The warehouse was huge. It felt like an empty football field, its flimsy roof and walls dotted with occasional holes and tears. Under the part of the warehouse roof that was still more or less intact, someone had set up a little sex den of sorts. A sprawling mattress with pillows lay on the concrete floor. Some blankets were strewn to the side. Whatever instruments of sexual torment the two perps might have brought, they'd clearly taken them with them.
Detective Fay Gracey walked the perimeter looking for clues while Vick talked to the officers on-site and got a mini-debrief on what had been found at the crime scene. The victim, Jessica Carleton, had been taken to Mercy Medical, the hospital downtown.
"It doesn't make sense," Vick rumbled as he walked up behind her. "They killed their first victim with a knife. Why drug the second one?"
"Maybe the video on the thumb drive will give us a clue," Fay said, her stomach twisting at the thought. Whatever was on that thumb drive, it would be tough to watch.
"True enough. I guess I'm getting ahead of myself. After we finish up here, let's stop by the hospital and take a look at our vic, find out exactly which drugs were in her system. Given the dosage, maybe we can get a fix on whether our perps intended it to be lethal or not."
Fay nodded. "Sounds like a plan." They didn't need to stop by the hospital, strictly speaking. They could have just waited for the medical report to hit their inbox. But Vick was old school like that. He believed that as a detective there was value in seeing things face to face. Seeing your victim lying there in her hospital bed was different than looking at a photo. It made you think about what was at stake in a whole new way, when you saw that victim lying there and knew that it was up to you to stop the ones who had done that to them. And as far as putting fire in your belly to get the job done, as a detective there was no greater motivator in the universe.
"Shit," Fay hissed.
Fay had frozen in place, and now Vick looked around confused. Fay's gut was seldom wrong, and right now she had a sixth sense of the creepy variety. It sat uneasily in her stomach like a glass' worth of curdled milk.
About ten paces away, an old and dilapidated scaffolding rose up to the roof. Fay found a handhold and began climbing.
"Um, Gracey, what are you doing?" Vick called after her. Knowing that there was usually a method to her madness, though, her partner forced himself to stand back. After she had clambered halfway up the scaffolding, its questionable sturdiness became even more obvious. A series of squeaks and groans now accompanied Fay each time she shifted her weight. Even the tiniest shift...
"Partner, you're killing me here. Are you trying to break your neck?"
"Just a little further," she murmured, focusing on putting one foot or hand to the next precarious hold, one after the next, until finally she'd reached the top. She gingerly reached out and detached the hidden camera, which was still recording, and tucked it into her pocket. Clambering down with an almost feline grace that still almost caused the entire scaffolding to collapse, Fay finally leapt back to solid concrete. Vick was frowning at her, but curiosity clearly superseded his annoyance.
"Didn't know you were into rock climbing," he muttered.
"Shut up." She produced the hidden camera, handed it to him. "We were being watched, and I'll give you one guess as to who."
Vick's eyebrow shot upward. "Sons of bitches."
Fay nodded.
Yep. Their two perps, nasty pieces of work which they were, apparently liked a good game of cat and mouse. They wanted to play mind games with their pursuers. Like so many sadistic criminals before them, they wanted to go toe to toe with the police because they were just that arrogant, and because, well, it was in their nature. The two scumbags just couldn't help themselves.
"These guys have balls of steel, I'll give them that," Vick said.
"So very true," Fay said with a grim smile. "and those are the balls I'm going to hang them by."
She elbowed Vick. "Come on, let's finish up here, then bug out. We've got things to do."
~~~*****~~~
After stopping by the hospital and then dropping off the hidden camera for analysis with their forensic tech, Fay and Vick were sitting in Fay's office. Her computer screen had the video file on the thumb drive pulled up.
Fay moved the cursor until it hovered over the icon. She was about to press play.
"You sure you want to do this," Vick said. They both knew that was a rhetorical question. This was what they did, this was the life they had chosen. Sometimes as a detective you had to walk waist-deep in the shit of what people did to each other before you could bring someone to justice. Hell, not even sometimes. Most of the time.
"Brace yourself, old man. Here we go."
Detective Gracey hit 'play.'
At first the video showed nothing but the bed they had seen in the warehouse. From off camera Fay could hear the voices of their two perps -- both of whom Fay had already dubbed 'Tall Psycho' and 'Short Psycho' based on the obvious -- and the whimpers of a girl.
The taller black man came into view holding a naked blonde girl. She was slender, with a beautiful face and lush breasts. Her wrists were cuffed in front of her. The Tall Psycho had on his dark mask, only his eyes revealed. He was reaching down between the girl's legs, stroking her clit. Jessica moaned.
"You want me to hurt you, white bitch?"
"No, please don't hurt me," Jessica begged.
Already, Fay knew that this video wouldn't be the same as the last. There was something in the victim's eyes. It startled Fay. The girl in the video...she actually wanted this. Fay could see it in her eyes, the way Jessica's gaze lingered lustfully on the erection of her captor.
"What do you want, slut? Say it," Tall Psycho growled.
"I want your cock inside me. I want to fuck big, black cocks," the blonde girl said breathlessly. Taller Psycho's hands slid upward. He cupped the girl's breasts and squeezed.
"Uhhh."
"You like that, slut?"
