He looked at the other pictures. Danielle Wickstrom, who had gone by the name Lola on the street, who had been found in the Willamette River not long after Rachel had been discovered. Her autopsy revealed that she had been beaten and strangled before she was dumped.

There was Kimberly Andrews, another prostitute that had disappeared, but reported missing by family members who lived in the city. In the picture, taken when she was still a cheerleader in high school, her long blonde hair was down past her shoulders.

He looked back to Rachel's picture. It occurred to him suddenly that all three of them were very similar in appearance. Two of them had died in different ways, and one was missing, but he was sure she was dead as well. Two of them were prostitutes while the other was a professional. But Rachel was known to be a volunteer that worked with people on the street. He wondered if there could be any kind of connection.

Meanwhile, he had many other cases he had to take care of. He stood up and moved the three pictures so that they were next to each other in a row. He would think about those later.

He started packing up the files on his desk. Some of them he slipped into his briefcase and the rest he put in the bottom file drawer of his desk. He needed a drink after this day. He shut the briefcase with a click and picked up his suit jacket, then locked up his desk. Walking out the door of his office, he turned out the light and closed the door.

Jacob Allen lived in a modest older house in the Sellwood area just south of downtown on the east side of the river. He traveled down Macadam to the Sellwood Bridge and crossed over the old, narrow two-lane bridge. Going past the business area, he took a left and after several blocks of antiques stores and office buildings, he turned again into the residential neighborhood where he had lived for the last fifteen years.

His wife Janice and he had bought the house just after getting married and lived there happily, or so he thought until she had him served with the divorce papers. That part of his life was almost over though, the three month waiting period was nearly finished and he would be a free man. Not that he wanted to be free, but the long hours and stress of the job were not conducive to maintaining the kind of marriage that Janice had expected.

He pulled into the driveway and the bright light above the garage doors came on as the motion detector sense his car. The garage was packed full of boxes and that left him parking his car in the driveway. It was a decent neighborhood though, mostly older people whose children had grown and moved away to other parts of the city.

He shut the car off and walked up to the front door with his briefcase banging against his leg. Unlocking the front door, he set the case down and started tugging on his tie. He slipped it off over his head as he walked to the bedroom to undress. After hanging up his suit carefully in the closet, he pulled on a pair of sweatpants and an old T-shirt. He slipped off his dress shoes and kicked them into the closet as well. There should still be a few beers in the refrigerator. In the kitchen, he pulled out a frozen pizza and turned the oven on. There were five beers on the lower rack in the fridge and he pulled one out and opened it, taking a large swallow.

Going back into the hallway, he picked up the briefcase and took it into the den. There was a large desk with a computer, printer and fax machine on it, the wall behind the desk was lined with bookshelves. There was a television on the opposite wall, and a complete entertainment system with surround sound directly across from the desk.

Laying the case on the desk, he opened it and began taking out files that he wanted to look at while he was eating. He sometimes had grand epiphanies while sitting eating pizza and drinking beer. He hoped it worked for him tonight, the cases he had with him should be closed quickly. He really wanted to work on the case of Rachel Weiss. For some reason, he couldn't get her out of his mind. After talking with her roommate, friends and coworkers, he almost felt as though he had actually known her himself.

Opening one of the files, he set a notepad next to it to take notes as he read. Completely absorbed, he almost didn't hear the timer for the pizza buzzing loudly in the kitchen. With a sigh, he set the pen down and went to turn off the oven.

Taking an oven mitt from the hook on the wall next to the oven, he opened the door and slid the rack out. He quickly pulled the pizza out and set it on the top of the stove. Slipping the mitt off, he opened one of the drawers and pulled out a large knife to cut it into slices.

The telephone rang suddenly and the knife slipped, slicing open his thumb. Cursing under his breath, he put the wounded digit into his mouth and went back to the den where the phone was. He pressed his other fingers against it to hold it closed as he picked up the receiver. Back in the kitchen, he finished cutting the pizza and slid two slices onto a plate. He pulled a paper towel from the roll, picked up the can of beer and returned to the den to try and settle in.

He turned the television on for background noise as he opened up the first file. He pulled out pictures of the crime scene; it was a known drug house in Northeast where a body had been left after the occupants had abandoned it. The photos showed the body from several angles, it had been found in the basement after neighbors had started complaining about a smell. A close up of the face showed the postmortem bloating; insects had entered through the eyes and nose to start the decomposition process.

There were a series of pictures that panned across the basement, he set these in order. There were also photos from the kitchen and bathroom upstairs showing the remains of a meth-cooking lab. Empty chemical bottles on the counters and hundreds of empty cold medicine pill packets on the floor in the corner were the obvious evidence of meth.

Reading the file, it appeared that the autopsy showed a single gunshot wound to the chest. The deceased was also a known gang member with a long felony rap sheet.

So far it looked like another drug deal gone bad. Jacob had long ago lost compassion for most of the drug-addicted tweakers that were a plague to the city. He glanced over the witness statements, then shuffled all the papers back in order and closed the file. He lifted the beer can up and drained it. He finished off the last slice of pizza on the plate and went back to the kitchen for more.

Several hours later, he closed the last file and leaned back in the chair. The news had come on the television and he saw Donna Owens on the screen, making another police statement to the reporter. A stand off in the suburb of Beaverton, they had called the CERT team out and had ended up with a dead lunatic inside. Luckily he had let his estranged wife go free before sending a bullet through his brain.

He closed his eyes, and with his elbows resting of the desk, he rubbed his temples. Society was going to hell in a hand basket as far as he was concerned. It didn't matter how many people they brought in, the jails were too full. That was another thing, all the inmates with free room and board on the taxpayers buck. He hated the thought of his hard earned dollars going to feed and shelter some of the most miserable scum on this earth.

With a sigh, he decided to go to bed. He had another long day ahead of him, with an appearance at court first thing in the morning and several appointments in the afternoon.

In the bathroom he brushed and flossed his teeth, and performed the rest of his evening routine. Shutting off the light, he went into his bedroom and laid down on the king sized bed. Jacob Allen was asleep in eleven minutes.