Killer Me

Chapter Three - Tick, Tock

Detective Jonathan Murphy slammed the phone down and pinched the bridge of his nose, a habit he'd fallen to far too much lately. Everyone across the western half of North America seemed to think they knew something about the latest murders, and he was tired of getting frantic calls from overenthusiastic citizens. Some guy had just claimed to be the vessel of God, speaking for the Lord and Savior, and he'd told Murphy that the murders were a cleansing. This particular serial killer was the right hand of God and, therefore, connected to the kooky caller.

Murphy had thanked him for his information and hung up, figuring that a call trace would lead back to a pay phone that still functioned somewhere down in the bowels of the homeless district. Even dusting it for prints would be useless, dredging up thousands of known miscreants and leading them nowhere.

"When was the last time you ate?" He looked up at his partner, who shook a McDonald's bag in his face, and Murphy could smell the hash brown inside. His stomach turned against him, growling and clawing to get to the delicious and incredibly unhealthy breakfast. Colton Hughes smiled at him and placed the bag on his desk. "And I'm betting you forgot to eat dinner last night, too. I can see your ribs from over here, man," he teased as he sat at his desk with his own bag.

Murphy grunted, clearly not amused as he pulled out the warm food and bit off a mouthful of delicious, greasy, potato. "I didn't forget. I got home and found nothing in the freezer. I had a rotten head of lettuce, some ketchup, and a few beers in the fridge. The bread in the cupboard had a big green mound on it. So I had a beer and went to bed."

Hughes shook his head. "Man, you have got to go shopping. I know it's been hard since Laura left, but you can't just give up. If you waste away, they'll stick me with some probie and I'll have to train the pimply little bastard. And Rosa is going to kill me if I keep feeding you. She's already giving me hell about going back to work now that the kids are back in school. You'd think we were about to be standing in line at the soup kitchen."

Honestly, Murphy wanted to be sympathetic, but at least Hughes had a family. His own wife had packed her bags, mailed the divorce papers, and sold the house out from underneath him. She was simply tired of never seeing her husband and just tired of trying. "I appreciate the breakfast, bud, but that doesn't mean I have to sit here and take your lectures." As an afterthought, he added, "Maybe you should take the kids to a food pantry and get the goods. Then, Lisa wouldn't be tripping so hard on you." He could tell Hughes didn't like that; his scowl was menacing, and if he'd been a criminal, he would have been pretty intimidated.

The phone rang, and with his mouth full, he said, "I've been answering this phone for two days, and the calls get crazier and crazier. It's your turn."

Hughes groaned but leaned over to answer while Murphy sat back to digest and think about what their next move should be. They hadn't released the details to the media about the latest murder, and, in fact, still hadn't given them everything about the first two. The new one – a young woman discovered just outside the homeless district – had been left dead in the middle of the sidewalk for anyone to step over; her throat slit like the others, and a small slip of paper in a tiny bag like dealers used for drugs was in her mouth.

Murphy shuffled the papers on his desk until he had the photocopy of all three slips in front of him. The man was telling a story, and Murphy had a sick feeling he knew where this was going. And even if he was wrong, he at least knew the guy would keep killing until the story was complete. Of course they had a serial killer on their hands; they had known that from Day One.

In the beginning...

That's what the first slip of paper had said. And the second wasn't much better.