“So how did we find out in the first place, chief?”

“The usual.  Garbageman came by on Tuesday, noticed a garbage bag full of blood, towels, clothes.  You know how it is.”

“Yeah.  Were you tempted to confront them right away?”

“Nah.  Always talk to the neighbors first, you’d be surprised the things they see.  Turns out there was a lot of commotion the previous Friday.  Some kind of jacuzzi party.  Guy hears this godawful noise like a jet plane taking off, glances in the perp’s dining room windows and instead of a table and chairs like usual there’s some kinda’ hot tub.”

“What about the women, I heard…”

“Oh yeah, there were girls alright.  Neighbors say the ladies started arriving in ones and twos after supper, hanging around the jacuzzi, at least one of them nude.”

“Damn.”

“It was all fun and games at first, loud music, dancing, but then something must have gone wrong ‘cuz one of the women starts making all kinds of noise, wailing like a cat in heat.  Neighbors say they would have called us, but they were scared.”

“What about the lab work, what’d they find?”

“Two victims, both female.  One lived in the house, most of the blood was hers, but the other DNA belongs to somebody not even in the FBI files.  How the hell does someone in this day and age avoid having their DNA on file?  Touch a light switch in a lavatory and the spooks’ll be able to tell what you had for breakfast, am I right?”

“Yeah.  You’re right alright.  Hey, Chief?”

“Yeah?”

“We got the guy in custody yet?  Or are we still playing watch and wait?”

“Watch and wait, kid, watch and wait.  Haven’t seen the woman leave the house so we have to assume she’s dead, her husband was seen spraying down a shop-vac on the side of the house one day, shopping for medical supplies the next, could be she’s being kept alive for some reason.  Soon as the warrant gets signed we’re breaking the door down and finding out.”

“All due respect chief, but screw the warrant, I got a feeling we can crack this thing ourselves.  Let’s go get this scumbag.”

“Fine by me, let’s roll.”

………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

“Hey kid, good thing we trusted your gut.  Do you wanna file the nursing person’s report or should I?”