closing in more than once. The only improvement in the situation here as opposed to what had been Joyce Olsen's safe little cozy corner of the world-home for her and her dog, Shep-was the reduction in number of people milling about and the sterile environment. In terms of space, the lab was close quarters, especially given the horrendous decay and mind-numbing wound.
A glance at her watch told Jessica the hour now neared 2 P.M. She marveled at how time seemed at first compressed, then stopped completely at a mutilation murder scene such as the one they had collectively endured today, and how amazingly time had vanished as a result of her focus and concentration on the job.
Sands now said to Jessica in a near whisper as he worked, “That boy Darwin's got a tear on for this monster. Can't say I blame him.”
“Darwin believes it's all the work of one man, these three separate murders.” Jessica hoped to get Ira's feelings on the matter.
“Covered his tracks well if Darwin is to be believed. Not an iota of DNA left at the other two crimes scenes. Kills at opposite ends of the country… unusual if it is a single killer. So who'd notice?”
“Who'd notice? Apparently Xavier Darwin Reynolds,” Jessica said, a half grin creasing her features. “I can't count the number of times intuition alone led me to unmask a killer.”
A valet stood outside Darwin's unmarked FBI car below a huge golf umbrella with the Wyndham Lakefront Hotel's logo clearly marked. He appeared to be held in check as he watched the arguing couple inside the car. A light drizzle had begun to speckle the lit windshield where Jessica and Darwin sat below the Wyndham's marquee.
“I am willing to accept your final verdict, Dr. Coran. I know you are the best the FBI has to offer.”
“You're that sure?”
The light drizzle began slapping hard at the car, turning into a downpour, encouraging Darwin to swear and pull further up under the crowded carport-canopy.
The young valet and a bellhop with another logo-stamped umbrella pecked on the windows. Reynolds rolled his down and popped the trunk from inside, saying, “Bags are in the rear.” He then turned to her and asked, “Well? Do we go over things tonight after you're refreshed or am I to leave?”
“All right. You can buy me dinner.”
“Thank you. I'm sorry to be so damned pushy, but we don't have a lot of time, Doctor, not if we're to stop this execution.”
“Give me half an hour and then call. We'll put our heads together on Robert Towne's behalf. No promises. That's the best I can do.”
Darwin grinned and almost crushed her hands in his. “That's all I can ask… all I can ask. Thank you, Dr. Coran. Thank you.”
As Jessica slipped from the car beneath the umbrella held for her, she stuck out a hand to the rain, enjoying its touch. “At last, something straight outta Mother Nature. Something real. I love it,” she muttered, while within she wondered when she had last been as passionate about a case as young Darwin Reynolds felt about this one and its relation to the impending Towne execution over half a continent away.
Jessica rushed for the warmth and safety of the well-lit lobby. Her mind kept at her, begging the question, When did you lose that enthusiasm and passion for hunting and running down evil, Jessica Coran? She wondered how she'd become so jaded and casual about something so absolutely awful, so terrifyingly and horribly unique as a murder case like this one-bodies stripped of their spines. To some degree she'd been thinking it was just another case, just another in a long line of jobs to be gotten through. Perhaps the time had come for her career with the FBI to be through. She wondered how many cases she compromised, how many people she hurt, including herself, while in her present frame of mind. A frame of mind she did not fully understand but one which painted her as an accountant in Hades-enumerating body parts, the remnant leavings of mutilation murderers- as if each body part formed just another bead on a rosary of evil, as if she were counting bones, organs and tissue for Sa-tan's ledger.
Darwin had followed her in. “I have a few things to do, but I'll call up to your room in thirty or forty, and we'll have dinner, and I'll leave you with the murder books from Minnesota and Portland.”
Too tall to stand below the umbrella held by the bellhop, Darwin had gotten wet. He'd helped load the bags onto a four-wheeled cart, and he had tipped both bellhops for taking charge of the bags, and the valet for allowing the car to remain in place for a short span.
“If you get no answer when you call up, I will've fallen asleep,” Jessica warned.
“Shower and you'll be refreshed,” he reminded her. “If I get no answer, I'll pound on your door.”
“Pushy man.” Jessica left him for the registration desk, acquired her key and made her way to the elevator. She felt a certain relief in watching the passionate and sure of himself young agent disappear through the revolving doors toward his waiting car. He was an exhausting man to be around for one thing, and for another, she had gotten by so far without the murder books. Perhaps he'd have second thoughts, perhaps he'd get involved elsewhere, and perhaps she could get a good night's sleep. Not a likely thing while within arm's distance of a man so filled with kinetic energy.
After showering off the taxing day, Jessica sat on the bed in her white terry-cloth robe and pulled the phone into her lap. A red light signaled messages. She ran through them. One from Eriq Santiva, checking in, asking if she needed anything in Milwaukee, and wondering if this horrible case she was working on might signal a serial killer or not. After Santiva, it was John Thorpe, with a few pleasantries, saying he missed her at Quantico, and that everything was functioning quite well in her absence.
“Thanks, J.T. You always know how to make a girl feel needed,” she said aloud.
The third message was Richard Sharpe, calling from their Virginia home. He had called to tell her how much he missed her.
Jessica smiled at the sound of Richard's baritone voice. He sounded like the actor Richard Burton.
She immediately went to her suit jacket and pulled out the PCS Vision phone with built in camera that Richard had purchased for her-or them rather. It'd been a special gift, a way to see one another despite the miles between them. This particular model had a feature that allowed real-time panning of a room or vista.
Using the gift, she now called her live-in lover and best friend. She had first gotten to know him as Inspector Sharp of the New Scotland Yard, London, England. They had met when Richard had come calling at Quantico in search of help, and she had gone back to London to work with him on a curious case there involving millennium- phobic cultists and crucifixion murders. Richard, nowadays a working consultant and liaison between the FBI and the State Department, had only recently returned from an overseas assignment, and now she had to leave him at their home in Quantico, Virginia. Richard kept up a half-kidding needling of her to marry him, but she had remained reluctant, fearful of such a heady commitment.
He came on, standing in the yard at a white fence, horses playing over his shoulder as he smiled at her. His first words on hearing her voice were direct, as always. “When are we going to tie the knot, as you Yanks say? I'm feeding apples to Ben and Porsche. Bet you wish-”
“I was there, yes! As to getting hitched, things between us are too good to sacrifice to a marriage license,” she firmly replied, waving into the camera for him to see.
“That room behind you could be our wedding suite,” he persisted.
“Are you kidding, Richard? I'm going to want Maui or Tahiti, maybe New Zealand, but certainly not Milwaukee for our… But why am I even talking about this?”
“Because, you secretly want it as much as I?”
She quickly changed the subject. “I've gotten myself involved in quite a strange case here, Richard.” He became instantly curious on hearing the details of the bizarre Milwaukee case and Agent Reynolds's theory that it could be connected to two other murders years apart from one another.
“Does his theory have any credence?” Richard jokingly asked Ben, one of the horses nuzzling, when a second horse shoved him completely off camera. Jessica heard Richard shout, “Porsche! That's not very ladylike at all!”
More apple slices calmed both horses.
“As a matter of fact, Darwin's theory has a great deal of credence, just not enough hard evidence to get a man off death row. We have no DNA, no fingerprints to match, not even the killer's blood to make any comparisons with. And Towne's defense went from pleading insanity to denying this, and then he apparently stopped any move toward an appeal made on his behalf.”
