The Death Sculptor

Thirty-Four

Captain Blake was standing next to Garcia, her mouth half-open, her unflinching gaze welded to the shadow images on the wall. This was the first time she had seen them.

‘This can’t be serious,’ she said after a long silence.

Garcia said nothing.

‘You’re telling me that some maniac killer out there broke into a Los Angeles prosecutor’s home, butchered him into pieces, bundled his severed body parts together to create some godforsaken artifact, just so he could cast a shadow puppet of a dog and a bird onto the wall?’

‘It’s a coyote and a raven,’ Hunter said as he entered the room. He’d managed just a little over four hours of sleep, which for him was as good as it got.

‘What?’ Captain Blake turned and faced him. ‘What the hell are you talking about, Robert? And does it matter what species they are?’

‘Good morning to you too, Captain.’

She indicated the replica sculpture, and then the shadow puppets on the wall. ‘Does that look like a good morning to anyone?’

‘A coyote and a raven?’ Garcia asked, his eyes narrowing at the shadow puppets.

Hunter took off his jacket and fired up his computer.

‘How did you find that out?’ Garcia insisted.

‘I didn’t. Alice did.’

As if on cue, Alice Beaumont pushed the door open and stepped into the office. Her hair was back in the same slick ponytail she had the day before, but this time the look was complemented by an expensive-looking pair of designer sunglasses. She was wearing an impeccably fitted light gray suit with a white charmeuse blouse and a dainty white gold necklace.

All eyes shot towards her.

She looked up and paused, feeling the heat of everyone’s stare. ‘Good . . . morning . . . everyone. Did I do something wrong?’

‘I just told them you found out about the shadow puppets being a coyote and a raven,’ Hunter said. ‘Maybe you should explain the meaning behind them.’

Alice placed her briefcase next to her improvised desk and ran Captain Blake and Garcia through everything she had found out the night before. When she was done, a thoughtful silence enveloped the room for an instant.

‘It makes sense,’ Garcia eventually agreed.

Captain Blake folded her arms over her chest, still measuring everything.

‘The way I see it,’ Alice continued, ‘if the killer considered Derek to be a liar, then to generate this kind of payback, it must be connected to something that happened during one of his cases. It must’ve been an alleged lie that caused somebody to lose his or her freedom, or that sent someone to death row. Someone the killer considered innocent. Or even, as Robert suggested, an alleged lie that meant someone didn’t get the justice he or she felt they deserved. Someone who felt betrayed by the system and by Derek in particular.’

Captain Blake was still pondering everything. ‘And do we have any names yet? Anyone Derek Nicholson put away that would fit this theory?’ Her stare went back to Alice.

‘Not yet,’ Alice said, not shying away from the captain’s hard gaze, ‘but we will before the end of the day.’

‘You better make that before the end of the morning,’ Captain Blake came straight back at her. ‘DA Bradley said you were the best he had, so be the best.’ She threw a copy of this morning’s LA Times on Hunter’s desk. The headline read ‘SCULPTURE OF TERROR. LAPD OFFICER MURDERED AND CHOPPED TO PIECES’.

Hunter skimmed through the article. It mentioned how Nashorn’s boat cabin had been bathed in blood, his decapitated and dismembered body left on a chair facing the door, and his severed body parts used to create some sort of grotesque and sickening sculpture-like arrangement. It also mentioned that loud heavy-metal music was left playing on the stereo. No real details were given.

‘The TV edition of that story made the news bulletin late last night and again early this morning,’ Captain Blake blurted as she started pacing the room. ‘I woke up this morning to find a newspaper reporter together with a photographer pretty much camping out in front of my house. Goddamn it, as soon as I find out which officer at the scene leaked that kind of information to the press, he’s on a no return trip to shit-licking duty.’

‘I don’t think a cop leaked the story, Captain,’ Hunter said.

‘Who, then? The woman from the neighboring boat who found the body?’

Hunter shook his head. ‘She was too distressed to talk to anyone last night. It took me half an hour just to get a few pieces of information out of her. Her subconscious was already starting to block her memory. Pretty much the only thing she remembered was the blood. And there was an officer with her until she was sedated and fell asleep. Reporters didn’t talk to her.’

‘Well, they talked to someone.’

‘Probably the marina security guard on duty last night.’ Hunter reached for his notebook. ‘A Mr. Curtis Lodeiro, fifty-five years old. Lives in Maywood. In her panic, Leanne Ashman ran back to the marina’s security hut after leaving Nashorn’s boat. While she called 911, Mr. Lodeiro went over to check it. He had a better look at the crime scene than she did.’

‘Great. I had the DA on the phone to me this morning even before I got out of bed. And his call was quickly followed by Nashorn’s captain, and then by the Chief of Police. With the press now sniffing around this story like starving dogs, the heat for results in this investigation has just hit DEFCON-1 status. And everybody wants some goddamn answers pronto. If it was attention this killer was looking for, one thing is for sure: he’s got every cop in this city thirsty for his blood.’