When I wake to sunlight streaming through Michael’s bedroom, I know.
Like Saul on the road to Damascus, the scales have been stripped from my eyes. My recurring dream was no dream at all, but a memory. A memory trying to come back to me any way it could. The business of my father walking on water was something grafted onto it, a different message from my subconscious, pointing me toward something I’ve yet to learn.
And today I will learn it.
Where Michael lay beside me in the bed, I find a note on the pillow with a house key lying on top of it. The note reads,
I take Michael’s phone off the bedside table and dial Sean’s cell number.
“Detective Sergeant Regan.”
“Tell me you got the autopsy report.”
“Cat, I moved heaven and earth to get that fucking thing, but it’s not to be had. John Kaiser’s sitting on it like national security depends on it. If you want that report, you’re going to have to ask Kaiser for it. I’m sorry, babe. I tried my best.”
I hesitate only a moment. “Give me Kaiser’s cell number.”
“Shit. Are you sure? The Bureau’s still looking for you.”
“If Kaiser really wanted to find me, I’d be in jail now.”
“Yeah. I guess you’re right.”
Sean reads out the number. I commit it to memory, then hang up and dial it.
Kaiser catches his breath when he hears my voice. “Do you have something for me?” he asks.
“No. I need something from you.”
“That’s not the answer I was looking for, Cat. The only reason you’re not in jail is because I thought you could help me solve this case.”
“I can. But it’s a quid pro quo situation. You help me with my problem, I’ll help you with yours.”
“Christ. What do you want now?”
If I seem too anxious to get the autopsy report, Kaiser might not give it to me. “Tell me where you are with the murders first. What about the saliva cultures? Any
“Not yet. The pathologist thinks it’s still early, though, that we’ll see it by the thirty-six-hour point.”
“No, twenty-four hours is enough, if it’s there. The saliva in those wounds is either coming from someone without teeth, or someone taking penicillin with gentamicin. You haven’t found any victims’ relatives who fit that description?”
“We’ve got a couple of male relatives with dentures. I’m going at them hard, but they look clean to me.”
“Talk to their families. If they wear their dentures at all, they’re not the source. What about the antibiotic angle?”
“That’s tough to nail down,” Kaiser complains. “Anybody could lie about that. We can’t take blood levels on every male relative of six murder victims.”
“Why not? The DNA evidence proves the source is male, and this is your only real lead. The British police did blood tests on thousands of people in one town to solve a murder case.”
“This is America, Cat, not England.”
“Okay, okay. Any sign of anaerobic spirochetes in the cultures? Bacteroides melaninogenicus? Anaerobic vibrios? Those are specific for teeth, and we could rule out edentulous people.”
“Shit. I’m looking…I don’t see anything like that.”
“It’s still early for those to show up, and they’re difficult to culture anyway. I’ll keep thinking about this angle. What about the skull in Malik’s lap?”
“Nothing. The only fingerprints on it were Malik’s.”
“Naturally. What else?”
Kaiser blows out a stream of air in frustration. “We’re checking all film-processing labs, in the hope that someone’s done work for Malik. It was video equipment we found in his apartment, but I’m hoping for a break.”
“What else?”
“I’ve got the technical services guys trying to resurrect data off the drives we took from Malik’s office computers, but they’ve got nothing so far. I think his film really is our only chance. But if the killer got that when he killed Malik…we’re fucked.”
“I’m sorry I haven’t been more help to you. I’ve had my hands full here.”
“You just get me the names of the women in Group X. Do that, and I’ll keep your ass out of jail.”
“I’m trying, John. But I need your help, too.”
“What do you need?” His voice is wary.
“The same thing I asked you for yesterday. The autopsy report on my aunt.”
“What are you looking for? Cause of death, what?”
“You know what I’m looking for. Her reproductive organs. Anything out of the ordinary?”
Kaiser takes his time to answer. “I shouldn’t give you this.”
My throat tightens.
“Didn’t you tell me that Ann was obsessed with having children?”
“Yes.”
“Well, that makes no sense at all, Cat.”
“Why not?”
“Because your aunt was sterile. She had been for decades. Probably from the time she was a teenager.”
“What do you mean? Sterile how?”
“Her tubes were tied.”
Something goes hollow inside me. “That’s impossible. The pathologist must have made a mistake.”
“You know better,” Kaiser says wearily. “And the sterilization wasn’t done by any normal procedure, either. That’s how the pathologist knew it was done a long time ago.”
“How was it done?”
“Apparently, in a tubal ligation the procedure is done fairly low down the fallopian tube. Your aunt’s tubes were cut just below something called the fimbria, a flowerlike opening of the tube just below the ovary. They were tied off with silk sutures, and the silk was still inside the scarred tissue at autopsy. The pathologist said OBs haven’t used silk for that procedure in decades.”
A cloud of fog has descended in my mind.
“I know this is giving you some ideas about your personal situation, Cat. Please try to stay calm, okay? Maybe you should call Dr. Goldman.”
“Did the pathologist say anything else?”
“He said that an OB wouldn’t cut off the fimbria. That was something a general surgeon might do as a quick method of sterilizing somebody. He thought it was damned odd.”
My hands are shaking, but not from fear this time. It’s outrage. “I have to go, John.”
“No!” he says quickly. “You can’t just go. I’ve given you a lot of rope to play with, and I’m afraid you’re going to hang us both. I’ve got superiors to answer to, like it or not. And every hour you’re on the street comes out of my credibility. I’m looking for some help here.”
Michael’s clock reads 7:05 A.M. “Give me eight hours, John. In that time I’ll have something to give you, or I’ll come back to New Orleans and let you throw me to the wolves.”
The silence seems interminable.
“What can you possibly learn in Natchez that can help me?” he asks.
“Eight hours,” he says softly. “Cat, if I haven’t heard from you by five o’clock today, I’ll have the Natchez police pick you up on suspicion of murder.”
Another pause.
