It had seemed like every other case at first. It could have been the case that would make my career. A local reporter found murdered in her apartment. No notes of any kind.
No, the notes had begun after the third victim, as had the bloodiness of it all. The killer had carved out the poor woman's eyes and left them in a gift box with a poem.
Her dead eyes stared at me,
Those eyes just like your own.
You may not know me,
But I had to make this known.
Your gaze has held me captive
In ways your handcuffs cannot.
And as long as you live,
I won't mind being caught,
If it means meeting you.
But I am just a common man,
Who doesn't have a clue
How to woo
A woman like you.
The note had been a game changer. Being taken seriously in the world of men was hard enough without criminals writing long lines of romantic goo and leaving them at crime scenes.
As if the others in the department weren't already talking about me, the killer made the poems a part of his pattern. He moved on from hasty typing to writings on the wall, joining the serial killer cliché by using blood as his ink.
"Hey, detective D! A call just came in. Your guy has dropped another victim." One of the newest recruits popped his head into my office.
"What? Already? We had a victim just two days ago! This is completely out of his MO!" I gasped, leaping to my feet.
"Well, the writing on the wall says otherwise. The press is having a field day with this one already." He ducked out, hurrying away.
It didn't take me long to find out why. A fifteen-minute drive later, I stood at the crime-scene, staring at the wall in horror.
A woman in a man's world,
She is the detective few can be.
When I saw her on the news
She stole my heart from me.
I am a man of passion,
A killer with a story to tell.
She became my new obsession
The verynucleus of my cell.
So tell her this for me
Tell her I need her more.
If she would come join me
I will end all this blood and gore.
Convince her for me, friends,
Convince her we are meant to be.
She can stop the many deaths
If she loves the killer in me.
I averted my eyes and asked one of the men from forensics. "Where is the victim's body?"
"The M.E. is with her. Turns out she might live. The perp seemed to have been careless." The man nodded, putting on his gloves.
I nodded, walking over to the M.E. in silence.
"... knew what he was doing. The cut was deep enough to put her down, but shallow enough to sustain her till help arrived. He must have been the one to call the police."I overheard the examiner say, and I knew we made a breakthrough at last.
"Detective! There is a note under the victim!" The examiner called out suddenly, jarring me from my thoughts.
I ran to take it, and opened it with shaky hands.
"Detective,
This is my gift to you this time, instead of eyes and hairlocks. Someone told me that women don't like things like that, so I decided to give you the best gift for you. Life.
This woman lives, because you want her to live, and I want to give you whatever you want. I know you want to arrest me, but tell me this. Why arrest a killer who promises not to kill?
All I want in return is you. Not in your uniform, but in your best dress, on a date.
Everyone deserves love, right?
Yours.
I stared at the paper in dread, knowing what I had to do,knowing I just lost my job. My boss would have to fire me, else the media whiplash will destroy us.
It had seemed like every other case at first.
How blind I had been.
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365 DAYS 365 TALES
Random"Every day has its own story" Yes, every day of the year 2016 is going to have a story. We will bring smile on your lips, We will bring tears in your eyes, We will make you sequel in joy, We will make you mourn and cry. You will travel to the...
