Paint the town red

Chapter XXIX

Lately, I've been having trouble sleeping - stress, nerves, and in general, what was happening to me was more like a nightmare, so what's there to be surprised about? And now I woke up, it's not even a sunrise now, and stared at the ceiling again. I'll soon know the location of all the corners of the foam tiles by heart, every joint between them, every bend in a barely distinguishable pattern. I'm tired of this stupid state of helplessness and a kind of despair. Sometimes it seems to me that if it weren't for Max and Yuki, I would've given up my idea of becoming an outstanding detective a long time ago and would've gone to some remote place where there are no people, but only silence, tranquility and serenity.

But life is such that I live in Monaco, I work for the police, and I'm stuck here with an unsolved serial killer case hanging on me like a rock on a drowned man's feet. Although, I put it wrong here: I live in Monaco, worked in the police, and now nothing keeps me here. Well, except for the "accessory" on my leg. Although I'm wrong here, too: I wouldn't be able to leave here because of Max. I've become too attached to him during this time, I need him too much, I've fallen in love with him too much to leave him because of my desire to be somewhere in a secluded area.

It was too early to write him a good morning text, so I lay in bed for a while, and then decided to do something in my temporary confinement. I got out of bed and took a quick shower, then, trying not to make any noise, went to the kitchen. Yuki is definitely still asleep, so I decided to make myself a couple of sandwiches and a coffee, but not from the coffee machine, because it makes too much noise.

I haven't done anything in the kitchen myself for a long time, because my neighbor forbade me to touch kitchen utensils and cooked everything himself. "If you try to cook something, you'll burn this place down to ashes, and I need practice, so don't get in here," he once told me, and since then the kitchen has been his territory. But this morning is an exception.

After a while, returning to the room with a cup of coffee and a couple of sandwiches, I sat down at my desk and turned on my laptop. I opened the files on the previous three murders on it, which I saved last time. I wanted to draw parallels with where the murders took place and do some "zoning". To make it easier for me to do this, I took out an old map of Monaco from my desktop. Yeap, Lewis was right - sometimes paper maps are much more useful than digital ones.

I opened the report from the first crime scene and carefully read the description of the location, then marked it on the map. Then I did the same with the Oscar, Carlos and George case. I've saved only the very first reports on three cases, which we haven't yet made any changes to, but I've noted the address from the place where George's body was found from memory. The case was completely new, so I definitely wouldn't have confused the last address with anything.

Having placed the dots with a marker, I connected them to get an approximate area where it's worth looking for a criminal or where he can strike another blow. I looked at the resulting area and was a little surprised because my house is included in this zone, even more so - my house was almost in the center of the selected area.

I bit the cap off the marker I was using to draw on the map and leaned back in my chair. Well, what does it turn out to be? Does the killer live somewhere very close to me? But all four victims' homes are outside this area, so he wasn't targeting their homes.

For the sake of interest, I looked at where my other friends live and how their addresses relate to the zone I marked. I took my phone and found in the phone book the addresses of those with whom I have been communicating the most lately. Sometimes I'm even glad of my habit of writing down not only phone numbers, but also addresses - you never know when it might come in handy.

I took a marker of a different color and began to mark on the map first Max's house, then the house of Liam, Logan, Esteban, Frederick and Mick. I signed each point with the name of the person who lives there, so that it'd be easier for me to navigate after. Frederick, Logan, Mick and Esteban live in different parts of the city, but Liam and Max live practically on the borders of the zone I have designated.