Steven Womack - By Blood Written

That Friday morning, the call he’d been waiting for finally came in.

“Agent Powell?” the gruff voice said.

“Hello, Max. I’ve been waiting for your call.”

“I’ve got good news and bad news,” Bransford offered.

“Which do you want first?”

Hank felt his chest weigh down. Damn , he thought.

“Okay,” he said after a moment. “Let’s go with the good.”

“I’ll fax you the whole report, but the bottom line is we got a match. The blood in the trunk positively matches that of Allison May Matthews. It’s going to take a couple of weeks to get a full DNA workup, but right now it looks like the same blood was at the murder scene, on the coveralls we found in the Dumpster, and in the trunk of the rental Schiftmann had when he was in Nashville.”

“That’s it,” Hank said, the heaviness in his chest lifting.

Not lifting, but releasing, exploding, like a fireworks display that, for a brief moment, let him drop his professional detachment. “Max, we’ve got him! We’ve got the son of a bitch! He’s toast.”

“I know, Hank. We did it. All of us. The DA is taking the case to the grand jury after their lunch break. They’ve already heard all of the evidence except the blood match-up.

After they get that, the DA will get the indictment processed, issue a warrant for Schiftmann’s arrest, and start extradition proceedings.”

Hank gripped the phone tightly and realized he was smiling so hard his jaw hurt. “Fantastic! This is incredible. But wait? You said there was bad news.”

“The bad news is somebody leaked the story to the press.

Andy Parks from the Chattanooga paper-”

“The same guy who wrote the other story,” Hank interrupted.

“Yeah, that’s him. He went to the DA with everything that had gone on in the grand jury room.”

“Jesus, how’d he get that?”

“I don’t know, but when the DA finds out, I wouldn’t want to be in their moccasins. He’s loaded for bear. But Collier made him a deal, if he’d hold off on printing the story …”

“He’d give him a heads-up on the indictment.”

“That’s it,” Bransford said.

“When’s the story supposed to break?” Hank asked.

“Sometime this weekend.”

“That means Schiftmann will have advance warning.”

“Maybe not,” Bransford said. “It’s just the Chattanooga paper.”

Hank shook his head. “No, not this story. This one’ll be all over. Probably be the lead story on the networks Sunday night. Schiftmann’s going to find out for sure. No telling what he’ll do.”

“Think he might rabbit?”

Hank shrugged. “Who knows? He’s got money, resources.

He’s smart.”

“Yeah, and he’s famous. His picture was in Entertainment Weekly and People magazine last week. How’s he going to hide?”

Hank sat silently for a moment, thinking.

“You there?” Bransford asked.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m here. Max, we already know how smart this guy is. He’s killed at least thirteen people we know of.

He’s bound to know that sooner or later, something like this could happen.”

“What are you thinking?”

“I’m thinking this guy’s already got an escape route. He’s got a Plan B in place, and if we’ve got a chance of actually seeing him in court, then we better not let the SOB out of our sight between now and the time the New York City police take him into custody.”

“So what are you suggesting?”

“I’m suggesting,” Hank offered, “that I call the NYC Field Office and have this guy put under twenty-four-hour surveillance. I don’t want him to go into a public bathroom without one of my guys standing outside the stall waiting for him.”

“All right,” Max Bransford said. “Let’s nail this bastard.”

Hank smiled. “It’ll be a pleasure.”

Andy Parks woke up early that Sunday morning, dressed quickly, and left his apartment at the Metro Manor. He drove his rusting Datsun 280Z out of the basement garage and turned left onto the James Robertson Parkway. At seven A.M. on a Sunday morning, there was practically no traffic.

The day held promise of warm spring sunshine and clear skies. Andy’s stomach churned in anticipation. This was the biggest story he’d ever covered in his life. If this story broke like he hoped, a little resume dusting-off would be in order.

He had worked like a demon these past four or five days.

He’d researched Schiftmann’s life and work, read three of his books, checked and cross-checked every element of the story. He had kept his word to the district attorney, and Collier had done right by him.

Andy sped up to make the light at Broadway, then turned right and headed toward Vanderbilt University. There was a small coffee and bagel place on Twenty-first Avenue across from the law school that got the Chattanooga paper every day. Five minutes later, he pulled the 280Z into a parking space out front and almost jumped out of the car.

He opened the door, nodded to Gretchen behind the counter, and went straight to the long rack of newspapers against the far wall. The wooden bins held the New York Times , the Washington Post , and papers from Birmingham, Atlanta, Miami, and, at the far end of the bins, Chattanooga.

“The usual, Andy?” Gretchen called.

“Yeah,” Andy nodded, preoccupied. He grabbed the top copy of the News-Free Press and smiled. There, in sixty-point bold block type, over the lead story for the Sunday edition, was the headline that Andy had suggested the afternoon before:

BEST-SELLING AUTHOR TO BE INDICTED IN BRUTAL DOUBLE MURDER

Andy laughed out loud and flapped the paper open, scanning his lead to see if the editor had changed it.

NASHVILLE, March 27-The Davidson County Grand Jury will indict New York Times best-selling author Michael Schiftmann on two counts of first-degree murder tomorrow in the brutal February slaying of two MTSU coeds. District Attorney T. Robert Collier will make the announcement at a press conference scheduled for 10 A.M. Monday.

Andy folded the paper under his arm and stepped between the empty tables over to the counter, where his double latte with an extra shot of espresso was already waiting for him.

Gretchen, the thin, dark-haired Vanderbilt sophomore with an eyebrow ring, gave him a look as he approached.

“What’s going on with you?” she asked. “You look like the cat that swallowed the canary. What, did you get lucky last night or what?”

“Yeah, yeah, that’s it,” he said. “I got lucky.” He reached into his wallet and pulled out a five-dollar bill. “Keep it,”

he said.

“Wow, you did get lucky last night,” Gretchen said.

Andy started to walk away, then turned back to her, grinning again. “Gretchen, you ever hit a home run before? I mean, really hit one out of the park?”

Sunday afternoon, Manhattan

Taylor Robinson’s violent retching echoed down the hallway of her empty office building.

Inside the women’s restroom, she was on her knees in a stall, her hands wrapped around the cold porcelain, not even bothering to hold her hair back. A ferocious wave of nausea swept over her once more, carrying her torso forward as she vomited again. This time, there was little left inside her. A thin trail of slime hung out of her mouth, into the putrid water.

She’d never felt so ill in her life. Her chest hurt; her ribs ached. Her eyes felt like they were going to pop out of her head. Her face and neck had broken out in a frigid sweat.

She struggled to get her breath, to try and relax before her heart exploded in her chest.

Then it hit again, a rolling, convulsive paroxysm that began deep in her gut and echoed throughout her abdomen and up into her throat. Her belly was empty, wrung completely out. Nothing came out this time, but the spasm rolled through the top half of her body. As she leaned over the toilet, the almost inhuman noise that came out of her sounded like a disembodied, continuous, agonizing wail.