Bones of the Demon King

Chapter 20

Detective Jerry Gonzales was exhausted. He had finished his shift at work and the only thing he wanted now was a beer or two. He sat on his sofa and splayed his arms out across the back of his worn out sofa. His legs were propped up on a second-hand coffee table that had seen better years and was now covered in Sports Illustrated magazines.

Jerry closed his eyes and thought of better times. He imagined a woman with long brown hair smiling at him, hugging him, and kissing him. His missed her. His heart ached and he wanted to scream when he thought of her. He wished things had been different. He wished he had listened to her and stayed with her that night but he had to go back to work so he had left her. He could still remember her looking into his eyes, "Please...stay here. It's scary being here all alone at night."

At the time, Jerry thought that she was joking. Instead he had laughed, gave her a peck on the cheek and told her to call him if she needed him. She had been wearing a white nightgown with giant pink hearts on it. She had also been wearing his grandmother's engagement ring which funnily enough matched her nightgown. It was white-gold with a diamond and two sapphires. Neither of them had any family left so they had decided to build a life together. Jerry Gonzales was a private person so he hadn't bothered to tell anyone about his engagement.

The sound of a cat's meow interrupted Jerry's memories. "Hey Scar, let's get you some food."

Jerry got up and headed to the kitchen. A couple of nights ago, he had found himself in an alleyway searching for a witness that happened to be a homeless man, when he came across a large cat that had been mauled by a dog. It was bleeding profusely and would've died if he hadn't found it. He had placed a plastic bag on the passenger side seat so that the material wouldn't get stained. He then placed the injured cat on top of the bag. He took the cat to a vet that was open late. She had stitched the cat up but the bag with the blood that the cat had bled on remained in his car. Later, when Jerry had arrived home, he had thought of an idea to scare Eva Lewis. He took the blood from the plastic bag and bottled it up into a small vial to use another day.

The cat seemed to be limping around a little. He still had bandages on him. Jerry had named him Scar because of all the scars the cat would probably have once the bandages were off. Jerry gave his new cat a can of food and walked back to his living room.

He looked at the picture of him and the dark haired woman. Nobody had known he and she were a couple. He didn't tell anyone after he had found out about her death because he didn't want to be removed from the case. He wanted to find Tiffany's murderer. Now he was kicked off of the case and he would never be the one to nab the Demon King.

"Damned Demon King," Jerry scoffed. He hated the name. If Eva Lewis had called him anything else, it probably wouldn't have bothered him. He felt like Eva had placed the killer on some kind of pedestal and now there were online forums and even letters to the newspaper from people that thought the Demon King was cool.

Jerry muttered, "Let's see them still call themselves his disciples after he kills someone they love."

He thought back to when he had found Tiffany's body. It had been less than twenty-four hours since he had last seen her. A report had come in from a family that had gone out fishing for the weekend. When they returned home, they found the body of a woman on their bed. She was wearing her nightgown and a small crown of white flowers. Her face had been skinned so nobody knew who the victim was.

The homeowners had called the cops and the police came out to investigate. He had also been called out. As soon as he had stepped onto the scene, it was like someone had punched him in the gut. Disbelief and denial flooded his being as he gazed at the victim wearing a blood soaked nightgown. It should have been white but it was now a brownish color from the dried up blood. The hearts were no longer a cute pink. Instead they too were a dirty brown. Even after seeing the nightgown, Jerry could still remembered thinking, "There's no way. It can't be. It's just a coincidence."

It wasn't until he saw the white-gold ring with the diamond and two sapphires that he accepted who he was looking at. He was overcome with grief and his knees buckled beneath him. His partner, David Wilson, was right by his side and helping to get him back up. Jerry never told David about his relationship with Tiffany Sanchez.

David had to help Jerry out of the crime scene, "Man, get some air Gonzales. You look like you just saw a ghost."

After that day, things changed. Jerry became hell bent on finding the Demon King, David also gave him a hard time for not being able to handle a gory crime scene, and the job he used to love...he now hated.

He had no family. He lost Tiffany. His job was crap. He was all alone.

Gonzales felt Scar sit on his lap. The only thing he had left was this damn cat. As he sat on the sofa, he once again closed his eyes and leaned his head back. He wasn't sure what he would do next, but he had nothing left to lose so the consequences didn't matter.

~AT THE LUDWIG POLICE STATION~

"Hey Sally," her partner, Agent Donald Ferguson, called her name trying to get her attention.

"What's going on?" she asked.

"So I followed a hunch and decided to look into any missing women that were associated with Tom McDaniels in any way," he started pulling out a file and handed it to Agent Sally Roux.

"Did you find anything?" she asked before reading what he handed to her.

He nodded, "I found a Nessa Torres. She's been missing for about two years. I was going to run DNA off the blood but that takes too long. So we're going to try and compare dental records in the meantime."

Sally was impressed. "Great work. Let me know what you find."

As she walked away from her partner, she smiled. This was why she got into law enforcement. Because of her, a killer was being stopped. As far as she was concerned, there weren't going to be any more victims from the Demon King.

~MEANWHILE~

Eva woke to the crackling sound of fire. Her head was unsteady as she tried to focus her eyes to what was around her. Everything looked like a giant blur. She tried moving her arms and legs but couldn't. They were bound to an old wooden chair. Eva pulled on the ropes that held her in place. She started to panic and began coughing as she smelled smoke.