Birdeater

Chapter 2

They had to dig the latest victim out. Pieces of rock were still embedded in her skin when they finally laid her body out. She was as white as paste. The mark around her throat sported especially livid bruising.

Hugh wiped the corners of his mouth and stepped over the yellow caution tape.

"Anything?" He asked, shoving his hands into his pockets and digging for his notepad.

Jackson pursed his lips.

"Maybe something." He said. "They found a bit of wire."

"Wire?" Hugh furrowed his brow.

"Yeah. They're going to send it down to Tusk."

"I thought Tusk did all of his work in Prints?"

"I'm just passing along what they told me."

Hugh nodded. "Anything else?"

"Nothing. We got lucky with the wire. It's not even an inch long but it just snapped off in her neck. He was angry this time."

"Mm. He enjoyed himself before."

"This was about something else."

"Goddammit." Hugh tapped his pen on the spirals of his notebook. "Anything else new? Sexual assault?"

"Nope."

"It's that goddamn nickname."

"Probably. His victims were more spaced out before." Jackson agreed.

"Now we have two in under 72 hours."

"With that, we should be able to get something."

"I fucking hope so." Hugh finally slid his pen back into his notepad. He shoved the whole thing down into his pocket without writing a single thing. "How long until the coroner gets here?"

"Already here. Just waiting on us to have one final look. They've got their pictures and everything."

The stray markers left on the scene were evidence of that. The photographer was still packing up his bag.

The media was already starting to press in against the visible barriers that had been set up.

"All right." Hugh said. "Let's go see what they missed."

:::

A knock on the door almost sent Blair crashing to the floor.

It startled him enough that he fell off the side of his bed while reaching for his glasses. He groped the edge of the side table and finally found them.

He slipped them up the bridge of his nose. Another knock came.

His mind was reeling. He never had packages delivered to his house. He had a PO box at the post office in town for that reason. No one ever came to see him. He had no friend, no family who were even close.

It could be the police.

In fact, yes. The more he thought about it, that made the most sense. They were questioning everyone in the area and they had come to talk to him about the Birdeater. 'Don't call him that, goddammit, no one knows what you're talking about and it just makes you look suspicious!'

His hands were trembling as he ran from his bedroom and bolted towards the front door. He wasn't even wearing a shirt; just his ragged bed pants. They were slung low around his hips because the elastic in the waistband was totally gone.

Blair grabbed the doorknob and peered through the little hole.

No one.

Shit.