Grave Instinct

by Robert W. Walker

  Grant followed her out the door and onto the street, where she finally acquiesced. “I might like to make a purchase from you, but that is all.”

  “A purchase, sure ...”

  “And that is all. We exchange goods, and you say goodbye.”

  “Of course, I could arrange that. But not here on the street. You'll have to come with me to my van.”

  She followed him to the side street, far from Bourbon Street where all the pedestrian traffic herded together like cattle. At the van, she insisted, “I will not get inside this thing with you. I don't know you.”

  “Then just climb into the passenger seat. You can leave the door ajar.”

  “Not the seat, not getting in. No way am I going into your van.”

  He argued, “I'm not conducting illegal business on the street, my dear, now come along.”

  “I am not, I repeat, going anywhere with you.”

  From her dress and manner, he imagined she lived nearby, that she was a native to the city.

  “Your place then? How far is it?”

  She had second thoughts. He was too pushy for her liking. “Just give me two packets of your best weed.”

  “Not out in the open like this.”

  They continued to argue, and as it heated up, the grocer came out and, with a broom in hand, began to shoo him away as if he were a fly. Frustrated at the man's interference and the woman's determination, Phillip caused Grant to lash out and grab the broom, and he and the grocer began a tug of war for it. The broom flashed wildly before Selese's eyes. A handful of onlookers from windows overhead and a few children straddling bikes on the street looked on from a safe distance, some laughing when the broom slipped from the grocer's hand and hit the woman in the temple, causing her to shout, “You stupid bastard!”

  Grant heedlessly grabbed her and forced her into the van at that point, handcuffing her to the seat. Her cries for help were cut off when he slammed the door shut. As he did so, the grocer tried to stop him, but Grant knocked him down, and the older man's head slammed into a metal pipe railing. More laughter erupted from the boys on the bikes.

  That's when Grant heard sirens. Some meddling person had called the police. He quickly leapt into the van and tore away from the place, knowing it was time to change his license plate for the one he had stolen in a hotel lot in North Carolina.

  He looked out his windshield to see a police car ap-proaching, lights and siren going. His immediate thought was to race by it, but Phillip said, “Calm down, pull over like a good citizen.” Just as the thought came to mind, however, the woman reached over and bit him in the neck, tearing wildly with her teeth, causing him to weave and almost hit the patrol car. He elbowed her in the gut, knocking the wind out of her, and she doubled over while he regained control of the van, missing the squad car by mere inches.

  Now he found himself in a police chase. “Fucking stupid, Phillip!” he shouted. “Look what you've got us into now!”

  Rounding a corner, he instantly wheeled the van into a dark little alleyway where he pulled in behind a large trash container. He next heard the approaching siren, and then saw the single set of flashing lights as the New Orleans police car raced by, missing him. She yelled out, but he covered her mouth and with his free hand, he stabbed her with the syringe and put her under with the Demoral.

  He again cursed. “Phillip, you son of a bitch, look what you've gotten us into!” He tried to breathe but found his air coming up short. He knew he could not remain there, that he had to find a safer place, the place along the levy that he'd scouted out earlier. He looked at the features of the woman as she began to doze off. Taking her purse from her, he found her ID.

  “Well, Selese, that's a pretty name, Miss Montoya.”

  He recalled how absolutely disinterested in him she had been, and he knew early on that he should have stepped away, apologized even. “Instead, I draw a fucking crowd and knock a man into a pipe. He's likely in a damned coma. Cops are all over my ass. Your fault, Phillip, your damned fault!”

  “My fault? How so?”

  “Bloody fool. You're getting so arrogant, so reckless that you don't care what happens to me.”

  And now here they sat parked in a dead-end box canyon of a place within sight of the Super Dome with a victim, the tools that would mark him as the Skull-digger, and the police in pursuit. He thought his heart would burst.

  “Calm down,” Phillip told him. “Calm down and get to work.”

  Grant replied, “You fool! You almost got us caught back there.”

  “Shhh . . . think I hear something.”

  Grant listened intently. He heard it, too. A slow rumble over gravel and potholes, followed by silence; then the sound of a door squeaking ever so inaudibly open but not quite silent, followed by an even noisier second door squeak. A look in his rearview mirror told him the situation. “The cops. They're here.”

  “We've talked about when and if this day ever came, Grant. It's going to be OK. Just remember how to play it.”

  He un cuffed the girl and quietly opened her door, telling her to run, that she was free. She moved like a zombie, but she did fall out and get up, attempting to escape in her heavily sedated state, creating the diversion Phillip knew she would.

  Meanwhile, he reached for the shotgun attached to the sidewall, and gingerly crept back toward the rear. He'd secured the shotgun when he'd first outfitted the van for just such a moment. He called out that he was giving himself up and unlocking the door.

  “We put in your location and the license plate,” said Doyle to whoever was in the van. “You did call it in, didn't you, Tony?” he whispered to Labruto.

  “Yeah, but that was back a ways, when we were in Jackson Heights.”

  “Maybe you'd better call it in again—now!”

  Labruto inched back toward the unit, but like Doyle, he watched the door latch jiggle and then came a thunderous pop, telling them the driver had suddenly unlocked it from the inside. Yet the doors remained closed. And the two officers remained anxious, their weapons pointed.

  “Open it up and come out with your hands on your head!” ordered Labruto.

  Collin Doyle thought he heard a sound from the side of the van, and even as he shouted, “May be two of them, Tony!” his eyes darted from the rear door to the direction of the sound of clumsy footfalls. Labruto glanced for a moment, and, seeing a woman stumble into view, shouted, “Hold your fire, Doyle. It's the woman.” Just as Labruto said this, Grant viciously kicked open the rear doors, resulting in an explosion of noise as he sprayed both officers with one round each of buckshot to face and upper torso. Both Labruto and Doyle fell to the sodden earth and weeds, even as Grant reloaded both barrels. The crackle of the buckshot wafted out over the river and toward the Super Dome. Silence followed the two explosions. Seeing no movement, hearing not so much as a moan from either policeman, Grant believed the shotgun blasts at such close range had killed both men.

  No doubt they had called in the plate, learning it was stolen. No doubt backup was on the way.

  He grabbed Selese Montoya and shoved her unceremoniously into the rear of the van, leapt in and secured her completely—ankles, wrists, head. He then grabbed the new license plate and quickly changed it out. Tossing the old plate into the van, he closed the doors and went to check on the two cops.

  Labruto had worked his way up to a sitting position, bloodied, dazed and attempting to steady his gun to fire. The noise he made against the gravel surface alerted Grant who turned from Doyle's silent body to find him self staring at Labruto's gun. Grant could not understand why the policeman did not fire, but it was written in his eyes. He hadn't the strength to pull the trigger.

  Labruto fought to get the words out, bluffing. “Don't maa-kee me ffff.”

  Grant grabbed up the shotgun and fired again, instantly killing Labruto this time. Doyle had not moved an inch since the first round. Grant let it be, rushing back to the driver's seat and tearing away from this place. To do so, he had to back over
Labruto's body to get out of the dead end he found himself in.

  He wound his way back toward the interstate ramp, hearing sirens on the way. He sped onto the ramp and blended in with a stream of dense traffic on the interstate.

  Quantico The same hour

  EVERYONE on Jessica's team was asked to pull a double shift, and no one balked. They had gotten word that AOC had lost the final and deciding round in their battle. Still, AOC found ways to delay, and so Jessica had asked all her people to stay on board. Phone calls to home were made, cots were set up, a catering service was called in for food, drink and coffee urns.

  The doctor list was still being closely examined against what little they knew of the Skull-digger. A doctor named Simon Wells looked like a good candidate from his picture and a history of violent episodes that had lost him his career. Several others appeared good leads, inclpding a domestic disturbance arrest against Dr. Jervis Swantor. Jessica immediately recalled the man from the yacht in Florida, and J.T. reminded her of both his suspicious behavior at the crime scene, which Combs had told them about, and his having attended the Jacksonville victim's funeral. They had cleared him as a serious candidate when Lorena Combs had done a complete background check on him. They hadn't taken Swantor as a serious candidate then, and he didn't look any better now. No other suggestions that he was violent had been reported to law enforcement since his wife's complaint months before. There was no coincidence in his coming up on VICAP; it was the same report Combs had flagged earlier. “Still, if and whenever we get access to Cahil's vistors online, I'd like you to check for Swantor's name.”

  One after the other doctor on the list fell to the wayside as alibis, time and geography cleared them. But Simon Wells still appeared worth a look, as his case was so curious.

  Eriq Santiva's Cuban features looked particularly weary when he entered the task force unit. Everyone cheered on seeing him, knowing he had fought and won against AOC.

  “Yeah . . . finally ...” he replied to them all, a bit embarrassed at the show of gratitude. “We finally have a victory over those damned AOC lawyers. The important thing is that we now have access to their database.”

  This was met with mutterings and shakes of the head.

  Eriq stared at Jessica and then J.T. “Don't tell me you're still waiting to hear from them?” asked Eriq. “The order was given over an hour ago.” He looked at his watch, which read 9:05 P.M.

  “Yeah, they're still stalling,” replied Jessica. “Now it's some nonsense about technical difficulties.”

  “The judge's order was plain enough.” Eriq found a chair and fell into it. “Tell me Jess, John, tell me that you've had some progress, that you've got something in the works.”

  “We've got a curious fellow here,” said Jessica, holding a readout of the information she had amassed on Simon Wells. “A tip from the ex-wife of a Dr. Simon Wells looks of interest. Wells was listed as a juvenile offender in VICAP—J.T.'s idea to check it. Anyway, Wells came under scrutiny when a high school student. He was put on a minor watch list for possible serial killer tendencies due to his cruelty to animals.”

  “Fits the profile,” commented J.T. “Not unlike Cahil.”

  “Really. Of course, the juvenile-offender program of violent criminal activity. Why didn't we go there sooner?”

  “It doesn't come up on its own with VICAP requests. You have to key it in separately,” said J.T.

  “Oversight,” said Jessica.

  “Perhaps it wouldn't have been if I'd been able to get you more help down here.”

  “In 1984, at the age of sixteen, he was at the American Academy for Young Men in Lauralie, Massachusetts, when that private boys' school had something of a scandal involving the ingesting of cooked cat brains. Some other students in the dorm objected to the odors coming from Wells's room, where he often cooked on a hot plate. While the American Academy downplayed the incident, the state wasn't so willing to sweep the incident under the official rug. Still, after some initial moves against Wells to try him in juvenile court, it was dropped. However, the DA contacted the closest FBI field office and reported the incident, which was placed in our files more than a year after the incident. The man who sent in a report, an agent named Alvin Degrasso, interviewed the kid.”

  “What did this Degrasso find?”

  “He found that Wells roamed the campus and town of Lauralie for its stray cats, offered them a home and soon they disappeared.”

  “Another cat eater like Cahil, huh?”

  “When confronted with it, the young man had confessed to the headmaster to killing the cats, skinning and cooking their flesh and eating them. This included eating their brains. He admitted to doing the same with a dog as well.”

  Eriq asked, “Why wasn't he expelled and sent packing?”

  “He was—for one term. Wells later went on to medical school at Northwestern, concentrating on pathology and forensics “He got into med school?” asked J.T.

  “Must have somehow gotten his record expunged, and like I said, it never went to court.”

  “But Degrasso made sure,” added Eriq, “that VICAP had his number.”

  “Degrasso hounded Wells for a time. In later years, discovering that Wells was marrying, Degrasso made it his business to inform his fiancee of Wells's earlier habits. The young bride stood by her man at the time, and she and hubby threatened a lawsuit against the agent for harassment. Degrasso was reprimanded and soon retired from the bureau. Urged to do so,” Jessica added, “I imagine. The wife left Wells soon after.”

  “You've done some digging,” said Eriq. “So, where's Wells now? Do we have him in our sights?”

  Wells's case had intrigued Jessica more than the others on the list because so many serial killers began their careers as children who harmed animals. “He's a general practitioner in Elixir, Mississippi, but he hasn't been practicing for a year. He was brought up on some ethics charge involving a scam on Medicare patients. He was out on bail when he disappeared. The wife divorced him seven years ago. At the moment, we don't know his whereabouts, which is another reason we're looking so hard at him for the Digger killings.”

  “Anything else?” asked Eriq.

  “Every new lead and a lot of old ones are being followed. Agents across the nation are questioning suspects, and we've urged them to ask our targets if they have ever logged on to Cahil's Isle of Brainsite, to see what the reaction might be. At the same time, we realize that the Digger is a moving target, not likely a homebody.”

  “Why are we still waiting on AOC?” asked Eriq, pacing the computer-analysis room now. Stating the obvious, angry. “What kind of technical difficulties are they saying?”

  “Something lame about a problem with getting all the IDs to us on a continuous flow. They thought it best for us that way. ...”

  “Thinking kindly of us now that we've killed their sorry asses before a federal court?” Eriq sarcastically replied.

  J.T. said, “We know this Wells character owns a Dodge van, and that he may have relocated to the D.C. area, which would give him quick access to Richmond and the other early kill sites.” “Wait a moment . . . hold on,” Jessica suddenly interrupted.

  “What it is, Jess?” asked Eriq.

  “We've been going at this all wrong . . . backward. Suppose we have a doctor who comes up on the tip list but not on the violent criminals file?”

  “I thought the idea was to cross-reference the three lists, VICAP, civilian tips and AOC, and if not, the two lists.” Eriq scrunched features displayed his confusion.

  “Yeah, that's been the plan, but suppose this Seeker guy has absolutely no record of any sort? Nothing on file?”

  “A killer like this Digger ... He has to have had some run-in with the law somewhere,” said Eriq.

  “Not if he's been careful and lucky. Just suppose it's possible . . . that he's avoided and eluded everyone around him .. . then . . .”

  “Then he wouldn't be on the list we just developed,” said J.T.

  Je
ssica went to the computer technician, Dana, and said, “I know this is redundant, but I need a list taken from the civilian tips only to be crossed with the words we've been matching.”

  “I saved that list already when creating the crossover list,” she replied. “No problem.” E>ana stroked a few keys and in a moment the printer erupted and the list from all the civilian tips with their key words encrypted was complete. “Here you are,” finished Dana.

  Jessica lifted the list. Only those on the civilian tips who were doctors and butchers in which the tip used the words, “brain,” “mind,” “soul” “isle” or “island.” The list was hefty at forty plus names, but it was quickly reduced as Jessica, with J.T.'s help, began comparing it with the ones on the VICAP list as well. J.T. called out the names from his list, and Jessica pencil stroked them off her list. This seems counterproductive,” said Eriq. “Subtracting the men who made the VICAP list.”

  Jessica asked for his patience. “Once more,” she added.

  Simon Wells, along with most of the others on the original list, were now hand stricken from the new list. Simon Wells had been put into VICAP by Degrasso years ago, and now he had come in as a tip from his ex-wife, who had hounded a field agent in Mississippi to take her tip to the highest authorities involved with the Skull-digger case. This had him on two lists. Jervis Swantor was also on two lists. Such names then were stricken.

  Jessica hesitated over Swantor's name for only a moment, seeing his boat marina address in Grand Isle, Louisiana. She wondered how close his tie-up was to New Orleans. Still, having met the man, she decided the civilian tip and the VICAP registry had come from the same source—Swantor's ex-wife. She wanted only those not on the violent criminal program.

  “We want only those names gleaned from a tip alone,” Jessica said, finishing the list with J.T. “Anyone without a criminal history.”

  J.T. said, “Swantor and Wells aren't carrying what you'd call a long criminal history, Jess.”