SrCuervo
patreon
41
🕑 Added 2025-04-04 04:51:23 +0000 UTCAnatomy of a Killer
Chapter 41 – Pond, Part 8
When Ángel looked at the message on his cell phone, he saw Masuka's message saying that the results of the diatom test were negative.
Ángel handed the phone to Larry, who nodded after reading it. “Looks like my instincts were right.”
As Ángel looked at Larry, a rather chilling feeling crept up inside him as he realized that this murder was starting to look more like a copycat case. The prostitute killer—somehow, that case was connecting to this one, and that changed everything.
Larry, who felt like he was being tested, gave a sinister smile and walked toward a whiteboard, where above the unknown killer’s head was the main serial killer who had taken the lives of two prostitutes.
“Tell me you're not thinking something crazy,” Ángel said. He knew Larry well enough to know that his mind was probably building a special diagram filled with wild ideas that would be hard for others to accept.
“Tell me, Ángel, do you really think it’s a copycat? That someone instructed the killer to mimic the way the original one killed?” Larry knew manipulation was a possibility—after all, the methods used by the prostitute killer were not publicly known.
If it wasn’t direct or indirect manipulation, then the killer had access to the Miami Police Department’s crime database, which gave rise to the crazy idea that they might be dealing with a serial killer who apparently wanted to play games.
“I suggest you focus on catching this killer. If more evidence comes up along the way, we can present the case to the captain.”
Larry nodded, walked over to the table in the center of the room, and while looking at the photographs, he said, “Of course. I'm not an idiot.”
Proposing something like what he believed to be true to people who didn’t share his mindset was a mistake—that’s also why he hadn’t done anything for a month after joining the police department. If he wanted others to believe him, he had to present conclusive evidence.
From experience, Larry knew they would eventually reach the deeper truths about this killer—just as they were doing now.
It wasn’t anything new—whether a copycat or a killer manipulating crime scenes to mock detectives or FBI agents. Now that he thought about it, the killer Jack had asked him to investigate bore some resemblance to this case. If it turned out to be true, things would get even more interesting for Larry, who, after realizing that his instincts had been right, was now more excited about this murderer.
“First, let’s find this imitator,” Larry said to himself as he thought.
From what he could see, there were also many pictures of Ron and his father, looking very close, showing the deep family bond between them.
Larry narrowed his eyes slightly—he recognized that kind of bond.
No matter how good a man is at pretending, to Larry, everyone was an open book of scattered emotions in a toy box.
No matter what kind of person he was dealing with, any father who lost his child at the hands of a killer would drop everything to search for more information about their child’s death. But in this case, what did Tara mean when she said Ron’s parents were unavailable?
“This doesn’t make much sense,” Ángel murmured, using every part of his brain to keep up with Larry, who was lost in thought.
Max returned and was puzzled to see Larry standing there motionless, so he stepped forward and approached Ángel. Then he asked, “Is he having an epiphany?”
“What?”
“Don’t worry—he told me that when he gets that deep into silence, we should call him by name. It usually works.” Max walked up to Larry and asked, “Doctor Luk, what’s going on?”
Larry tapped his fingers rhythmically on the table, speaking half to himself, half as if answering.
“This father decided that the best idea for his son, when he urgently needed medical attention, was to take him to another country with better medical opportunities. To have him undergo an extremely expensive surgery, to send him to study at the best institutions.”
To do all that, Ron’s father must have loved him a lot—but something didn’t feel quite right. Larry knew something was right in front of him, but he couldn’t see it yet. He needed more answers.
Even though surgeries in the country were good in every sense, that man chose to spend a fortune to take his son elsewhere.
Now, as an adult, after being disconnected from his son for months without reporting his disappearance, and after learning of his son's death, he was calm. Any father would lose their mind—at the very least, ask questions—but Ron’s father remained silent.
“Unless he’s following the news on his own, planning to take revenge—or he simply doesn’t care.” Ángel reached a fairly common conclusion for men of power.
“Yeah. Using common sense with that kind of person is a mistake.”
“Aren’t they busy with work? The report says Ron’s father’s wife is paralyzed.” Once again, Max’s empathy kept him from seeing the whole picture.
“Don’t use empathy for this analysis.”
Ángel followed Larry’s train of thought and considered it.
“Does the father’s behavior make sense? To me, there are only two possibilities: Ron’s father is out for revenge—or he’s not really his father.” Larry, slightly disappointed, looked at Ángel and asked, “Do we have DNA samples from Ron’s uncles?”
“We do.”
“It’s possible. But let’s not rule out a bad relationship with his father,” Ángel said, not wanting to leave anything out this time.
“That’s my personal opinion. Let’s wait for the communication investigation results before we discuss it in detail with the team,” Larry said, as he sat down to prepare new details about the murder.
