Fouintenac was indeed one of Lew Meade's operatives; his real name Leon Stedman, and he'd had a wife and several children. He'd taken on the character of real-life Deputy Mayor Fouintenac merely to remain close to Jessica Coran, to act, as Sand had acted, in the capacity of bodyguard. Apparently, he'd let his guard down. Stedman, alias Fouintenac, had to be bagged, as did Matisak's remains, and Lew Meade was flying in a pathologist from nearby Mississippi to do the honors. Meade, Police Commissioner Stephens and Carl Landry put in appearances.
Meanwhile, Alex saw to it that both Kim and Jessica Coran were ushered off to a safe location where they might gather perspective and breathe a little easier.
He later returned to make sure that evidence techs did their jobs to the fullest, and he even helped by bagging a shardlike piece of glass, thin and beveled to a point—a high-tech blow dart likely dipped in poison, which had miraculously remained in Fouintenac's neck despite the rough treatment Jessica Coran's .38 had given the dead man's torso. If Jessica's story could be believed, and he had no reason to doubt her, she'd fired three times into Fouintenac's lifeless body when she'd mistaken it for Matisak.
Alex also helped in the triangulation of both Matisak's body and Fouintenac's body, but this was a useless gesture since both bodies had carouseled about the huge warehouse repeatedly.
Lew Meade was understandably upset at the loss of his agent, and he remained uncharacteristically charitable, allowing Alex to do his job, not fighting for territorial or jurisdictional rights or flashing his FBI badge about the place. He muttered something about Stedman's having been a good man in such a way as to make Alex wonder if he meant that Stedman was too good a man to have wasted on Jessica Coran's safety.
Even Meade's calling in the pathologist from the Mississippi FBI field office did not get in the way of the data and evidence collection. This surprised Alex. Since Dr. Jessica Coran was both FBI and the principal in the incident, Alex half expected everyone other than FBI would be given the heave-ho, but this didn't happen.
When Matisak was being pulled from the hook which had entered the base of his brain via the neck from behind, it took several men and a number of sweaty tugs to unhook him. The man had a noticeable hunchback and thick, even bloated skin with splotches of discoloration, as if he had suffered from some unusual disease. Located in the warehouse, not far from the body were a definitely out-of-place surgical table and dialysis machine, which the warehouse owners claimed to know absolutely nothing about.
Reporters from the Times-Picayune did their best to get past barricades and get a photo of the dead Matisak. A picture of the vampire killer beside the sad-faced clowns amid the ruined menagerie in the Mardi Gras warehouse would go for big bucks, and Yancy Rosswell, the police photographer, got what he termed some great surreal shots of the hapless victim.
When two body bags came out of the warehouse, news photographers went to work.
New Orleans was spared the brunt of Hurricane Lois as she made landfall between Biloxi and Gulfport instead; still, the city was ravaged by a primal wind and storm surge that de-stroyed whole sectors, putting many sections under water, the death toll mounting into the thirties, even as the newscasters spoke, since bodies were being discovered beneath flying debris and rubble. But due to the National Weather Service warnings, the time given to prepare and the fact that the center of the storm had bypassed the heart of the city, opting for the east, and because most people were either in their homes or evacuated northward, many lives were spared.
Back at the precinct house, the day was filled with paperwork involving the Matisak case. Both Kim Desinor and Jessica Coran were brought in to give statements. The day wasted away beneath a gunmetal-gray sky. At one point Alex and the others learned that a black man named Lewis was telling a story about having witnessed a beheading inside the confines of an automobile matching the one Stedman had been driving, one found abandoned not far from Gatorland Storage. Lewis's unobstructed view of the beheading had occurred just outside the hotel where Jessica Coran was staying. “The bastard was stalking Coran all along, no doubt about it,” Alex told Ben as they drove for Surette's former apartment. Tonight, Alex meant to do what he could to get some sort of lead on Easy that might lead to the Hearts Killer. It was time New Orleans was rid of such filth and garbage along with Matisak.
Darkness had descended over the city again. It was half past eight when Alex pulled within sight of Surette's place. Beside him, Ben yawned and guzzled the final drop of a soda he'd been drinking.
“This is crazy, Sincy,” Ben complained again. “I mean, we looked that place over from top to bottom the first time, and it was clean as a baby's behind after a bath. I remember saying how great it'd be to be able to live like these damned transients, you know? 'Member that? No paper, no bills, no bull, I said. Never seen such a clean place in my life. Always thought these types were messy, but not this guy.” Alex kept his own counsel. He just wanted to get back inside Surette's place.
“Transients live empty fucking lives,” Ben said now. “Wish I had a little less paper on me. You know I'm still paying on that freakin' van I bought four years ago?”
Alex replied, “He wasn't transient, though. He worked seven blocks down the street at the Blue Heron, remember? And not so much as a paycheck stub lying around that apartment.”
The silence built between them like a wall until Alex finally broke it anew. “I... I just can't help feeling we overlooked something. Will you just bear with me? Hell, you can warm your seat here while I go up, if you like ... have a doughnut, but I'm going to pay a visit.”
“I don't know, Alex...this time o' night, dem dare French Quarter folks asleep with der derringers unner der pillows, mon.”
“We'll pol-lite-ly knock and ask.”
“Suppose Gilreath's sister is covering for him, Alex.”
“You really think Gilreath's been lurking around New Orleans all this time, sleeping in some hole by day and coming out nights to overpower larger men and rip their hearts out with a butcher knife?”
“Just 'cause Surette was bigger than Davey, you don't think so, Alex? Come on, we both know that men can find superhuman strength while under duress. There was a struggle with Thommie Whiley, right? And Thommie was bigger than Davey Gilreath too, but that don't prove nothing, partner.”
“I don't know... doesn't figure, Big.”
“What doesn't figure?”
The old sounding-board game between them was back, and it felt good, Alex thought. “Pigsty Gilreath struck me as one of the few cross-dressing cretins around here who actually had his feet on the ground.”
“That fairy? I never saw anything particularly stable about him. I wouldn't rule him out, Alex, certainly not on the say-so of that whore Susie Socks. Our little Davey, in an attempt to make up for a variety of shortcomings of one sort or another, and taking into account an upbringing that involved a beating every other day... well...”
“Well, be that as it may, I just can't buy him as a mutilation murderer, Ben. He wasn't above getting his hands dirty in the small-change department, but murder, getting blood on his hands... I just don't see it with Pigsty, no. Of all the street transies in the area, he was at least concerned about good hygiene.”
“Including oral?” Ben's joke fell flat.
“And AIDS and other diseases, and yeah, that's what I mean. Hell, man, he couldn't stand to see blood or roadkill, much less kill someone. It just doesn't wash, him as the Queen of Hearts killer.”
“Guess we'll know more after we bring him in for questioning,” Ben said, letting it drop.
Alex gave Gilreath another thought. Perhaps he had gone off the deep end, perhaps he'd become a Mr. Hyde, roaming the street by night, picking his prey—gay men known to him—choosing his moment and attacking them, cannibalizing them for some bizarre religious-fantasy experience understood only in the heart and the mind of the madman.
But somehow Alex doubted it.
31
May I meet him with one too
th and it aching, and
one eye to be seeing seven and seventy divils
in the twists of the road, and one old timber
leg on him to limp into the grave. There he
is now crossing the strands, and that the Lord
God would send a high wave to wash him from the world.
—John Millington Synge
Once at the apartment which had previously been Victor Surette's, the two detectives first learned from the superintendent who was the current occupant. It was a young man named Michael Dominique, and they were greeted with a smile from a tall, sallow-faced youth whose eye shadow was half on, half off, his eyelashes startlingly long and lovely, though the rouge and lipstick were a bit overdone. His eyes were extremely feminine, piercing and hypnotic, and as green and hard as jade as he peeked from behind the door chain.
“I'm Detective Sincebaugh and this is Detective deYampert, ma'am, ahh, sir...Mister... ahh...”
“Dominique, Michael Emanuel Dominique, and don't mention being sorry around me, sweet cakes. So, you're two big strong strapping cops here just to see me? Really now...” He opened the door wide to reveal that he was in a tie-dyed, rainbow-colored terry robe, his hair in a towel as if just washed.
“Freshly dyed,” he said, pointing to the towel atop his head, his eyes following Alex's. “Must keep up appearances, you know.”
“We're here... well, we've been investigating the Queen of Hearts killings from the beginning, and—”
“Oh, dear, how tragic... how terribly, horribly tragic it all is, but what has it to do with me?” Mr. Dominique looked truly perplexed.
“Well, we'd like to ask you a few questions about the apartment.”
“The apartment?'' He was now clearly confused, turning to stare inward at the place. It wasn't a bad place. Lots of room and closet space as Alex had recalled, the bedroom, living area and kitchen three separate rooms, a full bath rounding it off. Most of the older apartments in the area, you had to share a bath at the end of the hall. The furnishings were Surette's or belonged to the super, exactly as they'd last seen the place, a hodgepodge of styles from a steel-and-glass Scandinavian coffee table to an Early American couch with flowers and turkeys as a pattern.
“Yes, well, one of the victims once lived here,” Alex said. “His name was Victor, Victor Surette.”
The young man turned away and stepped to the couch, asking them to come in before he sat, crossing his cleanly shaved legs, displaying his manicured nails, the fingers long and delicate, his feet covered in bunny-eared slippers. “I wouldn't know. No one's ever told me about that.” Alex thought him extremely composed at learning such information. For all this guy knew, Surette's body might have been found right here in this room, on the very couch where Dominique now sat.
“Well, it has been a long time,” Alex volunteered, “but my partner and I would like to ask you if at any time during your stay here...”
“Yes?”
“If you've gotten mail for Surette, or a phone call asking about him, or just anything about the previous tenant. Or if you'd found anything lying about that might've belonged to Mr. Surette.”
“Well, no... I'm sorry, but I haven't.”
“You didn't know him?”
“Well, no... I didn't.”
“But you knew of him?”
“Of him?” He shook his head.
“Well, he had something of a reputation. He was an entertainer, a cross-dressing entertainer, so I assumed you might have met others in the area who knew of him.” Alex had calculated the number of potential victims for the maniac who preferred cross-dressing gays, and realized that he could well be speaking to a future victim of the killer at this moment.
“Well, if there's nothing else, gentlemen,” said the young man whom Sincebaugh placed at around twenty-three or twenty-four, a couple of years older than Surette would have been. Looking around and seeing no photos or loose papers lying around, no books or magazines or even a newspaper, made Alex flash again on the sameness of the room. Mr. Dominique or whatever his name was had not put any individual stamp on the place, at least not on this room.
“Yeah, Sincy, we'd best be on our way,” said deYampert, regaining his feet.
“Would you mind terribly if we looked around, Mr. Dominique?”
“For what?” he asked, surprised by the question.
“Well, for any loose boards or bricks, anything below or behind which Mr. Surette may have placed papers.”
“What precisely are you looking for?”
“Frankly, we don't know.”
“You don't know?”
“We won't know until we see it.”
“I see... I think. Well... feel free in here, but as I've said, I have an engagement and must finish dressing. I'll do so in the other room.”
“Very nice of you to allow us to search,” said Ben, who began to do so in haste—anxious to leave, it appeared. “We'd like to search all the rooms, if that's okay with you, Mr. Dominique,” said Alex. “Your cooperation in this matter would be most appreciated.” Dominique frowned and made a feeble joke. “Guess I'll have to check with my lawyer first.” Then, laughing, he said, “Sure, why not. But, if you should find something useful, and it actually leads you to this maniac, maybe I'll see some—you know...” He seductively blinked his fake lashes at Alex. “Some sort of... reward?”
Ben stifled a laugh.
Alex simply replied, “Your reward might just be in saving your own life in the bargain, Mr. Dominique.”
“Please, call me Dom or Dommie for short. Everyone does.”
“All right, Dom.”
Dom then twittered and started on his way into the next room. But he stopped at the door to add, “Just as soon as I'm dressed, you two boys can sniff around my bedroom all you like for all you want.” Now the coyness and the flirtation were overt, challenging.
Alex and Ben exchanged a putrid look as Dominique left the room. When he'd shut the door behind him, the two detectives fell out laughing, each shushing the other. In a moment, they returned to the business at hand, searching every corner of the room, Ben still filled with a disgruntled disbelief that they were even here and a powerful, preconceived notion that they'd find absolutely nothing as before.
“We're drawing at straws here, pard,” Ben was saying when his eyes fell upon something. His sudden silence made Alex wheel and look down at the hardwood floor below the couch where a strange-looking, white-laced doily with a queen of hearts playing card stitched into it lay half in, half out of the darkness. Dominique had first been sitting and then standing there, possibly trying to conceal the thing earlier. At the same instant, the door to the bedroom burst open and Dominique, in full feminine dress, attacked Ben, who was closest to the door, the huge blade plunging into the big man's chest even as he fended him off.
Alex snatched out his gun, but Ben's enormous form was between them, and with successive strikes of the knife, the big man fell into Alex, knocking him to the floor, Alex's head striking hard against the edge of a bureau.
His vision blurred, with no idea how long he'd been out, Alex's eyes opened on the horrid sight of Dominique in women's clothing, forcing his hand into the cavernous wound he'd opened up in deYampert's chest. Alex saw him come away with his best friend's heart and he cried out, his hands frantically searching for his weapon, which had skittered across the room.
But he was trapped under Ben's dead weight, and now he as she was coming for Alex, prepared to open him up with an enormous, serrated knife that looked like something out of an operating room.
When the killer leaned in over Alex, he saw clearly that Dominique's dress had been ripped and the carefully created breasts were real. The madman had all along been a madwoman. The knife loomed larger and larger as she approached with Ben's blood-soaked heart in her left hand. Alex fought a useless battle to struggle free of his best friend's dead weight, but being pinned beneath Ben deYampert was little different from being pinned below a dead horse. Only
Alex's arms had worked free, but they were no match against the cutting machine she would become once she began wielding the knife. He had a second gun strapped to his ankle, but there was no way to get at it.
She enjoyed his complete helplessness.
“You loved Vicki, too, didn't you? Everybody loved sweet, little Vicki,” she said in a cooing voice. “Ring around the rosy, pocket full of hearts, not posies... a heart is a terrible thing to waste, isn't it? Well, isn't it!”
“What have you done with the hearts?”
“Same as I'll do with yours and your friend's. You all have a place waiting at Raveneaux, just like little Vicki.”
He expected her at any moment to bite into the heart which had beat in Ben deYampert's chest only moments before, to cannibalize the organ, but she instead caressed the still-pumping muscle, and reverently placed it onto the glass table-top, which had miraculously escaped the kicking and fighting that'd been the death dance between Ben and Dominique.
The heart flapped like a fish there on the glass-topped table, and Alex's heart sank to see the awful sight, his grief for Ben almost overpowering the evil image of his own dislodged heart lying alongside Ben's.
She came closer with the knife, an elongated ratchet-toothed thing which could cut bone, shining swordlike in its sharp thin lines. Enjoying her self immensely, her tongue flicking about her lips, her animal appetite whetted, she plunged it at his exposed throat and upper torso, but he grabbed her wrist at the last moment, battling her for control. She placed both hands over the knife, shoving her whole weight against it, powerful with the strength given the mad.
Suddenly someone was pounding on the door, shouting from outside for the occupant to open up.
It was garbled, but it sounded like backup or at least the landlord. Someone had heard the disturbance and had called for help.
Pure Instinct (Instinct thriller series) Page 41
