Free Hot Blooded by Lisa Jackson

wire or one of those S/M dog collars turned inside out. While her legs were spread wide, her arms had been placed together, fingers interlocked, as if she were praying. The perp had taken time to pose her. Bentz’s gut tightened. “Time of death?”
    “Best guess—sometime after midnight, from the looks of her. The medical examiner will know more.”
    “Name?”
    “Rosa Gillette according to the roommate and the super.”
    “One bed? Two women?”
    “They just use the place for tricks. Rosa, here, and a couple of friends. The third, a woman named, oh get this—Cindy Sweet, sometimes known as Sweet Sin—she hasn’t been located yet. They’re independents, no pimp.”
    “Check this out.” Montoya pointed to a small table. Tucked beneath a candle was a hundred-dollar bill that no one had swiped. Odd, he thought. The roommate would have taken the cash or the perp would have retrieved it…then he noticed the mutilation—someone had taken a black felt pen to Ben Franklin’s eyes. It wasn’t the first time. His gut tightened.
    “Look familiar?” Montoya asked, dark eyes gleaming. The kid really got off on all this cop shit.
    “Yep.” Bentz nodded. There had been another murder, much like this one. The victim, a prostitute, had been strangled with some unknown noose—one that bit into her neck in a distinct pattern like this one. “The hooker near the French Quarter…A few weeks ago. Cherise Something-or-Other.”
    “Cherie Bellechamps.”
    “Yeah. That’s it,” Montoya said.
    An odd case. A waitress and loving mother by day, a hooker at night, a woman involved in a custody suit that her ex-husband, by default, had won. “Shit,” Bentz muttered under his breath. He’d seen enough. “Make sure nothing’s disturbed for the team. Let’s talk to the roommate.” As he crossed the hallway the ME and crime-scene team clattered up the stairs. While they entered 3E, Bentz introduced himself to the frail-looking, tense woman, who, guardedly, said her name was Denise LeBlanc and after being assured that the cops weren’t out to bust her admitted that she’d come back from a trick in the Garden District, to the apartment and found Rosa on the bed. Obviously dead. She’d started screaming, the super, Marvin Cooper, a beefy man of mixed race with few remaining teeth and a shaved head had taken charge, bolting the door and calling 911. Marvin, who occupied this studio alone, was leaning on the cabinets of the kitchen alcove, huge arms crossed over a black T-shirt while Denise chain-smoked and drank cups of coffee laced with cheap whiskey.
    “I know this is tough,” Bentz said, as Denise lit a cigarette while the last was burning in an overflowing ashtray.
    “It’s freaky, that’s what it is. Fuckin’ freaky.” Denise’s hands were shaking, her eyes wide. “Did you notice anything missing?”
    “How the hell would I know? I walked in and…and saw…Oh shit.” Her head dropped to her hands and she sobbed. “Rosa was a nice kid…She had dreams of gettin’ out of the business…oh, God…”
    Bentz waited, then said, “Was anything taken? Disturbed?”
    “The whole fuckin’ place was disturbed! The guy who did it is
disturbed!
Shit, yes, it was disturbed.” She was sobbing, and Bentz could coax little out of her.
    “I just want to find out who did this to her, and you’ll have to help.”
    “She’s scared out of her mind,” Marvin said gruffly. He sat next to Denise on the couch, and she curled up under one of his muscular arms. “I saw that C-note under the bedside lamp. When Denise started screamin’ I ran over there and I saw that hunderd-dollar bill all messed up. Man, whoever did this is weird, I’m tellin’ ya.”
    “Did you notice anything else?” Bentz asked. “You saw the body.”
    “Hell, yes, I saw her.” His lips folded in on themselves, and absently he patted Denise’s shoulder. “I saw the way that freak messed with her, leavin’ her all spread-eagled