Page 64 of Dropping Like Flies

“Such as?”

The traffic lights changed to red, and I brought the car to a temporary stop. “Option one as you already pointed out, is that this could be a copycat killer. Someone who’s heard about Satanic Romeo’s arrest and is such a fan of his work, they want to continue it.” Griffin made a noise of disgust in his throat. “Yeah, I know. There are a lot of weirdos out there.”

“Option two?”

“Dougie gave a false confession.”

“Why would he do that?”

“Attention. Or he convinced himself he did it.” The lights changed again, and I eased the car forward, frustration that we weren’t there yet burning in my chest. “Coercion. Covering for someone else. There are lots of reasons people give false confessions. It might not seem rational to you or me, but we already know Dougie was off his meds, and the brain can play strange tricks.”

“Is there an option three?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you going to tell me what it is?”

“Option three is that Dougie is Satanic Romeo, but Satanic Romeo was always more than one person. In Dougie’s absence, the other person just carried on their work. There were always things that didn’t add up, like where he got the knife from when we know he entered the club without one. And how he doesn’t seem to know where the fingers are. Perhaps his partner in crime was always the ringleader, and Dougie got carried along for the ride. And in the end, the combination of being off his meds and guilt had him freaking out in the club.”

“You seem more sold on the last option than any of the others?”

“It makes the most sense.” I slammed my hand down on the steering wheel. “Which pisses me off when I never even considered it. Some detective I am.”

Griffin reached over to lay his hand on my thigh, warmth leaching through the thin fabric of my suit trousers from where his fingers rested. “This is not your fault.”

“No?” The word came out like an explosion. “Tell that to the poor bastard we’re about to see. I’m sure he’d love to hear we were eating Chinese, fucking, and discussing marriage while he was dying.”

Griffin’s fingers traveled to my knee to offer a squeeze. “I’m serious about it not being your fault. They had profiles done, right? What did they say? Did any of them suggest it could be two people?”

“No,” I admitted. “All the profiles came out as a single white Caucasian male aged somewhere between twenty and thirty.”

“Well, there you go then. You were going on what others had said. And we don’t even know that’s what happened yet. It strikes me that jumping to conclusions before we know more is a waste of time.”

The Griffin that had come back into my life had been such a mess that I hated him being the voice of reason, even if it indicated him healing, that I’d helped him to heal. “You’re right,” I admitted as I took a left turn, the road completely clear. “It just feels like this fucker… or fuckers… has been running rings around me since day one.”

“Yeah,” Griffin said with a sigh. “I can see how it would feel like that.” He lapsed into silence for a few moments. “Where are we going, anyway?”

“Islington. Another apartment. We’re only a few streets away.”

Griffin nodded, and we didn’t speak again until we arrived at the usual scene of frenzied activity all tinged by the flashing blue lights of the squad cars. It spoke to how many crime scenes Griffin had now attended that no one questioned his presence as I flashed my badge to gain admittance and shouldered my way past all the crime scene investigators intent on doing their job. One or two offered a nod, but I wasn’t in the mood for small talk.

“DCI Ben Weaver?”

I turned to find a blonde uniformed officer coming my way, her expression suitably earnest. “Sergeant Lily Mapplewell,” she said, neither of us moving to shake hands. “I understand this is your case?”

“I’m hoping not,” I said truthfully.

She pulled a notepad from her pocket as she jerked her head toward the room that presumably held the body. “Victim is Aaron Cassidy, a Caucasian male in his mid-twenties. He shares this place with a Mr. Jamie Ashley, but Mr. Ashley’s currently away. We’re tracking him down to find out if his trip was a planned one or something more spur of the moment.”

“Tell me more about Aaron?” Whether this case proved to be linked to Satanic Romeo, it was still a murder, which put it firmly in my jurisdiction either way.

Sergeant Mapplewell checked her notebook again. “He’s an electrician, so makes pretty good money. He owns this place rather than renting it.”

“Gay?” Griffin asked.

Mapplewell didn’t seem to have any problems with answering Griffin’s question, despite not knowing who he was. “Bisexual, according to the neighbors we spoke to. They said they used to make bets on whether he would bring a man or woman home.” There was a pause while we presumably all thought the same, that Aaron probably wished he’d gone for a woman tonight. If he had, he’d have lived to see the morning.

“How was the body discovered?”

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