Page 24 of Pure Killers

“We’re going to catch you,” I tell him, voice tight.

“Well," something like a soft chuckle sifts through the mask. “I’d better finalise some things, then.”

My jaw tightens. There are not many things he can mean by that. “Who?” I dare to ask. “Who’s next?”

“Why? Are you going to offer them a nice hotel room, maybe room service?” I don’t answer, and the mask tilts, eerie in its mockery of a face, an expression. “The Butcher might wish you’d left him to me once his inmates get wind of what he did.”

“Why do things this way?” I ask stiffly. “You could have been an asset to our side.”

“I’m sure.” He leans on the table, pinning me under his scrutiny across it. "Catching them is one thing, keeping them is another. My way, you don't need to keep anything."

"That’s how the law works. Innocent until proven guilty. Something you're clearly not familiar with." I stop myself. How am I here, in some kind of strip joint fronting for a criminal meeting spot, having a conversation with Needler? Needler, who I’m now sure, has been following me since the wastewater plant.

"Come on," he taunts. "There's no camera pointed at you now. Innocent is a matter of one’s wallet."

My jaw works. I should scream, watch him disappear. But there is something I need to know, something I know he can tell me. "Is Cocooner a copycat?"

He draws back, infinitesimally, but enough.

"Did my husband get him?"

The mask is impassive… and silent.

A group of laughing, drunken men stumble towards the urinals. I glance sideways as one nearly stumbles into my seat, and I see the small white baggies they're already pulling out of their pockets.

When I look back forward, Needler is gone.

***

Well, Dirk was right about one thing. Thisiswhere you find the criminals. I'm leaving, and if I don't find him to tell him that in the next five minutes, he's just going to have to figure it out on his own.

I've done a circuit of the bar, and I'm about to throw in the towel when I happen to glance through the glass and onto the beer garden. He's there, smoking and laughing with some business types. He looks so… natural. Like one of them as much as one of ‘us’.

Once I step out into the fresh, cool air, I realise I've left my jacket inside somewhere. But Dirk spots me, and he excuses himself to walk over to me where I wait under the fake palm fronds in the corner.

"Seen a ghost?" he asks, turning to sit next to me on the wall, balancing his beer on his other side.

I nod towards the group he just left. "They won't mind seeing you talk to a cop?"

"Eh, they know I'm a cop. We're familiar."

I shake my head. I shouldn't be surprised that Dirk is not the law-abiding good boy we're all supposed to aspire to. In Tregam, everyone is dirty in one way or another.

The fresh air is soothing, and now that I'm sitting out here, I'm not in such a mad rush to leave. "Do they know anything?"

Dirk shrugs, fingers curling over the lip of the wall next to his thighs. "A couple says they've seen him- that silver mask anyway, around. But as for his next target… no idea. There's lots of talk though. They say a lot of the killers are going real quiet, scared they'll be next."

I frown. "That one in custody, Talisof…" I recall, naming the man we saw not so long outside the courthouse, the one who seemed more celebrity than suspect, in his sleek black car and tailored suit.

"The millionaire?" Dirk scoffs. "In custodyfor now, you mean?"

"We don't know he did it."

"El, if he didn't poison those old ladies himself, he paid someone to do it. He's guilty. Why are you asking about him anyway, he's not our case? Are people here talking about it?"

I shake my head. “No, I don't know. Just a thought. In all honesty, people are talking about Cocooner more than anything.”

Dirk pulls a face, tilting his head up towards the small sliver of night sky. “Have you seen the latest body yet?”

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