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  "Leave them here. It'll give you a change of clothes when you come back. Besides." He stared at my parade pants and the mesh shirt I wore to please him, "I don't want you wearing that anywhere except for me."

  That cheered me, that he assumed I was coming back. I wasn't sure about the rest. Was he saying I couldn't go out anymore? I didn't hustle, though he seemed to have a hard time believing me, but to be a virtual prisoner in his home?

  Just for the privilege of being fucked by him? Wait a minute—

  I said nothing. I did want to be with him. If it made him feel better to think I was going to rot away in some kind of tower, then let him have his illusion.

  I nodded and he swept me into his embrace. It gratified me to feel his erection pressed against my stomach.

  "Keep it warm," he murmured, pressing his lips into my hair. His hands roamed my backside.

  I swallowed against the sudden arousal his nearness brought. "Right," I managed to croak.

  He left me at Marina Four where my car was parked while I dug out my key. He sped off toward yet another dead body.

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  Spider

  Once I dropped Jason off I put my Bluetooth dongle in my ear and speed dialed Nancy. I did not ask for details in front of Jason, but I wanted them now. I wanted to know why she'd called me out of rotation.

  "This better be good," I said when she answered. Traffic sounds from her phone told me she was on the road, too.

  "DB at Rancho Verde, retirement home," she said.

  "Dispatch got a 911 call at ten-forty-five this morning. Patrol went out to check, found the deceased, a resident."

  "What makes it look like ours?"

  "Same MO. The guy was beaten to death with a weapon that wasn't recovered. Beating was excessively nasty."

  "Just like Blunt."

  "Just like. I'm thinking this is personal. Whoever did this really hated these guys."

  "Anything else?" I knew there was. That's why she called.

  "Got paper on the DB, name of Clarence Dutton.

  Suspected of molesting two young boys when he was a camp counselor fifteen years ago. No charges ever laid—"

  A link that definitely might imply the deaths were related.

  Or maybe not. But it warranted consideration. I guess she was right to call me.

  Rancho Verde was a squat, pale pink stucco structure nearly overgrown with clinging vines and a royal palm-lined drive. Numerous carefully tended flowerbeds and fountains cluttered the massive, sloping lawn. There were very few 121

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  people outside, though the day was bright, if cool. December in paradise.

  A pair of radio cars crowded the curb outside the front doors. Nancy pulled in behind me. People were leaving the building. The specter of violence always attracted a crowd.

  Nancy and I entered the building. Red earthen tile covered the broad lobby and a nervous knot of medical personnel clustered around the marble topped front desk, along with a gangly uni I'd seen before. He nodded at me and spoke to a barrel-chested gray-haired man in a navy suit and sedate tie.

  I pegged him as management.

  Gray-hair held out his hand and I took it. "Mr. Spencer, director."

  I introduced Nancy and myself, and he nodded briskly. For a guy who had one of his patients butchered, he was iceberg cool. I caught Nancy's eye behind his back and we shared a look. We'd been partners long enough to be on the same wavelength. We were both wondering why this civilian wasn't more upset.

  In my experience there's no right or wrong way for innocent people to act in the face of horrendous loss. Some are calm, and give nothing away. Others become hysterical and almost require medical care themselves. Of course I've seen the guilty mutts run the same gamut. Some killers can make you cry for their loss.

  I signaled the first responding officer to join us. Caldicott, that was the uni's name. Geoffrey Caldicott. He'd been around almost as long as me and was a damn fine officer. One without the ambition to be in plain clothes.

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  I left Nancy to talk to the director and I met Caldicott at the door. "What have you got?"

  He scanned his notes. "I responded to a call-out at ten-forty-five. I arrived on scene at two minutes after eleven. I found a man the resident nurse identified as Clarence Dutton.

  He's been a resident at Rancho Verde for the last eighteen months. According to her, he was in full-blown dementia, couldn't remember his own name. They were preparing to send him to a chronic care hospice for his finals days."

  "Terminal?"

  "Very much so. If the killer hadn't been in such a hurry, all he had to do was wait. According to the nurse, he had maybe two months left."

  "No satisfaction in letting him die peacefully in his bed, now is there?" I flashed back to the brutality of Blunt's death.

  Would this be as gruesome? "How bad is it?"

  Caldicott swallowed. "It's bad. I don't know what your average profiler would say but whoever did this had a lot of rage in him."

  My thoughts exactly. Our killer was very unorganized. I clapped Caldicott on his back. "Make sure I get a copy of your notes. Check that the scene is secure, then you can head out.

  And thanks."

  Nancy finished up with the director and we headed to the crime scene.

  "The guy's son has already been called," she said. "He said he'd be out this afternoon."

  I nodded, focused on the coming task. Yellow tape blocked the door to the room. We signed the log in sheet and I made 123

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  note of who had arrived before us. CSU wasn't onsite yet, but someone else was. Someone I really didn't want to deal with right now.

  I stepped into the room, with Nancy one pace behind me.

  Lieutenant Garcia looked up from where he stood over the bed studying what had once been a white bedspread. It was now mottled red with blood. I could smell the sharp metallic smell of fresh blood and the raw stink of excrement.

  "Detective." He stood over the blood bath on the bed, no gloves, his shoes perilously close to blood spatter on the linoleum floor. Idiot. I made a point of pulling on a pair of gloves and gestured him to follow me over to the window overlooking the idyllic lawn beyond. "You have anything for me?"

  "I just got here, Lieutenant. We're still appraising things."

  "Well we want some answers, fast. The Chief is not happy that this kind of thing is going on in his city. He wants this man found and stopped."

  "So do we all," I muttered. "I'll be sure to call you as soon as I have anything to report."

  Garcia sucked on his teeth. His nostrils flared as he stared his nose at me. "Do you have something you want to tell me, Detective?"

  "No sir. Nothing."

  "What's this I hear about you associating with known criminals? I've tolerated your lifestyle, as abhorrent as I find it, but being involved with a known felon who was only recently accused of homicide is beyond the pale."

  "With all due respect sir, my private life is my business."

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  "Not when it impacts my police department."

  "It won't ... sir."

  "See that it doesn't, Detective."

  I watched him leave, seething, barely aware of Nancy joining me. Only when she stepped into my personal space did I realize she was there.

  "What?"

  She held up her hands. "You know I'm not the type to say I told you so."

  "But you'll make an exception for me?" I approached the bed from an angle that would avoid the blood spatter on the floor but give me the best view of the body. Until CSU and the ME arrived we couldn't touch anything and my partner had more to say.

  "Y
ou know you invite it. What did you expect, rubbing his nose in it?"

  "Stay out of it, Nancy."

  "I sure hope he's worth it."

  Eight hours later we released the crime scene to a grateful director and headed back to the station to start the first of many reports. Tomorrow I'd be back at my desk doing it again. I wasn't looking forward to it.

  I started a search on the victim. Clarence Dutton had never been formally charged with any crime and only had a handful of vehicular paper—mostly speeding and illegal parking tickets. One sheet I pulled made reference to a three-year stint in the Army. I looked up his record. The information on my screen made me sit up. I glanced at Nancy slogging away at her own machine.

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  "You need to see this." I sent the output to the nearest printer. Nancy stood up. I pointed at the printer, spitting out several sheets of paper. "Get that, will you?"

  She read it on her way back to our desks. I knew the moment she saw what I had.

  "Ah, our boy was dishonorably discharged. Court-martialed and did a year in Leavenworth."

  "Just like our friend Blunt."

  "What are the odds, two dishonorably discharged pedophiles?"

  "Odds I'd love to take to Vegas. Is that our connection?"

  "But which side? The dishonorable or the pedophilia?"

  "Both?" I knew she was throwing out every oddball idea that came to see what would stick. "Someone's cleaning house? Taking out the scum that slipped through the cracks."

  "Cracks? Try gaping chasms," I said. Before I moved to homicide I investigated my share of assaults on children. So much innocence was lost to soulless people who couldn't or wouldn't control their impulses. And the courts never seemed to know what to do with them. Crimes against the spirit are never taken as seriously as crimes against the body. The law didn't seem willing to admit that there were some criminals that couldn't be fixed no matter what you tried. The recidivism rates for pedophiles were sickeningly high, but again and again the rapists and kiddie porn purveyors got slapped on the wrist. I stopped my internal rant. It didn't fix anything, just left me angry at a system I was supposed to support.

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  But it was getting pretty bad when I started thinking the guy doing this 'clean up' was doing a public service. I was a cop for God's sake. I wasn't supposed to think that way.

  I shut down my PC and stood up. Nancy looked at me in alarm. "You going somewhere?"

  "I need to get out of here. You should go home, too. We can start again tomorrow. None of the record offices are open till Monday. By then maybe we'll have something to use."

  She cracked a yawn, then gave a sheepish grin. "Yeah, sounds like a smart move. Go home. Get some sleep." She threw me a dark look. "And that means you, too. Go home.

  To your own bed. Sleep."

  "Sure boss." Only I knew right then I wasn't going home.

  At least not to my home.

  Ten minutes later I was in front of Jason's place. The lights were on, his car was out front. He had to be home.

  He better be alone.

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  Jason

  The banging on the door dragged me off the Murphy bed I'd turned down a few minutes ago. I'd been reading a library book I'd found on western birds and their behavior. It wasn't as dry as I feared and I'd settled in for a long quiet night. Even better, it came with a CD of bird songs I could upload to my iPod.

  I padded over to the door, barefoot, and peered through the eye-hole. It couldn't be—I threw the locks and pulled the door open.

  "Alex?" I was suddenly aware I had nothing on but ratty pajama bottoms. I danced on the cool air that flowed through the open door. "What are you doing here?"

  He moved past me without a word and stood in my tiny living room/bedroom, filling it. He peered into every corner and studied the bed as though he expected to find something important there. Shit, was he checking for visitors?

  Pissed off now I grabbed his arm and hauled him around.

  "What the hell are you doing here? You don't just barge in here like you own the fucking place."

  In response he took hold of my arms in a powerful grip and shoved me up against the wall beside my bed. "No?" he whispered as his mouth descended on mine. "Then tell me to go away."

  His mouth was hot and alive on mine. I moaned as his tongue invaded me. Moaned again when his hand went 128

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  between my legs and cupped my growing hardness through the thin PJs.

  He broke away from me. "You still want me to leave?"

  I stared up at his half-open mouth, his wet lips and I reached for him. "Fuck, no."

  "Good."

  I tugged at his jacket, encountered the leather harness that held his gun and backed away, startled. He must have come right from work. I swelled with pride as he peeled out of his holster and set it down on the floor beside the Murphy bed. He kicked off his boots and went for his shirt buttons. I stayed his hand.

  "Let me." I made a production of undoing each button, slowly exposing his broad chest. I smoothed the heel of my hand over the hard nub of his nipples and the crisp hair around them, loving his harsh intake of breath. He hissed when my hand dropped to his waistband. I skimmed his wool pants down his legs, pausing along the way to explore the furred thighs and smooth ankles. Once he kicked off his pants I went back up and pressed my mouth against his belly. He held my head in his hands and trembled.

  I pulled away from him and leaned over to pull a condom from my bedside table. I opened the packet and slicked the condom over his thick cock. Then I took him in my mouth. He cried out when I brought him to climax. His legs were shaking when he stripped the condom off and disposed of it. When I stood he pulled me into his embrace.

  I nuzzled his throat. He didn't speak. I leaned back to look up at him. "Why are you here?"

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  "Do I need a reason?"

  "Most people have one when they do something."

  "You angling for an 'I missed you?'"

  I sighed. "From you? No."

  "Good." He looked around my tiny kitchen. "You got coffee?"

  "Instant," I said. "Powdered cream."

  He made a face. "I'm going to have to do something about that. Well, get the kettle on and make me some coffee."

  I took the battered pan I used to heat water and filled it with tap water. The stove sizzled and smoked from the last meal I had spilled on it. I could only hope Alex didn't notice.

  Fat chance of that. He came up behind me, still naked, and ran his finger over the counter beside the stove.

  "Hey," I said. I knew what he was going to say. "If you gave a guy some warning I'd have cleaned."

  "I'll remember that next time."

  "Do that." The water boiled and I poured two mugs of strong black coffee. I put the powdered milk and sugar in mine. He took his black. I led him back into my living area.

  "Sorry for the lack of sitting space. There's really no room for furniture." I sat on the edge of my Murphy bed. He sat beside me.

  "There's plenty of room at my place."

  He said it so quietly I barely heard him. He was staring at me with an unnerving intensity. "What?"

  "Why don't you come out and at least finish the weekend we started? I have to leave for a while tomorrow, we caught a new case today, but you can watch movies or cable.

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  Supposedly I get nine-hundred channels. You can tell me if I do."

  My mind scanned frantically through his offer. What was he offering? Two days of mind-blowing sex and who knew what kinks? I already knew I was danger
ously close to falling for this hard man and even I knew that wasn't a good idea.

  He was sure to break my heart if I let him. But how the hell could I say no? Like a moth drawn to open flame, I had no will to resist.

  "S-sure."

  He put his mug down and pulled his clothes back on. "Grab some more gear. Pack for a week. Let's see where we stand on Monday."

  I shivered, knowing full well what awaited me at his place.

  The toys in his bedroom would not sit idly on the wall if I was there. How much could I take?

  I realized, for this man, there were no limits.

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  Spider

  There was no absinthe this time. Only a raw, unbridled need for each other. We fucked and sucked until dawn crept over the eastern sky the next day. I would have kept him in bed for the rest of the day but I knew Nancy was waiting for me. I climbed from under the warm covers that smelled of sex and Jason and after a quick, hot shower dressed and headed to town.

  Figures the first person I ran into outside the detective's room would be Garcia.

  I clutched the Starbucks coffee in both hands and sucked the caffeine rich brew, wondering how much the guy saw.

  Ignoring his glare, I crossed to my desk and booted my PC.

  Might as well start with some of the reports I needed to write while I waited for Nancy.

  She arrived in a flurry of cold air. "Damn," she threw her jacket over the back of her chair. "What ever happened to global warming?" She started to say something else then looked at me. "Oh, Christ man. What did you do last night?"

  "It shows?"

  "Trust me, it shows. That's probably why Garcia was glowering when I passed him in the corridor. You want to put your ass in a sling over this guy?"

  I almost grinned, tired as I was. It hadn't been my ass in the sling last night. Jason had looked so delectable hanging suspended in my rarely used leather toy. So open and ripe for all the things I did to him. So many guys who played at being 132