Her name was Dr. Allison Knowles, and although she was very highly regarded as a top FBI profiler, she had yet to achieve an elusive career goal of netting a high profile serial killer. As for her personal life, she seemed to have given up on breaking free from a marriage of convenience to a ranking Los Angeles police captain with political aspirations. It would be some time before anyone even dared whisper that Allison was in love with another woman, and her husband was in love with me. Still, if I had to bet on which disgruntled marital partner was more likely to save my life in the days after my roommate's dismembered body was identified, I'd have to go with the jilted lesbian wife. It had all gotten so complicated for a simple-minded blonde from the temporary typing pool.
I guess I fainted when the captain showed up at Rita's to deliver the news. Last thing I remember was sunbathing on the front lawn in a strapless red bikini she never wore, hoping she didn't show up and freak out anyway. I looked up to find the captain blotting out the sun, saying something about bracing myself. "Your friend has been murdered," he told me. "We're going to need some more information from you." I came to thinking about Rita's mother in Havasu -- or was it Sioux City? -- something with a "sue." She used to forward the random threatening collection letter scratched with a personal message, like "So over your bullshit!" and "Not in this, loser!" They weren't close.
I must have spilled my cherry-flavored Slurpee, because I sank onto a lounge chair to swipe at something cold and sticky staining my skin red. "Did you know Hollister -- or any of Margarita's regulars?"
"No! Oh my God. Oh my God." Rocking back and forth, I couldn't wrap my mind around all those crime scene photos of disembodied limbs belonging to Rita. The butchery had been so perfect, like those beautiful steaks you get at Benihana's of Tokyo. I got up to walk it off, my knees buckling beneath me. "Have you had anything to eat today?" he asked. With that, I hurled red Slurpee onto his shiny black shoes.
Setting me onto the lounger beside him, he wrapped a towel around my shoulders. "He claims he didn't rape her, if that helps." As an admitted necrophiliac, Dr. James Dean Hollister was not only attracted to human corpses, but also sexually aroused by their careful dissection and re-assembly. His surgical expertise had probably been born of these unspeakable urges, rather than any genuine interest in healing. "And yet, he's still insisting he's innocent," the captain scoffed. "Where are you getting all this?" I asked, having major trouble even following along. "My wife," he said, simply. "She's a criminal psychiatrist, best in the business. Don't worry. She'll break him."
He rested his hand on my knee, practically daring me to put mine over his, to drop my head on his shoulder and hide from the brutal truth in the safety of his arms. That's when a crime scene truck squealed into the driveway, releasing an army of science geeks to rope off Rita's bungalow with crime scene tape.
A swarm of media vans converged -- hot on the trail of unmarked cars delivering detectives, prosecutors and federal agents. A tall, slim, super friendly suit named Dr. Allison Knowles -- who insists you call her A.K. -- bounded up and introduced herself. I responded with a burst of delayed, uncontrolled sobs. "Go ahead and get her out of here," my closeted lesbian rival ordered her estranged husband -- in case there was any question as to which of the three of us would be running this show from here. "We're going to be awhile."
I must have spilled my cherry-flavored Slurpee, because I sank onto a lounge chair to swipe at something cold and sticky staining my skin red. "Did you know Hollister -- or any of Margarita's regulars?"
"No! Oh my God. Oh my God." Rocking back and forth, I couldn't wrap my mind around all those crime scene photos of disembodied limbs belonging to Rita. The butchery had been so perfect, like those beautiful steaks you get at Benihana's of Tokyo. I got up to walk it off, my knees buckling beneath me. "Have you had anything to eat today?" he asked. With that, I hurled red Slurpee onto his shiny black shoes. 
Setting me onto the lounger beside him, he wrapped a towel around my shoulders. "He claims he didn't rape her, if that helps." As an admitted necrophiliac, Dr. James Dean Hollister was not only attracted to human corpses, but also sexually aroused by their careful dissection and re-assembly. His surgical expertise had probably been born of these unspeakable urges, rather than any genuine interest in healing. "And yet, he's still insisting he's innocent," the captain scoffed. "Where are you getting all this?" I asked, having major trouble even following along. "My wife," he said, simply. "She's a criminal psychiatrist, best in the business. Don't worry. She'll break him."
He rested his hand on my knee, practically daring me to put mine over his, to drop my head on his shoulder and hide from the brutal truth in the safety of his arms. That's when a crime scene truck squealed into the driveway, releasing an army of science geeks to rope off Rita's bungalow with crime scene tape.
A swarm of media vans converged -- hot on the trail of unmarked cars delivering detectives, prosecutors and federal agents. A tall, slim, super friendly suit named Dr. Allison Knowles -- who insists you call her A.K. -- bounded up and introduced herself. I responded with a burst of delayed, uncontrolled sobs. "Go ahead and get her out of here," my closeted lesbian rival ordered her estranged husband -- in case there was any question as to which of the three of us would be running this show from here. "We're going to be awhile."
