The name is Diamond. Detective Jack Diamond.
Yeah, Mom was not too bright, while Dad loved the cards and hated me for forcing him to end his days as a single man.
Last week I was promoted to Detective in the Homicide Division of the Metropolitan Police Force.
On this day, I received a call that would lead toy first and last case as an official member of the police.
Patrol had noticed a door broken open and upon investigating, found a bit more than they had expected in the back room of a restaurant just off of Main Street.
They discovered a murder.
My partner had arrived ahead of me, just long enough to light up a cigarette and take a long drag before I arrived. He saw me, sighed, and put it out against a wall. “Hey, Jack,” he greeted in his gravelly voice, “They say we caught a bad one. Steel yourself, kid.”
Detective Sergeant Milton “Milt” Cranmore was a thirty year veteran of the force, who had been a Marine much of the decade before that and was about five years short of mandatory retirement. His gray beard concealed more than a few scars from his youth, and the fedora he wore helped conceal the fact that the gray hair on his head was mostly from a toupee.
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“Yeah,” I replied. “I heard one of the uniforms lost his breakfast. Probably do him some good.”
Milt barked out a laugh, straightened his coat, and led the way in.
The sight was pretty awful - if I had to guess, I would wager that the victim, or, as we call it “vic,” was staying behind to clean up the kitchen when someone as yet unknown, whom we called an “unsub” for “unidentified subject,” broke in and redecorated with some internal organs, most of all from the Vic. The uniforms were busy taking pictures, lots and lots of pictures. “I want a full set of eight by ten glossies,” I said to one in passing. He glared at me for a moment then resumed his work.
“You seeing what I am, kid?” Milt asked.
“Not sure,” I answered, “If you mean ‘do I think there seems to be some sort of pattern in how things were spread out,’ then yeah, I am.”
“You are. Cannot put a finger on it but there is definitely something to the, ah, placement. Well, let’s go meet our vic, shall we?”
“After you,” I replied.
We walked around the island in the center of the kitchen towards the back where the beat cops had found our victim. We heard a commotion from the front of the restaurant, and exchanged glances. “I’ll take a peek at the body then go check on that,” I offered.
“Good thinking, kid. Ugh what a mess.”
He saw the body before I did and stepped aside so I could take in the full, gory picture.
The vic was definitely female, despite the systematic dismantling of the body performed to redecorate the room. Oddly enough, despite the massive damage to the body, the head was amazingly pristine. I took a step closer.
“Damn. Milt,” I said, bitterly, “there is no need to get an ID here. I know her.”