Harley~
He gave me a shut your mouth look before leading me down one hall of mystery to his office. He closes the door, sits at his desk, gesturing for me to sit as well. "Is he one of the stalker victims?"
"I can neither deny nor confirm yet. Until now, Mr. Cervantes has been nameless. The police department must inform his family of his death. If you make me a copy of his personnel file, I'll be out of your way."
"I can't do that, Detective, not without a warrant. We also have a confidentiality clause. I could lose my job for breaking it."
"Did you miss the part where he's dead?! I can, Mr. Piolt, take the time to go all the way downtown, stand in line at the clerk's office during lunchtime, wait for the judge, and present them with a warrant to be signed. Then, I promise to dedicate the same amount of time when I shut down your office to conduct a thorough forensic sweep. Why don't you save us both some trouble and give me the damn file?"
That's what I thought! "Have a good day, Mr. Piolt."
Back in my car, I typed the address into my GPS and headed toward Cervantes' home. It's never easy to tell a loved one that a family member is deceased. It was the worst part of the job. Pulling the car over to the curb, I saw it wouldn't be an issue today. The GPS leads me to an abandoned lot.
Killing the engine, I get out. Just fucking great! Spotting an older couple sitting in the breezeway of the neighboring building, I approach them; they are so endearing, still holding hands in their early 70s. I love it!
"Good afternoon," I greet them and show them Cervantes' pick. "Have either of you seen this man?"
They look at the photo. And then up at me. "No, detective." The husband says.
My phone rings. I thank them for their time and get back into my car. I turn over the engine and connect my phone to the Bluetooth before accepting his call. "Yeah, Captain."
"Where are you, detective?" He sounded ready to come through the cellar waves and grab my ass!
I rubbed my aching forehead. "I was following a lead that led me nowhere. On a positive note, thanks to the glove, we know the ID of our third victim."
"That makes it two so far for the day. We just got the ID of the first victim. He has used several aliases, but the fingerprints match an Edward Tolley."
"Where did the IAFIS hit come from?"
"Oklahoma State Police, Mr Tolley, then Mr. Atkins, did a couple of years in McAlester for holding up a convenience store. Also, we have visitors here. I need you back ASAP!"
You can't make this shit up! I shake my head; humans never fail to amuse me. "I am on the way." So much for searching for the van. It would have to wait, though I was hoping maybe the stalker had left me something else behind.
The first thing I saw when entering the squad room was the bouquet of peonies and baby's breath sitting on my desk. They took my breath away. I knew who they were from because he knew peonies were my favorite. I went and retrieved the card from the little plastic fork. It read, "I will forever love you."
Though I wished he wouldn't, I rubbed my thumb across his handwritten words as tears stung my cheeks. My eyes lock onto the phone. I think about calling Ben.
'You can't do that, Harley. You know it isn't fair to tease him. Are you willing to give me and being a werewolf up to with Ben? Because that's the only way it could ever work.'
The answer is no. Rae is my best friend, and I wouldn't want to be without her. Nor could I ever be happy living a lie and denying what I am. That is a sacrifice I wouldn't make for anyone.
'I know, Rae, I have done enough damage already.' I wiped away the tears from my cheek and returned the card when I heard my captain coming up behind me.
He, too, focuses first on the flowers, which would be hard to miss, and grunts with a roll of his eyes. "Come with me," he barks.
We go down the hall to the conference room. Detectives from the DEA, Nelson and Spykes, and Dr. Lyles, our resident psych profiler, already sat at the table.
"Why are they here?" I snipped, locking eyes with my captain and nodding toward the two DEA agents. He already knew I don't work well with others.
"They got the same correspondence we did for a different reason." Captain Howard sits, expecting me to do the same.
"It's good to see you again, detective," Nelson drawls. I still haven't figured out how such a country bumpkin wound up in LA.
"Yeah, likewise, can we get on with this?" I shift my chair up to the table.
Nelson produces a jacket as thick as I have ever seen. He slides it across the table to us, and Captain Howard opens it.
"Meet Kevin Coalds, another alias of our Mr. Tolley." Nelson chuckled roughly. "Doctor Jekyll hasn't got shit on this guy! Whatever Kevin did that got him killed wasn't paying the bills. The DEA had eyes on him for running drugs."
"What did you find on the other victim, detective?" Sykes asked me.
I first handed Dr Lyles the coroner's report on Cervantes, and she put it beside Kevin's for comparison.
"Joswa Cervantes," I answered, "and not much. I tracked him down to his employer, but the address on his personnel file was a vacant lot. Big shock there. The phone number he listed as his home phone belongs to the dry cleaner over on the boulevard. However, I don't think he is involved in your drug ring."
Lyles looked up from the files. "I agree with Detective Gibson."
"How can you be so sure?" Sykes snipes at
her. "One can run them without partaking."