5 Blondes

5 Blondes

By

Brian Montgomery

Copyright 2005

Brian Montgomery

Published by Brian Montgomery at Smashwords

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Chapter One

#3.5 – Shelly Magnus

I

Shelly Magnus rolled her window down and turned the radio up until it was unpleasantly loud. She forced herself to sing along with the warbling voice of whoever it was who was attempting to sing this remake of Fools Rush In. She wasn’t even sure whether the singer was a man or a woman, the voice was that bad. She sang along regardless because she knew that if she didn’t, she would surely fall asleep at the wheel. The fog was beginning to roll in, a bit early tonight.

It was one of those rare days for Shelly. She had been up most of the night before, mesmerized by a Humphrey Bogart movie that she’d never seen before. The movie had started fifteen minutes before she latched onto it, so she didn’t even know the name of it. The plot grabbed her immediately and she was done for. She knew that she had to be at work for a full day, if not a day and a half, the following day and that she had to get her morning jog in even earlier than usual. The movie was too good to turn off though. She set her alarm for 5:30 AM, just six hours away. Not good news, especially since she had no idea how much of the movie remained.

Shelly was comfortable with the fact that she would be frantic all day, trying to squeeze in her exercise and work and hope to still be beautiful by the end of the day. In her own way, she relished these times. The long stressful shoot, people scurrying about hoping to get their work done before they lost the sunlight, the attention. Perhaps she would have given that extra bit of attention herself had she known that this would be her last day on the job.

II

Hello Cap, what now? Mick Dire said into the phone without even the faintest trace of sleep in his voice.

How’d you know it was me, Mick? Captain Dickinson said.

It’s almost four in the morning, who else would call me at this time? Mick said.

You don’t sound like you’ve been sleeping though. Are you doing that up all night thing again, Mick? Captain Dickinson asked.

Cap, what’s up? Where’s the body? Mick asked.

Mick swung his legs out from under his sweat soaked sheet and planted his bare feet onto the cold hardwood floor in his dark bedroom. He cradled the phone between his right shoulder and his ear and reached for his neatly folded jeans that lay across the wicker chair beside his bed.

This is number three, which makes it official, Mick. We both knew it would come to this, just not so quickly. This back to back stuff is not the norm, Dickinson said.

Young blonde between twenty-five and thirty, pretty, California cute, raped, tied to a chair, used condoms, two sets of footprints, random brown pubic and head hairs, throat slashed, other body parts slashed, Mick said, matter of factly.

Brunette this time, Ace. I’m sure we’ll find the hairs and fingerprints when the full investigation is done, Dickinson said.

Where is she? McGrew and the team en route or already there? Mick asked as he slid efficiently into his pants.

2717 Tracy Avenue. Nice place for a single young lady. The McGrew Crew are on their way, you ought to get there at about the same time, Dickinson said.

You coming too? Mick asked.

Nope. Seen one, seen ‘em all. This one’s bloody, Mick, Dickinson said.

I would expect so, Cap. Catch you at the office later, Mick said.

I’ll be there, he said.

Detective Dire lingered on the edge of his unkempt bed, staring off into the darkness. He thought about how most cops at this moment would have a good long smoke. He’d never adopted the habit, so he just sat in the darkness with his thoughts.

III

Mick sat in his car, looking out at the yellow police tape barrier around the home that now housed a mutilated corpse. The streetlights were still on and fog slowly rolled down Tracy Avenue. He remembered how early the fog had rolled in last night. He wondered if anyone else had noticed how early it had come. The sun was an hour from rising and the moon lit the fog and made a luminous ominous scene. Appropriate for the occasion.

The forensic team, headed by Greg McGrew and better known as the McGrew Crew, pulled up to the house and parked behind Mick. The three forensic experts stepped out of the van and began pulling on their rubber gloves and hairnets. They all had digital cameras around their necks and carried black bags like doctors. Two of the men carried fluorescent tube black lights for illuminating body fluids. McGrew himself approached Mick’s vintage ‘67 Camaro and rapped on the window.

Hey Dire, ready for the mess? McGrew asked.

Mick slowly opened the door and stepped out into the fog. He locked his car and took a pair of gloves from McGrew.

I’m never ready for this crap. How do you get ready for this? Mick said.

I’m always ready, McGrew replied.

That’s because you enjoy this shit, Mick said.

Well, you asked me how do I get ready for this, McGrew said.

"It was rhetorical. I meant how do humans get ready for this. That excludes you," Mick said.

Humans shouldn’t see this kinda thing, Mick. You can’t see this stuff and stay human, McGrew said.

The two men walked toward the cordoned off house with the rest of the crew in tow. The attending officers moved aside and allowed their entrance. As they entered the house, they all put on plastic shoe covers. One of the crew set up his camera on a tripod and began snapping photos. Mick Dire and Greg McGrew carefully maneuvered through the blood splatters on the floor and stood at the entranceway between the dining room and the living room. McGrew began pointing at sections of particularly bloody spots on the floor and walls. One of the crew snapped pictures every time he pointed. Shelly Magnus’ body lay butchered on the floor halfway beneath her own dining room table.

So, the boys chose a brunette this time and didn’t rape her too. That’s off pattern. Still left their shoeprints. Same two sets of running shoes. Messy for calculating, cold blooded killers, McGrew said.

"Serial killers. This is number three and that makes them official serial killers. I don’t believe they’re messy at all. They planned this one too, just as carefully, but something just didn’t go their way this time is all. She’s fully dressed, not even an attempted rape. Why not rape her too? Look at the slashes, Mac. Slashed everywhere. Look at how badly slashed her head is. She’s just about scalped. They let her run and bleed everywhere too. She wasn’t tied to a chair. She was killed in anger. Something was lopped off too. See that lump over there by the doorway? What the hell?" Detective Dire said.

That’s a tongue, pal. I’ll be positive when we’re able to walk closer but I’d bet my badge that’s her tongue, McGrew said, then pointed toward Shelly’s discarded tongue. Cameras flashed in the direction of the kitchen door.

Of course, they didn’t tie her up and tape her mouth closed this time but they didn’t want her screaming her head off while they cut her up. She fits their profile perfectly. Almost perfectly. Single white female, very attractive, fairly well to do, lives alone, I’m sure that she is active in the dating scene like the others, Mick said. He stared at the body for a long time without blinking. McGrew stared at Mick, watching the wheels turn.

Get your guys to hurry with the preliminary stuff. I think I know why she wasn’t raped and why she was slashed all to hell. I need to go to her bathroom down the hall and I don’t want to step on any evidence and screw anything up, Mick said finally.

I love to watch that little machine of yours work. What’s the theory, Mick? McGrew asked.

They expected her to be blonde. I think that she is a blonde who recently dyed her hair brunette and threw them off when they finally came to do her. Either that or she’s a brunette who went blonde for a while, during the time our boys came across her, then she went back to brunette by the time they decided to do her. In either case, she was a blonde when they first began to plot this thing. When they got here, she was brunette and that pissed them off, which is why they didn’t rape her and why they cut her up so badly. She changed the game and they didn’t get to play. There’s a bottle of dye in her bathroom somewhere or in the trashcans out back. We need to check her dirty clothes hamper for a towel with dye. We need to check her checkbook for a check written to a beauty shop too. Maybe she didn’t do her own dye job, Mick said. He continued to stare at Shelly’s lifeless body.

I love this guy. I never would have went that way but I can see your point. Could be so, McGrew said.

It is so, I can…feel it. There are too many similarities in these girls for it not to be so. There’s still a missing piece to their puzzle though. Something obvious that we’re not getting, Mick said.

Still a missing piece to these guys? There’s a lot of missing pieces to these maniacs, McGrew said.

Not a missing piece to them, I’ve got them pieced. There’s a missing piece to the girls’ puzzle. There’s something that unifies them and I can’t…can’t quite…see it, Mick said.

"What do you mean, see it?" McGrew asked.

"Sometimes I can…see what’s what," Mick said.

You mean like, you’re psychic? McGrew asked.

No bullshit like that. It’s more like my mind opens the book on a case and I can, I don’t know…see the picture. These three girls are all together in the picture but there’s a part of it that is right in front of me and I can’t quite see it, he said, then finally looked away from the body.

You are the most fascinating cop I’ve ever met, Dire. You really ought to take that lieutenant shield. Cap could be working for you in a couple of years, McGrew said.

Why would I want to do that? I wouldn’t get to do all the fun stuff like this anymore. Before dawn murders, blood and gore, beautiful young dead people, mindless murderers stalking the city-

Okay, Mick, McGrew said.

She hasn’t been dead too long, three or four hours I’d say. The blood is still runny in the bigger pools. How did we come upon this so soon? Who called it in and why? Mick asked.

Cap says the neighbors heard banging and what sounded like furniture moving. The woman next door said that she saw the Magnus woman come home around ten o’clock. She came over to see if everything was okay after hearing the banging noise, looked through the side window after no one answered the door, saw the body and called it in, McGrew said.

Banging but no screaming because of the tongue. Our boys were probably still here when the neighbor looked in. I need to talk to her after we do what we do, Mick said.

The McGrew Crew laid a plastic tarp over the body and the forensic team began their investigation of the room in earnest. They took dozens of photos of the blood-splattered walls and floor, Shelly Magnus’ defaced body and of course, her abandoned tongue. Mick Dire went directly to the master bathroom while the crew did their job.

Chapter Two

Marthangelica

I

Mick, I’ve got a…a tip for you. I have a woman who knows something about your case that will be helpful, Captain Dickinson said.

"How do you know that she will be helpful?" Mick asked, groggily.

"You were asleep weren’t you? I never catch you asleep. I take that back, I catch you sleeping the day after an investigation. You’re always awake when I call you to tell you about a murder, no matter what time. Why is that, Mick? Does that make you a suspect? I’m gonna have to watch you now," Cap said.

"Yeah, it’s me, Cap. So, why did you say that she will be helpful instead of saying that she could be helpful? Are we talking witness? It’s not the neighbor, Mrs. LaRue, is it? I talked to her. She doesn’t know anything. She didn’t see anything," Mick said.

Just write the number down and go talk to the woman, Mick. Got a pen? Cap asked.

No, just a good head for names and numbers, go ahead, Mick said.

Marthangelica Grande, 21774 South Rose Avenue. Head out as soon as possible, then come in so that we can throw some ideas around. I want to piece some of the forensic stuff together with your ideas and whatever Ms. Grande gives you, Cap said.

Now, tell me what’s really going on with this lead, Cap, Mick said.

We go beyond the boss and employee thing, Mick. That’s a good thing ninety-nine percent of the time, but then there are times like this when I need you to say, ‘Yes, sir Cap, I’ll get right on it.’ Why doesn’t that ever happen, Mick? Why can’t you, from time to time, just do what you’re told? Cap asked.

Questioning things is why you want me around, Cap. It’s what I do, he said.

"Detective Dire, I have an issue that needs to be resolved concerning a serial killing. There’s a woman with information that might be helpful to our investigation. Can you go and get the info from her or should I send someone else?" Cap asked.

I got it, I’m gone, Mick said, and then hung up the phone.

Cap, you’re holding out on me. Something’s not right with this. You know more than you’re saying, Mick said aloud in the empty room. He got up and trudged off to the shower.

II

Detective Dire, LAPD Homicide, ma’am. Captain Dickinson said that you called regarding information that-

I don’t mean to be rude, but can you hand me your badge so that I can see it up close? The woman behind the door asked.

Mick handed the badge to her through the four-inch gap between the door and the frame. There was an unusually heavy chain keeping the distance at four inches. He peered through the gap and she looked directly into his piercing green eyes. She carefully studied the slice of face that she could manage to see in her doorway. The man was handsome and serious.

She had the badge less than two seconds before she quickly opened the door and ushered Mick into her home. He scanned the room and what he could of the adjoining rooms in what would have been a glance to the average person. He knew volumes about this woman already and he had an uneasy feeling about who she was and what she was.

"I’m sorry about the badge thing but you can’t be too careful these days. I guess there never were days when you could be too careful, were there?" She asked, then handed him his badge. She let her fingertips touch and linger momentarily on his wrist in doing so. He pulled away and brushed the spot on his right wrist with his left hand. He smiled at her in a vain attempt to persuade her that he wasn’t wiping her prints from his skin.

So, Miss Grande, my captain said that you might have some useful information about a case that we are currently working on, Mick said.

Blondes bound to chairs, hand and foot, deep gashes all over their bodies, throats cut, three guys, that kind of thing. Please sit down, Detective Dire, she said.

Mick sat down. He stared intently into the woman’s eyes. He gnashed his teeth imperceptibly but hard and narrowed his glare to a pinpoint.

Is there something that I should know about you…Miss Grande? You seem to have a bit too much information. The press isn’t onto this yet, so how could you know what you seem to know? He asked.

Please don’t stare at me that way, detective. It makes me extremely nervous when someone stares at me, she said.

Forgive me ma’am, but you kinda threw out a big chunk of stuff that you have no right to know, he said.

I am several years older than you, I believe, but the ma’am name is making me feel much older. Please call me Marthangelica. Ms. Grande, if you feel like you must be ultra professional, she said.

Forgive me again, Ms. Grande. Can you tell me how you came about this…knowledge of the murders? Mick asked.

He purposely looked around the room to avoid direct eye contact with this woman. His heart was beating like a jackhammer in his chest. A little voice was telling him to grab this woman and shake the information out of her, cuff her, call forensics to comb the hell out of this house, throw her in the back of his car, drive her to the station with sirens blaring, hell-bent for leather. Looking around the room was helping to quench that voice.

I could just blurt out whatever answers you want but you’d…you wouldn’t take them the right way. You wouldn’t believe me. God, you are amazing. Amazing. I’ve never met anyone like you before in my entire life, she said. She smiled a tremendously warm smile at him that beamed awe and appreciation.

Mick’s eyes skittered about the room. He saw her unnerving smile and found that he couldn’t look at her face. She now had him on the defensive and he despised himself whenever he encountered someone who could disarm him and have the upper hand. He was, after all, Detective Mick Dire, the finest detective on the Los Angeles Police Department’s Homicide Division roster. A fact that he rarely used to give himself self-satisfaction. He used that fact now to regain his composure.

Ms. Grande, I’d like to believe whatever you have to tell me about this case. How do you know what happened to these women? Mick asked.

I promise to tell you every infinitesimal detail that I can about the murders in time, detective. First, I have to know you. I just said that you were the most amazing person that I’ve ever encountered and you completely ignored that. Why did you ignore that? She asked.

"First of all, I don’t particularly like compliments, if that’s what that was. Secondly, who or what I am has nothing to do with the information that I need from you. And lastly, I don’t know what that means, I’m amazing. I have a job to do. You are the job right now," he said.

I’m getting absolutely nothing from you. You are completely closed. I have no idea who you are. You are amazing, she said, still smiling.

"You do understand that I’m here to get something from you? Something very important. I’m not here to give you anything, Ms. Grande. I’d like to get what I came for and I’d like to get it very soon," he said.

I promise that I’ll give you everything that I can. I need to…I need for you to let your guard down for a minute first. Okay? She asked.

"I’m really not here for small talk or conversation. You don’t need to know me. I don’t think you know how serious this matter is," he said. He threw the narrow stare at her again.

Are you the lead detective on this case? Of course you are, I shouldn’t have asked that. Tell me about me. What do you know about me? It’s obvious that Cap didn’t tell you anything about me. Tell me what you know about me from the ten minutes that you’ve been here, she said.

I can tell that you like to play games, beat around the bush. I can tell that you’re a tease who has no idea how vital this information is, he said.

"Please don’t throw your anger at me. I really do have things to tell you and I swear that I will tell you all that I know. I just have to know who I’m