Bitter Instinct

FOUR

Dr. Jessica Coran stepped from the soupy Virginia fog that enveloped Quantico Naval Air Station to greet Dr. Kim Desinor. Taking her by the hand, Jessica said, “The boys at the hangar have a new toy to play with, a Soviet-built MiG tactical helicopter. It's not exactly new to us, nothing like a big mystery, but they're incredible machines. I think I've convinced them to transport us to Philadelphia in it instead of in that boring departmental Cessna Citation.”

“That boring Cessna is just fine with me, Jess.”

“But you want to know you're flying, don't you?”

“Flying's one thing, hovering Peter Pan fashion in something like a spinning top is quite another.”

“No, it's more like a magic carpet ride or a floating platform. Come on, you'll love it. I think they've got clearance.”

“Why do we have a Soviet helicopter?” Kim asked.

“Part of the struggle to fight boredom, the struggle to stomp out ignorance, all of it. We swapped ours for theirs. Happens all the time. They have our technology, we have theirs, everyone's happy, and no need for the spy business.”

“With the Russians? We do this with the Russians?”

“KGB, Russian military, sure. Look at this machine, will you?” Kim glared at the thing like an angry cat.

Jessica, ignoring this, said, “I've only had the privilege of flying in her once before. She's decked out with lounge seats and a Bureau VIP bar-at a cost government watchdogs must never know about.”

“So, I see you've already met the pilot and crew, as usual. Are you staking a claim?” Kim knew of Jessica's love for flying, one of her many passions. In fact, Jessica had earned her pilot's license some years back.

“Staking a claim? I'm spoken for, remember? Richard Sharpe. You're not still sore about New Orleans, are you?” Jessica recalled how on first meeting Kim, she had behaved badly. Not in the best frame of mind, knowing she was being stalked by an escaped convicted bloodsucking killer who had fixated on her, her nerves shot, Jessica had drunk too much on the flight, and she had flirted with the pilot. She recalled how wrong that first meeting with Kim had gone, and how patient Kim had been with her, showing her great understanding and giving her the benefit of the doubt several times.

“All I know is that every time you fly off someplace, you cozy up to the pilot or you wind up at the controls of the plane.”

“Come on. I wasn't at the controls for more than ten minutes.”

“Or you land yourself a new bureau-chief boyfriend, or a boyfriend who happens to be Scotland Yard. I'm so impressed!” She did a mock curtsy right there on the airstrip.

“You make me sound like a loose woman on the prowl!”

Kim laughed. “Not at all. Liberated, a role model for others all over the globe who have succumbed to the stereotype of barefoot and pregnant and in the kitchen.”

“Please, give it a rest, Kim. What about your love life? You still seeing Alex Sincebaugh, or has he uprooted himself and returned to New Orleans?”

“He's holding on in Baltimore, but he hates his situation. I'm not sure how long he's going to fight it.”

“You can take the boy outta the bayou, but you can't-”

“I see him most weekends and holidays. Some truth in that old saying 'Absence makes the heart grow fonder.' “

“That's crap and you know it; only works for a while before the charm of the distance between you wears off. I know from experience.”

“The alternative, cohabiting, is just as impossible, if not more so.”

“What's a girl to do?”

Boarding the wide-bodied helicopter, Jessica patted her inside suit pocket to be certain she hadn't forgotten her special scalpel; her father had given it to her the day she'd told him she meant to go to medical school. Nowadays, she never left home without it. In fact, she felt downright superstitious about having it near at hand.

Jessica and Kim looked at each other in the modified, VIP interior of the monster chopper. While they worked together at profiling sessions in the same building and in the same unit, each saw surprisingly little of the other. “Pity the bar's not open,” Kim lamented.

“And what would you do with an open bar this ungodly time of morning?”

“Not the bar, the bartender, dear. You like pilots, I have a weakness for bartenders.”

Jessica laughed. It felt good after the tension of the day before. “Here, have some coffee.” Rolls and coffee lay on the table between them. “Eriq's so thoughtful.”

After they sat down, Jessica watched Kim gulp back stomach bile instead of the rich coffee as the churning blades suddenly roared to life. An attendant young enough to be Jessica's daughter quickly secured the coffeepot and soon they felt themselves slowly rise above the airstrip. With a sudden, violent jerk, the helicopter veered to the left and sped diagonally upward.

“What the hell's that pilot doing?” Kim shouted over the thrum of the MiG.

“His job!” Jessica smirked.

Next the chopper pilot poured on the speed, plastering them to their seats. “Like a carnival ride,” Jessica shouted.

Kim felt every cell in her body tug outward. “I feel like a piece of cargo being tossed around in the hold!” This despite the seat belt she wore. “What did you tell the pilot, Jess? You didn't tell him that you wanted a wild ride, did you? You did, didn't you! Tell me you didn't!”

Jessica's smiled and her eyes lit up. “Doncha love it?”

In a moment the helicopter leveled out. The noise of the rotors took on a new pitch, the sound a whisper by comparison. Next the helicopter took on a new feel-that of a bird in flight, smooth and controlled.

At this point, Jessica unfastened her seat belt and said, “Maybe I'll just have a word with the pilot.”

“It's a little too late to tell him to take it easy on his joystick, wouldn't you say?”

“I won't be but a minute.”

“You're incorrigible, you know that?” Kim protested as Jessica made her way to the nose of the helicopter. “Why don't you tip him?” she shouted, knowing the sound of her racing heart and the rotor blades only drowned her out.

Kim opened a briefcase she'd carried on board and drew out a manila folder. She was opening it just as Jessica returned with the coffeepot. Jessica again saw the three victim photos that Eriq Santiva had shown her earlier, but included in this group were blown-up shots of the backs, the rust-colored, near-red lettering left behind by the killer. “Damn but this looks like something out of an Edgar Allan Poe story.”

“And the narrator of the tale, this Killer Poet, has to be as mad as one of Poe's narrators,” Kim agreed.

“It's likely a selective madness, one he controls when in the company of others. He's got to be some kind of sadist beneath it all, a true sociopath.”

“Maybe not, Jess.”

“What do you mean?”

“Read the poems. They're hardly sadistic or evil in intent; our boy or girl is-at least inside his or her mind- doing good, perhaps doing God's own work.”

Jessica recognized the one poem as the eulogy that Kim had already read to her over the phone. The other two began with the same three lines about chance meeting innocence.

“Read 'em through,” said Kim. “Familiarize yourself with the style, the voice, whatever you want to call it. After a while the poems get a little scary and… and something else, but I'll let you decide.”

“Scary?”

“I don't know… disturbing, like they have a life of their own. This murdering poet writes some truly engaging stuff; it catches you up so much that you actually forget that it was used as a murder weapon.”

“I'll have another look.” Jessica read the two poems she hadn't yet seen or heard. The first read:

Chance… whose desire is to have a meeting with stunned innocence… is a humming that wells up

In silver moonbeams appearing to the eyes like twin specters softly caressing the drapes, trembling, yet unafraid, languorous and expectant of a touch in return.

Beneath it all: a bed of fibrous dictation.

I am drawn forth, found out brushed with the feather of your glance.

Speaking to a mirror sparkling with never- before phrases, all against the marble life flickering.

Strangely sonorous stuff,” offered Jessica, nodding. “I see how you might get caught up in it, but not enough to allow someone to Etch A Sketch on your back.”

“The poetry is so… melodic and obtuse at once, so that while I'm not always sure what's intended, I don't much care so long as I can hear the music.”

“You mean it's kind of like reading Carl Sagan on the universe?”

“Maybe.” Kim laughed. “I mean that while he's difficult at times to follow… what a way this guy has of lullabying you into thinking sound makes sense, huh? And I'd hardly call it pathological or the words of a lunatic.”

“Maybe it all makes sense to the killer, Kim. How many times have we seen a killer create rationalizations for actions that led to murder? Whether it looks like the ravings of a madman or not, he may well be channeling voices in his head that ultimately tell him to kill.”

Jessica next studied the blown-up shot of the second deadly poem. Again, the torn flesh looked like blood-orange script on a clay tablet, but this was poisoned ink written into human flesh.

She read the second poem:

Chance… whose desire is to have a meeting with stunned innocence… is drawn up and perched to fall into the mirror pool, through meshes of metaphor to disentangle and leave behind unbound fingers of touch.

Sensing sounds in choruses of falling water crashing on nearby rock,

I hear harmony touching my hand where gazes fall into place.

The breath that exhales across the candle fails, and so it remains, flickering.

“And so, and further thoughts?” Kim asked. Jessica breathed in as much air as she could and slowly exhaled. “It's definitely the work of the same person. Along with the one I read before, and the one you read me, it feels almost as if…”

“Yes?”

“As if these weren't three separate poems at all, but-”

“Go on, but what?”

“But one long ongoing…”

“Dirge, yes. I agree.”

“Like a lament.”

“A death march,” agreed Kim.

Nodding, Jessica added, “Over in London they'd refer to it as a threnody.”

“Yes, a hymn, a requiem, all one piece. I just wanted someone else to tell me I wasn't crazy.”

“You think they follow in a sequence?”

“I'm not sure. I mean I've transcribed them and put them in the order of the killings, but there seems to be something… I don't know… missing, as if the killer doesn't know all the pieces yet himself. Or perhaps it wasn't meant to be written in order, because-”

“Because the missing parts haven't as yet been completed.”

“Which likely means more bodies.”

“Exactly.”

The chopper began its descent. Jessica strapped in once again. Kim had never loosened her belt.

Jessica stared out the window. She knew Philadelphia well, having lived there for a time with her military family. She now pointed out the banks of the Delaware and, in the distance, Burlington, New Jersey. Then she pointed to another river. “That's the Schuylkill River.”

“School-kill? Is that anything like road kill? What a strange name for a river, but it seems to fit with the chaos of the modem age,” replied Kim.

“It's pronounced 'school-kill,' but it's an Indian word. Oh, look.” Jessica pointed again. “Scullers on the river.”

Both women watched the machinelike rhythm of flashing oars in the hands of competing crews. The oars looked like blades, and their smooth, deft movement through the water was perfectly synchronized, giving boat and crew an appearance not unlike that of a gliding animal in its natural haunt.

Jessica and Kim made out the roofline of Colonial country houses and villas, and next the looming dome of Memorial Hall, a remnant of the Centennial Exposition. Soon they were over Boathouse Row, the Fairmount Waterworks, and the best view of the skyline of modern Philadelphia and the promenade leading up to the Museum of Art, the stairway made famous by the movie Rocky. The streets here, lined with parkways and universities and museums, reminded Jessica of Washington, D.C.'s Pennsylvania Avenue.

The city was famous for both its Quaker roots-hospitality and brotherly love-and for the ease with which people could get around, thanks to William Penn's surveyor general, Thomas Holme. Holme had laid out the city streets in 1682 on a grid quite visible from the air. The resulting rectangle, two miles long and one mile wide, enclosed approximately 1,280 acres between the Delaware and the picturesque Schuylkill River.

“East-to-west streets are named for trees,” Jessica told Kim. “North-to-south are numbered.”

“How… efficient.”

“Quaint, too, but there's a catch.”

“Naturally.”

“Early settlers counted back from both rivers, requiring each street to be additionally identified as Schuylkill Second or Delaware Third, and so on.”

“You're putting me on.”

“Actually, city fathers put things right around the turn of the century. The numbering now begins on the Delaware River side and moves westward to the city limits. Makes cab hopping a lot easier.”

“I should think.”

“If you'd like, Dr. Coran,” came the helicopter pilot's voice over the PA system, “I'll take you over the city first. We can pass the air station field for a helipad at Police Precinct One downtown. This'll cut out the need for a cab, and you'll have a nice view of the downtown area.”

Jessica put on a headset resting on her chair and spoke. “Thanks, Pete! That would save us a lot of hassle.”

Center Square with its massive Colonial-style city hall then came into view. When it had been erected in 1901, Philadelphia's city hall stood as the tallest and largest public building in the United States. “This area is the true heart of the city,” commented Jessica. “Philly is a walker's city.”

“A walker's city?”

“Down here it's impossible to get lost, given the layout, and in any direction you're going to run into an oasis with a park bench.”

Kim and Jessica saw the greenery of George Washington Park, David Rittenhouse Park, Benjamin Franklin Park, and James Logan Park, each flanked on all sides by traffic.

“Rush hour looks like hell,” commented Kim, pointing out a long snake of snarled metal on the street below.

“It is. Streets look quaint and narrow from up here, don't they?”

“Yes.”

“Fact is, the streets are quaint and narrow.”

“A quaint pain in the ass for those poor devils stuck in gridlock,” muttered Kim, breaking into a laugh. “While we blithely fly above it all.”

“Yeah, like winged goddesses.”

“Goddesses; really, Jessica,” Kim replied in mock amazement. A moment of static gave way to the pilot's voice over the PA again. “Doctors, welcome to Philly. Home of the Flyers, the 76ers, the Eagles, cheese steak sandwiches, Mummers, funky South Street, gateway to the Jersey Shore, the Liberty Bell, and don't forget soft pretzels.”

The chopper pilot worked his magic, aligning the machine with what looked to Kim Desinor like a postage stamp-the helipad atop the building. Jessica smiled at how calmly Pete brought the huge Soviet-made monster into the center of the X on the helipad marker. But her smile waned on seeing the people awaiting them at Philadelphia's police headquarters. Pete had called ahead, alerting officials of their arrival.

An uncharacteristic quiver could be seen in Jessica's jaw as she made out Area Special Agent in Charge James Parry, his broad-shouldered form standing beside what appeared to be the chief of police and most likely the detective in charge of the Philly task force, a towering dark-haired Sigourney Weaver look-alike.

Jessica saw that behind his resolute stance, Parry's nerves must be somewhat frazzled, the quiver in her jaw being matched by the clenched fists. He appeared as anxious about the prospect of working with her as she was with him.

“He knows you're coming, Jess,” said Kim, as if reading her mind. “He likely wants closure on this relationship as much as you, so just go easy.”

Jessica sat silent, unable to respond, her thoughts racing. She flashed on all the extremely happy moments she'd spent in James's presence, all the trips they'd shared, all the passion, and all the heartache.

“You okay, Jess?” Kim had reached out a hand to lay over her friend's. She had not missed Jessica's narrowing eyes and gritted teeth on seeing Parry.

“It's been a hell of a ride getting here,” Jessica replied, “but it's going to be even more hell seeing this through, I fear.”

Kim said into Jessica's ear, “But nothing you can't handle.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence. I'm not so sure.”

“You've faced far worse foes. This will be a Cakewalk for Jessica Coran.”

“I'm not at all sure.”

“Hang tough, girl.”

“You sound like my father.”

“I'll take that as a compliment.”

“Absolutely.”

The helicopter touched down and the blades began to slow. To Jessica, the big Soviet chopper's last groan felt like her insides, and it sounded like the final breath of a dinosaur. She steeled herself to get up, step out, and meet anew her former lover, James Parry, special agent in charge of the Poet Killer case. “God, I feel like I'm going to stumble or say something stupid,” she confided in Kim.

“If you stumble, just be sure not to fall into his arms.”

“You'll catch me, then?”

“Count on it.”

“Thanks, Kim.” Jessica clamped onto her friends hand and squeezed.

“Don't mention it. What're friends for?”

When she looked directly into James Parry's eyes, Jessica felt her knees weaken with the memories-vivid, precise, and unbidden-that flooded her mind, memories of the most intimate, most delightful moments on holidays they had spent traveling around the globe. James's sandy-brown hair now had a liberal dusting of gray, making it appear lighter, but otherwise he looked the same. A tall, handsome man with broad shoulders and a winning smile, he stood as straight as an oak. She wondered how she would ever completely free herself of him, but then she wondered if it was worth the energy even to try. The sadness and pain of her memory of James would be a part of her forever. After all this time, after all she and Richard Sharpe now meant to each other, one part of her mind fought to hold on to her and Jim's love, or at least to the spirit of that love. At the same time, another part of her fought to pry it from memory. She felt like a wounded wolf wanting to chew its paw off to free itself from a trap.

Focus, she heard her father's admonition from the grave, focus on the job at hand, Jess.

During introductions, there was just enough awkwardness between Jessica and Parry to alert even the dullest mind in the group. Afterward, something inside Jessica told her to relax. She owed the investigation her full attention and support, and she owed Parry nothing other than her thanks for a long and wonderful relationship, and her thanks, after all, for his having once saved her life. Instead of focusing on James-who failed the “cool” test, first by stammering that he'd already had the pleasure, then by offering his hand to shake only to retract it immediately- Jessica turned her attention to the other man, a solidly built fullback type with a limp, who appeared to rock his way along rather than walk.

The police chief introduced himself as Aaron Roth and added, “I am putting all my faith in this team, ladies and gentlemen, and I fully expect to see results soon. Is that clear, everyone?”

He then introduced the tall, stick-thin woman beside him as Lieutenant Leanne Sturtevante, whose firm handshake, take-charge air, and strong voice made it clear that, as she said, “I am heading up and coordinating the Philadelphia Police Department's task force on the Poet Predator, as the press has dubbed the murderer.” Jessica recognized Sturtevante's need to take immediate control of the situation-not unlike herself-and she knew they would have difficulty working together unless they tried extra hard to be sensitive to each other's rough edges.

Sturtevante next said, “If you'll follow me, I'll show you our ready room and introduce you to Dr. Shockley, who has had the bodies protocoled.” The detective started away as she talked, setting a brisk pace for Jessica, Kim, and the men.

“How much does the press know about his MO?” Jessica asked.

“They know the killer's leaving poems for us to ponder, but they don't know he's cutting the poems into his victims' backs,” replied Sturtevante. “They know his weapon of choice is poison, but they don't know the poison is in the ink. Still… it's only a matter of time before it all comes out.”

“We're trying to keep a lid on the details for as long as possible,” added Parry, “but the newshounds smell something, and it's impossible to get them off the scent. Everyone in Philadelphia knows we're withholding information at this point.”

They entered the building's rooftop service elevator. As the door closed, Roth pushed one button, Sturtevante another. “We'll want to see more than the protocols from Dr. Shockley,” Jessica said. “We'll want to see the bodies.”

“Both of you?” asked Sturtevante.

“Both of us,” replied Kim.

“That can be arranged, right, Leanne?” said Roth.

“Absolutely.”

Chief Aaron Roth sucked in his gut and nodded to them with a perfunctory smile. “I'm afraid I must rush away to a charity fund-raiser.” Gritting his teeth, he added, “Commissioner expects me to play a part. Keep me apprised every step of the way, Leanne.”

Jessica saw beads of perspiration forming on Chief Roth's forehead even in the relative cool of the elevator. His breathing sounded like the thrum of a poorly working refrigerator. She also smelled the acrid odor of tobacco that clung to every pore and hair of his body. A heart attack waiting to happen, she thought when the elevator doors opened on Roth's floor. He stepped off and waved an automatic good-bye.

“It was nice to've met you, Doctors. Happy hunting, as they say.” He then coughed and turned away, puffing down the corridor, dabbing at perspiration on his brow with a soggy handkerchief.

The others remained in the elevator car and descended deeper into the building as Sturtevante began her briefing.

“We don't have much of a ready-room display, just some photographs and the poems, of course, which you're all familiar with; nothing unusual or out of place at any of the scenes. Fact is, the crime scenes this guy leaves behind are remarkably”-she searched for an appropriate word-”tidy. Tidy as your grandma's parlor.”

Parry added, “Not so much as a candy wrapper on the floor. Wine bottles, flowers, candy boxes may have been handled by the killer. We've dusted for prints, but we've come up with zip.”

“The guy is thorough about cleaning up after himself, and you know how useless a smudged print can be.” Sturtevante raised a hand to her neck and rubbed furiously, apparently at some pain there.

Parry stared across at Jessica. “Whoever this guy is, he's at the opposite spectrum from Lopaka Kowona.”

Jessica recalled how horrid the Kowona crime scenes had been, victims hacked to pieces and brutally mutilated. “The guy kept parts of his victims in his refrigerator,” she told Kim.

Sturtevante turned to Parry. “I'd love to hear about your infamous Hawaiian case at some future time, Jim.”

“I mean, unlike Kowona, our poet uses no knives, doesn't have a love affair with blood, and he's thorough about tidying up; like you say, Leanne, tidy as Grandma's parlor.” James looked directly at Jessica as he spoke, as if they were the only two in the elevator.

The bell rang and the door opened on the lower-level floor where a sign pointed the direction to the morgue. They all stepped out into a bare, stark hallway painted an institutional green.

“Do you have anything on the killer's choice of weapon?” Jessica asked Sturtevante as they made their way toward a sign over a door that read ppd medical examiner's office. “What've you so far on the poison he's using?” She wondered if Sturtevante sensed her need to ignore James's eyes for the moment.

“It hasn't yet been fully identified, and as for the killer, we know about as much as the proverbial schoolroom dunce.”

“Not fully identified?” Jessica shot back.

“It's base is black India ink, possibly purchased at a specialty shop in the vicinity of the murders.”

“Specialty shop?” asked Kim.

“Nestled amid our target area, along Second Street, there's a bookstore called Darkest Expectations that sells it, as well as a stationery store named Ink, Line amp; Sinker. Upscale, hip shops. Only blocks from where we found the last victim.”

“No hemlock, no arsenic, no strychnine traces?” asked Jessica.

Sturtevante shook her head. “Whatever he's using, it isn't your run-of-the-mill poison.”

“I'll want to talk to your toxicology guys. What about you, Jim? Have you got a team of toxicologists working on identifying the poison?”

“We do, but it's the same with our lab. They don't know what they're looking for. It's been one hell of a problem.”

“If we can ID the poison, it might say something about the poisoner,” said Kim. “Behaviorally speaking, that is.”

“It might well be a hybrid poison, some sort of designer drug,” Jessica suggested.

“Chief Parry holds the same belief. Meantime, our people are thinking it's something new, like you say, possibly a hybrid.”

“Have they ruled out coldfire, then?” Jessica thought of her young victim in a morgue drawer back in Quantico.

“Tryptootilin? Yes, we've had our share of cases involving coldfire, and yes, they have ruled it out,” replied Sturtevante.

“Spanish fly? Azaleas? Rhododendrons? Other plants and flowers? I mean, doesn't this guy come with flowers and candy in hand?” Jessica asked.

“They have looked at all the usual suspects. You know how many poisons exist in the world?” Sturtevante asked in a strained voice.

Jessica realized only now that the detective had been offended by her tone. The two stood in the glow of light filtering through a glass door on which was lettered dr. Leonard w. shockley, me. The two women sized each other up, their eyes locked.

Jessica said evenly, “I have a dictionary-sized book on the subject of poisons.”

“That you've no doubt read, so you have some idea what our lab people are faced with… and how do you test for what you don't suspect? There's no way to test for everything, and everything on earth, if-”

“If used in excess, kills, I know,” finished Jessica.

Kim, sensing the hostility between the other two women, jumped in. “It would appear no one's seen the like of it before, whatever this poisoned ink is. They're sure to have tested for mercury, right?”

“Right,” Sturtevante echoed.

“Let's have a look at the victims,” Jessica suggested.

“Step inside.” Sturtevante opened the door. “You're expected; all has been arranged.”

“We aim to please,” added Parry. “I knew you'd want to take a hands-on approach, both of you. And it's as good a place to start as any.”

His deep-set blue eyes reminded Jessica of the Hawaiian nights they'd spent together, and a sudden weakness in her knees made her wonder if she could handle this. She wondered as well if she could work alongside this man as if nothing had ever happened between them. His eyes seemed to mutely ask her the same question. Jessica wanted both to be alone at this moment and to be alone with him; they had so much to say to each other, so much clearing of the air to do.

Jessica again heard her father's voice from deep within telling her to be strong as she unconsciously clutched at the heavy steel scalpel in her breast pocket. Somehow her father's gift gave her the strength and resolve she needed.

On entering the morgue's outer corridor, she saw a white-haired Dr. Leonard Walter Shockley through what seemed a series of prisms-glass office windows, rows of them. He looked to be conducting some test on a gas chromotographer no doubt, attempting to separate out various chemical substances in order to make some scientific determination about some evidence. He looked like a ghost, a very busy and preoccupied ghost. As they came toward him, he didn't show the least interest in them and didn't even look up from his work.

Jessica wondered how Shockley might react to her and how she should treat him-professional to professional or as the daughter of an old friend. Shockley had known and worked with her father many years before, and had in fact attended Jessica's graduation from medical school. Jessica rarely saw him anymore, since the death of her father. She already felt surrounded by people she must prove something to, and now she feared another was about to be added to the list.