Extreme Instinct

FIVE

Hours later, Jessica felt an overwhelming despondency regarding the lack of progress in the Chris Lorentian case. Despite all the FBI input and the heat put on the investigation into the heinous murder, nothing had come of all the time put in. Pictures of the young woman remained hard to obtain. Witnesses were nonexistent, and people who knew and saw Chris in the hours before her death were similarly hard to find. Her father, a wealthy hotelier with something of a shady reputation, had gone into a terrible depression on learning of his daughter's fate and was placed on medication.

Still, the newspapers and TV newscasts carried her photo and an artist's sketch of a red-haired man with whom she supposedly had been staying at the hotel. Her car and a rifled bag were located in the underground lot, but this discovery netted zero clues.

A reward for the capture and conviction of the man responsible for the horrid death of Chris Lorentian came from the family. Meanwhile, Jessica located John Thorpe, and together they decided to catch a cab to Lester Osborne's office to determine what, if anything, the autopsy had revealed.

The city crime lab and morgue occupied space with the largest police precinct in Las Vegas, taking up an entire city block, but getting to it would take time, as it was across town.

They talked in the cab as the city that never slept seemed to be yawning in the morning sunlight, street cleaners running up and down.

"So, how did you sleep last night after all the excitement, Jess?" J. T. asked.

"About as well's could be expected. How about you?"

"Well, I admit, I was up pretty late," he replied, seeing a glint of deprecation in her sparkling eyes. ' 'I mean, after I left you to rest in your room, I joined some of the other revelers at the reception for the convention, but… got to admit… I had little fun without you, dear."

"It's okay, honey," she shot back with a smile.

"Tell you what, though: News of what happened on the seventeenth floor spread like wildfire through our little community of forensics experts."

"Is that so? And how much did you blow on the fire?"

He tried his best to look offended. "Hey, I didn't have to say a word."

"But you did?"

He shook his head and added, ''Those guys were putting the pieces together as if playing a whodunit puzzle, for the sport of it all, and by the time I got downstairs, everyone-and I mean everyone with an M.E. at the end of his or her name-had heard about your involvement-you know, the phone call-and that Lester Osborne and Karl Repasi were principal M.E. s on the case, and the poor victim, this Chris Lorentian, she'd been painted as some kind of shadowy figure somehow connected to Vegas's equally shadowy underworld."

"All that, huh? Damn it, I'd hoped to keep my involvement-my tenuous connection with the killer-to ourselves, J. T. Now look what you've done."

He held up his hands. "I swear to you, Jess. Everybody in the community had already heard before I got downstairs, really, honestly."

"You're sure of that?"

"I swear, Jess. I wouldn't lie to you about that. Most everyone I talked to had the story already."

"Repasi, you suppose? You suppose he spread it?"

"All it would've taken was a call to one of his pals. As for Chris Lorentian, most are chalking her death up to some sort of Mob-related revenge hit, not so much on young Chris as her father, whose business contacts are said to be serpentine. Oddsmakers are making book on it."

"Jesus, is there anything in this town they don't bet on?"

"No, no, there isn't."

The cab pulled around a line and double-parked alongside the civic center and city government building they had come in search of. J. T. and Jessica climbed from the cab and stood in the desert sun as it reflected from the blinding mirrored glass here.

Deep inside the building's multileveled basement, Jessica and J. T. found Osborne and Repasi working diligently over the dead girl's cranial cavity, where they'd cut her open to reveal the brain. "Fluids completely gone…"

"Dehydrated," they confirmed for the tape-recorded autopsy report.

Both Repasi and Osborne looked as if they'd gotten even less sleep than had J. T. Each man was tired and exasperated, perhaps as much with one another as with the body, from the sound of things. A third man, a young assistant to Osborne, tried to stay out of the cross fire.

Osborne, his bow tie dangling like a dead bird below his open collar, fired a fresh volley at Repasi. "Do you really, honestly, think cutting open her chest and snatching out her rack of vital organs is necessary, Dr. Repasi, when we know for a fact she was alive when she was put to the torch?"

"Thoroughness is my watchword, Doctor," replied Repasi, whose wild shock of hair hung in his face. He'd long since dispensed with his hairnet.

J. T. understood the tension, knowing its creator was in fact the mummified corpse itself, black and clothlike to the touch.

Osborne gritted his teeth, released pent-up air, and replied, "We have corroboration now. It's no longer just Dr. Coran's word. We have hard evidence she died of her burns! There's the killer's message, left in his own hand…"

Repasi coolly replied, a touch of his Polish-Romanian accent creeping in. He'd worked to control it over the years, but his obvious weariness now got the better of him. ''What about the blow to the temple that I found? I believe in being thorough, and if my name is to be on this autopsy report, then-"

"Then by all means, don't put your bloody name on it. I'll take full responsibility. It is my jurisdiction."

"And you invited my help, sir!"

"Is that what you call it when you invite yourself in on an autopsy, Doctor?"

Jessica cleared her throat to announce her and J. T.'s presence. They had both gowned up and wore surgical masks and gloves, their shoes wrapped in surgical booties. "Doctors, how are you?" she asked, not expecting an answer. "I trust all necessary information has been relayed to FBI headquarters? I put in a call to Eriq Santiva last night, left him a complete and detailed message about what's going on here," she white-lied, having told Santiva nothing yet about how the killer had contacted her. It wasn't the sort of information one left on an answering machine. "He's expecting crime-scene pho-"

"All done, Jessica, dear," assured Karl, his eyes narrowing in mock consternation with her. "You know I keep my promises. And as for Dr. Osborne and me… well, we are finished here, according to Osborne. What do you say, Jessica?" asked Repasi. "Are we finished?"

''Toxicological reports?''

"Indicate sedatives, a heavy dose," replied Repasi.

"Don't suppose you could possibly tell me if there were any needle marks below the scorched skin?"

"Impossible with the equipment here," Repasi apologized, but it didn't sound apologetic. "Still, I found a bruise to the temple after noticing a slight indention."

"In all that crinkled flesh? Good work," Jessica complimented Repasi.

"Blood indicated the same high level of sedatives," added Osborne. "Some consolation in that nerve endings would've been dulled when it happened. And time of death was as indicated by the fire call."

"Her nerve endings weren't so dull she didn't scream, Lester," Jessica countered.

He curtly returned with, "You know what I mean."

"Yeah, I do, and I agree with Lester, Karl. We know what killed her. She sounded doped up when she spoke to me. I doubt the internal organs can tell us a thing more than we already know, and given the state of the body… well, it's already disfigured beyond recognition, wouldn't you say?"

"Not entirely," replied Osborne's quiet assistant as he put away some instruments he'd just cleaned. "Her father identified her around four this morning."

"That's what held up the autopsy," explained Repasi, speaking over the assistant. "We're given to understand that everyone and everything in Las Vegas waits on this tyrant named Frank Lorentian. As for the autopsy, I think we'd best be complete and thorough. I thought thorough was your trademark, Jessica."

She ignored this, continuing, "And I'm sure the family is anxious for Lester to release the remains to them, right, Lester?"

"As a matter of fact, yes. Mr. Lorentian's quite unhappy with us all."

J. T. added, "So, she was related to this big casino family."

"Closely, I'm afraid."

"The big man's daughter," added Repasi. "Read as much in this morning's paper."

Lester said sadly, "She'd been in the process of running away, it appears."

"How old was she?"

"Nineteen, dressed older but quite… immature, I'm given to understand. Frank Lorentian's known for being a doting father," Lester replied. "Lavished everything on her but what she truly needed, I suppose… At any rate, she was rebellious, wanted to make a life on her own, outside Vegas, you see, away from her father's lifestyle, so she disguised herself, struck out on her own, but didn't get very far, as you see."

"How long had she been reported missing?" asked Jessica.

"Four days, according to Missing Persons."

"I'm sure Lorentian has a few enemies," suggested J. T.

"He isn't buying that theory," Repasi replied. "A kidnapping for ransom, he believes maybe, but not a hit to hurt him. He and the types he runs with, according to Lorentian, know not to mess with family, if you get my drift."

"But he could be wrong," J. T. replied.

"But there were no ransom notes, no demands?" asked Jessica.

"No, none forthcoming."

"Then it tracks back to me," she said, stepping closer now to the shriveled body of the dead woman. From the look of her, she'd been tall, about Jessica's own height. Her bone structure told Jessica that she was curvaceous, but what remained of her features left no clue as to her beauty or lack thereof. All that remained was a blackened, red- and brown-splotched mask of mottled and fire-bronzed cardboard, the epidermal layer of skin as burned away as the woman's clothes, all to feed the smoking inferno. Her eyes had, of course, been reduced to sockets, the soft tissues having sizzled away like bacon on a hot griddle, the oils easily feeding the flames. Still, somehow, the ugly, eyeless mask looked as if she were crying-impossible and quite unscientific, of course, yet very arresting. Of course, it was simply fatty tissues frozen in a moment of time-at the flash point of superheated air-intermingling with the natural bodily decay. There was no crying corpse here.

"Bring me up to date, gentlemen, please," Jessica requested.

"Well, no gunshot wounds, no contusions, abrasions, or hammer blows to the skull, nothing to indicate death before the fire reached her," answered Osborne.

"Except the single sharp blow to the temple, which I detected," corrected Repasi.

"I was getting to that, Karl," said Osborne with a moan. "The temple blow may've stunned her, but it wasn't a killing blow. That's clear."

"Fire investigation team found traces of butane, just as Fairfax had predicted, along with the gasoline." Repasi spoke in a near whisper in Jessica's ear. "Fairfax has quite a nose for such things. What do you think that might suggest?"

J. T. shrugged. "What do you mean, Fairfax's nose or a butane lighter? Neither fact is of much help."

''No, the traces of butane were at much greater concentration levels than caused by a lighter, and no lighter was recovered from the bed."

J. T. exchanged a look of confusion with Jessica before asking Repasi, "Then they're clearly saying that our killer used some sort of butane torch?''

"That's what Charles Fairfax believes," Lester Osborne replied, and believe me, Charlie's the best fire investigator in the city. He's an old friend of mine, and he was in the hotel… for the convention."

Repasi quickly added, "I'd seen him in the casino, so I had him paged when I saw what I… we had."

Lester nodded, saying, "Karl knows I don't even step into a fire-death scene until Charlie's completed his work. Saves me oodles of time and effort."

"And, last night, more time at the gambling table as luck would have it, right, Les?" Repasi teased. Repasi then turned to Jessica and said, ''We told Lester here what you told us; told him about the whooshing sound you heard over the phone."

Jessica's eyes glazed over in thought as she pictured a butane torch with a long wand so the killer wouldn't burn his pinkies. Then he leans in over the smoldering body and sticks his fingers into the soup he's created of the victim to pen his cryptic message.

Repasi pushed her buttons further, asking, "Don't you see, Dr. Coran? You say you heard a great whoosh of air over the phone just before she screamed? Don't you see? Fairfax's instincts verify what you heard, Doctor," Repasi told her.

"That sounds about right, Karl. Now, is there anything else you two wish to share?" asked Jessica, trying to remain calm.

"Her hands were tied with a man's tie, her feet with a belt, and small remnants of a handkerchief were found amid the charred bedclothes."

"Any prints on any of these items?"

"None."

"Burned away, wiped clean, or he wore gloves."

"The phone?" she asked.

'''Nada.''

''All carefully planned down to the nth detail, and then he leaves prints in the message," Jessica said, wanting to curse the bastard responsible for this, responsible for killing Chris Lorentian for what appeared to be a random selection just to taunt Jessica Coran into giving him her undivided attention. Or did the killer know Chris? Was the charade some sort of attempt to hide the true nature of the murder?

"How did you know there'd be prints in the message?" asked Repasi.

Osborne added, "Yeah, Jess, where did that come from?"

"I smelled it, realized it was grease from fatty tissues. I just took a wild guess."

"Some wild guess," replied Osborne with a little shake of the head.

"I'd like to talk to Lorentian myself. Learn what I can about Chris. See if it helps," she suggested.

"My secretary outside has his number," replied Osborne. "Feel free."

Repasi followed her to the door and stopped her, asking, "Are you making it an FBI matter?"

"I think the killer already has, don't you?"

Both Repasi and Osborne exchanged a long stare, and they came to the same conclusion as J. T. during that moment of silence. Jessica finally spoke their fears aloud. "He may be just getting started."

Repasi instantly replied, "Yes, it's what he wants, isn't it? He'll continue to bait you this way, won't he? But what is his ultimate goal in all this?''

"He may"-she didn't want to believe it-"he may just want to outfox me."

Repasi twisted the invisible knife, adding, "He'll go on killing until someone stops him."

"And who's going to do that, Karl? You?" asked Osborne, a sheepish grin building on his face.

She drew in a deep breath of air. "It's either what he apparently wants, or it's an attempt to cover his true motive for killing Chris Lorentian."

J. T. instantly jumped on this theory. "Ingenious. Kill someone for common enough reason and mask it with a wild charade like this, calling you, Jessica, and getting the FBI chasing some mad lunatic when in fact the killer knew Chris Lorentian and he acted coolly, calculatedly in both the murder and in planning exactly how to throw authorities off. Could be… could be…"

"Are you going to…" Osborne's assistant cleared his throat with a handful of words and tried again.''Are you going to tell Frank Lorentian that his daughter died because some sick wacko crazy wants to play cat-and-mouse with you, Dr. Coran?" The assistant stood, arms across his chest, across the table from them, the younger man unable to hold his words back. ''I was there when the man identified his daughter's remains… what was left of her to identify, that is. The man crumpled."

She looked at Osborne's man. "I'm not sure what I'm going to tell the father at this point, Doctor, and I suggest no one speaks to the press of this until we've had time to learn more about this psychopath."

Osborne raised a hand and began to object, but she cut him short with, "Is that understood?" With that, she and J. T. left the autopsy room.

"What's next, Jess?"

"We find out more about Chris Lorentian. Where she went when she ran away, where she was staying and with whom. Her hideouts and haunts. Apparently she didn't run so fast and so far as she might've; perhaps if she had, she'd be alive today; perhaps she was being given sanctuary by a friend or friends?"

"So we find out who she hung with…"

"Who she knew. Where she was before this monster's path came to cross hers. We find out where she had her last meal, where she last bathed, where she last shopped, and we find out what her plans were."

"Sounds logical, but shouldn't you leave it to the local cops to talk to Lorentian?"

"I could, but I don't think the killer expects anything less from me. I've already abdicated the autopsy to Lester. God, I don't think I could've handled this one, knowing what we know… that she died because of… of some twisted sicko's attachment to… to me, because-"

"Don't do this Jess. Don't go there."

"— because some whacked-out, wackity-wack read about me in the newspapers and came after me, and-"

"Jess, Jess… don't do this to yourself. There's no way this is your fault."

"You think Frank Lorentian will see it that way, J. T.? I wouldn't blame the man one bit if-"

"Stop this right now, Jess. This young woman's death is not your fault."

Jessica fell silent.

They located Osborne's secretary, a pleasant, middle-aged woman with a broad smile who quickly looked up Lorentian's number and address, asked if they'd like for her to get Mr. Lorentian on the phone or simply to type out all the information for them. She also asked if they'd like a cup of freshly brewed coffee, rattling off several names of designer brands.

Jessica declined the coffee and took the address, thanking the woman on her way out.

Jessica and J. T. went directly for the Desert Imperial Palace, owned and operated by Frank Lorentian. They were quickly across the city, despite the congestion, thanks to a cabbie who knew every byway and back road. In fact, they faced more roadblocks inside the gambling casino than outside, designed as it was to keep people in the maze. And after several thwarted efforts to get in to see Frank Lorentian, they were finally led to the man's suite.

Lorentian looked like a shriveled gnome in his bathrobe and glasses, his skin a file-cabinet gray. His eyes, sunken deep, depressed, looked like those of a tortured ghost. His eyes looked through them rather than at them, a sure sign he remained sedated. From telltale signs about the room, he also appeared to have been drinking heavily, despite the certain caution of his doctor not to mix booze and pills, and despite the early hour.

Jessica thought the room stank of cigar smoke. When Lorentian turned his sad eyes away from them, he contemplated the world outside through a slit in the heavy drapery. In silence, he peered out at the desert sun and at the expanse of concrete that was dwarfed by the mountains in the distance. He worked at bolstering himself up, to stand tall and erect, larger than his own frame and depression allowed. When finally he turned to face them again, Jessica saw a devastated, shaken, physically hollowed-out, walking corpse, a man who might easily court death himself in a mad effort to find his lost child.

Lorentian's right hand was marred, missing several fingers. She imagined that in his youth, he'd been a rough, stubborn, hard-fighting street tough in Chicago or L.A. or perhaps New York, a man who generally got what he wanted. Jessica had seen larger-than-life photos of him adorning the walls downstairs in the business office, but somehow he had become a shell, the carved-out remains, a wandering shadow of the man in the pictures. She wasn't at all sure if he'd been in ill health for some time, or if this were the cataclysmic effect of his daughter's disappearance and now her death, but she imagined the latter was at work on him. She could imagine no worse blow to an indomitable spirit than the loss of a beloved child.

Lorentian was a small man in stature, and now in his expensive robe, he wandered the room, unable to make himself clear as he indicated a place for them to sit. The room screamed from outlandishly lavish furniture and decor, the floor-length windows covered in purple and burgundy, someone's idea of royalty. The false palace-penthouse suite-had become the father's mourning room, the ornate, crystal chandeliers ostentatious and vulgar alongside the decadent furnishings, which mixed Oriental with rococo. Jessica sensed a taste of vulgarity in the man as well.

"I'm Dr. Jessica Coran and this is Dr. John Thorpe, sir," she began.

"I know who you are!" It sounded an attack, the way he put it, but then he tempered himself. "I've been expecting you. Rollo from downstairs told me you were coming up." He looked anguished, caught on an unrelenting tenterhook that had risen from the depths of Hell to enter his entrails and tug and tear and rend from him all remnants of his soul. ''I know who you are, Dr. Coran, and I was told this… this bastard who killed Chris… he talked to you? Called you at your hotel room, so that… so that you heard her in the fire, heard her screaming?" His heartfelt anguish was unbearable. He looked into Jessica's eyes for her answer. "Well? What kind of human trash does this to an innocent child, and what connection do you have with this monster? What did he say to you?''

So much for professional silence, Jessica thought. Obviously Osborne, his assistant, or Repasi, or all three, had already spoken to Lorentian about the events of the night before in complete detail. We're all extremely sorry for your loss, Mr. Lorentian, she mentally ventured, instantly realizing that this kind of tiptoeing about wasn't going to suffice here. She said, ''Violence, it seems, is part of our human nature, sir; and no one is immune or safe from its influence."

"Indeed," J. T. gunned his agreement. "We're going to work hard, Mr. Lorentian, to locate the killer and bring him to justice. You can count on the FBI."

"FBI!" He spat his contempt. "Justice," muttered the gray-haired, ashen-faced Lorentian. "You think there can ever be any justice after this? Just tell me one thing: What did this bastard say to you, Dr. Coran?"

She shook her head. "He didn't say anything to me. He had.. he had your daughter do all the talking."

Lorentian's eyes welled up and he instantly wiped them with a monogrammed handkerchief. "Did she… did she suffer long?"

"No, not at all," Jessica half-lied, knowing that Chris did not die instantaneously, that is, without the time it took for the dying heart, mind, nerves, and cells to shut down completely; the death process, even amid flames, took a certain amount of time. Instantaneous death came only with explosions or high-velocity impacts such as airplane crashes in which the body became fragmented in the blink of an eye, as with ValuJet Flight 592's crash in the Everglades. Fire victims, such as Chris, did not circumvent the dying process. Few people ever died instantly. The phrase, "he died instantly" was something the living consoled themselves with, but death came in stages for a trapped fire victim: Once the fire has reached you, you might pray to the fire god for the smoke to render you unconscious, for the fire itself will burst your skin after the initial blistered epidermis has been fried off; next the blood is boiled to a searing pitch, followed by shock, followed by the lethal failure of multiple organs and loss of consciousness and heartbeat. All of this takes time, even under the heat of a directed torch.

When Lorentian remained silent, Jessica again spoke, leading him to where she needed him to be in his thinking. "We want to see this bastard fry, Mr. Lorentian, fry in Nevada's electric chair, you understand?"

"We don't got the chair in this state. They do lethal injection or gas. Either way it's too good for this… this… What kind of man does this kind of thing?''

"Maybe for this creep, they'll make an exception," suggested J. T.

He stared long and hard at J. T. but only replied, "Maybe.. maybe somebody will…" The innuendo resounded clearly enough.

J. T. said nothing in reply.

"We're afraid-no, we're sure that this fiend will kill again, Mr. Lorentian. We need your help."

He turned to look at Jessica, some of the old man's fire churning in the sad eyes now. "My help? You want my help?" He laughed. "Government people wanting my help. And they send you, of all people. The way I hear it, this bastard was pandering to you, Coran, when he killed my little girl, that he gets his rocks off by insulting you with this phone-in murder. Some are saying you chased this pervert here, cornered him here, and this is the result, my little girl is dead."

"No, no, sir, there's no truth to that."

He ignored her. "Maybe I ought to hold you responsible for this, Dr. Coran."

The gloves had come off, and the tranquility in the old gangster's voice was more chilling than any temper tantrum.

J. T. shot to his feet and firmly said, "Just a minute, sir. None of this is Dr. Coran's fault. She didn't drive this man to his madness. She didn't create his fixation. The storm was out there and moving toward your daughter independent of Jessica."

Jessica stood beside J. T. now, placing a hand on his arm, the gesture telling him she preferred to fight her own battles. She now stepped closer to Lorentian. "We knew nothing of this killer before yesterday, before his first contact, and I don't know why he chose to contact me, Mr. Lorentian. Again, I say, we need your help, sir, before the… before he strikes again." She then turned on J. T., holding up a hand to him, saying, "It's okay, J. T. Mr. Lorentian has every right to be upset. We're all upset."

"I don't see how I can help you, so if you please… leave an old man to his grief."

"Sir," J. T. interjected, his hand up like a schoolboy, "we're all shaken and upset by the events that have-"

"Upset… you're upset. My world has crumbled, and you're upset."

"Maybe another time," J. T. suggested.

"We need to know where your daughter was staying, with whom she spent her last hours, sir," Jessica pleaded. "We have a killer to track."

"If I'd known where she was, I'd have dragged her home. I didn't have no idea then, and I don't have no idea now."

''You checked with all her friends?''

"Yeah, of course." He began pacing again, his body language telling Jessica that he meant to hide something.

"And they were all honest with you?"

"As far as I was able to tell, yeah."

"And you had no reason to doubt any of them?"

He hesitated. He stepped about the room more. He paced back toward the drapes, stared out again, and finally, he again approached the doctors. He wrapped his arms about himself like the king of Siam in The King and I while Jessica continued to read his body language and patiently awaited his reply.

He finally admitted, "She was being closely watched."

"Really?" Jessica was legitimately surprised. "You had her in your sights? The whole time?"

"Obviously not… not entirely, anyway. I… knew where she was… for the first two nights… of her disappearance." Talking about this was difficult for him, as if his stomach were tossing dry tennis balls into his throat, as if all the guilt and remorse were lodged in his chest and vocal chords. ''She somehow… found out I knew… got angry… at Sharon and… and sneaked off from her as well."

"Sharon?"

"Sharon Pierson. Her… one of her best friends."

''Who was on your payroll?''

His eyebrow arched upward and darted toward Jessica, an indication he was impressed. "Sharon owed the casino. It was her way.. of paying me back."

"This Sharon calls you up with the deal the moment Chris shows up at her place?''

"No, it was my suggestion… should my little girl appear. I got the distinct impression she might've been hiding out at Sharon's. Chris"-saying her name aloud was painful for him as well-"she'd run off before. I thought I'd give her time to… to cool down, you know? Figured she'd be back soon enough, but by the third day… and with Sharon swearing she hadn't seen Chris, I dropped a dime to a friend on the force to locate her."

"Did this friend file a Missing Persons report?"

"We don't work that way, no."

"But there was a report made out on her," countered J. T.

Jessica suggested, "Her friend Sharon? When you called Sharon, she had thought Chris had returned home, and she told you so, right? And Sharon made the official call to the police? Is that how it happened?"

"Close enough…" He nodded and fell into a seat, looking like a deflated balloon. "Like Shakespeare, huh?"

"Sir?" asked J. T.

'' The Comedy of Errors.''

More like the tragedy of King Lear, Jessica thought but did not say.

Lorentian went on, "I thought I had it covered, where she was staying, and I was right. But she slipped out on Sharon, 'cause she knew Sharon owed me and would keep me apprised. We figure she heard Sharon talking to me on the phone. Money… she hated it and she loved it, sweet kid… sweet Chris." He was overcome with grief, the tears freely raining now.

''Do you have any idea why the killer would have written a message about your daughter's being a… a traitor, sir?" she now asked.

"A traitor?"

"Any sort of traitor, to any sort of… cause?"

"A rebel, maybe, but a traitor?" He sadly shook his head. "No… no. She was a bit"-he paused, swallowed hard-"she was a bit rebellious, feisty… gone back to the hippie lifestyle, the way she dressed, the damned tattoos, the religious icons she wore, all that, but that's natural in the young, isn't it? Traitor? No… no.. the word has nothing to do with my Chris."

"Any former boyfriends who might've categorized her as such?" suggested J. T.

"No, nothing like that going on. I woulda known. She hadn't an enemy in the world."

"How about you?"

The lion roared, "I was her father, not her enemy!"

"I meant, sir, anyone have reason to call you a traitor?"

"None," Frank Lorentian said with a cold eye and a coy laugh, his tone implying that he had more enemies than he could count on fingers and toes.

"Can you or your secretary provide us with a list of Chris's friends, their phone numbers and addresses?"

"See Virginia downstairs. She'll arrange it." Then he turned his glassy stare on Jessica. ''One thing, lady: If you don't catch this SOB, and if you don't destroy him, I'll be even more upset with you than I already am. One thing you can count on… a sure thing, as they say here in Vegas. Now get outta here, both of you."

The naked threat wore not so much as a veil.

Again, Jessica told the man how extremely sorry they were for his loss, but this prompted only a deeper and more dangerous silence. It was a silence that told them the interview was over. The two medical people left Frank Lorentian standing once again at the covered windows, peeking out on a world he had helped to create, a world he no longer felt at ease in, a world that had so altered him with the horrible murder of his child that Jessica wondered if he would ever fully be a part of this world again.