Disclaimer - contains gore, death, and mild language. If any of these are triggers for you, please do not read. Self-care, y'all. It is based on a mystery prompt so be careful okay?
She had had no idea why she had to enter first in the Old Hawkins House, but she did it anyway. I mean, what would they find? A bunch of dead bodies?
As it turns out, that was exactly what they had found, in the middle of what could only be a ballroom. How the Hawkins family had fitted such a large space in that tiny house she would never find out. Not from them anyway, hence the fact that they were dead as doornails, limbs crooked out in unnatural positions, blue and green veins bulging out like maggots from under their skin as their eyeballs glassed over the ceiling, boisterous flies scampering over them.
Their corpses were at least a few days old, judging by the discoloration and the onslaught of gas-release. She covered her nose with a dirty rag always hidden inside her coat pocket, staring at the bloated bellies and toad-like eyes, so swollen she was surprised they hadn't come out of their sockets.
She was not new to these scenes and yet bile rose in her throat and her stomach began to attempt eating itself. Another body dangled from the golden candelabra; its candles shriveled from disuse. Blood congealed on its nose like honey on a beehive, so thick it barely even fell anymore and when it did, it thudded against the hardwood floor with sickening thumps.
She watched it sway above her head wondering what would happen if it fell, its pink tongue lolling out from yellow teeth, tainted by the abuse of nicotine. Then, as she retraced her gaze back down where the Hawkins elderly couple had died, her eyes stumbled upon another cadaver. Two men and two women. Symmetry's a bitch when you have OCD. This could only be the work of The Compulsive Minnow, the most famous of the serial-killers out there. Unfortunately, OCD meant the cops had little chance of finding any evidence. Good thing she wasn't a cop.
Bradley Hawkins, the only living relative of the kind but annoying Henry Hawkins and Marjorie Hawkins, had been visiting his grandparents for years, doing the groceries and all that cuddly stuff a grandson should do. He had been running errands when they were killed, but, of course she would have to check that fact. Being a private detective didn't absolve her of running all leads, no matter how disgusting she thought them to be.
The cops were haggling with the federal bureaus, wasting, as always, precious time to determine who had the bigger balls. And, of course, Special Agent Brown did not take kindly when the local P.D obstructed his view of the crime scene, hurling cops out of the way with his boorish manner. The hallway leading to the ballroom was chock-full of forensic scientists, strobing every inch of the walls, the heavy read carpet, even the paintings – why the Hawkins had so many possessions when they stated their poverty, would remain a mystery. She concluded it was one of the reasons they were now dead. It had to be. Minnow always preyed on those he thought lived lives too lavish for what they claimed. Hypocrites were his victims of choice.
Brown gazed at the corpses with the expression of a man having eaten a food which did not treat him well and was now curled on the floor with a stomach pain. A navy blue suit bulged under his beer-belly, hidden under a pale pink shirt. A skinny lilac tie pulled the outfit together, making Special Agent Adam Brown the best-dressed FBI employee of the month. How he had the money for what was clearly a bespoke shirt she had never learned even after months of surveillance spent in her black Nissan Versa. Not a single speck of dust could be seen on his suit, his shoes reflecting the sunlight, so well-polished she could see herself in them.
"Brown" she hid the discomfort created by the ghastly corpse dangling from the candelabra.
"Nikki" he stepped away, making room for the coroners and their briefcases.
The only thing which had stuck to her as she grew up was the respected one should treat the dead with. As such, not caring how Brown smiled at her when he watched her unease, she turned around and walked into the painting-lined hallway, it's tomato red walls reminding her of the crime scene she was leaving. The agent trailed behind her, heels clicking on the carpeted floor. Heaps of equipment had been left behind, leaning either against the walls or the ascending stairway which narrowed the hallway to a one-man access point. She squeezed between the winding stair and the walls then decided that if the codgers had anything to hide they would most likely have a safe in their dead daughter's room. Miranda had died too soon – an untimely demise, caused by a train smashing into her car.
She had dubbed it a suicide. No one had agreed.
Nikki clutched the waxed rail, her fingers tracing every line on the auburn planks. Her splotched trainers made the stairs creak even if a larger man would be able to pick her up with only one had. She was tiny, but she was feisty. They didn't call her Wolfe for nothing. A smile danced on her lips and she quickly extinguished it. It wasn't proper to be happy when all around you corpses were decomposing, and, out in the front yard, Bradley cried at the death of his grandparents, forgetting that this house, with all the Picassos on the wall, would be left in his care after the reading of the will
She wondered if the Hawkins' had had their will redone as they told her they would. It was a pretty small neighborhood.
Miranda's room was crammed between a storage space and a bathroom the octogenarians never used, unable to climb the stairs without getting a heart-attack. A bad place for a safe, but she had to check anyway. If Minnow had been looking for something he would have been more thorough than any cop would.
She just hoped he left something behind so she could finally nail him.
"What are we looking for?"
Brown followed her like a servile dog, his hands already in the pockets of his pants, shoulders sagging with boredom. He chewed on something – she just hoped it wasn't tobacco. She hated people with foul breaths.
"Evidence of Minnow passing through."
"Good luck with that. You're familiar with how clean he is" Adam straightened his tie and gathered invisible specks of dust from his suit, paying no attention to her as she tried the doors, checking to see if they were locked.
The bathroom was bolted and so was the storage room. Miranda's door creaked open of its own accord and Nikki, stepped inside, hand digging inside her belt and pulling out a Swiss Army knife.
Behind her a gun was cocked.
No one was inside the bedroom and she let the knife fall back in its sheath as her eyes perused the altar the retirees had constructed for their deceased daughter. Dozens of photos of a blonde-haired girl with green eyes and freckles spotting her face lined the baby pink wall, snubs of candles thrown on the ground, their wax covering the floor like icicles on a cavern ceiling.
"God damn" Brown muttered, kicking a pile of dusty magazines, and coughing when debris exploded in his face.
The bed, as pink as the wall, was done neatly, dark-eyed toys staring at her every move, smirking at the mess they made. A lonely hair wafted on a teddy bear's fur, pale as freshly fallen snow.
"Brown" she pointed to the strand of her, beaming as she pulled her white gloves on to lift the evidence.
"I'll be damned" he put on his glasses as he gawked at the newest lead on Minnow. "Do you think this is Minnow's?"
She just nodded, slipping the hair in a vial, and dropping it in her pocket. She couldn't care less about any evidence inside the house, her top priority to find out if the hair matched the alleged descriptions dozens of people had provided regarding Minnow's appearance.
All, without a fault, had noted a suit draped across two bony shoulders, a leather belt cinched at his waist.
Brown blocked her way out of the room, slipping inside the doorframe.
"Come now, Nikki. this home in under FBI jurisdiction. You don't seriously think we will let a private detective walk out of here with our biggest lead."
"Only lead, you mean. Step away, Adam." She crossed her arms against her chest and glared at him.
The only window in the room was closed, and even if she jumped, she would sprain both of her ankles. When he didn't move she braced herself and kicked him in the groin.
For a moment it seemed that her attack hadn't had the reaction she thought it would, but then Adam's face contorted, his hands shot to his crotch and he fell on his knees, eyes watering from the pain of getting a kick right in the balls.
"Serves you right" she walked out of the room, down the flight of stairs and emerged into the front yard were the coroners were shuffling the tarp-covered bodies into vans, preparing them to be analyzed.
Bradley was nowhere to be found. She dialed his number as she continued to walk down the boulevard, dodging the people who had gathered to balk at the murder scene, mouths hanging limp when a hand fell from beneath the tarp, exposing the livid flesh of a corpse.
A cadaver hanging on a golden candelabra, swaying above her head. Blood. So much blood. She shivered and closed her phone, speeding up her pace. Adam would come looking for her; he knew where she went to get the evidence processed.
So she had to go somewhere else.
Jumping on the first bus and deeming the driver a good morning she shuffled onto a seat, wrinkling her nose at the stench of root beer and cigarettes. Damn London kids, always making a mess at the back of the bus.
The double-decker sped along various streets, stopping only at red-lights or when a passenger buzzed it to wait so he could get out, grunting a polite thank you on his way out. By the time she got to her friend's house the only one left in the bus were her at teenager miscreants throwing a party on the back seats.
"Thank you. Have good day" she wished the driver as she stepped out, drinking the fresh air of the suburbs.
Little homes, crammed into one another, watched her every move. An intruder, they whispered. Most unwelcome. She stuck her tongue out at the windows and made her way to the most orange of them all, ringing the doorbell and glancing at the grass. Zack had apparently bought a new lawnmower.
A short man opened the door and craned his neck to watch her.
"Can I help you?"
She blushed, pointing at the stairs. "Is Zack home?"
"Who's asking?" trust had never accompanied Zack's dorm mates and it seemed this new one was no different.
"Tell him Nikki is here."
The birch door was slammed in her face and she yowled when it touched her nose, minuscule splinters digging inside her skin. A few moment later, a lanky boy appeared, his grin revealing a set of cavity-filled teeth.
"Nikki" Zack embraced her, his bony fingers clutching at her bra.
Pervert.
"Come on" he dragged her inside, slamming the door behind them. "The gear is in the basement. What do you need to have checked out?"
She pulled the vial with the strand of hair inside it and gave it to Zack.
"A hair?"
"I think this is Minnow's" she whispered, unsure of where the new dorm mate had disappeared.
"You're joking, right?"
She shook her head and watched Zack whoop as he opened the door to basement, turning on the garish blue neon lights. How he managed to work in such a setting was beyond her abilities of understanding.
The damp stair was covered in moss and a brown goo stained the rail. She abstained from touching in, pulling her coat closer to her skin. Rows of cables snaked on the ceiling, intertwining as they reached all the neon bulbs and continuing to slither up and down the walls, all the way to the stone floor.
Zack fumbled with the lid almost dropping the vial on the ground as he headed straight for a microscope. His table was a mess of discarded equipment, failed projects, messy blueprints, lab coats thrown on chairs and even a forgotten Monopoly board.
"What do I owe you for this?" she asked watching Zack at work.
She wondered if the government knew who they had awarded a scholarship to.
"We'll talk later. Let me look at the nuclear DNA in this thing and then run it through the database."
He'd never told her how he had managed to hack into the bureau's database, leeching off intel on various black market sites while preparing to graduate magna cum laude. All she knew was that a lot coffee and take-away had been fueling him for months. The bags under his eyes seemed to support that evidence.
His chair spun all the way to his desktop, and he typed frantically, once, or twice glancing over his shoulder to keep an eye on her.
"Why can't I look?" she asked once more, knowing the answer before Zack even replied.
"And see me type my passwords? Or my embarrassing wallpaper? No, sister. You're stuck looking at my new poster" he pointed to a grey wall on which a cat poster had been glued.
"Cute cat."
Feet scampered above them as Zack's dorm mate opened the door to greet yet another guest.
"Woah."
"What?"
"You might want to check this out."
The heavy basement door rattled as it opened, its hinges creaking after remining unoiled for such a long time.
"Hello, Nikki" Ada sauntered down the stairs, his hand caressing the greasy rail.
She gaped at him and back at the desktop, its light messing with her vision. It had to be a cruel joke.
There was no way Brown was Minnow.
Despite that the DNA was obviously telling another story.
"Well done, Detective Wolfe. I have to admit, I did not think you were quite so observant."
For years, she'd watched this man dissect every crime scene, obsessing over Minnow, to the point where he'd bang on her door at night to inspect a new lead together. His ego – so huge when it came to dealing with cops – had always been left aside when it came to searching for a new serial killer.
Brown/Minnow straightened his tie and drew a gun from his belt. One arm grabbed her from behind and a hand was pressed to her mouth. The palm was too wide for her to bite it properly and her screams were now muffled.
When the barrel of the pistol pressed hard at her left temple she closed her eyes and stopped fighting.
"I've been thinking of a very special death for you, my dear."
"Why?" she croaked, her breath warm against Zack's hand. "Why did you kill the Henry and Marjorie?"
"For the same reason I killed Miranda."
Her brows knitted together as Minnow laughed. A deep laugh, resonating not from his belly or chest, but from the pits of hell.
"Miranda did not kill herself as you thought. I killed her. She saw me murder a man. She had to die. But, you see, she was clever. She left a note to her parents where she told them everything. Last week, when old man Henry finally decided to clean that blasted storage room, wheezing from climbing the stairs he found it. Of course, he called the police."
"He told you everything."
Minnow nodded and his eyes flickered to Zack's table.
"When we're done, you're cleaning that up." He turned to Nikki once more and lifted her chin so much, the neon lights blinded her. The pistol barrel dug deeper, carving a hole inside her temple. "Too bad the man had guests. I had to kill them too. It was fun throwing one on the huge candelabra and watching your reaction to it. Ok, enough chitchat. Let's get this over with. I have a reservation at the finest restaurant tonight and I'm holding a speech."
When the pistol clicked, and the bullet passed through her head she knew why she had to die. If she didn't, Minnow would never get caught.
She just hoped her sister would find the note Nikki had left her and go straight where she was told.
Or else, he would kill again.