Blood Solutions: A Detective Red Shaw Novel

Prologue

Imperial Caesar dead and turned to clay

Estopped a hole to keep the wind away;

The great god Ra whose shrine once covered acres

Is filler now for cross-word puzzle makers.

The Destiny That Shapes Our Ends

Keith Preston (1884-1927)

The boy was lost. Surrounded by dying elms, scraggled firs, red-orange maples and dense brush thick with itch weed, he’d looped around again to the point of decision. Twice he’d chosen the wrong path. Once more and he was certain to be out well past dark. Hungry. Cold. Afraid. He wondered if he would die.

Whatever lived out there in the dark would be watching. His Uncle James once talked of a bear that had wandered down from Minnesota all the way to Keokuk County before a farmer shotgunned it. There could be other bears, or even a cougar up from Osage County.

Randy had not wandered so far into the woods before. He had not been in the woods at all since that thing with his sister. It was so long ago that he could not remember where he had found her or what she had looked like.

Ran!

That was Mamma’s voice, faint, distant.

Ran!

He knew that the sun went down in the west and he imagined the points on his compass as he crossed himself. North, South, East, West. Father, Son, Holy, Ghost.

Ran!

West must be that way, to his left now, toward the little bit of daylight that remained. West was where Mamma’s voice was calling him to dinner. He walked toward the voice until she stopped calling, then he just walked toward the quickly fading light.

~~~~

Chapter 1

The man with the boning knife stood in a doorway across the street, watching a window on the third floor of the apartment building. The light there had gone out a few minutes earlier. He stood almost perfectly still. If anyone had seen him there, he would have looked like a statue, but no one saw him.

It was well after midnight and the street was empty. He stood back far enough in the shadows that anyone driving by would have had to look at exactly the right moment, and even then he was almost invisible in the darkness.

His eyes stayed riveted on the window. He looked away only when an unexpected sound startled him or he heard a car approach. He flinched when something brushed against his leg, but he managed to stifle everything except for a quiet gasp.

He pushed away gently with his foot as he looked down. A stray she-cat took a few steps away, out into the light from a streetlamp. It stared at him, sitting on its haunches, then padded over and brushed his leg again. Once more, he pushed it away.

When the cat came back yet again, he ignored it and returned his attention to the window. There was no light and no sign of movement. The animal curled up on the concrete a few feet away and watched him as he watched the window. He felt the yellow eyes on him, and he looked down.

The cat was standing in the light now, pointing like a gun dog to the man’s hiding place in the shadows. It could give him away. He bent down slowly, crouching, and reached out with his left hand, keeping his right on the smooth, wooden handle of the knife concealed in a sheath in his pocket.

The cat stretched, then came slowly toward him to sniff the outstretched hand. The man stroked the top of the cat’s head, heard the low purr begin, then closed his hand quickly around its throat from behind, choking off a yowl. The blade plunged into the animal’s heart and the cat was still. The man pulled the knife free, tossed the lifeless creature back in the shadow of the doorway, and stood. He studied the blood-covered blade and shook with excitement.

Collecting himself, he looked around on the ground for something to clean the blood away. As he wiped the razor-sharp blade with a scrap of paper, a door opened across the street. An old man stepped out and stood on the sidewalk outside the apartment building. A light breeze rustled the bathrobe that he wore loosely over a stained T-shirt and tattered trousers. He called out, shaking and crinkling a small bag of kibble.

The old man walked slowly along in front of the building, supporting himself with a cane in his left hand. He passed the next apartment building and stopped at the corner, looking back and forth, still shaking the bag. He crossed at the corner and started back down the street, then slowed as he neared the first recessed doorway to peer inside.

He moved on again, shaking the kibble more softly now. He slowed again at the second doorway and looked inside as he shuffled by. At the third, he stopped, then cried out.

Koshka!

As he stepped toward the dead cat, something cold and sharp flashed across his throat. He grabbed at his neck as the cane and bag fell to the sidewalk. He felt something warm and wet on his fingers. Moments later, he felt nothing.

The man with the blade pulled him deeper into the shadows.

~~~~

Chapter 2

Detective Sergeant Edward Shaw never functioned well early in the morning, and when his cell phone jolted him awake at 4 a.m. Monday, he could tell it was going to be a long, painful day.

The desk sergeant had to explain twice before Shaw understood.

Be right over, Shaw told him, but after he hung up he stayed in bed for a few more minutes and listened to the blood pound through his brain.

Finally, he rolled himself out of bed, made his way into the bathroom, turned the cold water on in the shower, and retched into the toilet. It was 4:30 when he got to his car, a well-used civilian Buick Regal. At least the traffic would be reasonable at that hour, even if nothing else was likely to be.

The Des Moines address the desk sergeant had given him was only five minutes away. Shaw pulled up to the police barricade at the end of the 1000 block of Cherry Street and passed through after flashing his badge. Five patrol cars were clustered near a darkened apartment house in the middle of the block, and an ambulance was backed up to the curb. The M.E.’s van pulled up as Shaw dragged himself out of the car.

Morning, Red. I hear we’ve got a messy one.

Wonderful, Shaw answered sourly. Penawalt jumped from the van and slammed the door hard behind him. Shaw flinched at the sound.

You don’t look too good, Red. Maybe you should come by for a checkup. He raised his voice. Intentionally, Shaw thought.

Fuck you, Penny, he said. Let’s just get this over with.

Okay, but I’m serious. You don’t look very good.

Shaw waved him toward the flashing lights of the squad cars.

You’ll have to make do with this stiff here for now. Why don’t you take a look at him first?

Penawalt squinted and walked toward the lights, black bag in one small hand. The county’s chief medical examiner was five-two, max, Shaw guessed. Maybe one day he would ask the little prick.

A patrolman stood in front of the entryway. He gestured to a spot behind him as the M.E. approached. Shaw waited twenty yards away on the sidewalk, hoping he wouldn’t be sick again, hoping his insides would settle down so he could study the crime scene like the tough cop he pretended to be. Another patrolman was leaning against a squad car at the curb, making notes.

What do you have so far? Shaw asked him.

Old man and a cat, sir. Both are cut up pretty bad. Blood all over in there. Neighbor upstairs heard a scream about 3:45, looked out and saw an old woman out here on the sidewalk. Apparently his wife. It looks like she found him and fainted. Ambulance took her to Methodist. No weapon yet, but I got a look at the body. Must’ve been something pretty sharp. Razor, maybe. The guy’s T-shirt was all slit up and bloody, not to mention his throat was slashed.

Nice. Thanks.

Shaw looked down the street and started pacing, trying to keep his eyes from the doorway. The chilly morning air felt good and his head was getting better. He breathed deeply, then started to cough, then gagged. The patrolman by the squad car rushed over and clapped him sharply on the back.

You all right, Detective?

Yeah. Thanks. He hacked some more.

You don’t look very good. The uniform really looked concerned, Shaw thought, but he was stating the obvious.

I’ll make it, he said. Some kinda bug. Up too early.

The patrolman nodded doubtfully, but Shaw ignored him and made his way farther down the block. Why do so many people die so early in the morning? When he reached the barricade, he noticed a small crowd had gathered. A paper carrier with a bag half-full of papers, a pair of bag ladies with bags overflowing, other early risers brought out by the flashing lights and sirens. And by the scent of death, no doubt.

You a cop? someone shouted as he turned away. Shaw ignored the question.

Somebody get wasted?

It was the same voice, high-pitched, grating in the darkness. An old woman, he decided without looking back. He kept walking.

Detective!

That voice was different, more familiar, and he stopped. A patrolman dragged the barricade aside to let a car through. Shaw recognized the assistant county attorney behind the wheel, poking his head out the window. The red Saturn pulled up beside him, under a streetlamp.

I don’t think we’ll be needing a warrant right away, Mr. Mazza, Shaw said. You could’ve slept in.

One of us has to check it out anyway, you know. Procedures. Ryan Mazza looked around quickly, surveying the scene. Besides, I live in the neighborhood and heard the ruckus.

The ruckus?

Sirens. I heard the sirens and it sounded like they stopped pretty close to home.

Shaw shrugged and turned away. Mazza parked the car and followed close behind.

I don’t see anybody in cuffs yet, he said. I thought you guys were the best.

No arrest yet.

Shaw was always annoyed by Ryan Mazza’s smart-assitude. In broad daylight he might not mind so much, but it was too early in the morning for the bullshit.

Just two stiffs. An old man and a cat. Looks like they were stabbed to death.

Sounds messy.

That’s what I hear. I’m waiting for Penawalt to get out of the way. He gestured over his shoulder toward the activity in the middle of the block. Looking him over now.

No, here he comes, Mazza said. What have we got, Dr. Penawalt?

A pretty bad one, Ryan. The old man’s all slashed up. The cat, too. I suppose the cat got it first, if it matters. No cat I’ve ever seen would come around in the middle of something like that. Blood everywhere. Maybe you should take a look.

Yeah, I suppose I’ll have to.

Penawalt chuckled. Mazza didn’t look all that reluctant.

Well, it’s all yours, Red, the M.E. said. Where’s your partner?

Shaw pretended to look around.

I knew I’d forgotten something.

Still out rehabbing the leg, huh?

That’s what I hear, anyway. I think he’s got another week or two.

Penawalt nodded.

OK, then. Well, I’ll work this guy up good later this morning, maybe tell you what the weapon might have been and whatever. I gotta get a couple hours’ sleep first. See ya.

Yeah. See ya, Penny, Shaw said, raising a hand in answer to the M.E.’s mock salute.

Now he would have to look. Mazza tagged along as Shaw headed slowly for the doorway.

The scene was lit by an electric lantern someone had hung from a broken light fixture next to the door. The photographer’s strobe popped every few seconds, making Shaw wince as he approached. When he looked down, he was mesmerized.

The old man was on his back, his face ghostly pale, paler still in the intermittent flashes from the strobe. His long, thin, gray hair hung back, matted where it touched the pavement in drying blood. The right side of his throat gaped open, the blood that had spilled from the wound a pool all around him, framing his body, or splattered across two walls that met at the corner where he lay dead. Two tiny rivulets had started toward the curb and then stopped, dried, a few inches short.

Shaw’s eyes fixed on the man’s chest, so thin under the tattered, blood-stained shirt. The killer had taken some time with him. He had slit the front of the shirt into several pieces. The blade had gone through the skin, too. Thin red lines formed a bloody grid. The cat lay dead beside him, a slash across its throat that had nearly severed the head. Another deep wound marked the white patch on its chest between the two front legs. A bag of what he assumed was cat food sat on the concrete next to the cat. Shaw saw that some of it had spilled, leaving little star-shaped islands in the little sea of congealing blood.

He lurched to the street and fought off the urge to puke.

Goddamn flu, he muttered as he turned back to the crime scene.

He hoped he’d said it loud enough for the nearest patrolman to hear him.

* * *

Shaw had just fallen asleep when the phone rang. After nearly vomiting in the street two hours earlier, he’d given orders for a door-to-door canvass of the neighborhood where the body had been found, not really expecting anything to come of it. He’d been around long enough to know that people weren’t likely to have heard much of anything, and not everyone would tell the police anyway.

Crime wasn’t exactly unheard of in the neighborhood, which seemed to be home to more than its share of blind, deaf and dumb. No, maybe that was too harsh. He knew some of those people. The ones who were the most likely victims were mostly just frightened or skeptical about the PD’s ability to protect them. Some of the others were predators themselves, who survived by feeding on the weaker. Interesting that Mazza lives somewhere around there, he thought. Fitting.

Before nodding off, he wondered as always if the old man would be an innocent victim who went unavenged or if maybe this would be easy. Shaw knew the odds were against the latter. These things were rarely easy.

Still, there were procedures to be followed. SOPs. It helped to have routines, checklists. While the uniforms spread out to start knocking on doors, Shaw decided to try to sleep for a couple of hours before he’d have to show himself at the station.

It was closer to ten minutes than two hours. He grabbed the phone from the stand by the bed.

You should probably come down here, Red, Penawalt said.

Huh? Shaw groped for the light and struggled to sit up.

Penny? I thought you were going home. What the hell is it?

I did go home. One of my hotshot assistants started working the old man up as soon as the meat wagon got him down here. He called me right away and I came down. He was talking faster than usual, Shaw noticed.

Slow down, Penny. Tell me what’s going on.

You’ve got a real twisted bastard on the loose, Ed. I mean real.

What are you saying, Penny?

Come down and I’ll show you. He hung up.

Shaw swore, crawled out of bed and dragged his clothes back on. Damn Penawalt and his mysteries. Why did he insist on being so fucking melodramatic? He was probably smiling over what he’d just done, knowing that Shaw wouldn’t be able to sleep and would rush right down. Penny loved to put on a show, and he was good at it, Shaw admitted as he got in the car. In ten minutes, he was standing in the door to the M.E.’s office.

I knew you wouldn’t be able to resist, Penawalt said, smiling as he poured black coffee into a dirty cup and handed it over.

It had better be worth it, Penny. I’m in no mood for games this morning.

I hear you lost your breakfast after I left.

"Not true, and fuck you, Penny. I haven’t even had breakfast. Just tell me what this is all about. Now, or I’m leaving." He turned toward the door, gulping the coffee.

This killer left a message.

The word stopped Shaw in mid-swallow. He turned back toward Penawalt and let his hand drop from the doorknob.

I’m not sure what it means, Penawalt said quickly. Not specifically, anyway. But I’d bet money this one will kill again. My money. You’ll agree when you see it.

See what?

Penawalt picked up two photos from his desk and carried them over to Shaw.

I took these just for you, my friend. I figured they’d be easier on you than looking at the real thing right now.

Shaw reached for them, but Penawalt pulled them away.

They’re in full color now. Are you sure you’re ready?

Quit fucking around, Penny. Maybe I’m a little hung over … and I’m really tired of playing games with you.

He meant it. Penawalt could tell. He lost the smile and silently handed over the photos. Shaw took them and sat down.

The first was a picture of what he’d already seen. The bloody, tattered shirt, the ashen face. Shaw looked up at Penawalt and shrugged. The second photo was worse, taken after the shirt had been peeled away from the lifeless chest. It was covered with dozens of squares, formed by slashes running horizontally and vertically.

He’d lost most of his blood before those cuts were made, Ed. The slash across the throat. That’ll be the official cause of death. Loss of blood. Same for the cat, I’d guess. He shrugged. The blade was extremely sharp.

No shit. So where’s this message? You said he left a message.

Penawalt held up a finger. He turned, walked back to his desk, and brought back another photo.

A sort of message. Like I said, I’m not sure what it means.

He handed over the picture.

You’re the detective, he said. You figure it out.

Deep into the old man’s back, in large, unmistakable letters, the killer had carved a number and a word, and Shaw saw that what had been cut into the man’s chest wasn’t just some random pattern.

We didn’t see it because of all the blood when we turned him over on the street. One of the guys found that when they brought him in and cleaned him up a little. What do you think?

I don’t know, Penny. I really don’t know. His eyes stayed on the photo as he spoke.

1 Down, the killer had written in bloody flesh. 1 Down.

Shaw slumped in his chair and let his head fall back. He studied the ceiling tiles, which formed their own stained grid below the real ceiling and the decades-old flat roof above.

You any good at crossword puzzles, Penny? he asked finally, looking once more at the photo in his hand.

No … I’m afraid not, Red.

Shaw sighed, shaking his head.

Neither am I, Dr. Penawalt. Neither am I.

~~~~

Chapter 3

Tom Harris leaned over and shut off the digital recorder, then sat back in the leather chair and closed his eyes. The case he’d just neatly summarized had gone ten minutes ago and he had five more minutes until the next