2- Jack

"You should at least meet her, Jaga-ji. She comes from a very good family– "

"Yeah, mum, I’m sure she’s a great girl, but I’ve already said I’m not going to any more of these meetings!"

"I am only trying to help you . . ."

"I know. But you have to remember things are different for me and T.J."

"But it’s so hard for you to find a nice girl with your kind of work. Maybe if you were a doctor like Tinkoo . . ."

"Mum, we’ve been over this . . ."

"But I just think– "

"Look, mum, I’m working right now. I’ll call you later." Jack snapped his phone shut and scowled at Detective Inspector Collins, who sat in the driver’s seat obviously trying to suppress a laugh. "Let’s go then, shall we?" Jack hopped out of the car and jogged around to help the 7-month pregnant homicide specialist out of her side, but she had already gotten out and slammed her door before he could reach her.

"Such a gentleman, Jack," she chided as she marched across the street to the dilapidated little building.

A police barrier had already been set up, and a small crowd of busybodies had gathered to watch the officers coming and going, as if it were a film set and not a crime scene. A young constable came trotting over to greet them. "Good god, Collins, are you ever going to take leave? You look like a balloon!"

"Piss off, Dan," Inspector Collins replied with a smile. She turned to make the introductions. "Jack, this is Constable Dan Walker. We’ve worked together several times. Dan, this is my friend, Detective Chief Inspector Jack Bannerjee, our rep from the Kidnap Unit."

Dan offered his hand with grim politeness. "Right. You’re here about the kid." He glanced nervously toward the door of the roped-off second-story flat. "Ah . . . I’m not sure how much you’ll need to see . . . It’s a bit gruesome in there. . . ."

Jack blinked. For an officer in Collins’s unit to say something was "gruesome" . . . Just how bad was it? He cleared his throat. "I’ll need to take a look around, then I’ll be wanting to interview some of the neighbors."

Collins clapped her hands together. "Well then, let’s go have a look!"

The first body was in the kitchen. Two officers wearing paper aprons and plastic gloves were taking pictures of her. The woman was skeletally thin and very pale, dressed in nothing but an oversized T-shirt and her undergarments.

One of the paper-aprons crossed over to where Jack and Collins were standing. "Ever seen one like this, Collins?" he asked. "It’s got Boyd and me scratching our heads."

Jack looked over the body again. She was covered in scrapes and bruises. "Looks like she tried to fight," he observed.

"No," paper-apron replied. "The bruises and scars are too old to be related to the murder. Looks to me like she’s been beaten regularly for years. Probably by the fellow in the bedroom."

Jack nodded. He really wasn’t used to all of this murder business, although he had worked on a few kidnappings that had ended badly. Still, his stomach wasn’t quite strong enough to just calmly look over a corpse like this.

Collins squinted at the body. "Any clue how they managed to do this?"

The other fellow put down his camera. "We can’t quite figure it out. Even if several guys worked together, it would take an impossible amount of strength to turn it like that."

Jack frowned and looked once more at the woman on the floor. "Oh my god . . ." he muttered. At first glance he had assumed she was lying on her back, but on closer inspection he saw that only her head was facing up; the rest of her body was facing down.

Detective Inspector Collins stepped carefully around the corpse and stared down at her. "It’s amazing, isn’t it?"

"Indeed," Dan said softly, "I thought this kind of thing only happened in films." He turned to Jack. "Our guy was somehow able to turn a human head completely backward, without using any restraints."

"What?"

Paper-apron indicated the woman’s arms and shoulders. "With that kind of force, any restraints used on the body would have left marks, even if it were done post-mortem. But there are no marks. And without restraints, the body would have turned with the head, so twisting the neck to this degree would be impossible. We have no idea how it was achieved."

Jack gritted his teeth and looked up at Collins. "I assume this is the mother?"

She nodded. "Ms. Carrie Andrews. She lived here with her boyfriend, Avery Spencer, and her son– "

"John Andrews, age three," Jack finished for her.

Dan clapped him on the shoulder. "Are you ready to see the other one?"

Jack and Collins followed the constable toward a back bedroom. There were even more officers in paper aprons rushing in and out of that room. One of them handed a few plastic-wrapped bundles to Dan, and he pulled the two detectives aside into a small washroom. "You’ll need to wear these when we go in there," he explained as he handed a bundle to each of them and began opening one for himself. Inside was a paper apron, a hair net, two pair of plastic gloves, a paper face mask, and a pair of disposable shoe-covers.

Jack glanced at Collins, who was calmly wrapping the apron around her pregnant belly. "I’ve been told the second victim looks quite different from the first," she explained. Once they were all properly covered, Dan led them into the bedroom.

Jack fought back the urge to vomit the moment they entered the room. Everything was covered in blood. A tall, thin man was tied to the bedposts. His clothes, skin, and hair were caked with dried blood. The bedsheets were soaked; the walls, floor, and furniture were thoroughly splattered. As he tried to look away, Jack noted that even the ceiling had blood on it.

One of the people in the room wore a different sort of disposable outfit from the rest, and this woman came away from the corpse to greet them as they came in. "Detective Inspector Collins," she said with a nod at Collins, then she turned to Jack and nodded to him as well. "I’ve never had the pleasure of working with you," she stated politely, "but I assume you’re Detective Chief Inspector Bannerjee, from the Kidnap Unit? I’m Dr. Theresa Lovett, Specialized Crime. I’ve been examining the bodies so we can develop a profile of our murderer."

Collins placed one hand on her belly and took a deep breath as she looked around the room, then at the figure on the bed. "Tell me about this one, Tee."

Dr. Lovett grimaced and led the two detectives to the bed. "This one’s also very unusual, but in a different way," she said. " It seems the killer specifically aimed for major arteries, which shows a better-than-average knowledge of human physiology. . . ."

"And would also explain the massive amount of blood in this room," Collins added.

"Yes, the wounds seem to have been strategically inflicted to create the heaviest possible arterial spray. Either the killer had some reason to want this man to watch himself bleed to death in the most dramatic way possible, or– more likely– the killer has a psychological affinity for blood."

Collins frowned. "A blood fetish . . . Do you really think it could be a sexual killing?"

Dr. Lovett tilted her head as if unsure. "At this point I can’t say for sure, but as only the male victim was killed in this manner, I do believe it’s very likely." She glanced apologetically at Jack. It was obvious to all that the missing child, if he weren’t already dead, would likely be dead before he could be found.

Jack cleared his throat. He needed something useful, something that would lead him to this psychopath as quickly as possible. "Do we have a murder weapon?" he asked, hoping he was using the correct terminology.

Dr. Lovett gave him an odd look, then said, "That’s the part that has us really baffled." She gestured to another officer, who handed her a small plastic bag with a label on it. "Every wound on his body has one of these embedded in it. They vary slightly in size, but they’re basically all the same." She held the bag up to show the object to the two detectives.

"What is that?" Jack asked as he peered at the small metal object.

Collins gasped. "That’s a calligraphy pen tip!" she exclaimed. "My sister uses them for her scrapbooks."

Dr. Lovett squinted at the bag again. "A pen tip?"

"Right. It’s the sort where you put different size tips on your pen to make different size writing, and you dip it in a little jar of ink."

Dr. Lovett frowned. "That would explain how these were imbedded so deeply into the wounds. The tip simply slides on and off of the pen?"

"Yes."

Jack stared at the little blood-stained pen tip. " So he would have had to stop after each blow to attach another tip to his pen. He really took his time, didn’t he?"

Collins blinked. "Which would indicate that either he really enjoyed what he was doing, or he truly hated the victim. Though I’m inclined to think this is a sexually-driven killing with a randomly-chosen victim, we can’t rule out the possibility that the killer knew the victims personally and wanted to make them suffer for non-psychosexual reasons. We should investigate anyone connected to them, especially to this man here."

Jack nodded. Now they were getting somewhere. "Certainly we should interview anyone who might know this couple or their son, and we’ll need to look out for any of them who might use calligraphy pens. Murder isn’t my specialization, but I would assume that if he murders with a calligraphy pen, he probably writes with one as well."

Dr. Lovett handed the evidence bag back to the other officer. "I think that’s a logical assumption," she agreed, "You might also take note of anyone with a high level of education, especially in the medical field. And judging from the methods that were used here, I would say this person is the sort to remain outwardly calm under pressure– likely someone who is very organized and meticulous, who likes to make a detailed plan and follow it."

Collins nodded her agreement as she looked around the room. "And probably is also in very good physical condition. However it was done, it must have required a great deal of strength to turn that head around." She turned to Jack. "I’ll need to talk to Dr. Lovett a bit longer. Do you need to see anything else in the flat?"

Jack glanced at Dan. "If someone could direct me to the boy’s bedroom, I’d like to have a look. And then I’ll be wanting to speak with the neighbors and any other witnesses we might already have."