Fatal Instinct Read online

  Why? Why had he jumped from that window?

  Was it the grueling hours he had put in both at the scene of the Olin murder in Scarsdale and later at the laboratory performing autopsies on two victims? Even with her and Archer's assistance, the amount of work might simply have been too much of a strain.

  He'd come back to the M.E.'s office against doctor's orders, at the behest of Mayor Halle and Commissioner Eldritch, or so Alan had confided, saying, “Perhaps we were all expecting too damned much of Darius.”

  In a sense, the deadly Claw had claimed yet another victim, but the sun rose over New York Harbor just the same, setting the Statue of Liberty ablaze in a red-orange hue, while all around her city sounds from tugboats to fire trucks signaled that New York was clamoring for this new day like none before. The sun-dappled water reflected back the tall skyscrapers, turning their shapes into living, moving images. Nothing in this city was as it seemed, and everyone held secrets, her included. The only truth to be found was below a microscope, and even then the truth mocked her, proving her wrong, showing in no uncertain terms that the killer was one man and not two. On several of the victims she had taken her own findings and had personally overseen to their dispensation—she had thought: the samples sent to the FBI labs at Quantico to be examined by the best in the business. There seemed no way that the evidence could have been tampered with unless... She ruminated further, allowing herself the ugly thought. Only a man of Luther Darius' caliber could send a lab technician away from his duties of processing and properly packaging such evidentiary items for shipment. Might he have dared to open her samples to replace them with others? Nothing... no one is completely as he seems, she told herself again. It was a terrifying, fluttering, wild bird of a thought, trapped in the building of her head, screeching, flapping, not wanting to be there. It was the kind of thought Jessica wished she might banish the moment it entered her consciousness, because it felt evil even in its instinctive conception. Could it be that Darius, unhappy at her coming in on the case, had used his charm and flattery to beguile her in an elaborate ruse to gain her confidence? Perhaps he had wanted to retire in a blaze of glory, reason number one for coming back onto the case after his serious bout with illness. Perhaps he didn't in fact want her arriving at the same Sherlockian presumptions about the Claw as he had won through his hard work and determination? By now she couldn't recall which of them had arrived at the two-killer theory first, but even if Matisak had arrived at this same conclusion from his asylum, it hardly seemed improbable for Luther Darius to do the same from a hospital bed where he may've spawned a plan to “unveil” the true nature of the Claw in the grand style for which he had, over the years, become famous.

  The sun shined now like a giant fiery fingernail over the horizon beyond the great harbor where the Statue of Liberty stood. Jessica gazed at the sun as it rose in increments, turning from a fingertip to a crescent and soon to a huge, blood-red orb in the sky, the eye of God, she thought. Nothing was as it seemed, and yet how could she refute the microscopic evidence that proved her wrong, the teeth marks sent to J.T. She had taken the samples herself. They had been in no one else's hands save Dr. Darius' when he had sent them to Quantico.

  The terrifying unwanted thought fluttered back into her brain.

  It was the kind of thought Jessica Coran wished on no one: Darius perhaps had not actually been happy with her coming on to the case his flattery about her father was all a ruse; he had not wanted her to come to the exact same theory he had of two killers instead of one, because it was a notion he had had long before her, one that he had been carefully nurturing along; he was secretly upset with her. Darker thought still: Darius was in a position to do something about how he secretly felt.

  He always stood in a position to subvert her forensics work on the case, especially after lulling her into thinking him a worthy associate. But worthy associates didn't commit suicide...

  Darius was also in a unique position to divert or sabotage the work of his other colleagues, Simon Archer and Perkins before her. Even from a hospital bed, a man of his reputation could see to it that the wrong files were sent to the wrong locations. In an M.E.'s office such mix-ups were common enough without someone deliberately destroying or withholding evidence.

  She recalled the doctor's reluctance when she had wanted to take the additional bite mark cuttings from the throat, and how he had kept the head covered, and how she had placed the materials to go out to J.T. into his hands.

  But why? she asked herself several times. Why would the old man sabotage her work? In an attempt to regain his former stature within the medicolegal community as something of an amazing guru? It seemed almost too farfetched, but recently farfetched was the rule of the day.

  No! no! she told herself, not wishing to hear it. Then she wondered if Darius had been pursued to come back on the case initially, or if he had put the idea into Eldritch's mind. According to Dr. Darius' own statements, they were actively seeking a replacement for him. Was he hoping to so dazzle them with the Claw case that they'd ask him to stay on permanently?

  There were not too many men who, after so long a service, could gracefully walk away from such an all-encompassing career as that of Dr. Luther Darius.

  But then why kill himself? If he thought to make a comeback of a spectacular nature, to crack the biggest case in New York City... why? Archer had said that the old man had fallen in the locker room outside the autopsy theater, and when he awoke, he must have found himself alone in that hospital room, his body connected to an IV, machines registering his heartbeat, blood pressure and breathing. It was perhaps too much for him to bear, this enormous setback.

  Thinking he could no longer cut it...

  Alan Rychman had called the lab and everywhere else he could think of in his attempt to locate Jessica, but no one seemed to know where she was, and she wasn't answering her phone at the Marriott. Then he recalled how she and Darius had disappeared the previous day. He went searching for her himself and found her strolling a harbor sidewalk, stopping to stare off into the bay, occasionally reaching up to gulls that hovered nearby. From a distance she looked to be in conversation with the birds, who were simply fooled into believing she had something for them in her hand.

  Rychman beat a path over the aged, discolored wharf, straight for her.

  “Talking to the birds?” he shouted as he approached.

  “To myself, actually.”

  “Come up with any solutions?” He slipped an arm over her shoulder and she leaned into him.

  “Why is it always that beauty . . . integrity . . . honor . . . all fine things in this city of yours come wrapped in such ugly packages?”

  “What's that supposed to mean?”

  “I mean that Darius was all those things, at least outwardly... beautiful in his soul, and yet he was also deceptive and dangerous at the same time... cloaking his own personal mystery and pain so well, working in the lab at the same time.”

  “A man's got a right to a few secrets, Jess. Hell, without them, we're all... well, naked and at the mercy of others who aren't often kind.”

  She said no more. It seemed strange how the city had come to life around her, but in her state of mind she hadn't before noticed the melee of activity and bustle from cars and buses to pedestrians. He looked into her shimmering eyes. “I tried reaching you at your hotel... then thought of here. Listen, Jess, I'm... I couldn't be sorrier about Luther. He was a hell of a doctor and a fine man.”

  “I only knew him for a short time.” She sniffled and dabbed her eye with a handkerchief. “Foolish, I guess, standing out here crying over him. Fearful for his memory.”

  “Nothing foolish in it at all,” he countered. “Might do us all some good. As to fearful... well, no one can hurt him now. Hell, no one would want to, Jess.”

  “Yeah, I guess Archer and the rest of the people in the lab have to be feeling pretty low over it. I should get back, do what I can to... to straighten out a few things.”

  He was
confused and curious at once. “Straighten out what?”

  “I think maybe Dr. Darius had more reason than alcoholism or depression to take that jump. He... he had to, and perhaps...”

  “You're getting me confused, Jess. Perhaps what?”

  “You had a high opinion of Dr. Darius.”

  “Of course.”

  “Everyone did, right?”

  “Right. So?” Rychman held her to a dead stop.

  “He was above reproach, above question. His reputation alone—”

  “What's this all about, Jess?”

  “The first coroner worked for the king as a watchdog, overseeing suspicious deaths in the kingdom, Alan. Mostly the king wanted someone to represent his interests, so that he got his due on the death of a subject—taxes, lands, whatever. Nowadays things have changed, sure, but just like the king, you and others in government have to rely on the coroner to tell you the truth. In other words, the king may have a man watching out for his own interests, but who's going to question the king's man?”

  Rychman didn't understand what she was driving at. He looked deep and questioningly into her eyes. “Jess, I don't do riddles. What're you saying?” You up for some coffee? Let's get some.”

  Over coffee she confided her dark suspicions of Dr. Luther Darius. Rychman listened with quiet reserve the entire time, flinching only once, at the idea that Darius would sabotage his own investigation.

  “To heighten the payoff,” she suggested. “At the end he would pull the rabbit out of the hat. He'd thought he could do that when he discovered some small clue that the Claw was two men instead of one.”

  “So he withheld information on the bite marks?”

  “I think so.”

  “And he diverted some of the tissue samples you sent to Quantico?”

  “I know it sounds crazy, but—”

  “It sounds crazy, all right.”

  “—but, Alan, it also makes crazy sense. He was the first besides me to suggest that the Claw was two men.”

  “It's so unbelievable. Darius?”

  She was quickly angered by his coolness to the idea. “I know I'm right.”

  “Now you sound like Luther.”

  She relented. “You knew him a lot better than I did. But all the time you knew him, Alan, he was in good health and mentally capable. Perhaps, with his failing health—”

  “He was a fighter, Jess.”

  “So, dammit, what made him go through that window?”

  “You tell me. I'm going to make a phone call.” Alan was upset with what he saw as her wild suspicions.

  Alan returned and sat down heavily, his brow creased.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “I've just talked with Archer... Blood tests show no drags, nothing foreign in Luther's system, and nothing to indicate anything other than a jump from the window.”

  She breathed in a deep gulp of air, filling her lungs and releasing it in exasperation.

  “I think our next step is to talk with Archer, find out if he thinks Dr. Darius was acting strangely, and if he thinks anything strange was going on with respect to the forensics evidence in the case.”

  “A careful accounting will show you're wrong, Jess,” he said. “You've got to be.”

  She nodded. “I've been wrong before, and this time I also hope I am...”

  Eighteen

  Alan escorted her back to the NYPD forensics laboratories, where they parted company. Jessica feared making any further commitment in their runaway relationship. She feared anything more with a man like Rychman. Like Otto, he lived too close to danger. As far as she was concerned, their love-making was an offshoot of the war they were engaged in, two people thrown together due to circumstances, their attraction the only thing bonding them. And yet, she cared deeply for Alan.

  In the laboratory she returned to a project she'd begun the day before. Using computer graphics, she matched the ugliest wounds inflicted on the victims, trying to determine the exact nature of the weapon used against these women. She had programmed-in the depth of the wounds and the abrasive nature of the instrument used to turn flesh into jagged scars. She fed every detail to the computer. The computer's job was to find a weapon to fit the wound as closely as possible.

  It was determined quickly that in the case of each victim all three rents to the torso had been done simultaneously, and not—as earlier suspected—one at a time. This explained the exacting parallelism of the wounds. The image that was slowly surfacing on the computer screen was that of a three-pronged garden hoe, the prongs sharply bent, the ends like ice picks with razorlike serrated edges.

  The Claw lived up to his name.

  She stayed with it into the evening, soon realizing that the computer's insistence on the perfection of the three simultaneous jagged lines signaled something else significant. For each of the long tears to be so similar, the pressure had to be extremely even. With a hand-held tool this seemed unlikely. But if not hand-held, what else was there?

  Dr. Archer, fascinated with her tack, had become increasingly interested, asking questions. “You don't think the guy's got talons, do you?”

  “That's what the computer's saying; that it's the work of a bird of prey with talons created for ripping flesh.”

  “But that's impossible.” Archer suddenly realized that he had lost track of the time and said he must rush off.

  Word was circulating in the building that Archer was up for Darius' vacant position, and she guessed that he had an important meeting regarding this possibility. “Good luck,” Archer said as he was leaving.

  “Good luck to you,” she countered, making him stop for a moment and stare.

  She qualified her statement, “I mean... well, I've heard that you may be stepping in to... to fill... into the coroner's seat. Good luck.”

  He bit his lip and dropped his gaze. “I... I... wouldn't take it if they offered... not under the circumstances. I'm not in Dr. Darius' league, anyway...”

  Archer was so self-effacing, perhaps too much so. This was very likely the character trait that had kept him here for so long, working in Darius' shadow.

  “Actually, I think you'd do a fine job,” she told him.

  He laughed boyishly at this. “Coming from you, Dr. Coran, that... that's quite a compliment.”

  “Go for it, Simon. God knows you've worked hard enough over the years.”

  “That's true enough, but it takes more than years of work and dedication... I mean, running this place? Me?”

  “Who they gonna call?” she quipped.

  “Hell, any number of good M.E.s across the country. Perhaps they'll even offer the job to you, Doctor.”

  “No,” she said with a laugh, “it's definitely not for me.”

  “Oh? And why not?”

  “I tried a big-city coroner's job once, in Washington.”

  “And once was enough?”

  “Too much politicking; had my hands tied at every turn. Guess I just didn't have the right... mind-set.”

  “Is it so different with the FBI?”

  “There're some problems with the Bureau, too, don't misunderstand, but in my present situation I'm given more latitude, more freedom, more...” She searched for the word.

  “Respect?”

  “Yeah, at least by most of the people I work with.”

  He nodded. “A valuable asset such as yourself? They best respect you, Doctor.”

  She blushed and looked away but kept talking. “As for you, Dr. Archer, you seem to function so well here. You know how to beat them at their own game.”

  “Beat them at their own game?” He was momentarily confused.

  “Politics inherent in the umbilical tie between the medical and the legal worlds. You've managed the office for Dr. Darius in his absence; you took care of everything and remained above the pressure. That's all rather commendable and they must see that.”

  “Yes, all true. Well, I appreciate the fact that at least you have noticed my contribution,” he said with a
warm smile. “Must run now. Please, excuse me.”

  Even as he spoke his last words to her, she managed to keep her expression convivial, although her thoughts were running toward darkness like a mouse down a drain pipe. She had begun to listen to herself as she complimented Archer on how well he had managed things during Darius' convalescence. Even as she spoke she had begun to wonder about Archer's part in Darius' cover-up; then she began to wonder if it wasn't Archer's cover-up, and if so, was he covering for Darius or for himself? After all, Archer had been in charge of several of the Claw cases himself. He was in a unique position to alter or obstruct the flow of the investigation.

  The thought was like a wild horse galloping through her brain. She tried to catch a complete glimpse of it, but it was too fast. She needed time to mull it over, view it from all angles.

  Was she being foolish? Alan's reaction to her suspicions about Darius now tempered her new suspicions about Archer. Had she targeted the wrong man? Would Alan understand if she went to him with her latest dark deduction?

  Had Archer heard the innuendo in her voice? Had he seen any moment's hesitation or shift in expression that gave her away? His having to leave left her little chance to study any reaction, and finally she wondered if Luther Darius had ever entertained like suspicions, and if so was Archer aware of such suspicions? Was it possible that Archer was far more ambitious a man than he let on? And if so, to what lengths would he go to have Darius' position? If he began with lies and cover-ups which escalated with each Claw case in a blind attempt to gain prominence in the lab, and Darius learned of this and threatened him with revelation of the fact, what would the tightly bound Dr. Simon Archer do?

  Was he capable of striking out at Darius? Had Darius' locker-room fall more to do with a blow than previously suspected? Worse thought yet, had Darius' jump from his hospital window been helped along by Archer?