Robert Walker - Killer Instinct

The relatives of the dead were in an impossible situation, Kafkaesque in its nightmarish proportions. They saw evidence of the police, the firemen and the medical teams rushing in to save or identify their loved ones. How then might they question a missing broach, a lost diamond, a wallet? Without recourse, there was no way to accuse anyone or even prove that something had been stolen.

Pan Am 929 had been a “rich” flight, coming in from Buenos Aires, the passenger list reading like the social register of Washington, D.C. But by the time Jessica had arrived on scene, it looked like a planeload of paupers. Another reason to put the bodies all in a row, she guessed, in order to frisk them for rings and things-things that might quickly identify the charred and mutilated remains.

She overheard one policeman say to a distraught young woman, “You say your mother always wore this ring? But can you say you actually saw it on her hand when she boarded the plane in Buenos Aires?''

An archbishop on his way back to Rome via D.C. was located, his body intact, but his gold and amethyst ring and cross, along with a Rolex, had vanished without a trace. Outraged, one police lieutenant ordered all wallets and jewelry removed from the bodies under the watchful eyes of his men, and these items were tagged with a number corresponding to a number given each body, and placed in plastic bags sent to the police property room so that no further thievery would occur. It was at this point that Jessica and other M.E. s had come on the scene, having battled rush-hour traffic to get there. By then there was not much personal property left, and the bodies, all neatly numbered and assembled in a row, and covered over by a green tent, had been stripped of whatever personal effects might identify them.

As a medical examiner, Jessica's main concern was to identify unrecognizable bodies. The easiest, quickest and least painful method of doing so was through the use of personal effects and the passenger list, with its seat number for every passenger. At the untouched “pristine” scene, the M.E. could see patterns of injury, relationships of body parts, enabling her to work out the exact details of what happened, and why one passenger's head was severed and another's left intact.

While she was working over the bodies at the crash site, Jessica had been painfully aware that influential people at the FBI had their eyes on her, as she was awaiting an appointment to the academy. The tragedy of Flight 929 became a litmus test for her. Two of the passengers aboard had been with the Bureau. She got the appointment, but she reserved the right to maintain a little contempt for all those who had profited in one form or another from the tragedy, including herself, all those superlatives about ambition notwithstanding.

Now in Wekosha, Wisconsin, with a single body to work with, she was expected to have all the answers, but without the necessary lab time, all she could manage was the same as Stowell or Lumley: guesswork. However, one clear fact in all of this stood out. Without a doubt the killer had literally “milked” the dead girl of her blood. She pictured an enormous vampire bat at the girl's throat, huddled there, lapping up her life with a vile tongue and incisors.

Otto returned from outdoors, looking controlled and tightly wired once again. He extended a hand to help her to her feet from her kneeling position there at the throat.

“ I've got all I need,” she told Otto, “and I'm ready to leave.”

Lumley lost some saliva and tobacco when he blurted out, “You mean we can cut her down now?” His tone was sarcastic and brittle.

Sheriff Stowell fixed him with a stare.

Jessica said simply, “Yes, but do so very carefully and gently. We don't want any mortician wounds confusing anyone later.

“ We'll be careful,” said one of the Wekosha cops.

Jessica left quickly, now anxious to breathe the crisp, cold air of the Wisconsin countryside, filling her lungs with it while the car was loaded with her equipment and findings.

The night here had a silence that seemed impenetrable, the stillness like cold lead leeching into her bones. The darkness of the deep woods was complete and mysterious. It was such an isolated place, both peaceful and dangerous at once. It reminded her of a hundred hunting camps she had visited with her father on excursions for deer. The end result of their hunt was a gutted carcass, and when she heard the grunting and noise of the men inside as they released the dead girl from her bonds, she thought of the horror that she had somehow put on hold for these many hours. She could hardly blame men like Lumley who looked at her as if she were a ghoul.

“ We're ready to roll, Jess,” said Otto, who'd come from the cdr with her overcoat, placing it over her shoulders. “You're shivering,” he said.

“ Thank you. Didn't realize just how cold it was.”

In a moment she was leaning into the soft, clean upholstery in the back of Stowell's squad car. Stowell reached into his glove compartment and offered her a pull on a Jack Daniel's bottle, which she hesitantly took only after Otto gave her a nod.

Sheriff Stowell turned the car around, nearly throwing them into a ditch, before righting the car onto the overgrown dirt road which would take them to the highway. Otto took the whiskey from her, pulling on it twice before returning it to Stowell with a “thanks.”

“ Sheriff Stowell has agreed to keep a lid on the more gruesome aspects of the crime, Jess,” Otto was saying, while all she wanted to do was drift off with the soft slumber reaching out for her, the car gently rocking now over the dirt road.

“ Good,” she managed.

“ But I promised something in return.”

She blinked, her expression turning to curiosity, before she said, “He'll get a full report, soon as we have-”

“ He wants to know if she was or was not sexually molested before the mutilation.”

Stowell spoke for himself. “Candy wasn't a bad person. She didn't deserve dying like this.”

“ You knew her?”

“ She had an arrest record.”

“ Prostitution?”

“ Yes.”

“ Is that how you knew her?”

“ I spent some off-duty time with her; got her a job; got her to clean up her life. Now this…”

Stowell filled her in on the details concerning Annie “Candy” Copeland's life. At the age of eighteen and three-quarters, she'd been a waitress for all of two months at a diner in Wekosha. Before that she had been working the streets and living with her pimp. Before this, as an idealist still in high school, she had been a volunteer at the local hospital, a candy striper, from which she had derived the nickname, Candy.

“ What about her family life?” asked Jessica.

Stowell's voice had the grit of a man who had seen a great deal of sorrow in his professional life. “She was what you'd call a throwaway kid. Stepfather abused her, mother looked the other way, and when she tried to fight back… came to me… they booted her onto the streets. System didn't begin to work for this kid, so I did what 1 could, which wasn't much.”

“ Stowell and I'll be talking with the pimp soon,” Boutine said.

“ And the stepfather.”

“ Co-workers at the diner, all that,” Otto added.

She knew the routine. First check with those who knew her, those who came into routine contact with her; who had last seen her alive, when and where, and with whom? Suspect the relatives, the friends, the co-workers, and work from there. Question each and from each gain a new insight and a possible new lead or clue to her demise.

“ So, tonight, you want me to tell you if she was sexually molested?”

“ Best guesstimate, Dr. Coran,” said Otto.

“ My best estimate should await lab analysis, Otto, and you of all people should know that.”