Free Grind Their Bones by Drew Cross

stopped reading and looked at my three words again. Not ‘have we met’, but ‘we have met’, a statement not a question. This man had made me part of his fixation, which was not a new consideration, it had already been raised a dozen times throughout the ongoing investigation. The problem was that we’d never been able to nail down why that was. A review of some of my old cases had been held in an attempt to identify whether there were any viable suspects from my past, who might type as a possible Grey Man, but there’d been no breakthrough and we’d dropped it in favour of other potentially more productive avenues of enquiry.
    I’d been a murder detective for eight years now, but I’d been in the force for fifteen, and there’d been interactions with too many criminals of all varieties to hope to be able to quickly recollect one in isolation who might be capable of offences like this series. Truth be told, I’d met a hundred who struck me as capable of serial murder and mutilation, violent angry men with holes where their hearts should have been. All that most of them lacked was that additional unknown factor that might transfer their rage onto strangers as objects to act as an outlet for their warped reasoning, rather than those poor unfortunates who chose to live their lives around these human time bombs.
    I sat back and tapped the pen against the top of the desk, contemplating my options and ticking them off in my mind. I needed to approach this case differently. This man had reason to feel a connection to me, and I was certain that we’d met, even if it had been more significant for him than for me. I needed to make a list of every man I could remember coming into contact with throughout my career so far, not just the obvious lunatics, if he’d been one of those then chances were we’d have found him already. I needed to begin methodically ruling them out one by one until the last man remained. 
     

Chapter 26
     
    Eleven thirty at night and I was throwing my best shapes on the crowded dance floor in a trendy club with Emily. It was incredibly hot among the tangle of lithe sweating young bodies, and the fact that I found the music both too loud and completely unfamiliar should have been proof enough that I was too old for this stuff now. This impromptu night out had been another one of Lee’s bright ideas, and he’s waved me and my protestations away from work with a laugh, a lingering kiss, and a cheery ‘have fun, but not too much’. Surprisingly, my sister hadn’t needed asking more than once when I brought up the possibility of a night on the tiles, and now we were both pleasantly drunk on over-priced cocktails. Anybody watching would never have guessed that there had been any animosity between us to begin with.
    A group of testosterone oozing students were starting to move in our direction, so I decided to beat a tactical retreat, gesturing to Emily that I was fit to drop, sticking out my tongue and crossing my eyes to emphasise the point and noticing again how alike we looked when she laughed. I knew she wouldn’t be able to hear me properly until we got away from the giant speakers, but I trusted that she would follow me out into the fresh air and I began to apologise my way back to the doors.
    The drop in temperature back out on the street was exaggerated by contrast with the oppressive humidity inside the club. I immediately began to shiver as the moisture on my skin suddenly cooled and my clothes starting to press up against me uncomfortably. I looked up at one of the largest moons I’d ever seen hanging in the night sky, breathing in big lungs full of the crisp air and wondering why it looked so close sometimes and so far away at others.
    The seconds slipped past and Emily still didn’t emerge to join me, I pushed aside my annoyance and fidgeted impatiently, plaiting my hands together for warmth and checking the messages on my phone to pass time. Lee had sent me a smiley face and a