A POUND OF FLESH

What's In A Name

WHAT'S IN A NAME

27

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He does not know her name.

He does not need too.

She is perfect.

It feels as if he has been walking down the road and the air has wafted over the most intoxicating aroma from a nearby bakery. Even from the ten paces that he walks behind her, he can smell the crisp apple pie. The combination of sweet and tart, brings him back to a time long forgotten. He cannot be older than either, his feet dangling at the kitchen table as he watches his grandmother with anticipation. Flour dust her hands as she places the cubed apples into her homemade pie crust. His grandmother's secret had been a sprinkle of cinnamon, brown sugar and maple syrup.

"Now fold it in with love," she would always say as she tucked away the apples under folds of pastry.

They always came out of the oven fluffy and a golden brown. Before even cleaning up, she would dish up a huge slice for both of them. They would sit, talk and eat until his stomach ached.

It had been a Sunday tradition that took him to his twelfth birthday, around the time dementia clouded her mind. By fifteen she lay in a nursing home, barely able to lift her head or remember his name. Mentally she was gone a year later. Physically she held on until he graduated high school.

She had been the only grandparent he had ever known.

The scent brought those memories flooding back. Where the aroma is coming from he is uncertain, as she carries nothing on her person other than a small clutch that dangles from her wrists.

Her hands folded deep into the pockets of her jacket, for warmth. Even bundled in layers of clothing, he can tell that she was slender.

Following along several feet behind her, he studies her.

The short, delicate slope of her nose, the plumb and subtle pout of her lips - moving as she says unspoken words to herself. Her cheeks rosy as the wind whips against her fair skin. Her bright eyes tear as she walks against it. One word comes to his mind as he takes her in. Lovely.

He cannot quite place the resemble, yet he senses the familiarity.

She will be his Mary.

***

Following a gut feeling, Ron trusts Emma in her assessment that they will find him on Miller.

Mary Kelly had been discovered at 13 Miller's Court, which was located on Dorset Street during the reign of Jack the Ripper.

Emma theorized that Dorset Street in Markham is much too residential for Matt, not only hide, but commit such an offensive act. Miller Avenue in comparison is part of the industrial district, allowing for more coverage and less visibility.

To be certain, they sent squad cars to every area that Emma and Ron thought to be possibilities. The number tallied nearly a dozen locations. The various Chiefs had wasted no resources. This was an embarrassment.

Ron white knuckles the steering wheel as he slowly maneuvers down Miller Avenue. The street is a combination of small industrial plazas and shop fronts. 'For Lease' signs fill more than half the newsprint lined windows.

His breakfast had consisted of a black coffee and a pink foaming bottle of antacid. With a worried expression in her eyes, his wife had raised her displeasure to the amount he had been consuming lately. Ron had reassured her it was nothing and kissed her good bye, she had responded with those same sad eyes and a tight lipped smile.

The brown bag lunch she packed him still sat on the dash, it would most likely end up in the garbage like the others from that week.

Driving in silence gave Ron the opportunity to analyze everything up to this point. Today, he did something out of character - he over analyzed. Had he internalized all of this? Had he asked too much of Emma? Was he asking too much of himself? Would any of it even change anything?

Shouldering what he can, he does his best to hide the stress from his partner. His grip relaxes a tad on the steering wheel as he keeps his eyes trained on the street.

Ron thinks back to the file that Emma had prepared and the disembowel photographs that she had included. Even in the stark contrast of the black and white, they seemed to creep into his mind as he lay away in bed at night. It had been overkill and Ron was not eager to have that repeat itself in the present day.

***

Emma found herself apologizing. It was becoming a habit - a repeated statement she has made to Ron over the short course of their partnership. She had failed Catharine and Elizabeth. Matt had slipped through their fingers and she felt the responsibility was on her. Perhaps her own obsession with following the Ripper angle had pulled attention and resources away from a different avenue, one that might have been more fruitful. What if she was doing it again right now?

It brought her back to her first case she had ever worked. Twin girls. Sixteen. One with long beachy blond hair and the other with brown shoulder length curls. The note they had found sounded nothing like something a teenage girl would write.

Her partner - senior on the force - had ruled it a suicide. After an autopsy, the coroner had agreed. Everything about it felt wrong to her, yet her partner explained things to her the way you chastise a small child.

She did not push it further.

The family had seemed at peace with it, as much as one could be. So she apologized to her partner for her mistrust.

The event made her question herself over everything after that. She found herself doing the same now. It brought herself back to the self-doubt that she had initially experienced when she had first made detective those years ago.

"There," Ron's level voice brings her out of her turmoil and focuses where he is pointing. His arm stretched out across her. In the closeness she breathes in the musk of his aftershave. Her eyes adjust to the overcast day as she peers down the alleyway in the direction of his finger.

Slight movement in shadows is all that she can make out. Ron has already stopped the car and steps out of the vehicle, making his way around the front of it. By the time that Emma has her seatbelt unbuckled and swings her legs out of the door, Ron is half way towards the alley. Emma hurries her step in an effort to catch up.

Considering his age Emma finds Ron to be quite agile. Picking up speed the only thing Emma does is find herself flat on her face. Cursing her clumsiness, she peers behind her to see that her right foot has caught on a root growing up through the cracked pavement.

As quick as she can, she pushes herself up off the ground and checks herself. She can no longer see Ron clearly and lets frustration take over that he has not followed protocol.

It quickly passes as she makes out the sound of a struggle. Pulling her gun from her holster, she readies it before her, and cautiously she makes her way into the depths of the alley.

As she draws closer, she can make out three figures.

Two crumpled in heaps on the ground.

Ron being one of them.