Blood is Black in the Moonlight

a kid, I loved dragons, but it’s to be expected. I grew up playing D&D with my brother and his friends.
Shit, all the buttons been ripped off how the hell did that—oh, now I remember. I let Greg tear my shirt off, and the buttons flew across the room. I grab a long-sleeved black button-down shirt out of the closet with a red dragon slithering down the arms of the shirt.  “Okay new rule, we need to exercise restraint during rough sex. Ripping my shirt off is against the rules from now on.”
He grins. “I’ll be gentle next time.”
I beam a wolfish grin. “Just with the shirt, I hope?”
He chuckles. “Obvi.”
I saunter over to the dresser, grabbing my Sig P226 40 Cal. It’s solid black, and it holds ten rounds of death to anyone who’s sick of living. After making sure there is a full magazine, I slap the mag back in the weapon and rack the slide. Slipping it down in my holster hooked to my belt.
I always keep a bullet in the chamber because you won’t get a chance to rack the slide on the street. I take my 357 snub-nose and slide it down in a clip-on holster on the back of my belt.
He frowns. “I wish you didn’t have to run. I’d love another go at that ass.”
I saunter over to him and playfully slap his cheek. “I would love to nothing more than go for round two, but I have to catch this guy.” I’m about to walk out the door when he calls out to me.
“Hey, Detective. It’s kind of hard arrest bad guys without this.” I turn, and he’s holding my shield.
I stroll over and give him a peck on the cheek and clip the badge to my belt. “Thanks. Hey, don’t go blabbing to your college buddies about how you’re drinking and fucking a cop. You’re still under 21,” I say, putting on my OD green field jacket.
“Damn, maybe I should, so you can put me in cuffs and have your way with me. I could be your slave ready to obey your every command.”
I beam a lustful smile. “Hmm, tempting, but maybe some other time.”
I shut the door behind me and rush down the steps and into the damp streets. The full moon illuminates the night sky with a bluish hue. The streetlights glisten off the wet concrete of the parking lot. The streets are pretty much empty, except for cops on their beat and homeless people scavenging for food or lying around tweaked out of their heads. It’s that time of year when it gets colder than a nun’s bed and hotter than the Devil’s scrotum on the 4th of July the next day.
Climbing into my 2014 ebony Dodge Charger, my original car was a black Sedan, but I lost it in a nasty divorce. So I had to buy another one. After cranking the engine, I notice Greg dropped his 8-ball of cocaine on the seat. The old cravings hit me like a tidal wave. My jaw tenses finger aches from the death grip on the steering wheel cold sweat breaks on my forehead. I manage to resist the manic hunger and toss it out the window and exhale surfacing from the abyss. I don’t wanna crawl back in bed with that demon again.  Greg is lucky he fucks like an animal, or I’d arrest his ass for leaving that shit in my car. I’ve been clean for two years now. When I was undercover, it was the only thing that jacked me up to do the shit I had to do without blowing my cover.
***
The air above the port is tainted with the noxious fumes of diesel and dead fish. I cut through an alleyway between two warehouses. Reaching the edge of the alley, my Lieutenant walks over to greet me. A towering man with salt and pepper hair, in a long-sleeved white button-down, and dress pants. He has to look down to talk to me. “Sorry to bother you on your day off, Lobos.”
I shrug. “Oh, what the hell, Frank. You only disrupted my sleep. Same MO?”
“There’s a moon. He used barbwire as a strangulation device. No sign of theft or trace evidence of glove residue. So yes, I’d say it’s the same MO.”
“And you’re sure this wasn’t a copycat?”
He sighs. “I’m pretty sure. All the same, I got Anti-gang trying to rule out this wasn’t just a gangland slaying. After all, it’s not beyond local gangbangers to copy a serial killer to cover up their tracks.”
“Well, if nothing else, we got till the next moon till he or she strikes again. Which is in the next couple of days, so let’s get to it.”
Most cops assume serial killers are male, but history has shown females are just as deadly, and in some cases, they’re far more sadistic.
I slip on a pair of latex gloves I took from the forensic kit in my trunk. “Well, shall we?”
He shoots me a smug grin and raises the tape.  “Ladies first.”
“Nice to know chivalry isn’t dead.”
Ducking under the yellow crime scene tape, we stroll to the body lying face down in a puddle. Giving the Moonlight Killer’s rep drowning is not the cause of death here. No, it’s something far more sadistic.
I walk up to a petite brunette medical examiner, with creamy white skin and freckles bridging across her cheeks. “Who was he, Amber?” I ask.
She stands up and lowers her mouth cover. “Robert Stetson forty-nine years old. The guy was loaded. We found a business card for Horizon Oil. He was an executive for the company.”
“Poor bastard almost made it to fifty.” I rest my hands on my hips. “This sounds like our suspect.”
“That’s because it is, Lobos. We found a keycard for the Avila suburbs.”
Another rich