After an hour's examination, she began to talk to Otto once again. “She… the mutilation to the body was done after she was dead.”
County Sheriff Stowell had drifted in, and hearing this, he remarked, “Thank God, then she didn't suffer.”
“ Wrong. She suffered a great deal,” countered Jessica. She then said to Otto, “I'll know more about the weapons used by the killer later, after I've had a chance to examine the tissues under magnification.”
“ How can you be sure she was dead before the mutilation occurred?” asked Otto. “The lack of blood evidence?”
“ Yes, for one.”
“ Killer cleaned up the place,” suggested Stowell.
“ Not a chance he could have cleaned it entirely from the walls, the ceiling, the floor,” she said. “Besides, other than footprints, the dirt over these floors hasn't been disturbed. No, he didn't bother cleaning a damned thing.”
“ Then where the hell's the blood?”
She and Otto exchanged a look. Otto glared at Stowell from where he was crouched beside Jessica, and said, “This information is strictly confidential, Sheriff.”
“ Absolutely… absolutely.”
# # #
She and Otto huddled together, Otto obviously excited now. “So the bastard drained her of her blood.”
“ A slow process and a slow death.”
“ What'd he use?”
“ Tubes maybe… I can't say at this point… but it was controlled, very controlled.”
“ And the mutilation afterward? Just a cover?”
“ Purely cosmetic, for our benefit.”
“ You can tell all that without your tests and scopes? It's that cut-and-dry?”
“ No, the other way around. It's dry first, cut second.”
“ No doubts?”
“ None. Look… look closely here.” With forceps, she opened the awful gash to the dead woman's throat which had been smeared with blood that had dripped down to her chin and mouth, drying in an unusual pattern. “This wound is awful, but it was inflicted after she died, and the blood… well, it had to have been placed on-”
“ Placed on?”
“ Applied, smeared on, afterward.”
“ There's got to be prints in the blood, then.”
“ Not if he used surgical gloves, and I believe we're dealing with a very controlled killer here.”
“ You saying he's a shrewd bastard?”
“ In some ways. Others, he's foolish. Like we're supposed to naively believe that she died of these wounds? Odd thing is that there is significant coloration below the facade of the blood on the throat to indicate some sort of ligature wound possibly, or something else to discolor the tissues here and here,” she finished, pointing.
“ So it's just as I suspected,” he said, “a Tort 9.”
“ Think you can get me some black coffee, Otto?” she asked. “I've got a lot more to do here yet.”
“ Doctor, your wish is my command. This is an important step for us both.”
“ That coffee'11 do me just fine, and maybe a hot shower later? And maybe the understanding of God?”
“ I can arrange for the coffee and shower, but the other one? You're on your own there, kid.”
She watched him go before turning back to the corpse, her eyes zeroing in on the whites of the dead girl's eyes where they had rolled back in her head, a natural reaction to terror. The whites were speckled with near invisible, infinitesimal red dots which would show up much better under bright light and magnification, but Jessica had seen the unmistakable telltale signs of strangulation before, and here they were. Everything pointed to the throat as the aperture through which the killer drained his victim. Below the cosmetic slash of the madman, she was certain there had to be more signs of the actual cause of death. But here, now, under these conditions, how was she to determine that? It couldn't be done.
Where was that damned coffee?
Suddenly, one of the deceased's eyes wobbled and flipped back into place, the pupil staring back at Jessica Coran, making her start. The dead girl had had lovely, deep blue eyes.
TWO
“ Assuming you're right,” Chief Inspector Leamy, Otto Boutine's boss, had said the day before, “that there is a serial killer making off with whole liters of blood from his victims, Otto, what in hell do you think the guy's doing with it?”
“ He might be using it for any number of purposes. Case histories have people using it in ceremonies, rituals, satanic-”
“ But you don't think this has anything to do with any cult? You think it's one flippo, right?”
Leamy leaned into the cushioned leather chair, rocking lightly, waiting for Otto's answer.
“ It's my educated guess that this guy drinks the blood, but whatever he's doing with it, bathing in it or painting his walls with it, the bastard's got some warped need for it, and he wants it fresh and pumped direct from his victims.”
“ Whoa, you're going way out on a limb here, Otto. Nothing in the forensics reports I saw backs you on this. At every crime scenario, the locals believed the body was removed from the slaughter scene, which explains the absence of blood all over. Now you take a giant, imaginative leap and on the basis of that, the bureau's supposed to launch an all-out investigation of this guy based on possible wrong assumptions?”
“ You pay me for my imagination and my intelligence. Bill. I've never let you down before, have I?” Leamy hesitated, started to form words, but rolled his gums about instead.
“ Well, have I?”
Leamy leaned even farther over his desk, fixing Otto with a cold stare. “You know as well as I do, Otto, that it only takes one major screw up and the organizational find a new place for both of us to sit out our years. You remember Colin Armory? You recall where he finished up?”
Otto hated this side of Bill Leamy: the man had worked hard to get where he was, and he meant to take no risks, and what he was saying at the moment was less than veiled. There was a recession on, budget cutbacks had been brutal, and if Otto committed manpower and a small fortune on an investigation plan, it had better produce results or it was Boutine's ass and not Leamy's.
Leamy suddenly began asking Boutine about his wife's condition, a courtesy that the man had extended once too often of late, the conversation taking on a perfunctory, sterile quality. Boutine's wife was in a coma in the hospital, the victim of an aneurysm.
Otto had become convinced that a number of previously unrelated cases were in fact related, that the killer had a taste for blood, and that he was that rare breed of killer who relied on the ninth level of torture, blood draining and blood drinking, to get his kicks.
Tonight was the first time he had seen a recent victim of Tort 9 firsthand; he had, as a first year field operative in California, seen the results of one other such blood-sucker. And now, he knew in his soul, with every fiber of his being, that the crime scene he stared at tonight had everything to do with that awful California case, almost as if this new killer had studied under James P. Childers who died in the gas chamber in 1979 after Boutine had helped put the bastard away. But Childers left a trail so clear and obvious that it was as if he had wanted to be stopped. That seemed not to be the case with this new psychopath.
And this guy ran the torture gamut, touching almost all the grid boxes on the FBI forms: Torture levels one and two with disfigurement of the sexual organs; dismemberment, Torts three through five. The only heinous acts the bastard seemed uninterested in performing were Torts six through eight, acts of disembowelment and cannibalism. But there was no doubt the fiend enjoyed draining his victims of their blood, slowly and with extreme caution, so as to lose not a milliliter unnecessarily. Boutine could be wrong, of course. The blood could be taken off for other than a manic feeding, and maybe the killer didn't use it as Kool-Aid, but something told him differently.
Otto believed Jessica Coran's findings would not only lend credence to his theory, but that she, like him, would soon be risking her hard-won reputat
ion as well. As young as she was and as new to the division as she was, Dr. Coran was known for her thoroughness and her tenacity to stick by her convictions, no matter what the consequences. She was a far cry from the man who had been overlooked for the position she now held. Dr. Zachary Raynack had been blind to what Otto felt to be obvious signs of a Tort 9 killer.
“ Call it a hunch,” Otto had finally told Leamy the day before.
Leamy had gotten up from his seat, not a good sign. “You don't bet the ranch on a hunch, Otto. You, of all people, should know that. You sure this thing with your wife-” Leamy hesitated “-hasn't affected your reasoning on matters of-”
“ You've got nothing to worry about on that score, Bill. Nothing whatsoever!” Otto hoped that his firm voice, tinged with anger, had settled Leamy's mind about him. It was obvious that Leamy's garrulous golfing buddy, Dr. Raynack, had already gotten to him.
Otto pulled his thoughts from Leamy's and Quantico's concerns about him. He concentrated instead on Jessica Coran whose orchestration of the evidence gathering must seem like science fiction to the locals. Her instruments and the procedures she followed were cutting edge, and she had taken charge as she should, sending the brawny policemen to their hands and knees to rip out linoleum just below the sink in an adjacent alcove, as well as floor boards below the victim's head. Despite what seemed a lack of any blood anywhere, she knew that trace elements, even after washing and scrubbing, could be detected under a scanning electron microscope. If the killer so much as pricked himself as he hacked away at the body, she'd find some trace of his blood from the sink, the tiles, or the boards, Otto believed. He had heard through the grapevine that she was affectionately known as the “Scavenger.” Raynack, by comparison, was known as the “Rat Man” of the department.
Otto watched her intently now, finding Dr. Coran extremely easy to look at, remembering the first time he had ever seen her, and how he had felt as if his breath had been stolen. In this setting, she was of course in stark and unrelenting contrast to the male-dominated environment, but even in a roomful of vibrant women, he believed she'd stand out. Jessica had long auburn hair, which when not tied back, was just this side of wild. Her creamy complexion was flawless against a beautiful, navy-blue suit with a white chiffon blouse, but now the suit jacket was out in the car, lying atop her overcoat, replaced by a linen apron that also covered her petite skirt. Not even this could hide her slimness. Otto saw Stowell and some of the others snatching glances at her from time to time.
Terrific genes, he realized. At seventeen, she had been a tall and willowy girl, possessing a startling grace for one so young. She had her father's height, his knowing glint in the eye, and her mother's whiskey voice and high cheek bones. She had the characteristic intent-on-her-work attitude that had made her father so invaluable to the military. Boutine had known Dr. Oswald Coran as one of the finest medical examiners he had ever met, as had everyone who had dealings with the man, some of whom were the families of MIAs, senators, generals and presidents. In fact, Coran had presided over many controversial autopsies, his expertise often sought in an attempt to disprove rumors of foul play as in the plane crash deaths of two senators in a one-week period two years before.
Oswald Coran had died of a debilitating disease that first took his limbs, his muscles atrophying, leaving only his keen mind intact, imprisoned in a useless, wasted body. For such a man, it was a condemnation to hell. There was some talk that his sudden death was the result of euthanasia, but it was never pursued. Sadly for Jessica, her father's condition came on the heels of an automobile accident that had claimed her mother. Somehow Jessica persevered and had finished her residency at Bethesda Naval Hospital, where her father had once been chief of forensics.
According to Jessica's father, the Navy saw that their medical practitioners got what they needed in the way of training, as opposed to the Army. He insisted she either train under the Navy or through private medical schools. She chose the latter, but as a “navy brat” her upbringing was filled with upheaval, change and disruption, and as a result she seemed tough beneath the gentle exterior, and she hadn't a clue as to just how stunning she was. Her idea of a beauty regimen was to pull her hair back and splash on perfume, and for her, that was all it took.
She was holding back tonight, allowing Boutine to be the man in charge, and yet everyone in the place knew that she was in charge, that something had happened when she went to work. Charisma, the X-factor, whatever it was that made others respond to her, she had it. Otto knew that all he had was the ability to intimidate and frighten.
He had met her once, when she was sixteen or seventeen, at the ceremony held when her father had been made chief of forensics at Bethesda. She had come a long way.
Suddenly she stood, stretching out the cramps in her legs from the crouching she had been doing. She turned and found him staring, and almost politely asked, “Daydreaming, Otto? At a time like this?”
Not giving away anything, he fired back at her. “Defense mechanism.” He wondered if she had any idea that she was the subject of his thoughts.
“ Give me a hand,” she said. “I need a pair of tweezers I left over by the valise, and another vial, please.”
He pocketed his unlit pipe, nodding, saying, “Sure, sure… Anything else?”
Otto felt the eyes of the other men on them, perhaps envious of him. Envious not because of his many years of service with the Bureau, nor his long record of accomplishments, but envious that he knew her personally and professionally.
“ Family's got a right to put this thing to rest,” said Dr. Samuel Stadtler in her ear. The gray-haired, pinch-faced local pathologist had been shuffling the periphery of the crime scene for hours muttering disturbing words to the sheriff and the others because he had not been asked by Jessica to assist in any way.
“ It may be a while before I can release the body to you. Dr. Stadtler,” she told him. “I'll want to be involved in the autopsy, you understand?”
“ I understand more than you know,” he said cryptically. “For instance, I know that murder isn't normally the concern of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. I know that Stowell called you people in, and I know how you people operate, without the slightest concern for the family.”
Otto stepped in, hearing this, and seeing that all the other lawmen were anxious to see the showdown between the old country doctor and the young lady doctor. Otto said, “This is a federal affair now, Dr. Stadtler-”
But he was cut off by Jessica, who stepped into Dr. Stadtler's face. “And you can either cooperate or be removed from the case altogether. Either way, it's up to you.”
“ I have jurisdiction here, Doctor,” snapped Stadtler.
“ No, no, you don't. Not unless and until we are asked by the authorities who requested us in to leave,” she countered. “Now, I suggest, sir, that if you're so concerned about the family, then you go and sit with them and counsel them, sir.”
Stadtler's face was flushed and he could not find words to express his anger. Looking around for support but finding none, he marched out. They heard his car ignition and the bump and grind of the vehicle on the weedy dirt road.
Otto turned to her and said, “You're going to find that a lot of locals are threatened by us when we come in.”
“ God, I hope I didn't make things worse.”
“ No, no, you handled him by the book.”
She smiled for the first time tonight. Otto's forehead was one of his most intriguing features, being so dominant and wide at the top. His cranial size gave way to a smooth tapering jaw and firm chin, which made for a long face with a variety of expressions, all hard to read at times. He was tall, regal even; his straight-backed posture and take-charge manner never failed to impress. And now Otto's steel and ice eyes penetrated the fog of her fatigue, and for a moment she saw the pain behind those eyes, the ghost of a demon, perhaps two or three, demons that creased his face with concerns he could not voice.
“ Better get done here,” he s
aid, drawing away from her stare as if to hide his eyes from further investigation.
“ Yeah, right.”
Boutine returned to the tight leash he'd held the other men on, ordering them back to work, telling them precisely what Dr. Coran wanted and needed, managing to irk them all in turn until silence blanketed the crowded little death hole. When this happened, Otto stepped outside for some air.
Everyone here had been touched by this victim; touched in a place no one wished to ever be touched. She realized only now just how badly Otto had been affected.
The idea that there was in this world someone who wanted to rob her of her blood, to drink it down and piss it away, the thought alone made the FBI woman shudder in that secret part of her soul reserved for fears she had thought long banished from her psyche.
But the psyche never did play fair, not even with itself.
Otto Boutine had seen mutilation murder in its every guise throughout his long career in the FBI Psychological Profiling Division and as an advisor before such a division existed; in fact, most of the cases he had handled dealt with some form of body mutilation. He had become the resident dean of mutilation murders, the expert, the Ben “obi-wan” Kenobi of mutilation. It sometimes concerned him that this was how he had spent his life; that he had spent more waking hours-and sometimes the hours in deep sleep-inside the minds of the most brutal killers ever brought to justice, than he had with his wife who was now slipping helplessly away from him. But from the moment he had gone into collaboration with the Bureau, he had learned how to think like a man capable of the most atrocious acts imaginable, but this, the result of the ninth level of torture, was not easily fathomed.
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