hesitated. “What has your master done to you?”
“What has the Spanish Inquisition done to its victims?” Ramirez asked back. “My master saw it his personal vocation to exorcise the evil from me… and he had an impressive collection of tools to use on me. Have you ever heard of the agony pear?”
Reid nodded, shivering.
“That was his favourite – but not his only tool, and not even the worst one. He collected medieval torture instruments, and let me assure you, they all were in the best working order.”
“Oh, God,” Reid whispered tonelessly. “How did you survive that?”
“I haven’t,” Ramirez said with a shrug. “I’ve been dead for a very long time.” He sighed and patted Reid’s back. “Go back to sleep, muchacho, and have no fear. I’ll be here, watching over you. No other monster will enter this house on my watch.
With that dubious reassurance, he left Reid’s room, closing the door behind himself quietly.
Part 06
Author: Soledad
Disclaimer: I don't own Criminal Minds or the White Wolfe characters and settings or any of the other shows from which I've borrowed characters for cameo appearances. All I own are a few OCs and a really twisted plot idea.
PART 05
Author’s note: As before, LAPD statistics are genuine, thank Wikipedia.
The Preacher is a character borrowed from the X-Files episode “Sleepless”. He’s a recurring figure in the “Pathways” universe.
Branco Vukovic is modelled after a German actor/singer who, at one point of his career, used to be a model. And I don’t need to tell where Ethan Gold has come from, do I? *g*
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
“We are making some headway,” Hotch informed his team colleagues before the beginning of the next shift. Like many LA police stations, West LA Community Station had a 4 day-10 hour work week schedule, which meant that at least the uniformed cops who’d just come to work had to be debriefed again. “We – that is, Detective Murietta and Dr. Reid – have managed to identify two of the previously unknown victims. It seems that Detective Murietta’s original theory about how the unsub choses his victims has been right.”
“Were these two also talented in some ways?” Detective Barritza asked.
Hotch consulted his notes for a moment, and then pinned two photos onto the whiteboard. He pointed at the picture of a boyish-faced young man on the right; the victim wore a suit on that one and had a violin in his hand.
“This one, Ethan Gold, used to be a very promising young violin player,” he said. “He came from Pittsburgh and was considered extremely talented. Worked for a recording company for a year or so, even produced a couple of CDs of his own concerts… then got into an abusive relationship with an older man, broke his career and ended up on the streets where he used to earn some money with playing classical music on his violin.”
“How old was he?” JJ asked, staring at the photo of the very youthful-looking man in sorrow. It always saddened her when young lives got wasted like that.
“Twenty-five, apparently,” Hotch replied. JJ just shook her head in regret.
“What about the other victim?” Prentiss asked, looking at the picture of a somewhat older but still fairly young, spiky-haired man who had a flawless face and large, soulful eyes. “Was he young enough for the unsub?”
“He was just beyond thirty,’ Officer Wong piped in. “I remember him being a model for the Girard Fashion House – and a very popular one, at least for a while. He also tried to start a career as a singer, but with very little success. Then he tried to compose his own music, for which nobody showed much interest. The last report of him was that he wanted to become a dancer, but that’s all. A typical LA failure: after years on the cover of the greatest fashion magazines, he lost everything, began doing drugs… and ended on the streets.”
“Unfortunately, there are many such young people in LA, especially in the Hollywood area,” Lieutenant Bronowski agreed. “The glitter of Tinsel Town awakens false hopes in them; they grow overconfident… and fall deeply. Very, very deeply.”
“Is there any sign of them having known each other?” Prentiss asked. “Aside from having visited the same homeless shelter for a warm meal, that is?”
“There is one place where at least three of our homeless victims used to work for a time,” Reid answered. “An exotic dance club called the Vesuvius. This Vukovic person tried his luck as a background dancer there. Ethan Gold gave two concerts, joined with a literary evening, two and five months ago. And one of the previously identified victims, Douglas Howser, helped out as an ersatz waiter sometimes. Whenever he managed to stay clean for a few weeks, that is.”
“Could it be a coincidence?” Detective Turner’s voice revealed that he didn’t really believe it could.
Reid shook his head. “Statistically, it’s unlikely. Two of the victims working at the same place would already be stretching the limits of a possible coincidence, but three…”
“Have any of the upper class victims favoured the Vesuvius?” Lieutenant Bronowski asked.
Reid shrugged. “Garcia is still analysing their past-work activities. She’ll tell us as soon as she’s found a pattern.”
“That can take some time,” JJ commented. “Are there any other possible connections between them and the upper class victims, now that we know what they were doing for a living?”
Wong made a quick cross-reference search. “Well, one of those used to work for the Girard Fashion House as a fashion designer,” she said.
The profilers exchanged interested looks. “Two tangents,” Hotch said thoughtfully. “That’s a beginning. I think we have found a pattern. We need to see those places – both the fashion house and the dance club.”
Bronowski looked around his own people. “Anyone has a link to either of those places?”
“I know the owner of the Vesuvius,” Moralez raised her hand. “We helped her with one of her female dancers who got in trouble, a year or so ago. The Summer case, if you remember, Lieutenant.”
Bronowski nodded. “Yeah, I do. Well, let’s hope she’s still in a somewhat cooperative mood. By the way, haven’t you and Murietta investigated in a murder case involving Victor Girard?”
“We have,” Moralez said. “It was the case when one of his Puerto Rican seamstresses was murdered. But that was a simple case; she was killed by her own abusive husband. We got the guy and he’s still sitting in jail.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Bronowski said. “At least Girard knows you and will probably be cooperative. These people don’t like it when their business is connected to common crimes in any way.”
“I thought Fashion District would be my area,” Detective Lochley protested indignantly.
“It is,” Bronowski replied, “but in Girard’s case, I prefer to send someone who already does have the connections.” Lochley huffed but couldn’t fight the logic of the decision.
“Have Morgan and Detective Hoffs checked in already?” Sergeant Elizabeth Cruz, CO of the uniformed cops from the day shift, asked. She was a small, wiry woman in her mid-fifties, with her jet-black hair pulled into such a tight bun that Reid’s scalp started hurting just from the sight of it.
“One of the regular patrols spoke to them,” Bronowski answered, “but they haven’t learned anything yet. It will take time. The homeless people have grown wary and suspicious, even towards their own kind, which is understandable, I guess. It seems, though, as if they were shunning potential future victims.”
“Which is also understandable,” Detective Barritza commented dryly. “They don’t want to be killed just for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“Yeah, but that way they’re endangering potential victims even more,” his partner said.
Murietta shook his head. “I don’t think so. This killer isn’t going after easy prey. All of his victims, without exception, have been murdered in places where he could have been caught red-handed… pardon the bad pun.”
“The upper-class victims have all taken steps to ensure their own safety,” Reid added. “One of them was killed in his own house, with the elaborate security system fully working, and his family sleeping upstairs.”
“And what does that mean for us?” Turner asked.
“It could mean two things,” Reid said. “Either we’re dealing with a severe case of devolution – a process by which the unsub begins to lose control, falling in a downward spiral, unable to control his urge to perform a particular offence – or he’s suffering from the delusion that he can’t be caught because he’s smarter than the police. Personally, I think the latter is the case.”
“Why so?” Lieutenant Bronowski asked. “He sure as hell seems crazy enough.”
“Yes, but he’s also highly organized; or has been, so far,” Reid pointed out. “He commits his crimes in a premeditated manner, leaving few to no clues. Organized offenders also typically choose their victims with precise specifications.”
“That certainly seems to be the case with this bastard,” Turner agreed.
“Which is exactly why we need to know more about the victims,” Hotch said, then he looked at Reid. “I want the fashion house connection checked out first. Speak with this Victor Girard character. Try to find out whether any of the other victims had in any way been connected to his business. The others continue to map the victims’ lives and environment. Send all oh so insignificant-looking detail to Garcia. If there is a pattern, she’ll find it.”
“What about the Vesuvius?” Detective Lochley asked.
“Later,” Hotch replied. “Right now, that seems to be the point where the paths of most future victims have crossed. If that is so, we’ll have to be careful, or the unsub might retreat from there, and we’ll lose the chance to catch him.”
“We should go there as simple customers first,” Prentiss suggested. “Try to get a sense of the environment, get familiar with the hunting ground of the unsub.”
“Or one of his hunting grounds,” Murietta corrected. “We still don’t know enough to be sure about that.”
“I’ll call up their programme in a minute,” Officer Wong typed away on her keyboard with great speed. “Here it is. Tomorrow, Velvet Vellour – that’s the club owner – will read her poetry, and the Blount sisters will perform an acrobatic dance sequence.”
“Sounds interesting,” Prentiss commented. “Morgan will regret to have missed it.”
“He’ll have to try his luck later,” Hotch said dryly. ”We’re not on a vacation here. Anyway, I think the rest of us should go there as a group. Different viewpoints might bring different results, and in the end, a more complete picture.”
“Perhaps if the owner doesn’t connect us with the police, we’ll have more luck,” Prentiss said. Hotch nodded.
“Agreed. If Ms Wong can get us reservations, we’ll go as a group of businesspeople on a working holiday. However, we will need at least one insider with us; someone whom the club owner hopefully wouldn’t recognize.”
“I’m out, then,” Detective Lochley said, clearly unhappy about the fact. “I’ve already butted heads with her a couple of times.”
“I’ll go,” Agent Sandoval offered, looking at JJ with a thin, amused smile. “If you don’t mind coming as my date, that is.”
JJ shrugged. “I could do worse,” she replied.
“But who’ll go with Dr. Reid?” Moralez asked. “I can’t; the regular clientele knows me too well that a different hairdo and a little make-up would fool them.”
“I don’t need an escort,” Reid answered. “Skinny little geeks like myself are usually alone, even within a group of co-workers. Anything else would only raise suspicions.” But there was a sudden bitterness in his voice that made his team-mates wonder for a moment.
Detective Ioki shook his head. “Nobody goes alone to the Vesuvius. But don’t worry, I’ll go with you… assuming, you can pull out the gay boyfriend act.”
“Can you?” Reid returned a little sharply.
Ioki grinned. “I used to be an undercover cop among high school kids and college students. I can play a pregnant woman if I have to.”
Everyone laughed at that mental image – Ioki, while still looking youthful, had absolutely nothing feminine in his features or mannerism and was known as quite the ladies’ man in the precinct – and the general mood lightened a little. Even Hotch’s face softened a little for a moment.
“Very well,” he said. “Now as everyone knows their next target, I suggest that we adjourn the meeting until tomorrow morning.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
According to the previous agreement, Reid stayed with Moralez and Murietta for the rest of the day, and they drove him to the Fashion District to visit the famous Girard Fashion House. Although not very fashion-conscious himself, Reid had, of course heard about Victor Girard – who has not? While not as big a name as Armani, Gucci or Lagerfeldt, the man was nonetheless a celebrity in the world of fashion, and that in the third or fourth generation already. He produced mostly for the French market, for the former French colonies and South-East-Asia, and was considered the most popular French fashion czar next to Dior.
The building in the Fashion District wasn’t his home, of course – or rather, none of his several homes. It was only the main atelier where his designer worked. He had several other ateliers, since he also created costumes for movie studios, accessoirs, perfumes and a dozen or so related items. But this was the main one, and therefore the place where he could most likely be found.
Murietta had called in advance to announce their coming, of course, so they were expected and led directly to Monsieur Girard’s office. It was a fairly large one, with massive, antique furniture, the windows covered with heavy, dark brocade curtains and crystal lusters hanging from the ceiling.
Girard himself, in contrast to his environment, was a rather unremarkable person: a tall, lanky Frenchman of indeterminate age, with a mobile face, animated gestures and slightly long, mousey brown hair that barely reached his collar. He could be in his late forties or early fifties, and with his conservative suit and wire-rimmed glasses he looked more like a book-keeper than a fashion designer. Which was perhaps the truth. As the grandson or great-grandson of the “Grand Girard”, he was probably just the manager of the empire, with young, nameless yet talented designers doing the actual work.
In any case, he was friendly enough to the local detectives, whom he seemed to have known for quite a while; and not just from the one case they had worked on in his atelier. He looked at the pictures, paling slightly when he saw that of Branco Vukovic, commenting that the victim had been ‘a pretty boy, looked good on the catwalk but had little to no personality’ – and then selected another photo, one from the wealthy victims.
“This is Rémy Leblanc,” he said, becoming even more chalky white than before. “He’d used to work for me for two years, before he opened his own small studio. He designed jewellery: brooches and bracelets, mostly, sometimes also rings and colliers. His big breakthrough was an exposition in Madame d’Excavalier’s atelier in West-Hollywood, last month. Since then, he could barely keep up with the demands for his designer pieces. Every star and starlet in Hollywood wanted to wear Leblanc jewellery.”
“I guess the pieces will become collector’s items from now on,” Moralez commented dryly, “for astronomical prices. Who inherits Leblanc’s studio and the already existing pieces now?”
“Madame d’Excavalier and I, to fifty-fifty per cent, respectively,” Girard replied. “We were the ones who’ve financed the start of the studio. Rémy had nothing but his talent, so far. He was just beginning to make money. By the growing interest for his work, he could have paid us off within two years – and considering the amount of money we’d put into this business, that’s saying a lot.”
“What will become from his studio now?” Reid asked.
“That’s over,” Girard answered with a shrug. “His apprentice will probably manage to finish the last pieces – fortunately, Rémy used to make very detailed drawings to each of his designs, so that we can come out of this whole mess with a minimum of financial loss. But without his vision, the studio has no future. We’ll transform it into a prop manufacture or something similar. It’s a shame, really. Rémy could have reached so much, with his talent and his hard work.”
“Apparently, that was exactly what the unsub wanted to deny him: well-earned success,” Reid said quietly. “Just like with the other victims. Mr. Girard, can you tell me whether the ways of Mr. Leblanc and Mr. Vukovic ever crossed? They both worked for you, after all.”
“True, but in different times,” the fashion czar replied. “Branco already lived on the streets when Rémy came to us. I can’t see how they might have met.”
“And yet there seems to be a pattern,” Reid murmured. “Two of the victims worked for you. Three of them had a connection to that dance club, the Vesuvius. I’m fairly sure that we’re going to find more similarities.”
“Why don’t you and Moralez question the designers?” Murietta suggested. “I’ll write the protocol about the interview with Monsieur Girard in the meantime.”
“A good idea,” Moralez said enthusiastically and dragged Reid out, before she could be loaded with the paperwork again.
Once they were gone, Girard looked at Murietta in deep concern, his mannerism changing profoundly at once.
“I don’t like this,” he stated. “The evidence leads to my business… and to others of our people. That could be extremely dangerous… on several different levels.”
Murietta sighed. “I know. Believe me, I’m doing my best to end this… this madness, without revealing ourselves. But it’s not easy. Not only am I forced to drag around with me the perfect bait for the killer, I can also count on Hawk stepping into the game, and that could be really ugly. The possible collateral damage would be extensive.”
“You think one of our people is behind the killings?” Girard asked. There could be little doubt that it was, indeed, his opinion, but perhaps he still hoped he was wrong.
Murietta nodded. “Afraid so… and not just any of us. Someone from an old and very strong bloodline. No one else would have the strength and the skills… or the sufficient insanity to kill like this.”
“But no actual suspect so far?” Girard asked.
Murietta shook his head. “None. I need to speak to speak to The Preacher, obviously – if there are any crazed killers among us, he’d be the one to know. But I don’t think this murderer would be openly, obviously mad. On the contrary.”
“No, it doesn’t seem so,” Girard agreed. “I particularly dislike how all these killings point towards our legal business. As if the killer wanted to expose us all. Our branches are so intertwined that if one of us falls, the others would go under, too. And what that means… I don’t have to tell you, do I?”
“No,” Murietta said grimly. “I’ve seen cases like that.”
“I just don’t understand why any of us would want to reveal the rest,” Girard said. “They must know that they wouldn’t be spared, either, when it comes to the final confrontation.”
“Perhaps thy no longer care,” Murietta said. “Or perhaps they never really cared and just have reached the phase when they feel like actively doing something to provoke the confrontation. I just don’t know who would be mad enough to do that.”
“What about al-Muthlim’s gang?” Girard suggested. “Can the Crypt-Ticks be involved somehow?”
“I don’t think so,” Murietta replied slowly. “They might be homicidal from time to time, but they’re certainly not suicidal. Perhaps I should speak with the Bishop, too… just to make sure we’ve covered all bases.”
“You’d be dead in the moment you entered Crypt-Tick territory,” Girard warned him. “They don’t take intrusions to their domain kindly.”
“I don’t intend to go there,” Murietta grinned. “I’ll invite al-Muthlim to neutral territory… to have a little chat.”
“And you think he’ll come?” Girard asked doubtfully.
“I hope,” Murietta replied. “I can at least try.”
“Good luck,” Girard said sourly. “You’ll need it.”
“We all are gonna need it, if we wanna survive this,” Murietta sighed.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Reid found his interview with the designers… well, informative, if not directly interesting. He had never cared much for fashion trends, to be honest. The only things he wanted from any piece of clothing were that they would be warm and comfortable.
The designers, on the other hand, found him interesting, it seemed… mostly for his looks. In the first hour, already three of them asked him outright if he would like to work for the house as a model. That surprised him a bit, as he never thought of himself as being physically attractive. People usually appreciated him for his brains – and rightly so. Not many people had ever come even close to his level.
He found this sudden interest for his physical attributes embarrassing, to be honest. Moralez, on the other hand, seemed to find his embarrassment cute, which made him blush all the time.
In spite of these highly embarrassing side effects, he found the interviews with Girard’s employees useful. They could tell him quite a few details about the personal lives of both LeBlanc and Vukovic – there is nothing like workplace gossip to gather information – and one of them turned out to know another of the victims: Tom Leatherer, a highly successful young banker… the same one who had been killed with his wife and kids sleeping in the next room.
“He wasn’t one of Monsieur Girard’s usual financiers,” the resolute elderly secretary explained. “But he was one of the sponsors of Rémy’s jewellery exposition… I think his wife talked him into it. The young lady was very fond of designer brooches… only one-of-the-kind pieces, of course.”
Reid exchanged a look with Moralez; it was clear that they had just found another previously hidden connection between the victims. They thanked the well-informed lady and returned to Girard’s office to pick up Murietta.
“It’s strange how more and more victims turn out to have had connections to Monsieur Girard’s business,” Reid commented thoughtfully. “This is far beyond the possibility of being a coincidence. He is likely involved somehow… or someone does their best to make him look involved. In either case, he’s having a problem, I’d say.”
“It might seem so at the moment,” Moralez agreed reluctantly; she didn’t like the direction this case was taking a bit, “but we’ve got no evidence against him.”
“No forensic evidence, you mean,” Reid corrected. “And I’m not saying he’s the one killing all these people. But there’s a definite connection; one that we can’t ignore.”
Moralez knew that all too well. And while she did not believe that Victor Girard would be involved in the killings personally, she knew that if they did not find – and eliminate – the killer very soon, this case could be the end of the Girard Fashion House… and probably the end of Murietta, too. At least the end of his long, successful career as a police detective; but he would probably have to flee Los Angeles entirely and seek refuge somewhere where nobody had heard of him yet.
And Murietta would not be the only one swept away by the waves. Everyone with close ties to him – or to Girard, for that matter – would have to flee or go undercover. There would be a great upheaval, a violent change in the balance of power in the underbelly of LA. With consequences one could not even begin to foretell. All that because one crazed killer.
Only that this one was not your average serial killer. While they did not know his identity – not yet anyway – there could be no doubt about his nature. And should the BAU-team realize what kind of criminal they were dealing with, the consequences would be devastating. Certain government forces were well aware of the existence of things they officially denied… and they would not hesitate to initiate a first strike that would wipe out everyone and everything even remotely connected.
“I don’t know how you intend to do this,” she murmured to Murietta, while they were waiting for Reid to return from the men’s room, “but you must act, soon. Things are getting out of hand.”
“I know,” Murietta replied unhappily. “Take him back to the station and let him work on the statistical analysis. If we’re right, he isn’t in any danger during daytime, surrounded by people. I’ll fetch you shortly before sunset to take him to the safe house if I can. If not, I might ask you to do so.”
“And where are you going?” Moralez asked.
“I’m going to speak with The Preacher,” Murietta replied; then, with a humourless half-smile, he added. “He ought o know more about crazy people than the entire police station counted together.”
Moralez grinned back at him the same way. “That’s beyond doubt, I’d say. All right then, we’ll see each other on the station… or not, however the rest of your day might turn out.”
Murietta let immediately, and when Reid returned, he accepted the plan without argument. He wanted time to think anyway – and to consult with the others, especially with Garcia. So they drove back to the police station and spent the rest of the day with research and paperwork, glad to be able to escape into the virtual world for a while.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Murietta, in the meantime, was visiting a place where few people would go voluntarily, unless they absolutely had to.
It was an abandoned weapons depot of the military, in a little-known part of East LA; a large, ugly concrete building that should have been pulled down decades ago but somehow managed to avoid that fate. Of course, the connections of its current inhabitants played an important role in that.
Murietta waited with forced patience in front of the small steel door that served as the main entrance. He knew that hidden cameras watched the door day and night, and that one of The Preacher’s people always sat at the surveillance monitors. So it was only a matter of time till they would let him in. They had known him for a long time, after all.
And indeed, a few minutes later the door was opened by Duke Fontaine, The Preacher’s second: a big, balding man with cold, dead eyes and a thin smile that sent a cold shiver along Murietta’s spine. He was not easily frightened, but the things people whispered about the former CIA-agent were enough to make even him uncomfortable.
“Detective Murietta,” Fontaine drawled. “To what do we owe the honour?”
“I’m here on official business,” Murietta replied. “Is Augustus in?” He was one of the very few people who knew The Preacher’s real name.
“Sure,” Fontaine moved to the side to allow him in. “He was just about to leave, but I guess that can wait a little later. Come!”
He led the detective to the former mess hall of the facility that now served as their living room… well, sort of. It seemed like a strange mix of library, study and chapel, with a hint of surveillance center… every bit as strange as the people who currently inhabited.
The Preacher was a tall, big-boned black man with short-cropped, grey hair and sharp features. A Vietnam era veteran, he had belonged to a special unit whose members had undergone brain surgery, which eradicated their need to sleep, by cutting out a part of their brains. As a result, they had never slept again and ended up in mental wards upon their return, due to the massacres they had performed in Vietnam.
The following treatment itself and the drugs given to him in the ward gave The Preacher strange mental abilities. He could kill people through mental images, and had used this ‘gift’ to put his former team members out of their misery. Having turned to the Bible in the ward, he considered this salvation, not murder.
Needless to say that the FBI had seen it quite differently. They had hunted the man down, shot him and left him for dead, back in 1965. They had not counted on his self-regenerating powers… and on the intervention of one Brother Bernardus – a poor confused man who considered himself God’s emissary to all ‘lost souls”. Brother Bernardus had found The Preacher, whisked him away before the return of the FBI and cared for him until his recovery. In exchange, The Preacher took Brother Bernardus under his wings and protected him ever since… even from himself if necessary.
They had gathered a small group around themselves, consisting mostly from equally unstable individuals, with the possible exception of Angheliki, a scholarly Greek woman of regal carriage, who simply liked Brother Bernardus, and seemed to cope with their troubled past as well it could be expected. However, the fact remained that most of them were insane in one aspect or another, so Murietta hoped that they could help him hunt down a crazed killer.
To his disappointment, both The Preacher and Fontaine shook their heads.
“We’ve heard about the killings, of course,” Fontaine said, “but if one of our people would be the killer, we’d know it.”
“What about Skin?” Murietta asked quietly, knowing that he was touching a very sensitive topic.
Skin was The Preacher’s progeny, the only other survivor of their unit, of whom The Preacher had hoped to join his case. But Skin had refused to ‘see the light’ and joined one of the nomadic packs instead, to the great regret of the others.
The Preacher shook his head again. “He’s not in town,” he said in that deep, rough voice of his. “Hasn’t been here for a long time.”
“Are you really sure?” Murietta asked. “Think about it, Augustus; we can’t afford mistakes in this. You all know what’s at stake… for us all.”
“I am sure,” The Preacher replied simply. “Were he here, I’d feel his presence. I could always sense him.”
With his abilities, a declaration like that practically counted as hard evidence, so Murietta did not push him any further.
“All right,” he said. “But if you hear something…”
“I’ll call you,” The Preacher promised solemnly.
The audience very obviously ended here, and Murietta found it better to leave as long as Malkav’s Childer were still in a cooperative mood. One did not put crazy people with Special Ops training under pressure… unless one had a death wish.
Another trail that had not led anywhere… well, at least he knew now that the Malkavians were not involved. Not as a group anyway; although the possibility that one of their people was involved somehow could not be refused out of hand. Not all of them accepted The Preacher’s authority, and in a city as huge as LA could even be some of them operating without his knowledge.
Murietta sighed. He’d been exposed to daylight for many long hours since that morning, and the hunger in him grew stronger. He decided to play safe tonight. Moralez could bring Reid back to the safe house without him.
He grabbed his cell phone and discussed the matter with his partner. Moralez promised him to be extra careful and wished him good hunting. He laughed and told her that it was exactly what he was planning.
He pocketed the phone again, and for a moment he stood still in the middle of the dark, silent street, allowing the hunter to emerge.
************************
Jesús Ramirez folded his newspaper and set it aside to begin his next control round in the safe house. He did not need to check the clock to know it was time; like all nocturnal predators, he could feel the moving of the moon across the sky, even if he couldn’t see it. Like tonight. It was a new moon, and it was dark outside, very dark, despite the light pollution of the big city, in which he now lived. He liked these dark nights. They reminded him of the years he had spent alone in the jungle, trying to find his identity, with his master gone.
He had never been so free like in those years. Not that his current life would have been bad – but it was more complicated, full of duties and responsibilities. Like tonight, when he had to protect an outsider from one of his own. But that was all right. He might not be as boundlessly free as he had been in the jungle – but now he belonged. Salvador and Carlyle and Valeria and the others had become the family he never had, and that was worth everything.
He almost finished his round when his acute hearing picked up the soft, whimpering noises coming from the guest room. Jesús tensed in mid-movement, opening all his senses, sharpened by his years in the jungle, widely. He could not sense anyone else in Dr. Reid’s room. Perhaps the young man was having a nightmare. It would have been understandable. Like many people who tended to hang out online, Jesús had seen Reid’s ordeal as displayed by his torturer on the internet, and was surprised that the young man seemed to have recovered so quickly.
But again, he had also heard that Reid had shot his torturer in the end. So perhaps there was more steel behind that seemingly fragile exterior of his than one would have thought.
Deciding to take a look at the guest he had been ordered to protect, Jesús slipped into Dr. Reid’s room, quietly like a ghost, mentally berating him for not having locked the door. The young man either did not take the potential danger seriously enough, or he did not care anymore. Which, again, would have been understandable enough… to a certain extent. But even if he was so eager to commit suicide with the help of an insane murderer, he was not doing it on the watch of Jesús Ramirez!
Jesús allowed his eyes to adjust to the near-darkness of the room; like his entire kind, he did have night vision, but needed a moment to complete the switch. As soon as it happened, he could see the young man, sitting in the middle of the large bed, bony knees hugged to his chest, shivering with the memories of a recent nightmare. He seemed so lost and so hopeless that Jesús’ dead heart contracted painfully in his chest with the memory of similar feelings.
“Dr. Reid,” he said in a low, even voice he had once used to calm down frightened animals, “is something wrong?”
To his surprise, the young man was not startled by his voice. As if he had felt his presence. Drug addicts sometimes did, and Jesús already knew their guest was using. Dr. Reid could perhaps fool his boss and his colleagues, but not Jesús’ nose.
“What are you doing here?” Reid asked in a strangely monotone voice.
“I was making my rounds and heard noises from your room,” Jesús explained. “I wanted to see if you’re all right.”
“No,” Reid said blandly, “I’m not all right. Perhaps never will again. But you don’t need to worry. It was just a nightmare.”
“Those can be bothersome,” Jesús agreed, knowing them from first-hand experience. “But shooting yourself up with drugs won’t help. Been there, done that – made everything only worse.”
Reid turned to him at that. Mere humans wouldn’t be able to make out his features in the darkness, but Jesús’ night eyes saw clearly the deep, dark circles around his expressive eyes, making them unnaturally large in his pale face.
“What makes you think I’m using drugs?” he asked. It wasn’t exactly a denial – just an evasive maneuver.
“I can smell them,” Jesús replied simply. “I don’t blame you for seeking escape, hombre; I know what happened to you. I also know what it’s like being tortured… but believe me, that shit isn’t gonna help you a bit.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Reid’s first reaction was to snap at him, for how could he possibly know…? But the he remembered the scars he’d been glimpsed under the older man’s shirt and realised that yes, it had to be true.
“I guess you do know,” he answered tiredly. “And I know the drugs won’t help. It’s just… it’s just so hard to remember…. And with my cursed memory, I’ll never have the chance to forget, you know? It’s not fair.”
To his utter mortification, he felt the tears prickling in his eyes. He was just about having a breakdown in front of a complete stranger! He fought viciously for control, but in the end it was futile, and he knew it.
Ramirez sat down next to him on the bed and sighed.
“No, it ain’t fair,” he agreed. “Nobody should ever go through that; and those who’re unlucky enough to do, should be able to forget. I guess you got that perfect memory thing, eh?”
Reid nodded, his throat too tight to speak right now. The older man’s solid presence was strangely comforting, considering how hard he usually found it to trust people. Perhaps the fact that Ramirez didn’t ask any questions, that he seemed to know what it was like to be a torture victim, helped. That he, apparently, had gone through the same thing and came out of it stronger than before. Strength – that was what he radiated, with every movement that stretched the blue cotton shirt over the wide expanse of his broad back and heavy shoulders. Strength that was as solid as the earth itself, as the stems of ancient trees…
Suddenly, Reid felt the irresistible urge to lean against that strength; and in that precise moment, he lost it completely. Great, wrecking sobs shook his thin body, and the more he tried to hold back, the more they tore at him. As a strong, hard arm came around his shaking shoulders, at first he stiffened in panic; he never liked to be touched. But then he let himself being drawn against the older man’s broad chest, half-lying in Ramirez’ arm, while a large, rough hand was rubbing his back soothingly.
“Let it out, let it all out,” Ramirez murmured. “You’ve bottled it up inside your for way too long, muchacho. Everyone has a breaking point, and you’re way beyond yours, it seems. Let it go. I’ve got you.”
Reid couldn’t have stopped, even if he‘d wanted – but he didn’t, not really. As embarrassing as it was to cry like a baby in front of someone he had just met - he never cried in front of anyone, period, and hardly ever even if he was alone – it was very liberating at the same time. He had no idea how long it took him to calm down… long, he guessed, as it had been a lot to let go. But he did calm down gradually, and just stayed as he was, nestled in the stranger’s arms, hiccupping a little.
“I’m sorry,” he finally said. “I’ve never broken down quite this spectacularly – and certainly not in front of complete strangers.”
Ramirez shrugged. “Perhaps it was the time to do so. Perhaps the fact that I am a stranger you’ll probably never meet again did help. You can go home and pretend it never happened, and there will be no one to remind you.”
“I dunno,” Reid said doubtfully. “I’m not really big at the denial thing.”
“Then admit yourself that you had a moment of weakness and accept a little help,” Ramirez answered. “There is no shame in that, no shame at all.”
“Have you…?” Reid trailed off, uncertain how to continue.
“Needed help?” Ramirez clarified. “Oh yeah, and how I needed it! Accepted it? Yeah, after the obligatory phase of manly stubbornness, I did, gratefully.”
He fell silent for a while, still rubbing shooting circles on Reid’s back, as if trying to decide whether he should tell more.
“I’ll tell you a story,” he finally said. “You see, I was born in Nicaragua, as the only son of a poor serving woman on the hacienda of a very rich and cruel landowner, Don Christian de León. All people who worked for him were poor and superstitious… and deadly afraid of him, for often people who were called to his house, never returned. They were hardly more than slaves, labouring sixteen hours a day, and were not allowed to leave his lands. They believed in all sorts of strange, evil creatures, from the chupacabra to los vampiros. So, when I started getting my permanent teeth and happened to sprout longer and sharper eye-teeth than most other kids, people said I was a monster.”
He grinned bitterly, showing said eye-teeth, which were indeed a little longer than the average, although not overly so.
“They attacked our hut, driven by fear,” he continued after a while. “When my mother tried to protect me, they beat her to death. Then they tried to prove what they called my ‘true nature’ by testing me with red hot iron,” he opened his shirt, revealing the scars on his chest. “Look at them. I know you’re curious. I’ve caught you watching earlier.”
“Do they still hurt?” Reid whispered.
Ramirez shook his head. “It was a long time ago. Needless to say, whatever they did to me, I didn’t turn into anything monstrous. So they brought me to Don Christian, complaining that my evil nature was too strong, even for the old methods. Don Christian promised them to keep me in his house – to keep a close eye on me, so that I won’t harm anyone.”
“Did he?” Reid asked.
Ramirez nodded grimly. “Oh, yes, he did. He made me his eternal servant; his personal slave. He broke my will and brainwashed me until I lost my identity completely; until I barely had an independent thought. I did terrible things for him; things I’d never have done on my own – and when he was finally killed by the Sandinistas, back in nineteen-seventy-eight, and I was finally free, I knew they’d kill me, too. So I fled from the only place I knew and spent several years in the jungle, alone, living like an animal. Those years made me realize who and what I truly was.”
“How did you get here, then?” Reid asked. “You must still have been a child… or barely more.”
“Oh, I was more,” Ramirez said. “I’m a lot older than I look – whether it’s a blessing or a curse, I don’t know. I came to LA alone. A court might say that I wasn’t fully responsible for my actions – nobody would stay sane, going through what I went through in the hands of my master, day to day, week to week, year to year – but that doesn’t change the fact that I, too, did hurt a lot of people. Here, in East-La, is quite a large Nicaraguan community, and there is where I usually live. Those people don’t know who I once was; they’re poor and need help, and I do help them, wherever I can. That’s my atonement and I hope that will be my salvation one day.”
“What… Reid hesitated. “What has your master done to you?”
“What has the Spanish Inquisition done to its victims?” Ramirez asked back. “My master saw it his personal vocation to exorcise the evil from me… and he had an impressive collection of tools to use on me. Have you ever heard of the agony pear?”
Reid nodded, shivering.
“That was his favourite – but not his only tool, and not even the worst one. He collected medieval torture instruments, and let me assure you, they all were in the best working order.”
“Oh, God,” Reid whispered tonelessly. “How did you survive that?”
“I haven’t,” Ramirez said with a shrug. “I’ve been dead for a very long time.” He sighed and patted Reid’s back. “Go back to sleep, muchacho, and have no fear. I’ll be here, watching over you. No other monster will enter this house on my watch.
With that dubious reassurance, he left Reid’s room, closing the door behind himself quietly.
Part 06
