The dimly lit room cowers behind the blinds as I, 21st cigarette in hand flick through my meticulously vetted dossiers. One of these people is the Inferno Killer, but which one.
The first case seemed clean cut, the police arrested a perpetrator and brought him in for questioning, but when I went to visit, I found the guy to be wholly maintaining his innocence and, he asked me to check out his apartment, told me where to find a spare key, hidden in the roots of the potted plant to the left of the door. Not very secure. I picked up one of the photo's I had taken of the room. It was pretty typical apartment, flowers on the wall, looked lived in but not messy. He enjoyed tending to his flowers, now I occasionally stop by to water them. I am pretty convinced that frank was innocent and that means that the Killer's death toll is actually 6 and not 5 like the police think.
The first victim was Frank's girlfriend, the two were partying in a bar when, Frank says, a strange man asked his girlfriend to dance. She declined and he whispered something into her ear. Frank said that the words were "Small Bills" but he didn't understand they meant. From then on, she started to complain of heart burn and eventually dropped dead on the dance floor. The coroner found her heart had been charred and the court case was open and shut, the prosecutor claiming that only a loved one could inflict that much concentrated damage directly to the heart.
I moved to the next victim, he was a handsome fellow, but, like the last victim, was charred on the inside, again, the heart. His happy smile staring at me in the picture. It was easy to get into his house, the door was kicked in. The killer had clearly wanted kill this person. Like the last victim, the police tried to pin the crime on the man's girlfriend, but her defence attorney put up an iron defence. She had a solid alibi. Although, looking at the door, clearly it was a man who broke in, the way the door had split from the force of a kick to the handle, the man was expert at breaking and entering. The witnesses described the man as roughly five foot nine to six feet tall, stocky and wearing white running shoes. The same description given for the third and fifth murder.
The police had several suspects in their custody but none of them were the right guy, I knew who he was, and he would be coming through the door any second.
The phone buzzed.
It was time. I assembled my notes and put them back into the draw, before pushing the button. "Send him through."
The figure at the door pushed his way into the room and I turned on the desk lamp.
"I've been expecting you."
"Cut the crap!" The figure said in a harsh tone, stamping his way up to the desk.
"You think you can black mail me!!!" He screamed.
"No Carl, I know I can." I retorted calmly as Carl grabbed his chest, he could feel the slow burn of the simple retort.
"You ain't nothing! I can end you with a sentence!" He responded.
"Anybody can Carl, it's nothing special, why don't you sit down and think rationally. What's a few thousand bucks compared to life in prison." I smiled, sticking my feet on the table. "A good deal, that's what."
Carl looked nervous as a police siren whizzed past down below. "Relax, nobody but us knows about your little game and if you pay up on a regular basis, nobody but us will know."
"What's stoppin' me from endin' you and you're little whore out the front." Carl smirked.
"I have a safe deposit box and instructions with an attorney, if I die, you are exposed." I smiled as I put the cigarette out.
Carl got up from the chair. "I will make you pay for this."
"No Carl Stanley, I am the one making you pay, shut the door on the way out, oh and Carl." Carl was sweating profusely as he lent against the door clutching his chest.
"Small bills."