Extreme Instinct jc-6 Page 23

  "I suppose they've been interviewed? Saw no one, heard nothing until the explosion?''

  "All of 'em have already departed this morning, but they left statements with the local authorities. They add nothing useful."

  Jessica stepped to within inches of the bed where the Whitaker woman's black-scourged body lay in the familiar crumpled, fetal position. The superheated fire had reduced her body to near dwarf size, it seemed. Maybe the bastard burned himself badly on this one, she silently prayed. "Too bad his body's not amid the rubble," she said aloud.

  "Will you allow me to help, Dr. Coran?" asked Repasi.

  "You'll see to it that copies of your protocols follow me?"

  "I will indeed."

  "Then it's a deal."

  "Jess!" complained J. T.

  "Karl's right, John. We need the freedom to move quickly. I can't be tied up in another autopsy, which is going to tell me nothing I don't already know, so… so let's get out of here."

  "But Jess…"

  Ignoring J. T.'s whining, Jessica stepped out of the crime scene and rushed to the nearby restaurant, where she plopped into a booth. J. T. chased after her and found her nursing black coffee. "You going to drink that whole pot alone?"

  "Help yourself."

  "You okay, Jess?" he asked, sliding into the booth.

  "Stop asking that."

  "Sure, sure… whatever you say." He poured himself a cup of black coffee, lifted the cup, chinked it against hers, and said, "Cheers."

  "I'm sorry," she apologized. "This case is driving me mad."

  J. T. looked up at the pretty waitress whose shadow fell across the table. "Well, hello," he said.

  "May I get your breakfast order?" she asked.

  "Nothing else for me," Jessica replied.

  J. T. ordered two eggs over easy, hash browns, and bacon.

  "You ever going to get that cholesterol down, J. T.?" Jessica said as the waitress hurried off.

  Pouring himself more coffee, he asked, "What's our next move, Jess? We can't simply just wait for him to dump another body at our footsteps,"

  "That's exactly what he's doing, isn't it?" she asked, her eyes displaying a revelation. "He's wanting us to trail him, so he leaves a trail of bodies, but where do they ultimately lead? If we knew that, then maybe we could get a step ahead of him. Do you still have that area map you've been carrying around?"

  "Got it right here," he replied, snatching the map from his coat pocket.

  "We've got to predict his next stopover. Where he will next kill, and try like hell to stop him before he does it again."

  "But how?" J. T. pleaded. "How're we going to do that?"

  "What if he's on one of these tour buses coming and going out of these parks, J. T.? What if he was on one the other morning, pulling out of Page at Wahweap Lodge? He may well have seen me, or you, or both of us. That's how he knew I wasn't the one on the phone back in Vegas where he called. He knew it going in; and that's how he knew to find me at Wahweap Lodge last night, to log his last call."

  "If that's the case-"

  "Then he's been yanking our chains right along. It's time to turn this chase around. Let me study that map."

  FOURTEEN

  To a man who is afraid, everything rustles.

  — Sophocles

  Over coffee and J. T.'s breakfast plate, they discussed tourist points on the map, of which there were too many to count. They discussed what they so far knew about the killer, each comparing the notes of the other. They discussed the new message on the mirror and how it fit with the others, J. T. displaying it on his notepad. To date, the list now read:

  #1 is #9-Traitors

  #2 is #8-Malicious Frauds

  #3 is #7-Violents

  #4 is #6-Heretics

  "Now, logically speaking, his next victim will be number five, right, Jess?"

  "We can't let that happen."

  ''Bear with me, here, Jess. If his next victim is number five, and it follows as it has been going, then we can predict part of his next message will be"-he interrupted himself to add to the list-"this. Right?"

  Jessica looked down at his added line, which read:

  #5 is #5

  "Interesting juxtaposition, wouldn't you say, how five crosses five?" he asked.

  ''Yeah, but what does it mean? How does it help us to stop the bastard?"

  J. T. bit his lower lip, frowning. "I don't know… yet.. "

  With maps and tour bus guides laid out across the table, they continued the brainstorming session they'd begun. "J. T., you think it's just a coincidence that two of the victims were traveling on touring buses?"

  "Yeah, I have to agree. It is a bit strange, but each victim, Melvin Martin and Eloise Whitaker, were using different tour bus companies."

  "Still, the two buses interweaved from sight-seeing point to sight-seeing point."

  J. T. considered this, sipping at his coffee. "Yeah. You saw how many buses were pulling out of the lot here this morning?"

  "I saw, all right. One almost ran me down."

  "Maybe the killer's that bus driver."

  Jessica replied with a slight shake of the head, ' 'More likely to be a less than remarkable passenger. Besides, come to think of it, being run over by a monster bus like that, it'd be too easy a way for me to go, so far as this guy's concerned. He wants me to suffer along with what- nine other victims?"

  "You think he'll stop at nine?"

  "Unless he plans to spin on nine and take it back down to one."

  "I'm going to do some checking about these bus tour lines. See what I can find out about them," J. T. suggested.

  ''Do that. As I recall, that Pierson woman whom Chris Lorentian stayed with said Chris was in the process of- or had gotten-tickets for both of them to escape Vegas. I had assumed she meant plane tickets, but bus tickets would have done just as well."

  "Hey, that's right."

  "And there've been buses loading and unloading around us since… well, since Vegas."

  "My God. If this is true, the killer took Chris Lorentian's ticket and is traveling on her reservation."

  "Contact all the bus lines and run down Lorentian's itinerary, and we may know the killer's next destination. Short of that, check also for anyone with the name Charon or Nessus traveling by bus."

  "That might take some time."

  Jessica gritted her teeth, but looking across the room, she saw her old friend the tour guide Ronny Ropers. She scooted from the booth seat and rushed for the tour guide, asking, "Where do the buses go from here?"

  Ropers, looking confused, his hands in the air, asked, "Which buses? They all go in different directions."

  "What's tonight's destination for those heading north?"

  "Salt Lake City for some; Pocatello, Idaho, for others; and Rock Springs, Wyoming, for others. Depends on site destinations."

  "And those heading south?"

  "Where we came from, Zion National Park, Wahweap Lodge, Glen Canyon country, or a straight run to Vegas. Ultimately Vegas for most, Flagstaff for others."

  "Salt Lake City," she repeated while Ropers stared at her. It stood out as the largest northerly destination at the moment.

  She returned to J. T. "He's headed for Salt Lake. It's a large enough city. We could lose him forever, if he suddenly decides to cut his losses and wishes to disappear, but I doubt that's his plan."

  "What do we do?"

  She started away, saying over her shoulder, "Follow through on your plan. Check with the bus lines. Run down that ticket."

  "And what are you going to do?" he asked, chasing after.

  "I'm going ahead to Salt Lake."

  "Alone?"

  "I'll wire Bishop to meet me there."

  "I don't know, Jess. I think we ought to stick together."

  "J. T., that information on what bus line he's on will be vital. It will tell us not only his next destination but also the one after that. There's no way you can get that info while traveling to Salt Lake. We need to know Lorentian's
proposed itinerary and what hotels she would've been staying at, the same ones we hypothesize that he will be using in her stead."

  "But Jess!"

  She was making her way across the highway to the helicopter again. "Don't you see? That information is vital now, John. Get it! Meanwhile, I'll organize a strike force in Salt Lake, utilizing FBI headquarters there."

  "Are you sure?"

  Over her shoulder, she called back, saying, "I'll call you here when I'm set up there."

  "But Jess… Jess…"

  She had stopped listening and continued her march to the helicopter pad, determined now to be at the killer's next destination before him, glad that she had brought along an overnight bag along with her medical bag.

  J. T. discovered that many of the people staying at the hotels at or near national parks such as Bryce Canyon and Zion were indeed on one bus tour or another, that on any given night at least two and perhaps four or five tour buses lodged at Ruby Inn and Lake Powell's Wahweap as well. No surprises there. He also learned that like ships at sea, there were weary-worn routes all the buses took, but that some tours included side trips that others failed to take. All of this he learned from the clique of tour guides hanging about Ruby Inn. He also learned something of the history of the inn, that it was a favorite haunt of cowboy and Western stars from Gene Autry and Roy Rogers to Audie Murphy and John Wayne.

  From the bus companies he'd contacted, he had heard from only three of seven so far, and none of them listed a Chris Lorentian, a Charon, or anyone named Nessus in any of various spellings on their manifests. It had been four hours since Jessica had left, and no word. He began to worry when Warren Bishop showed up at the inn, seeking Jessica.

  "Where is she?" Bishop asked J. T. where he sat before a phone in the manager's office.

  "Salt Lake City."

  "Why Salt Lake?"

  "We believe-or rather, she believes it will be where he next kills."

  "How does she know this?"

  "She doesn't, not exactly, but bear with me."

  Bishop, exhausted from what appeared lack of sleep, dropped stonelike into a chair beside J. T., who then continued, "He's a killer of opportunity. He bides his time, seeking out the weakest to prey upon, someone lonely or despondent, someone alone, and he pounces."

  "I follow you so far."

  "Step out to the restaurant with me for a moment."

  "I'm not hungry. Get on with it, Dr. Thorpe."

  "Please, come along," J. T. gently urged.

  Taking a narrow passageway, they came upon the dining area. It was dinnertime, especially for the bus tour crowd staying the night at the inn. "Notice how many of these people around you here at the inn, Bishop, are just that- vulnerable one way or another?"

  "They're mostly elderly people-couples, and in packs. What do you mean?"

  "Women alone, women traveling with their daughters, single women, single men in search of a mate along with their adventure into the wilderness parks. Sure, there are a lot of couples, but there are also the singles. Melvin Martin was a single man traveling alone, and now this Whitaker woman, a single woman traveling alone."

  "Then the killer could still be at this lodge, camouflaged among the bus tour crowds," suggested Bishop. "So, you and Jessica have concluded that he's traveling by bus, I see."

  "How do you suppose he learned we-Jess, rather- was staying at Wahweap Lodge when he was here, killing again? He's following a bus route, and he has us marching to his drumbeat, and he knows it."

  "Then he's thought this thing through thoroughly, hasn't he?"

  "We believe so. As you know, he's been baiting Jessica all along. The creep was milling around in Page while we were there, just.. just to taunt us."

  "Yes, Jessica feared her path and his might cross there."

  "He knew enough to telephone her there, so he either saw her there or assumed she would follow him there…"

  "And if he assumed… Well, either way, he's as shrewd as he is psychotic. I got Jessica's wire, flew out to Page only to discover you had all rushed here."

  Bishop's apt description of the Phantom as a shrewd psychotic recalled Mad Matt Matisak to mind, along with a host of other satanic killers whom Jessica had helped, either directly or indirectly, to put down or behind bars, and he wondered, as Repasi had, if the Phantom might not be someone with a long-ago grudge to settle with Jessica. He suggested this to Bishop, who quickly informed him that it was unlikely, since a thorough check of all former such opponents revealed no one missing from lockup.

  ''But what if someone in lockup is holding the strings, telling this puppet what to do and say to terrify Jessica?"

  "Maybe… it's a possibility, but Quantico says no. And Santiva has taken measures to stop all communiquйs going out of federal asylums and federal prisons housing anyone who could conceivably hold a grudge against Jess."

  "You should have seen Jessica last night after that bastard telephoned her again, Bishop. Mother wanted her to hear Eloise Whitaker's last screams."

  ''Lowlife-SOB-motherfreaking-rat-bastard.''

  "Yeah, my sentiments exactly."

  "Maybe it's possible then, at some point, he was at Wahweap Lodge in Page while you two were there," suggested Bishop, imagining it.

  "I suspect our paths crossed. The killer didn't have to wait there long, just long enough for the tour guide to round everyone up, minus Melvin Martin, of course, but then a check with Martin's tour bus company turned up no one traveling as Chris Lorentian, so Melvin may not've been a part of the same tour group as the one the killer is traveling with. Actually, as it happens, Melvin was traveling in exactly the opposite direction when their paths crossed. His tour was passing through the national parks from the north down on a journey for a destination southwest-for Vegas, in fact. And the morning after Chris Lorentian was killed? The hotel parking lot in Vegas was crammed full with touring buses."

  "He made his escape from Vegas on a tour bus?" Bishop's shake of the head spoke volumes. "We had men watching the buses for anyone looking suspicious."

  J. T. frowned, knowing it sounded somewhat ridiculous, but he replied, ''What better way to blend in than to join a gaggle of tourists? And we never found Chris's credit cards or her purse. Besides, as the FBI profile says, this guy is so unremarkable as to be virtually invisible."

  "And using a unisex name like Chris, I suppose the tour guide would have little reason to question his sex when he went to use that ticket." Bishop sent his balled fist down on a table, the noise startling everyone in the restaurant area.

  "Right," agreed J. T.

  "So, supposing they were both-killer and victim- touring with the same or similar bus tour companies," suggested Bishop, warming now to the game of supposition they were playing, "they strike up a conversation, maybe have dinner together, and he slips his victim something in a drink…"

  "Just enough drugs to incapacitate. Then he goes up to the victim's room, concerned about the victim's pallor, which the bastard remarks upon at dinner," added J. T.

  "And the rest, as they say, is smoke and history…" Bishop's hard-set jaw began to quiver. "Cold, methodical bastard. Quite sure of what he wants, but I'll be damned if I know. Tell me what you know of this untapped phone call Jessica had from the creep at Wahweap Lodge."

  J. T. wondered for a moment how Bishop knew the call had been untapped, but he mentally shrugged it off. There'd been no time for Jessica to place a tap on the phone. Bishop must have assumed as much.

  J. T. now launched into as detailed a description of the killer's last communiquй as he could muster. He told Bishop all that Jessica had revealed to him about the phone call, and he ended with the killer's professed reason for doing people: "In order to climb from Hell himself, or so he said."

  "Nifty and the freshest excuse for murder I ever heard," Bishop sarcastically replied.

  J. T. nodded. "The devil made me do it."

  "In your search with the bus companies…" began Bishop.

  "Yeah?"
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  "Did you ask after the name she'd registered under at the Hilton?"

  "My God. I'd forgotten. Chris Dunlap."

  "Let's get back on the horn then."

  They rushed back to the phone J. T. had left in the manager's office.

  J. T. and Bishop double-teamed the effort, and they tied up the phone lines out of Ruby Inn with the help of the cache of tour guides they'd rounded up, making phone calls to all the various bus companies working the national parks routes in Arizona, Utah, Nevada, Idaho, Colorado, and Wyoming. They'd thought themselves clever by limiting themselves to the national parks tour packages in this area, since the trail of the killer appeared to be that of a tourist interested in the Grand Canyon, Glen Canyon Dam, Bryce Canyon, and the Zion area. They then narrowed their search to buses going to, through, or toward Salt Lake City, Utah, in the past twenty-four hours.

  The search proved frustrating, however. The bus dispatchers they talked to were, to a person, reluctant to release information over the phone without proof of Bishop's or J. T.'s credentials. The tour guides had far better luck, their voices and tour package numbers familiar to those within a given company.

  Further vexing Bishop and J. T., some of the bus company records seemed in disarray, despite their systems' computerized promises.

  At one point J. T. found himself disappointed to the point of considering murder.

  Finally, after two and a half hours of nonsense, someone at the other end of the line said, "Yes, yes, sir… I do have a Chris Dunlap registered on our bus tour number thirteen fourteen, which is due into Salt Lake… ahhh, an hour and a half ago!"

  J. T. had to check which bus company he was now speaking to, he'd been on the phone with so many today. It was the VisionQuest bus line. One of their buses had almost run over Jessica that morning.

  "Thirteen fourteen? That's the number to identify the bus?" he asked.

  "No, no… that's the tour group number. Bus number is sixtyyyyy… seven."

  "License number?"

  "Bus travels through sixteen states. Which license number do you want, sir? Arizona, Nevada plates?''

  "Utah… Utah plates'll do."

  The voice at the other end slowly enumerated each number.