LITMIR.BIZ

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called Gershwin and gave him directions to the scene. It took me fifteen minutes to arrive beside a lock separating a pair of drainage canals a few miles west of Miramar, the landscape flat and thick with swamp grass and mangrove, the sound of birds and insects as thick in the air as the scent of water.

      I saw a taped-off section along a rise between the road and the canal. The crew supervisor was Deb Clayton, a pixyish woman in her mid thirties whose button nose, large bright eyes and close-cropped sandy hair would make her a perfect Peter Pan on Broadway. But instead of Pan’s tight green uniform Clayton wore a white tropical shirt, baggy brown cargo pants and red sneakers. She flanked a forensics unit step van, labeling evidence bags. One held a fishing bobber. Gershwin pulled up in a motor-pool cruiser.

      “Who found him?” I asked Deb.

      She walked us to the edge of the canal, green and still. “Two guys in a boat. The victim was only visible from the water.”

      “Any eyes nearby?”

      She nodded to the east. “The nearest house is back on Highway 27. All the perp had to do was pull off the road and drag the victim over the rise.”

      I checked the sightline from the road. All you saw was wild grass. I turned to Gershwin. “The guy was probably supposed to die from exposure.”

      Gershwin shook his head. “Not if the perp knows the area. This lock is where the Big Miami Canal intersects the South New River Canal. Heavily fished, more traffic on the canals than on the road. He was on display.”

      “You’re sure?”

      “At daybreak this becomes a parade of fishing boats.”

      I crouched beside the shallow water, seeing a dark garfish hunting the shoreline for minnows. It seemed we’d just gotten a glimpse into our quarry’s mind.

      “He incapacitates his victims and assaults them, Zigs. But maybe our boy doesn’t need to kill.”

      “Didn’t you tell me these freaks never ramp down,” Gershwin said, looking into the flat expanse of sawgrass. “Only up?”

      Debro was lazily reconnoitering bars and bistros in the near-Miami area, gauging escape routes. He’d visited most of the places, studying the seating, the lighting. The crowd. It used to anger him, the skinny little twinks finger-flicking hair from their glistening eyes as they minced from one clique to another. They’d look at him once and ignore him.

      He was invisible then, too. This way was better.

      Debro turned toward downtown. He’d finished his morning’s work – up before dawn, take the package to the Glades, dump it.

       Buh-byee, Brianna. Did the boats dock enough for you, bitch?

      He drove carefully, signaling turns, stopping fully at signs, avoiding speeding through yellow lights. If he drove poorly, his invisibility would falter. But with proper care, he could remain invisible for ever.

      He saw a street sign. The comic-book shop was five blocks away, too close to let the opportunity pass. He tossed his knit cap to the seat beside him and turned the corner, pulling to the curb a dozen feet from the window glowing with neon signs. He reached for the outsize sunglasses in the glove box, but paused. He had his own mask, he realized. Right here in his hands.

      Even better, he could flash the sign.

      Debro pulled the cap low and strode to the store. He paused beside the building, pinched his thumbs and forefingers together before lifting his elbows skyward. The mask in place, he stepped to the window and leered inside, seeing a shape behind the counter. He pushed his groin against the window, his belt buckle clicking against the glass. If the clerk wasn’t looking before, he was now.

      He turned and walked calmly back to his vehicle and climbed inside, pulling to the curb three blocks away. He pulled off his cap, set it on the dashboard, and once again made the mask with his hands.

      Do you see us now?

       9

      The new victim’s room flanked Dale Kemp’s room and we peeked in on Kemp. He had fallen back into himself after the delirium, his face seeming a somber mask waiting only the closing of the casket lid.

      We stepped to the next room and found Morningstar and, to my surprise, Roy McDermott, who offered a sheepish grin. “I couldn’t help myself, Carson. After your tutorial in the case, I got interested. I’ve got some free time, since it ain’t like I’m J. Edgar, right?”

      Roy was referring to J. Edgar Hoover’s involvement in every aspect of the FBI, micro-managing, they call it now. Roy was hands-off, hiring the best people and trusting them to get the goods on the bad guys. “I don’t really care what y’all do,” Roy had once told me. “I just want to see files stamped Case Closed.”

      My eyes moved to the patient on the bed, victim two. Light brown hair with a buzz cut. Closed eyes. Had I not known the vic was male, I would have thought him female, the features small and delicate. His hands lay outside the sheet and I saw digits smudged with fingerprint ink. The fingernails showed traces of red polish. I lifted the edge of the sheet, again the fading abrasions of ligatures on wrists and ankles.

      “Got a hit on prints from a bust last year, Carson,” Roy said. “No biggie, caught at a traffic stop with a half-doob in the ashtray. Name’s Brian Caswell, works under the name Brianna Cass. He was reported missing eleven days ago.”

      “Works as what?”

      “Female impersonator, drag queen. Day job is at a nail salon.”

      “How’d you find this out?”

      “Checked with Missings at MDPD. I also called to see if anything new had come up, but nothing.”

      “You talked to Rod Figueroa?”

      Roy nodded. “Nice guy, eager to please. He asked if we could handle it as a joint case with the FCLE in full lead. Basically it means we copy him on reports.”

      I shook my head in disbelief. If Figueroa had any more faces to spin he’d need gimbals in his neck. But at least it was cooperation. I studied Caswell’s motionless face. He would have been good at the cross-dressing thing, I figured, given the bone structure and lips so full I suspected collagen enhancement.

      “Age?”

      “Twenty-seven.”

      “Injuries the same as Kemp?”

      Roy’s eyes went to Morningstar, so mine followed.

      “Semen found orally and anally. Lots of tearing, like the attacks were violent and repeated.”

      Eleven days allowed a lot of time for attacks. “Under the influence of the datura, you think?”

      “It makes sense, Carson. After feeling ill, the victim starts hallucinating violently, then crashes into semi-consciousness, unable to fend off attacks or even comprehend them. If the toxins are administered on a regular basis …”

      “The mind could be permanently wounded.”

      “So even when a vic recovers,” Gershwin said, “we’re screwed?”

      Morningstar nodded. “Ask who he saw raping him and the answer might be a purple dragon.” She looked at me. “You saw the effect on Dale Kemp.”

      “It’s insane,” I said. “And yet totally rational and brilliant. After the initial capture and restraint, the perp has no need to keep victims bound. He drugs them so heavily that they’re trapped inside themselves. When he tires of them, he simply trades them for fresh meat. Even if they recover, they’ll never ID him.”

      I paused as a nurse entered the room, a guy in his mid twenties, intelligent green eyes, chestnut hair just long enough to cover his ears. He had a runner’s carriage,

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