Things had indeed escalated. That was Natasha's first thought when she saw the corpse. This body should have been labeled "Not Suitable for Anyone Under Eighty." In other words, no one present except her should have been looking at it.
But clearly, the people of this city didn't see it that way. They seemed accustomed to it. Natasha had already seen plenty of young faces hurrying past the crime scene—probably trainee officers or trainee agents, perhaps no older than twenty. Other than frowning and walking quickly, they showed no discomfort at all.
What a goddamn city, Natasha couldn't help thinking.
In the previous cases, although the Garden of Eden Killer's victims had been killed and there had been splattered blood at the scene, the sights had not been particularly gruesome. They could only be called classic murder scenes.
But this time was different. For some reason, the Garden of Eden Killer had begun playing with the bodies. The two corpses were still connected, but this time, a rope had been threaded through their chests. They were pressed tightly together, their arms sewn together, and hung upright. The entire scene formed a cross, one horizontal and one vertical. It was not particularly bloody, but it was deeply bizarre.
The victims were quickly identified: one was a judge from the Gotham District Attorney's Office, and the other was his lover.
That was right. This time, it was not a prostitute, but a lover. The judge had recently divorced, and both of them were currently single, making their relationship perfectly legal.
Gordon was overwhelmed. The biggest problem was still the reporters. They charged in like lunatics, and most of the police force had been deployed to maintain order at the scene.
Natasha found it rather absurd. If there wasn't a single good person