The Poet (Samantha Jazz)

“No. The stalker comment sucks, Jazz, but he has a point. We need to work the case. We have witnesses and interviews coming in, starting in an hour.”

I want to fight back, I do, but he’s right. We have to work the case. My mistake is to allow the ticking clock to the next murder to be all I see, blinding me to the facts. The Poet is not a god, no matter what he believes. He’s human. He makes mistakes. It’s time to dig in and find those mistakes.

Chapter 48

Lang and I head back into the conference room, where I avoid eye contact with Officer Jackson, who thankfully doesn’t push for my attention, which I’m not ready to spare yet. We’ll talk. Just not now. I claim a seat next to Lang and across from Chuck to quickly review the interview list, which is fine, but too small and drawn out over a full week. We need to work the case but do it faster.

“Let’s double up interviews,” I suggest, eyeing Lang. “I’ll take the Summer interviews. I’m the best person to get a read on a poetry event. I know what Dave did to set off our killer. I need to talk to the people who attended that reading to see if I can pinpoint what Summer did to end up dead.”

“We don’t even know if a trigger happened that night,” he says, “but take the Summer interviews. The only thing I know about poetry is that it makes me dizzy and irritated.”

It’s not really funny, but everyone laughs as if they need to laugh, the rumbles strained and nervous with good reason: there’s a young man now dead and he’s dead for no reason other than his personal dislike of poetry. Dislike that could just as easily been another man’s dislike of coffee, tea, or milk. We all hate and love, and that is our right as humans. But The Poet has now stripped that right away and made us all think about how easily life can change. And end.

Chuck clears his throat nervously and the mood shifts away from a morbid “death to us all” to a focused, investigative tone. I’m introduced to our new team, which now includes several tech guys and a couple of forensic investigators. The one person outside of Jackson and Chuck that stands out is Martin Rodriquez—a forty-something Latino, who has wavy dark hair with a hint of salt and pepper—and for more than one reason. For starters, he’s the guy who hit the dark web for cyanide with excellent, rapid results.

He hands me his notes, which are impressive. I give him a curious look. “I’m in love with your skills. Where have you been all my life?”

“At the ATF. I worked a task force with Wade recently. He pulled some strings and inserted me into this.”

And there’s yet another reason that he stands out. The captain didn’t arrange his help at all. It was Wade. “Is that right?”

“Yes,” he confirms. “He says you owe him wine and chocolate. I say you owe me wine and chocolate. And a killer. I’m here to catch him. That’s what I want out of this.”

“I might like you,” I surmise. “But I’ve met too many impressive killers to like anyone this quickly with any certainty. So, we’ll see.”

“That makes two of us,” he agrees, and he gets right back to work. “I’m working on a meeting to purchase cyanide from the dealer, but it won’t be here in Austin.”

“Where?” Lang asks.

“Brownsville,” Martin replies.

“Brownsville is where Newman grew up,” I jump in.

“Circumstantial evidence,” Lang says, “but something at least.”

“Don’t get too excited on my end,” Martin says. “I have to warn you, our guy could have found someone else to buy the cyanide for him. I was born here, but my parents are from Mexico. If you know where to go, you don’t even have to cross the border and you can find plenty of people who will do anything for cash money. We just have to hope he had his guard down at the border and showed his face to someone who talks. Or better yet, near a camera. I consider this a long shot, at best.”

It is. A worthless one. The Poet didn’t let his guard down. He doesn’t leave behind DNA.

“If we can date the transaction, can we get his vehicle or plates at the Mexican border?” Lang asks.

It’s a good angle. The Poet, I remind myself, is human. I flip open a folder to a picture of Dave tied to that chair and silently add, he’s also a monster who I had a chance to shoot and didn’t. Right now, I think that might just make me a monster.

Chapter 49

Dave’s parents and girlfriend arrive early, not long after our talk with the captain, and well before any of my scheduled interviews. In my book, these particular interviews are certain to be emotional and useless. We know how The Poet found Dave, and that was me. Thus, I defer to Lang’s expertise and stand down when I would otherwise sit in. He doesn’t ask why. We both know why. Despite logic telling me and everyone I am not responsible for Dave’s death, guilt crawls through me, and it has claws. Long, sharp, angry claws.