Wolf in the Big City

Chapter 5 - Rabbit

I arrived back at the office just as Dylan and the others were gathering in our briefing room for our usual lunch meeting. It wasn't anything special; we talked about the case over lunch and we split up to do different things afterwards. I dumped the sandwich I'd gotten from a nearby bakery at my usual spot and sat down with my soda. 

Dylan pulled up our board of information from his tablet and swiped it over to the big glass wall display in the room. I saw the photos the techs had taken, autopsy pictures and other things along with written notes for each. Stuff I hadn't seen either, pictures of witnesses, lab reports among other things. He sat down and took another bite of his burger, chewing in thought before he spoke.

"What do we think so far, team? Thoughts on the case?"

Before I could open my mouth, the new guy spoke first.

"The killer is a sloppy guy. Inexperienced. And this is his first murder."

I saw Dylan perk an eyebrow and smirk.

"Really, detective Ortega? Explain."

Louis took a sip out of his milkshake and stood up to walk to the board.

"Well, it's pretty clear that he attempted to clean up after himself. There's the fact he mopped up the blood on the bathroom floor and doorknob. Add to that the blood-stained clothes in the laundry basket and the closet, along with the broken lock on the window. It's pretty clear that our suspect did the deed, then cleaned up after himself but didn't think to dispose of the bloody clothes somewhere else."

"Good observation, although it's rather obvious given the facts. Anyone else wanna add on to this base we got?"

There was a moment of quiet as a few people thought at once, so I spoke up next. I had another hunch, from what I'd seen of the crime scene.

"I think our killer might've known the victims."

Dylan turned to look at me next, his mouth full of burger. He didn't speak but his raised eyebrow meant that I should go on.

"Well, here's what we know: the killer's an amateur, right? But the fact that our victims' front door had no evidence of tampering means that they let our suspect in. He probably even sat down for breakfast with them. Then he had it in him to off our victims, clean up the crime scene and break out instead of going out the front door. Maybe he didn't want to be seen leaving the scene of the crime? Maybe he was being careful? Can't say for sure, but whatever the case, we know he's left a ton of evidence behind."

Dylan swallowed and gave me a nod of approval.

"Very good, Daniel. Detective Ortega, take it from detective Anderson here. Don't make assumptions about our suspect until we've thoroughly confirmed his motives. Assumptions only lead to false motives, things that your mind attempts to link with the evidence. We need to be one hundred per cent objective here."

I could see Louis swallow his pride as he walked back to his spot and sat down. Dylan finished off his burger and turned his attention to his fries, looking around the room to see who else he could call up.

"And how about you, detective Troy? Anything about our witnesses?"

Evelyn stood and went over to the board. She pulled up another window that had pictures on it, with written notes underneath each.

"So I've identified a few key witnesses, all of them were neighbours who were awake or active around the time of the killing. I only managed to interview one of them, this lady."

She expanded a picture of a brunette with glasses and a pert smile.

"Connie Gelson, upstairs neighbour. She told us that on the morning of the murder, she'd heard the victims greeting someone and letting them into their apartment. That coincides roughly with the time of death given to us by Doctor Stephen. I still have to interview their other neighbours though."