City of Fire (23 page)

The elevator shook and groaned all the way up to the third floor. The doors vibrated, then opened, and Novak led the way down the hall to the bureau floor.

“It’s six-thirty,” he said. “Let’s divvy them up and get the hell out of here.”

Sanchez nodded with relief, crossing to his desk. It looked
as if the stack of case summaries was four to five inches thick. Lena slipped her share into her briefcase, then sat down before her computer and quickly checked her e-mail. When she had stepped off the elevator, she noticed that the door was closed to the Computer Crime Section. She hadn’t spoken with Upshaw since he’d come up with Charles Burell’s address and was hoping that he had a better day hunting than she did. But as she weeded through the junk mail, she didn’t find anything related to their case. By the time she logged off, the only one left on the bureau floor was Novak, hovering over an open file on Lieutenant Barrera’s desk.

“What is it?” she asked.

“The DNA report.”

Novak grabbed the file, shaking his head as he returned to his desk and sat down beside her.

“Is there something wrong?”

“I don’t think so,” he said. “What’s a CCR5 gene?”

She had never heard of it and shrugged.

“It’s mutated,” he said.

She rolled her chair over and leaned in for a closer look. When her eyes hit the words
Black Death
, she started reading. Romeo’s CCR5 gene had mutated into something molecular biologists were calling delta 32. According to the report, the mutation was rare and had occurred somewhere in Romeo’s lineage 350 years ago as members of his family struggled to survive the Black Plague. Those who carried the mutated gene survived the epidemic. Those who didn’t suffered a particularly hideous and lonely death. The discovery of delta 32 was related to present-day HIV research because the two diseases attacked white blood cells in a similar way. For some reason, anyone who inherited the mutated gene was immune to HIV. But what struck Lena most was the shadow that the plague had cast over the world. It was limited to Europe. Thus Romeo couldn’t be Asian or African because only Europeans carried the mutated gene.

Lena gave Novak a look. “Why didn’t Barrera say anything?”

“He probably didn’t get this far in the report. He was
looking for a match. When he saw the DNA hit, he knew we were in trouble with the Lopez bust and went upstairs to work things out with the chief.”

Lena thought it over. It was a case without clues, yet vague pieces of the puzzle were unfolding before their eyes. A portrait of the doer.

“Romeo carries the delta 32 gene,” she said, “so now we know for a fact that he’s Caucasian.”

“What else?”

“He’s not leaving any hairs behind. Could be a serial rapist who shaves.”

Novak swiveled his chair toward the window, his eyes turning inward as he stared outside at the marine layer sweeping in between the buildings like smoke.

“His features could be light or dark,” he said. “Let’s stick to what he know.”

“He’s a lefty,” she said. “From the severity of the wounds, he’s young and strong.”

“I would agree with that.”

“But he’s educated as well. He works the crosswords with a pen. He listens to classical music and knows something you don’t.”

Novak glanced at her. “What’s that?”

“How to use a fucking computer.”

He flashed a tired grin, then sank back into himself. “What about his penmanship?”

“Extremely neat,” she said. “But he’s got an odd way of writing the letter
P.
So odd that Irving Sample says it’s as good as a fingerprint.”

“Keep going.”

“There’s not much left. He gets off on porn. He’s showing an unusual interest in his victim’s lives. How much money they make and what they think about. He’s posing his victims using religious themes so there’s a moral angle. And he doesn’t seem concerned about his DNA. He’s tossing his body fluids around like a calling card.”

A moment passed. When Novak finally turned away from the window, he looked a day older and shook his head.

“What is it?” she asked.

He stood up and started gathering his things. “Nobody wins in cases like this, Lena. We may know how to ID Romeo if we ever meet him. If we ever get the chance. But that won’t happen until he makes a mistake or we catch him in the act. It could take awhile.”

Lena got the drift and didn’t say anything. She could see the disappointment in her partner’s eyes. The frustration. As he said good-bye and walked out, she sat back in her chair and gazed at the empty room. It didn’t take experience to realize that the price of catching Romeo would be another innocent life. Maybe two or three leading to nine or ten, and there was nothing either one of them could do right now to prevent it.

She grabbed her briefcase, fighting off a mix of depression cut with panic. She needed to clear her head. As she waited for the elevator, she decided to get some fresh air before driving home and thought about walking over to the Blackbird.

The doors opened. Rhodes was standing in the elevator alone. Maybe it was the glint in his eye or the way she was feeling tonight. Whatever the reason, she hesitated a moment before stepping inside and leaning against the rear wall. He turned away and pressed the button to the ground floor. She noted the Lopez murder book under his arm and the worn-out leather briefcase, guessing that he stopped off at SID on the fourth floor before leaving for the day. Once the doors finally shut, he turned slightly without looking at her. Thinking something might be on the floor, she followed his gaze and realized that he was staring at her hand. He was examining it. Probing it. She could feel his dark eyes tracing an outline around her fingers until they reached her palm and slid over her hips and legs. He was undressing her.

She didn’t move, and he didn’t say anything.

When the doors opened on the ground floor, a moment passed before he even noticed. Then he gave her a fleeting look in the eyes, stepped into the hall, and hurried off.

MARTIN Fellows lay back on the bench, lifted the bar off the rest, and heard the weights jiggle. He had reached his limit and wanted to laugh, but knew it was too dangerous. Tightening his grip, he glanced at the three hundred pounds teetering above his head, then looked over at his friend and spotter, Mick Finn.

“Ready?” Finn asked.

Fellows nodded with determination.

“Then give me five reps so we can start backing down again.”

“I’m not sure I can do it.”

Finn let go and gave him the nod. Fellows steadied the weights, then lowered them to his chest, gritted his teeth, and pressed the bar toward the ceiling. He had been pumping iron three nights a week ever since he was a teenager. On his own in the basement at the house until Finn finally convinced him to join a gym. It had been Finn’s idea to begin increasing the weight, just as it had been Finn who suggested that they were now in training and Fellows needed to add bulk to his already hard and lean physique. Tonight Fellows was working the great pyramid. He’d begun with ten reps of two hundred pounds, adding weight in twenty-pound increments while decreasing the number of reps by one until he reached the pinnacle. After five reps at three hundred pounds, Fellows would have to perform five more sets, steadily decreasing the weight and increasing the number of lifts until he returned to where he’d begun.

Fellows couldn’t help but admire his forearms, trembling as he strained to lift the weights upward again. It was the feeling of power and invincibility. Like a fine-tuned machine catapulting forward under the watchful eye of his trusted spotter.

They had met nine months ago at the Pink Canary, a diner run by an Italian family just around the corner from the promenade at Venice Beach. Fellows had been a lunchtime regular since he’d begun working nearby. He liked Italian food, and the old lady who worked the kitchen assured him that she used natural ingredients and made everything from scratch. Although Finn stopped by only once or twice a month in the beginning, Fellows noticed early on that the man seemed to be drawn to the same table he was. A table set apart from the others in the shade below a pair of palm trees. Fellows’s sensitivity to light required that he eat lunch at that table. Rather than get into an argument over it, one day he asked Finn if he could join him, and they struck up a conversation. Finn’s visits soon became more frequent, and Fellows realized that he had gained something he’d never possessed in all his life. Someone he could share his darkest secrets with. Someone who would never judge him but push him forward. A spotter and a partner. A true friend.

Finn grabbed the bar, helping him lift it onto the rest. As Fellows sat up and caught his breath, he looked about the weight room. He was free here. No one stared at him and no one laughed. Not even the brunette with the man muscles and pockmarked skin pumping fifty-pound dumbbells on the other side of the room. Finn had been right when he said that this was the one place in the city where they would
blend.

Fellows almost teared up as he thought about it, removing twenty pounds from the bar and returning to the bench. Working his way down the pyramid always took more effort than the climb upward. If the going got tough, he might need an adrenaline boost and be forced to think about Harriet Wilson and what she had done to him.

“You sure you don’t need a longer break?” Finn asked.

“Not tonight. We’re going out later, right?”

For some reason Finn hesitated. He seemed preoccupied tonight, distracted, as if he wasn’t all there.

“We’ll talk about it after your reps,” Finn said. “What about a swig of water?”

Fellows tried to get a grip on his anger. “I’m good. Just help me with the weights.”

Finn grabbed the bar, lifting it over the rest. As Fellows took control of the weights and began his next set, he watched his friend watching him back.

Finn didn’t want to do it—that much was clear—and he wondered why. Charles Burell needed to be punished. It seemed so obvious now. Even worse, Fellows had already done all the legwork. He’d found Burell’s address and even scouted the location several times. Most nights Burell was home alone working at his computer or crying like a fool over the kitchen sink. When he wasn’t alone, the wretched little cretin was doing the wiggly giggly with one of his leading ladies in the hot tub. Fellows had managed to work his way to within ten feet of the tub, hiding behind the trellis and listening to the horrible man moan and groan like some kind of animal as he received his daily blow job. Because they were playing to the camera set just outside the sliding door, neither one of them ever looked behind their backs or noticed that he was watching. Curiously, Burell never used a cameraman. Every time Fellows stopped by, the camera sat by itself on a tripod with the wires feeding into the house and directly onto that outrageous Web site.

Charles Burell was what came next because he deserved what came next. He was feeding on Harriet’s low self-esteem. He had been fucking her for at least the past two months and doing it for the whole world to see. His fate was pure, clean, and true.

So why couldn’t Fellows convince his friend?

It had taken nothing to win Finn over on his birthday last Thursday night. A single sentence coupled with a three-word description of their quarry, Nikki Brant.

Fellows hurried through his sets, then lifted the bar onto
the rest and grabbed a towel. The accomplishment of performing the pyramid had been ruined.

“So now it’s time to talk,” he said.

“About what, Martin?”

“You know what I’m saying. Charles Burell. He’s a heathen and it’s righteous. He’s taking advantage of Harriet.”

“I can’t tonight,” Finn said. “I’ve got work to do. That’s why I was late.”

Fellows thought it over. When he arrived at the gym, he waited on Finn for a good thirty minutes. Thinking his friend might be a no-show, he got changed and walked upstairs to the weight room on his own. He didn’t see Finn until after he’d sprayed the bench with Windex and carefully wiped everything down. It was Fellows’s practice to work only with equipment that was properly sanitized. As much as he liked the gym, the staff was an international collection of losers who undoubtedly had no conception of how ugly a bacterial infection could become or how fast it might spread.

“That’s just an excuse,” Fellows said. “You don’t want to do it.”

“It’s not an excuse. And I’m not going to get into an argument about it here at the gym. I can’t do it tonight. Besides, precautions need to be taken. You know that as well as I do, Martin. This one’s different.”

“You mean because of who Burell is?”

Finn nodded. “Why are you in a rush? What’s the difference between tonight or tomorrow night?”

Fellows shrugged, then smiled, thinking about tomorrow. Reaching for his three-inch stainless-steel cross, he clasped it around his neck. Life before he’d met Finn had been so complicated. So fucking lonely.

He checked the cross in the full-length mirror, admiring his body. His prowess. When he turned back to the room, his friend was halfway down the stairs. Fellows watched him exit, then gathered his things and headed for the locker room. Five minutes later, he was in the shower lathering up with a can of shaving cream. Like the bodybuilders he grew
up watching at the beach, Martin Fellows shaved his entire body once a week. To the outside world, to his fellow students when he attended graduate school, even to himself in the beginning, his hairless appearance took some getting used to. But as with everything else he was forced to endure over the years, he found a way to manage.