S. Cedric - Of Fever and Blood

“Yes. Both the patients and several staff members said they saw animals prowling the hallways. The district sent in specialists to check the facility for any toxic emissions that could have caused the hallucinations.”

“Did they find any?”

“Nothing at all. But now it gets even weirder. During the same period, four young female patients went home on weekend leave. They never returned, and they were never found again. Vanished in thin air. Well, except for one: Christine Garnier, twenty-one years old, unemployed. She was found. She had been bound in her own home with her throat slit.”

Vauvert slammed his hand on the desk.

“How come there was no investigation?”

“There was one,” Leroy said. “At the time, all the evidence pointed to her boyfriend, Mario Dupuy, so the police down there nabbed him.”

“Did he confess?”

“They didn’t have a chance to get the confession. He killed himself in his cell. It caused a hell of a scandal. The very next day, the local chief was fired by the region’s chief of police. The chief wanted the case tied up as fast and quietly as possible.”

“You mean they buried it,” Vauvert grunted. “God dammit, why do they always do that?”

Leroy shrugged.

“For them, Dupuy was the man, and I can’t really blame them. I would have assumed the same thing. The couple had a long history of drug abuse. Their apartment was found trashed, the walls splattered with the girl’s blood. Someone had written inscriptions and all sorts of pentagrams all over the place. The officers didn’t look any further. For them, the boy was high and just slaughtered his girlfriend. And actually, after this incident, there were no more disappearances.”

“No further reports of disappearances. You have hundreds of girls going missing every year. Students who start college and don’t come back to class after the first week. Runaway kids no one cares about. People who move away without anyone noticing.”

“Exactly,” Leroy said.

“Okay,” Vauvert said, standing up. “Was that hospital in Rodez?”

“It is down south, in the region.”

“I know exactly where it is, thanks,” Vauvert said with a sigh.

He walked over to the map of France, riddled with thumbtacks, and he stuck four new ones on the city of Rodez. Then he took a couple of steps back.

Seen from that angle, the city stood dead center in a swarm of red tacks.

“All right,” he said. “So maybe the Salaville brothers started their killing there.”

Leroy shook his head.

“Not them. Those girls went missing before they were sent to Raynal.”

Vauvert stared at the detective. Now he got it.

“You think our killer was already in that hospital?”

“Eva is convinced that we’re dealing with a deranged person. Someone who’s already been in treatment. Assuming that this person actually was at Raynal back then and also assuming that she managed to commit her first murders without anyone catching on.”

“The Salaville brothers could have met her when they came in for rehab,” Vauvert said. “And this person could have taught them how to kill, like some sort of mentor?”

“There you go.”

Vauvert scratched his two-day beard.

“It’s not like there haven’t been cases that are more far-fetched. Did you get in touch with the hospital?”

“Well, I tried,” Leroy said. “But there’s a problem. The place was shut down. Not profitable enough. New government regulations. Same old story.”

“When did it close?”

“Over six months ago. The building has already been leveled to make room for a mall. I asked for a copy of their archives, but you know the procedure. It’s going to take at least a week to get them.”

“We don’t have a week!” Vauvert burst out. “Eva is…. We’re losing too much time!”

“I know that,” Leroy said. “But listen, I searched the hospital staff, and I tracked down the ex-director, Jacques Fabre-Renault. He’s been transferred to Millau. That’s where he works now. I called him but only got his voicemail. I’ll get his personal number, and I’ll call him, okay?”

“Fine,” Vauvert said, calming down.

He picked up a photo of Barbara Meyer clad in vinyl and fishnet. A dead girl whose blood had spilled out of Eva’s mirrors.

Just as Roman Salaville’s blood spilled out of the flesh of some hellish beast.

He had to tell Leroy.

As he opened his mouth, a voice boomed in the hallway.

“Where is he? Where the fuck is he?”

Leroy frowned and looked toward the door.

“That’s Deveraux. Sounds like someone has him royally pissed off.”

“Where?” Deveraux bellowed.

A second later, he stormed into the office. It appeared that he had run all the way up the stairs, because he was out of breath, and the front of his shirt had come untucked from his pants. His cheeks were crimson, and his face was contorted. He was not just pissed. He looked like he was about to have a coronary.

“You!” he barked at Vauvert. “What’s with the bullshit?”

Vauvert straightened. He figured this kind of thing was going to happen eventually. He had just hoped it would take longer.

“Is there a problem?”

“The problem is that I called your supervisor, you fucking liar,” Deveraux yelled. “It seems that you never told Chief Kiowski that you were coming up here, and he certainly never gave you the go-ahead to join us. In fact, he was wondering where you were all morning. You abandoned your post without telling anyone!”

Leroy stared at Vauvert in dismay.

“Is that true?”

“What does it matter? I’m here, okay?”

“You don’t understand,” Deveraux said, still seething. “Not only did you lie to the chief, you disregarded standard operating procedure and chain of command in the middle of a manhunt where a cop’s life is on the line. This is a serious breach of professional ethics. Now get the fuck out of here.”

“But we’re making progress,” Vauvert responded.

“Well, you can go make your progress back down in the boonies and let us do our job.”

Vauvert slowly rose to his feet, his mass towering over Deveraux. Then, emphasizing every word, he said, “I don’t know what the fuck is going on in your head, man. We are not in competition here. I’m trying to help save a colleague, and we are running out of time. Every minute we waste…”

“I don’t give a fuck if that stupid cunt got herself in trouble,” Deveraux flared. “If she had followed procedure, we wouldn’t be in this sorry mess. The entire department wouldn’t have had to drop everything just to try and bail her sorry ass out because she had to get pounded once too many times by some dipshit she picked up in a bar!”

Vauvert stared at him, motionless for exactly two seconds.

Up until now, Vauvert had been proud of how long he had restrained himself. This much self-control was rare for him.

But he had reached the point where polite behavior would only slow things even more.

Jean-Luc Deveraux did not see the head butt coming. Vauvert’s forehead swooped toward his face so fast, he couldn’t have dodged it anyway. It collided brutally with his nose, lighting up a big scarlet sun behind his eyes.

“You did what?” O repeated, furiously eyeing Vauvert, who was sitting in a chair in the hallway while the whole department gathered around.

“He broke my nose! The hick broke my nose!” Deveraux whined. “I want Internal Affairs! Right now!”

O raised a hand to quiet him.

“They’re on their way, Jean-Luc. Now, shut up.”

Deveraux pressed his handkerchief to his nose. It was quickly filling with blood.

“You guys, get him to the infirmary, now,” O ordered curtly.”