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There was a castle once
built beneath the earth.
You could call it a dungeon.
You could call it a desire.
You could even call it a march toward death.
You could even say we were on that road. You, fool. & me. We were.
& in that darkness, the bright angel of the eye.
In that burial we found each other. We picked up
the bones, the shame caskets. Your name especially.
I heard the voices. Your little mother, your little father
telling stories of Cain & Abel. There was an eye
in the center of the pit.
The eye saw all light. The eye saw all murders.
The eyes spoke the way eyes speak. No possibility.
No Loving. Until the eye left its burning accents.
—Juan Felipe Herrera, “ezekiel’s blood”
Frank really is a walking cliché, a retiree in Miami. To be fair, he’d only headed here after he’d heard about the murder; it’s Trinity’s MO, has Trinity’s fingerprints all over it. He approaches Miami Metro PD on a whim, doubting they’ll let him participate but hoping his reputation precedes him.
Which, thank God, it does. He’s directed to Detective Morgan, mid-thirties, brunette, “My own daughter, trained her myself, the best there is.”
He approaches; she tilts her head at him, and says, “What does a retired FBI manhunter want with a bathtub suicide?”
“There was an identical suicide in that same house thirty years ago,” comes a voice, and Frank looks up into brown eyes and an earnest expression. “Could be connected.”
“Hello, Dexter.” Detective Morgan rolls her eyes. “This is my brother. Dexter, this is Special Agent Lundy.”
“The Special Agent Lundy?”
“The very same.” Detective Morgan smiles a little. “So, Special Agent. You feel like telling us the whole story?”
Of course there are three of them. He shouldn’t be surprised. He looks them both in their eyes, finds a certain eagerness, a lack of judgment, and thinks, Eh. What the hell. He takes them out to lunch at a taco truck and makes a bad decision as it concerns his arteries and lays the whole thing out, fifteen years of murders, how he never could get the FBI to buy it. “It’s the one that got away,” he says, shaking his head. “I know you have no reason to help me. But—”
“Don’t be stupid,” Detective Morgan says, her mouth full. “’Course we’ll help you. Right, Dex?”
Dexter nods. “We could be looking at an additional fifteen years of murders. It’s our duty to apprehend this heinous criminal.”
Detective Morgan elbows him. “Don’t overdo it, fuckwad.”
“Was I?”
“Don’t get cute.”
“I can’t help it.”
It’s a pleasant thing, watching them interact; Frank’s relationships with his own brothers were never half as close. They obviously have a great deal of affection for one another. He takes a bite of chorizo and shakes his head, smiling to himself. “You two can come by my apartment to see my files, if you want.”
“After work,” Detective Morgan says. “Don’t forget to let Rita know where you are.”
“I think I can manage to keep in touch with my own wife.”
“I know where I know you from,” Frank remembers suddenly. “Both of you. You were in the news when—your brother is the Ice-Truck Killer. You begged them not to give him the death penalty at his trial.”
Dexter goes very still, and then he looks away. “Yes.”
Detective Morgan rubs his arm. “Even I feel kind of bad for Brian,” she says. Frank raises his eyebrows. “I mean, obviously it isn’t—he shouldn’t have killed all those people. But it isn’t—”
“The only thing standing between me and being him was you,” Dexter says, and then glances over at Frank. “That isn’t to say—that didn’t come out right.”
Something tells Frank it came out perfectly, but he’s the one who opened up what’s obviously a wound for both of them. “He had a hard time of it,” Detective Morgan says. “Obviously plenty of people go through all kinds of shit without committing murder, but, well. There’s just something pitiful about Brian. I don’t know how to explain it.”
“He’s pathetic,” Dexter agrees. “Sometimes he still tries to convince me to free him.”
Detective Morgan shakes her head. “Anyway, we don’t need to bore Agent Lundy with this shit.”
Frank bites down on please, go ahead. “It’s quite alright.”
“We’re the world’s goriest soap opera,” Detective Morgan says, laughing, and despite himself Frank watches the brush of her hair against her neck and finds himself almost wanting again, in a way he hasn’t in years.
Huh, he thinks. Then: You are her father’s age. You stop that.
But he catches himself watching her lips next time she smiles, and thinks, Ah, hell. Okay, then.
She starts coming by after work to help with the case, helping him brainstorm, helping him exhaustively review every detail he has. They interview Vicky Noonan’s husband, and find a man who in no way matches Trinity’s profile; Morgan puts him in touch with a lawyer, which strikes Frank as unbelievably kind. She’s obviously got a good heart, and when she smiles at him, he feels her age.
He’s beyond surprised when she kisses him over Thai takeout about a week into it, but lets himself kiss back. Then he pulls away. “Morgan—”
“Will you fucking call me Deb already?”
“Debra—”
“Don’t fuck up something good because you’re too much of a pussy to try,” Debra says, and this time he’s the one kissing her. They leave the Thai behind, making their way to his bed, where he lets himself make love to her, savoring her small breasts, her strong, angular young body. She doesn’t seem disappointed by him; if anything, she seems ravenous.
Afterwards, they lie together, Frank holding their entwined hands above his body. “I’m your father’s age.”
“So?”
“It’s a bit inappropriate, don’t you think?”
Debra shrugs. “I’m so attracted to you it’s ridiculous,” she says. “And I know you’re attracted to me.”
“Who wouldn’t be?”
She nudges him. “Flatterer.”
“Anyway, I’m just saying. This doesn’t have to happen again.”
“I disagree. Vehemently.”
“Vehemently, eh?”
“Vehemently,” Debra agrees. “So just shut the fuck up and get with the program, would you?”
“I really could fall in love with you,” Frank says, and Debra laughs into his chest.
There’s a jumper suicide a few days after that. Tarla Grant, thirty-six, mother of two; there’s a matching “suicide” at that site from thirty years ago, and Lieutenant Morgan, wonderful man that he is, allows him to get the other Morgans to conduct tests, throwing dummies off the ledge, seeing if they can match her trajectory.
It’s fruitless, but it helps to have people to bounce ideas off of, and it’s pleasant to have Debra to come home to. She’s been at his place every night since they first slept together; he knows they’re going too fast, but finds himself utterly unable to turn her away. Something in him recognizes something in her; he doesn’t want to feel like a teenager again, unable to keep his hands off her, but finds himself powerless to resist.
She’s funny and brilliant and foul-mouthed and kind, and he knows deep down that he’ll love her before too long. It’s impossible not to.
He spends a lot of time with Dexter, too, picking his brain, getting his opinions; he seems very excited about the case, almost too much so. He has a certain admiration for Trinity that goes beyond professional intrigue, and though he’s always making comments about how awful the whole thing is, the look in his eyes says that he’s living for the thrill of the hunt.
Well, so is Frank. And Debra, it’s clear, utterly adores him; when she’s not with Frank, she’s at Dexter’s place, for movie night or steaks or just plain conversation. When he asks about it, she says, “Yeah, we’ve always been really close. He and I—we were always going behind our dad’s back. Dexter—you read about what happened to him and Brian? At the shipyard?”
Frank nods. “Dexter had a lot of trouble growing up,” Debra says. “Behavioral stuff. He confided in me a lot. Still does. He’s a good person. But he is fucked up as shit.” She traces patterns on his chest. “A lot of it was our dad’s fault.”
“How so?”
“He treated the whole thing like a dirty secret. He never let Dexter—he didn’t even find out I knew about him until I was seventeen. He thought I thought he was completely normal.” She sighs. “He’s such a good person, and our dad has always treated him like a ticking time bomb. It makes me so fucking angry.” She laughs. “I’ve never told anyone about that. I really trust you, you know that?”
“I trust you too.”
“Really?”
“Very much so.”
“Dexter will try to scare you away,” Debra says. “If he ever finds out about this. He does it with all my boyfriends.”
“I think I can handle him.”
“It’ll probably help that he already likes you. He never knew any of the other ones beforehand.” She sighs. “I understand why he does it. I usually don’t have… great taste in men. To put it mildly. I attract total losers.” She shakes her head. “I don’t know why. But nobody has ever… well, Brian stood up to Dexter, but he wasn’t—isn’t it fucked up that he’s the best relationship I ever had?” A laugh. “I don’t know what it is about me that turns me into a goddamned magnet for fuckups.”
“I’ll try not to take any of that personally.”
“Oh, God! Not you! I didn’t mean—Jesus, Frank, you’re the best guy I’ve ever dated by a factor of a fucking billion!”
Frank laughs. “It’s fine, Debra.”
“Why do I have to always say shit like—”
“I really was just joking. I’m glad you opened up to me. And I’m sorry you’ve had that experience.”
Debra shoves him. “Asshole.”
The word is unmistakably fond.
They start preparing for the bludgeoning, researching old cases; he encounters an odd man while he’s staking out the old tavern site, and pursues him all the way to the bus. The next day, he goes back, and as he’s leaving, there he is again. Frank makes himself invisible this time, lets the man slide past him, and follows him again, this time to a gray van.
Frank feels giddy as he takes down the plate. Is this him? It seems too easy, too straightforward.
But that night, he and Debra and Dexter stake out the building. Dexter takes the parking lot; Frank and Debra take the surveillance room, after some cajoling with the security guard. Around ten, Dexter calls. “Van approaching,” he tells Frank. “Same plates you marked down yesterday, belonging to Arthur Mitchell.”
“Thanks.”
“Yeah.” A pause. “He’s parking in the gated area. Maybe one of you can—”
“On it.” He dispatches Debra to explain the situation to the parking attendant, if there is one, or the security guard, if there isn’t, and follows Mitchell with the camera, all the way until he starts approaching the security room. He hides in an empty room; when he’s back, the security disc is gone.
He inserts another, and calls Debra. “I need you to get back up here as soon as you can. Mitchell’s on the move. He tried to stop the security disc from recording. He’s on the first floor, but he’s moving fast.”
“On it.” Debra stays on the line, panting over the phone. “I can see him. I’m following him upstairs. Putting my phone in my pocket.”
“Great.”
For a long time, there’s silence, and he tracks them both on the monitor. She follows without being seen; and then Mitchell brains the counter attendant over the head, and Debra shouts, “Freeze, asshole!”
“What?” comes Mitchell’s voice. “You’re not supposed to be here, little girl.”
“I’m a Miami Metro Homicide detective,” Debra says. “And you’re under arrest for attacking that man.”
“Am I, now?” Mitchell looms, taking large steps forwards. “Am I, girlie? Am I under arrest?”
“Stop it—don’t come any closer—I mean it, I’ll shoot if you don’t—”
And there’s the sound of gunshots, and Mitchell falls: dead.
They investigate Mitchell afterwards, talk to his family; the son seems so relieved his dad is dead it’s a little difficult to conceptualize. Mitchell’s Four Walls build dates and locations correspond perfectly to the murders; it’s circumstantial, like everything else about him, the familial deaths that so closely match the pattern—even his job matches the pattern, the timing of the murders throughout the year.
Something, deep down, tells Lundy they got the right guy. But he doesn’t press the matter with the cops, or with the family; instead he stares at his files, wondering how to live with this forever going down as probably Arthur Mitchell in his own mind, and conspiracy theory of Lundy’s in the Bureau archives.
There’s no bludgeoning anywhere else that same night, at least; and Mitchell had had a framing hammer on him, and a little vial of ashes. It’s Debra who points out the smudges in all his old crime scene photos; but nobody ever collected them as evidence, and there’s no way to prove Mitchell intended to do anything with the ashes. There’s no way to prove any of it.
It’s an unsatisfying resolution to the case, but it is a kind of resolution, and abruptly he finds himself without anything at all to do. There are other cold cases, but none of them have ever consumed him the way this one does. Did? He’ll know if there’s ever another set of murders.
He stays in Miami afterwards, though he hadn’t meant to. But he tells himself, Just one more week with Debra, and one week turns into two weeks turns into a month turns into three. During the fourth, Debra says, “Okay. I’ve had enough sneaking around.”
“You have, have you?”
“Let’s introduce you to my dad and Dexter as my boyfriend,” Debra says. “I think it’s time.”
Frank opens and shuts his mouth. “Okay.”
Three days later, he’s sitting around the dinner table at Harry Morgan’s house with Debra and Dexter and Rita, heaping takeout onto a paper plate. “So you decided to stick around,” Morgan says. “Can’t say I was expecting that.”
“I like Miami,” Frank says. “Good weather. Good people.”
“You’ve got that right,” Morgan says. He looks at Debra. “You’ve been spending an awful lot of time together.”
“Well, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about,” Debra says. “Frank and I—that is—we’re dating.”
No one at the table looks surprised. “Okay,” Morgan says. “Thank you for finally telling us.”
“Oh,” Debra says, and Rita starts laughing. “I, uh—”
“You’re happier than I’ve ever seen you,” Dexter says, and Debra ducks her head. “Congratulations, Deb.”
“You mean it? You’re not going to threaten to kill him?”
“No. I approve.”
Debra’s smile is blinding. “You’re not gonna give us shit about the age thing?”
“It’s certainly—I was certainly concerned at first,” the lieutenant says. “But you’re both consenting adults. And Dexter was right that you’ve never seemed quite this happy.”
“Oh,” Debra says again. “Well, uh—pass the okra.”
When they get home, she kisses him like he’s never been kissed before. “I love you,” she says. “You know that, right?”
“I know,” Frank says. “I love you, too.” God help me.
Her grin is radiant. “You’re gonna stay, right?”
“Yes,” Frank says. “I’ll stay.”