Twisted Ends, Chapter 1

Death, murder, blood, homicide. Those were things I was used to. But this. This was something different entirely.

When you’re an agent in Cincinnati, sure, you get some gang killings, drug killings, etcetera, and yeah, those can get messy, but its normally messy as in several-gunshot-wounds type of messy. But this body. The woman’s scalp was nearly gone, dried up blood crusted over her eyebrows, sunk into her eyes, ran into her hair. Her wrists were slit with the psychopathic perfection of an experienced killer.

Even after the rest of my team had retired for the night, I was still in evidence, staring at the case evidence box in the lab. In short, I was staring at nothing. Assistant Director Thomson had sent his best team of investigators to the scene, and we came up with nothing. Absolutely nothing. No hair follicles, footprints, fingerprints. Not one speck of dust was out of place.

How? I continued asking myself.

A movement at the door interrupted my thoughts. Agent Abbad Salib, forensic technician for our Cincinnati-based division, popped his head into the door. “Agent Nelson? I was about to head out…uhm…”

I smiled. Abbad (who no one ever called Agent Salib, oddly) had a hard time asking people to close for him, as he is normally the last one out of the office at night.

“That’s okay,” I picked up the empty evidence box. “I was done in here anyway,” I said, even though I was not. Sighing, I placed the box back into its place on the evidence shelf.

As I walked out of the evidence station, I flicked off the room lights and said, “You got anything on The Man, Abbad?” The Man was our killer. Or, at least, that’s what we called him. On the walls, over the mutilated body he had left lying in the woman’s bedroom, were the words “The Man was here” carved out.

“Nothing,” Abbad said, adjusting his laptop bag on his shoulder. “This man is pure genius –  like I can’t find a hint, not a clue. Nothing!” Abbad ran his hands through his hair in dismay.

“Nothing?” I asked incredulously. “But the great Agent Salib always finds something.” I smiled. Although I was joking, it was true. Abbad was a forensic genius. If he couldn’t find any evidence on that crime scene, no one on God’s green earth could do so.

Abbad smiled back at me shyly and flipped off the overhead lights of the division headquarters.

“Goodni-” Abbad started, but I interrupted.

“What about the wood?” I asked, spinning around to face a very perplexed Abbad.

“What?”

“You know, the wood from the message. If our UNSUB carved that deep there’d surely be some wood shavings, right? But I was on the scene myself, and I didn’t see any.” My voice wandered off as I pondered.

“Get some rest, Lillith,” Abbad said, using my first name. “We’ll clear this up tomorrow.” Abbad walked off to his car, leaving me to sit, knowing with despair that, no, this will not be cleared up tomorrow.

This will not be cleared up any time soon.

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

Due to the holiday, I am not posting a new chapter of Twisted Ends, but I’m feeling generous, so I’ll give you a sneak peek!

“Death, murder, blood, homicide. Those were things I was used to. But this. This was something different entirely.”

Twisted Ends: Prologue

The Man stood in the shower, the water washing over his bloodied hands. He heard the front door open and close. She was home.

She didn’t know what the Man did. She didn’t understand the Man’s joy in seeing his victims beg, plead, grovel for a chance to live.  He let them. The Man liked seeing them beg, on their knees, tears staining their ugly, imperfect faces, lying straight to him.

“Please,” the red-haired girl had begged just hours ago. “Please.” She had sniffled, her tears blotching her face as the Man twirled the beautiful, fragile knife in his hand. “I won’t tell anyone if you let me go. I won’t tell…I promise I won’t tell!” She had squealed like a pig at the slaughter, a sheep being sheared, until at the end, all that was left was a lovely, perfected slab of meat. No, a piece of art. A masterpiece.

Her red hair was no longer colored the limp, hanging ginger that it had originally been, but was now painted the fiery bright red of blood from the incision he had made on her thick forehead. He had meant to stop there, but the Man was an artist, and an artist needed to perfect his work, so he worked the knife masterfully around her scalp, until her fair skin and bloodied hair decorated the woodworks, parts of her snow white skull playing hide and seek behind the beautiful chaos. He had cut her wrists until they were a perfect mess of tally marks and squirting blood, made more lovely by the girl’s screaming and writhing. Oh, the high-pitched screams were music to his ears. The Man smiled. This is what he lived for. To kill.

The Agent closed the front door and wearily stumbled upstairs, to where the water was running in the shower. Her husband was home early, she thought. She sat on the edge of the bed, waiting, thinking, reliving the nightmares of the day.

The body – the girl. The poor, poor girl. She must have screamed, begged, pleaded, the Agent knew she had. Her killer probably didn’t even care, they probably just tossed the deadly, ugly knife in the air carelessly while admiring her tear-stained face as she fell to her knees.

The Agent could imagine the girl’s words. “Please, please!” Tears filled the Agent’s eyes as she continued deeper into the girl’s conscience. “I won’t tell anyone if you let me go. I won’t tell…I promise I won’t tell!” The Agent pictured the UNSUB, flipping that knife in his hand one final time and inspecting it lovingly before bringing it to the girl’s forehead as she screamed uncontrollably, begging, pleading, praying for another day to see the sunlight.

Her red hair was no longer the orange of the sunrise, though. It had been stained with the dark, reeking red of blood from the deep incision that ruined her lovely, fair forehead. The UNSUB had stopped there, temporarily inspecting his work as the girl no doubt continued to whine hopelessly, not yet dead, but almost there. The UNSUB then decided to scalp the poor girl until her red curls clumped onto the messy floor, and parts of her skull cried from behind the bloody mess of skin that was left on her head. Her wrists were cut with tally marks, each mark deep and deadly, causing the maroon blood to squirt from her wrists to the floor, in between the floorboards and drip into the kitchen below. The messy crime scene would haunt the Agent’s dreams for weeks to come, she knew as she tucked herself into bed. The Agent shuddered. This is what she lived for. To protect.

The Man stood over the bed, where his wife was already tucked in, but not yet sleeping. He gently rested himself next to her. She turned toward him, and the Man kissed her cheek.

“Goodnight,” the Man said.

“Goodnight,” the Agent replied.

Hello, Readers!

I’d just like to take the opportunity in this post to introduce my new work, Twisted Ends, which explores the mysteries surrounding a serial killer called “The Man” from the POV of Agent Lillith Nelson and her task force. You can expect the prologue of Twisted Ends by 3/12/17.