Cereal Killer

twenty-four hours, Savannah fought the urge to feed somebody their front teeth. She looked down at the dead woman’s toned, muscular body... voluptuous, yes, but beautiful even in death.
    She gave the cop a quick once-over, taking in his flabby middle, double chin, and pudgy cheeks. Funny how many men held a completely different standard for women than they did for themselves.
    She turned and walked back to Dirk, who was finishing his conversation with Howard. “Her name is Kameeka Wills,” she told him. “She’s a model. A close friend of Caitlin Connor.”
    For a couple of seconds she let her information sink in and watched Dirk’s brow cloud. Then she added dryly, “What do you figure the odds are of them both being accidents?”
    “About the same as you and me running off to Vegas, getting married, and winning a million at the blackjack table.”
    “Yep. That’s about right.”
     

Chapter
    7
     
    D irk had called the station house, requesting an address on Kameeka Wills, at the same time that Savannah had phoned Tammy and asked her to find it on the Internet. Tammy had beaten the station by more than two minutes—a personal best record for her. Usually her lead was only a matter of seconds.
    When Savannah and Dirk pulled up in front of the modest bungalow, hidden among a thicket of trees in the crook of a cul-de-sac, she couldn’t help doing a mental comparison to the glass house on the beach.
    The home had a woodsy charm with natural siding and a pseudo-cedar shake roof. Real shake roofs had been outlawed long ago after San Carmelita had lost an entire neighborhood to a blazing inferno, which had leaped from one wooden roof to the next, devouring the dried cedar shakes and the houses beneath them.
    The new fake shakes didn’t look as good, but they didn’t burn either, and there was a lot to be said for that.
    As Savannah and Dirk walked up the sidewalk, they passed a small but pleasant pond stocked with koi to the left of the path and an interesting sculpture on the right. Carved from some sort of exotic, gold-toned wood, the piece reminded Savannah of a Polynesian fertility goddess with enormous, pendulous breasts and a full, rounded belly that could have been carrying a baby or simply an abundance of good food.
    Bees buzzed in a nearby bottlebrush plant, and the smell of wild honeysuckle hung heavy and sweet in the warm air.
    She watched the windows of the house as they approached, but she saw no movement.
    “I don’t think anybody’s home,” Dirk said. “Maybe you’re right; that mighta been her back there on the side of the road.”
    “I’ve been known to be right before.”
    “Eh, you luck out sometimes.”
    “I’d like to be wrong this time.”
    Dirk shrugged. “Well, if that body ain’t this Kameeka person, it’s gotta be somebody else, so either way it’s bad news.”
    “But if it’s somebody other than a second full-figured model, it’s more likely that the lady on the road was killed accidentally rather than murdered. And I could still believe that maybe Cait Connor died of dehydration.”
    “True. Killing yourself through stupidity is better than getting murdered.”
    “A little better.”
    “Yeah, a little. But, then, dead is still dead.”
    Savannah sighed. Detective Sergeant Dirk Coulter, she thought, a man of few words. But not few enough.
    On the front door of the cottage hung a wreath of dried grapevines sprigged with lavender and wild sage. The aroma scented the whole porch and gave the home a cozy, welcoming presence.
    Dirk rang the doorbell several times, but there was no sound of movement within, and no one pulled the curtains aside to look out.
    He turned the doorknob and gently pushed; the door opened an inch. Turning back to Savannah, he said, “How sure are you that was Wills back there on the road?”
    “Sure,” she replied.
    “Sure, sure?”
    “I hate to say it, but I’m sure as shootin’.”
    “Okay then,” he said, slowing pushing the door open. He took one step inside. “Anybody here?” he called. “San Carmelita Police Department. Anyone home?”
    Instinctively, Savannah’s hand slipped under her sweater, and she unsnapped the holster that held her Beretta. She noticed that Dirk had reached under his leather jacket, too, for his Smith & Wesson.
    She followed him into the gloom of the living room, where they waited just inside the doorway for their eyes to adjust to the dim light.
    White wooden shutters were closed over the