Heart of a Killer is an idea created completely in my warped, crazy mind. The title might change later...Please forgive any mistakes I make, I don't completely understand police, coroner or court procedure, so I might not get it right. Some of the names are taken from my friends, but otherwise, no similarities to people, places or events are intended.

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Angel of the Lilies...

Detective Artie Rosales was not having the happiest of nights. After two days of almost no sleep, he was no closer to solving the case that only four days ago had landed in his lap. The eyes of the city were honing in on his station's every move in regards to the three murders, each gruesome and more brutal than the last. It didn't help that all evidence pointed to a killer that had slipped through over twelve different authorities' fingers over fifteen years ago. He had more people screaming in his ear every day over the right of jurisdiction, and now the FBI wanted in on his investigation. So the phone call he recieved one hour earlier did not make his night.

He pulled up behind the coroner's van, and swiftly put out his cigarette in the already full ash tray. He took several deep breaths then exited his car, pulling his jacket closer around him. Texas weather was never completely normal, and this year, even in january the spikes in temperature were insane. The day before it was hot enough to stick to the shade, then suddenly a cold front blew in, causing the Texans used to warm weather swarming to buy heavy jackets. Even in the crisp air he could smell the uneasiness, and tucked another cigarette between his lips and lit it. Strolling toward the police tape, he showed his badge to several officers guarding the perimeter of the crime scene and waved toward the coroner and his assistant, who waved solemnly back.

Ducking beneath the yellow tape, he approached the examiner kneeling over a white sheet, writing on his notepad. Rosales had worked on several cases with Marcus Keeling and knew he was a top notch examiner, and he played a mean game of pool. At the sound of his footsteps Marcus stood, and turned to Artie, a tight smile of greeting on his face. "Evening Rosales."

"Hey there Keeling, what've we got?" Rosales replied, sucking sharply on his cigarette.

"Tiffany Grantly, nineteen years of age, killed by a gunshot wound to the head at near point-blank range. Lacerations to the face, abdomen and legs, coupled with the amount of blood covering the crime scene indicate the victim was tortured prior to her murder," Marcus informed him stoicly and knelt back down to lift the sheet away from the body.

Rosales could only take a deep drag on his cigarette, before looking away, but the image of the victims now almost none existent face matted with congealed blood in the hair and most of the body was imprinted behind his eyelids. He forced the image away and refocused on the name that had just clicked. Pulling the cigarette from his mouth he asked Marcus, "Tiffany Grantly? She wouldn't happen to be related to George Grantly, the man who instigated the nationwide man-hunt for our world reknowned killer, would she?"

"Grantly's granddaughter, yes," Marcus replied, the concern edging his tone.

"Great," Rosales breathed, "just what I damn well need. A celebrity journalist's granddaughter, murdered."

"Looks like our killer is getting personal now," Marcus commented quietly.

"Which is precisely why we are here," a new voice inserted.

Rosales cringed inwardly, even as the words slid across his body like warm molasses. Keeling had already turned to greet the newcomers, but he took a last puff of his cigarette and put it out on the bottom of his shoe, and pocketed the filter.

"Belle, how are you?" Marcus greeted warmly.

Detective Christabel DiMilo gave Marcus a tight smile in response. Her partner, Detective Ron Stewart stood a little behind her, his eyes sweeping across the crime scene before coming back to Rosales and nodding with respect.

"My my, Detective DiMilo, and Detective Stewart, what do I owe this pleasure?" Rosales bit out.

"Now now Arthur, now isn't the time to air out our dirty laundry," Belle replied, and turned to Marcus, ignoring the sounds of outraged choking coming from Rosales. "Are we sure this was our killer?"

Marcus' glanced at Rosales before replying, "Yes. Not only is the victim a relative of someone he has a personal connection with, his trademark was found in the victims hand."

"Or her," DiMilo supplied.

"What?" Rosales asked sharply, unable to keep the annoyance from his voice.

"It was never established weither the killer was male or female," Stewart answered, giving Belle a warning glance. His partner clamped her mouth shut, and steadily glared at Artie.

"Well aren't we well informed," Rosales remarked casually.

DiMilo smirked arrogantly. "Of course you knew all this already Arthur, considering your father was one of the men leading the hunt for the bastard."

"What're you doing here DiMilo?" Rosales demanded impatiently, ignoring her intentional dig at a subject he was extremely sensitive to. He would bet anything the Detective Christabel DiMilo was damn aware of it.

"Chief sent us. Since you refuse to take on a partner, he decided to assign us under your investigation," Belle revealed, a smirk on her lips. "Something about 'three heads are better than one,' or some such nonsense."

Rosales felt the tick on his jaw increase steadily. Counting slowly to ten, he squashed the reflex to reach for another cigarette. He didn't need to indulge in chain smoking. This was so not the week for him to decide to try to quit. He inhaled deeply. Definitely not.

"Fine," he snapped, "until I talk to the chief you are part of this investigation, but remember you were assigned under me, so don't try anything stupid, got it DiMilo?"

"You got it boss," DiMilo replied cheerfully.

"Keeling, be sure to get me the coroners full report tomorrow morning on my desk, got it?" Rosales barked out.

"Sure thing Rosales," Marcus replied calmly.

Rosales turned on his heel, and was fully prepared to walk away before DiMilo spoke out softly, so only the four of them could hear, "You always did like to be on top Arthuro," she murmured, her voice twinged with regret.

Rosales could almost feel the vein in the side of his temple gear up to explode. Without another work he strided quickly away, pulling his pack of smokes out of his pocket and lighting one. Screw it, his lungs would have to deal.

"Great going DiMilo," Stewart breathed uneasily.

"How else am I going to get on his nerves?" DiMilo asked innocently.

"You were doing fine without adding that little sidenote," Stewart reminded her.

"If I want to pick on him, that's my problem," DiMilo remarked acidly.

Stewart just smiled, used to his partners boughts of pique. "A crime scene isn't the best place to instigate a fight with an old boyfriend."

DiMilo sighed. "Yeah, you're right. Jeez Stewart, you're starting to sound like my dad."

Detective Stewart grinned. "Good, at least then if you listen to me, you won't get hurt. I am not about to deal with your father, or your four brothers, thank you."

DiMilo laughed. "Chicken shit."

Marcus listened to the two partners as they walked away, a small smile forming on his lips. Moments later, the smile vanished, replaced with a somber frown. He leaned back down on his hunches and pulled back the sheet. The only part of the girl that was untouched was her arms, and in one delicate hand was a perfect lily flower, the clear water droplets still perfect on the stunning petals. He closed his eyes for a minute and sighed. "Only nineteen," he whispered. "Jesus, just a baby."

Replacing the cover, he moved aside, scribbling the last few notes as the coroner and medi-team placed the victim in the black body bag and lifted it onto the stretcher.

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Rosales slammed into his car, inhaling his cigarette deeply, and nearly choking for it. Damn her, he thought, she managed again to do what she had done countless times before--distract the hell out of him. Out of all the women he had ever known, she was the only one who managed to get under his skin, both irritatingly and pleasurably. Because of his increasing familiarity with the crime world that existed, not only in Austin, but throughout the southern half of the United States, he had no choice but to leave her. He had known that if he made her aware of the threats made on her life because of her connection to him, she would only shrug it off and laugh about it to his face. He wasn't about to let anyone get killed because of all the people he put away, or had a grudge against him. Visions of his mother flashed through his head, but he supressed them easily, like the many times before.

Feeling around the bottom of his seat his hand connected with the thick manilla folder he had stuffed under there on his way to the crime scene from the station. Opening the file he reviewed it's contents. It had information on the past three murders, then skipped back to fifteen years prior. The list of victims from more than fifteen years ago was long, far to long for anyone's comfort, including Rosales' father, who had spent the vast majority of what turned out to be the last few years of his life continuely trying to track down the mysterious killer. Each murder had been clean, the victim killed before they even knew they were in danger. Most had been rich hits, most likely hired assasinations, with a few random kills otherwise, most likely for revenge. The file even included the names of victims from outside the country, for there were quite a lot of foreign kills as well. Each body was identified as a victim of the notorious killer by the lily flower each victim had placed somewhere on their body.

The killer had been pegged, 'The Angel of Lilies' early on in the investigations by the crazed and information hungry media. In order to indulge the more morbid media mongers, the title was sometime later changed to 'The Angel of Death,' completely unoriginal, but suited the press well enough. For almost three years the 'Angel of Death' struck fear into the regular Joe's life, as the killer again and again evaded the police. From one side of the country to the other, then across to a completely different continent, the killer seemed unafraid of capture, or of discovery.

Then suddenly, the killings stopped. For almost a year everyone waited for the killer to pop up again, to start his killing frenzy once more. But the years floated by and it seemed like the killer had either dropped off the face of the earth or was lying in a ditch somewhere, dead. Rosales had personally preferred the latter, but now that the killings had started up again, he felt his father's curse lock in on him. The only difference was the killer's method. Fifteen years before, each kill had been professionally and coldly executed. Now, each murder was brutally done, the victims tortured then murdered at close range, instead of from a distance. Each kill seemed personal, filled with hate. It bugged the hell out of Rosales when killers stopped being predictable. It was even suggested that the killer was a copycat, taking out the people who had any involvement in the original murderer's investigation. But Rosales turned to the color photo print out of a .38 calibre bullet, with sweeping engraved symbols around the metal casing.

For years, Miguel Rosales had searched for the meaning of the symbols engraved on the bullet. It had been found by a great stroke of luck during the first few murders fifteen years ago. It seemed, or so Arthur's father would quip grimly, the killer somehow managed to miss and had to fire at the victim, a twenty-nine year old drug trafficer a second time. The victim turned out to be the son of an ambitious drug dealer. Bullets in each victim afterward were found and identified with the same markings. The media never caught wind of this bit of information, but since the killings began less than a week ago, three bullets had been identified. Each one had the same engravings, which proved to Rosales, and his superiors that this was no copycat...this was the real thing. Returned from the dead, and he was pissed off. Rosales supposed he should be careful. He was the son of the man who chased 'Angel' for the entirety of his deadly career. But Miguel Rosales was dead, sent to an early grave still wondering if the filthy murdering bastard was dead, or hiding out there. Now it seems, Artie had his father's answer.

Snapping the file closed, he tossed it onto the seat next to him and turned his car on. He had no choice but to find this killer, his ass, and his career were riding on it. And now that the FBI wanted in on the case, he would have even more bossy stuffed shirts riding his ass. "The perfect end to my week," Rosales muttered, as he pulled away from the crime scene, and casually tossed his cigarette out of the window. He really should quit, really, he should. Maybe tomorrow....

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A/N: Please tell me what you think! I would appreciate it! Thanks.