Blood Memory (11 page)

I press my garage-door opener and anxiously watch the white panels rise. Sean’s car is parked inside my garage. A dark green Saab turbo, ten years old.

I walk into my house with my purse in one hand and a paper sack in the other. The sack holds a bottle of Grey Goose, already half-empty. I pass through the kitchen and den like an exhausted soldier, then climb the stairs to the living room, which looks out over Lake Pontchartrain. Sean is waiting on the sofa, facing the lake. The picture window is covered with drops of condensation from the air conditioner, but I can still see sails on the horizon.

Sean isn’t watching the sails. He’s watching a golf tournament on ESPN. He points at the paper bag. “The news about Malik’s teeth bum you out that bad?”

I set my purse on a glass-topped table in the corner. Then I take a highball glass from a shelf on the wall, pour two fingers of vodka into it, and take a bittersweet sip.

“I’m not thinking about Malik.”

“Hey.” Sean stands and comes to me. “You need a hug.”

I do, but not the kind he wants to give me. As his arms close around me, I feel the temptation to yield to his embrace. He squeezes gently at first, working his fingers into the muscles of my lower back. A week ago I would have loved this. Now I feel a manic pressure building within me. As predictably as the evening tide, his erection presses into my abdomen. I feel only revulsion.

“Hey,” he says as I pull away. “What’s the matter?”

“I don’t want that.”

His green eyes soften. “It’s okay. I can wait awhile.”

“I don’t want it later either.”

Sean leans back to study me but keeps his arms around my waist. “What’s the matter, babe? What’s happening? Another depressive episode?”

His casual use of medical jargon irritates me. “I just don’t want to, okay?”

“But you always want to.”

“No,
you
always want to. I just never say no.”

He stares at me in disbelief. “You mean you make love to me when you don’t want to?”

“Sometimes.”

“Sometimes? Like how many times?”

“I don’t know. More than a few. I know how important it is to you.”

His hands drop from my waist. “And you waited over a year to tell me this?”

“Looks like it.”

The look of pain in his face is like the look of dumb hurt on an animal when it’s been struck for no apparent reason.
God,
I think.
Is there anything on earth more fragile than male pride?

Sean swallows hard and gazes out toward the lake. After a while, he looks back, his face composed. “You and I have been through some serious shit together. Your mood swings, some bad arguments. I’ve spent the night here and done nothing but hold you all night when you were suicidally depressed.”

This is true, though on most of those nights he tried to make love with me.

“You
have
to tell me what’s going on,” he says.

I want to. Yet I can’t. I take another sip from my glass.

“Why did you stop drinking? I mean it’s great that you did, but what prompted it? Was it just another crazy tangent, like yoga? And why are you drinking again now?”

It would be so easy to tell him. But why do I have to? He’s a detective, for God’s sake. Why can’t he figure out the situation and just tell me it’s okay, without me having to say it? Is the answer that hard to see? Has anything else
ever
prompted me to stop drinking?

“Cat,” he says softly. “Please.”

“I’m pregnant,” I blurt, and tears fill my eyes.

Sean blinks. “What?”

“You heard me.”

“But…how? I mean, you’re on the pill, right?”

“Yes. I was. But I took those antibiotics for my bladder infection, and that interfered with my pills.”

He nods for a few moments, then stops. “Didn’t you know that could happen?”

Here it comes. The accusation.
“I only took three Cipros. I didn’t think that would make a difference.”

“But you’re a doctor. I mean—”

My composure snaps like brittle glass, and suddenly I’m screaming.
“I didn’t do it on purpose, okay? You gave me the goddamn infection! You’re the one who wanted to have nonstop sex for three days!”

Clearly unprepared for this level of anger, Sean takes two steps backward. “I know you didn’t do it on purpose, Cat. It’s just…a lot to get my mind around. How long have you known?”

“Three days, I think. Almost four now. I’m not sure anymore. My sense of time isn’t working too well. I’ve been off my meds for three days. I know that for sure.”

“Off your Lexapro?”

“And the Depakote. Depakote can cause spina bifida if you take it in the first twelve weeks.”

“Okay, but shit, you have to get back on the Lex. You know what happens when you skip.”

Yes, I go manic
…

“You stopped drinking when you found out you were pregnant,” Sean thinks aloud.

I can’t think of anything to say.

“But you’re drinking again now. Did you lose the baby?”

“No. I couldn’t tell you I was pregnant without a drink. Isn’t that pathetic? I’ve been taking Valium, too.”

His eyes narrow in anger. “What the hell for?”

“To keep from getting the d.t.’s.”

He tries to take the glass of vodka from my hand. When I resist, he grabs my wrist and jerks at the glass with his other hand. I let him take it, but then I get the bottle from the table. “Try to take this away and I’ll brain you with it.”

He starts toward me, then stops. “Jesus, Cat. Think about the baby, will you?”

My laughter rides an undercurrent of hysteria. “Is that what you’re thinking about? Or are you thinking about the wife and kids you already have? And whether you can still keep me a secret through all of this?”

He rubs his forehead with both hands, drags his fingertips back through his hair. I see more gray when he does that. “Look, I just need some time to absorb this. To think about the implications.”

“The implications,” I echo. “Let’s see…they’re pretty straightforward. A: I’m pregnant. B: I’m keeping the baby. C: a baby needs a father as well as a mother. D: this baby either has a father or it doesn’t.”

“It sounds simple,” Sean agrees. “But it’s not. You know that. Look, my honest answer right now is that I’m not sure what to do.”

“Yeah, I got that.”

He gives me a pleading look. “Did you think I’d know in the first five minutes?”

“I hoped you would.”

He tries to come to me again, but I hold up my hands. “Just go, okay? Leave me alone.” The next words spill out almost of their own accord. “And leave your key here when you go.”

“What? Cat—”

“You heard me!”

Sean stares at me in silence for nearly a minute. In his eyes I see a long history of hurt and confusion. He looks away, then pulls his key from his pocket and lays it on the glass table. “I’m going to check on you tomorrow. Even if you don’t want me to.”

Then he goes downstairs.

When I hear his car start in the garage, I feel my chest caving in. But I have the antidote for that. Taking the Grey Goose bottle from the bag, I go down to my bedroom and lie on the duvet. With my free hand, I rub a little circle on my tummy.

“Just you and me now, kid,” I say in a desolate voice. “Just you and me.”

I sip from the bottle, savoring the anesthetic bite as it spreads across my tongue. I hate myself for doing it, but I swallow anyway. Self-hatred is a familiar emotion to me, and familiarity brings comfort. As the chemical warmth diffuses through my veins, I hear the sound of rain again. The rain from my waking dreams. Not the soft hiss of drops falling on my shingles, but the hard percussive patter of rain hitting a tin roof.

I hope oblivion comes soon.

I awaken to the hiss of rain, but this time the sound is real. My bedroom window stands open, and Sean Regan is leaning in through it, his hair and shoulders soaking wet. A corona of gray light shows behind him. I look at my alarm clock: 11:50
A.M.
Sixteen hours have disappeared down a hole.

“You wouldn’t answer your phone,” Sean says.

“I’m sorry about last night,” I reply, my throat dry and croaking. “That’s not how I wanted to handle it.”

“That’s not why I’m here.”

The bottle of Grey Goose spilled during the night, saturating my sheets. Self-loathing fills me like poison. “Why are you here?”

“Our boy hit again this morning.”

“No way.” I rub my eyes, not really believing it. “It’s only been two days. Are you sure?”

“The victim was a fifty-six-year-old white male. Bite marks all over him. No forced entry, body found by the maid. We don’t have a ballistics match yet, but we do have this.”

Sean holds up a piece of paper and extends it toward the bed. It’s a photograph. Even from this distance, I can see that it’s of a window. On the glass above the sill, written in blood, are the words
MY WORK IS NEVER DONE.

“Holy shit.”

“We never released that to the media,” he says. “So I’d say the ballistics match is pretty much a formality. Same for the bite marks.”

I roll over and try to rise, but my whole body feels sore. Maybe after three days sober, the vodka was a shock to my system. Still, there was enough left to soak my sheets, so I didn’t drink all of it. “Where was Nathan Malik last night?”

“Home all night. Under surveillance.”

“Are you sure he was in his house the whole time?”

“We didn’t have anybody sleeping with him. But he was there.”

I wave Sean inside and push myself up to a sitting position. “What should I do? I want to do something. I want to help.”

He climbs through the window and sits on the floor, his legs crossed Indian-style. The posture makes him look twenty years younger, but his drawn face betrays his age. From the shadowy circles under his eyes—eyes that carry twice the spiritual burden they did yesterday—I’d guess he’s slept three consecutive hours since I last saw him.

“Do you want to talk about the baby?” he asks.

I close my eyes. “Not right now. Not like this.”

“Then we’ll do what we always do.”

“What?” I ask suspiciously.

“Work the case. Right here.”

I feel relief and a strange spark of excitement. “The kitchen table?”

“It’s worked before.” He picks the television remote off the floor, switches it on, and tunes the set to the local news. The screen shows Captain Carmen Piazza leaving a blue two-story house. Special Agent John Kaiser walks a step behind her.

“That’s the scene,” Sean says. “Old Metairie. The media’s amping up. Story’s going national. Some cops have started calling this guy the Vampire Lestat.”

“Tell me you’re kidding,” I mutter, wishing I’d left a bottle of water by my bed.

Sean laughs darkly. “Hey, this is New Orleans. And it fits, if you think about it. No witnesses, no forced entry, affluent male victims, teeth marks everywhere.”

I wonder what the killer will make of his new appellation. If my past experience with serials is a guide, he’ll love it.

“Why don’t you take a shower?” Sean says. “I’ll give you the details when you get out.”

I roll slowly off the bed and walk to the bathroom, unbuttoning my soiled blouse as I go.

“Hey, Cat?”

I turn back.

Sean’s green eyes focus intently on mine. “When you’re ready to talk about the baby, I am, too.”

There’s a hitch in my heartbeat. “Okay.”

His eyes go back to the television.

Sean and I sit on opposite sides of my kitchen table, case files and photographs spread out between us. We’ve enacted this ritual many times before, but in the past we sat on the same side of the table. Today this new arrangement seems more appropriate.

For the past fifteen months, it’s been Sean’s habit to build a private file on every major murder case assigned to him. He keeps these files in a locked cabinet at my house, selectively adding to them as new evidence comes in. He digitally photographs what he can’t get me access to and dubs audiotapes of most witness interviews and interrogations. He’s broken countless rules and probably some laws by doing this, but the result has been to jail more killers, so he doesn’t struggle with the ethics too much.

Sean brewed coffee while I was in the shower, and by the time I emerged wearing scrub pants and a Pearl Jam sweatshirt, a cup was waiting by my chair. This kind of courtesy grew rare after the first few months of our relationship, but today it doesn’t surprise me. The pregnancy is making him walk on eggshells.

Captain Piazza hasn’t officially suspended Sean from the task force, but she did remove him as lead NOPD detective on the case. She only toured him through the crime scene this morning because his case clearance rate is so high. Piazza doesn’t know that Sean uses a lot of help from me to accomplish this, but after the captain’s little lecture at the LeGendre crime scene, I think she may suspect it.

In any case, Sean’s information flow has not been cut off. His partner is shuttling between police headquarters and the task force headquarters at the FBI building, keeping Sean informed of all new developments by cell phone. Ironically, the fortresslike new FBI field office is situated just five minutes up the shore of Lake Pontchartrain from my house. Inside that building, at least fifty people are studying the same information we’re looking at now.

“James Calhoun,” I read, naming the fifth victim. “What makes him different than the others?”

“Nothing,” says Sean, leaning his chair back on two legs. “He was alone in the house. No sign of forced entry. One paralyzing shot to the spine, then the bite marks, delivered antemortem like the others…”

Delivered
is a pretty sterile word to describe the savage act of tearing human flesh with teeth. But that kind of semantic distance creeps into law enforcement work all the time, just as it does in medicine. When thinking about murder, I always try to keep the immediacy of the violence in the forefront of my mind.

“…and a coup de grâce to the head,” Sean finishes. “End of story.”

“Trace evidence?”

“Aside from the note written in blood—the victim’s blood—nothing new.”

“This guy is too good,” I say with frustration. “‘My work is never done.’ He must be wearing a space suit while he does this work of his.”

“Then how is he biting them?”

“He left saliva in the bite marks again?”

“Yep.”

“Huh. Is there any way Nathan Malik could have gotten out last night without his surveillance team knowing?”

“I don’t think so.” Sean leans forward, bringing the front legs of his chair back to the floor. “But there’s always a way, I guess.”

“No thermal-imaging camera to make sure a warm body was in the house?”

“No. They were going to start using one tonight. It’s been about a week between each hit, like you said. I don’t think the feeling of urgency was there last night.”

“Famous last words. Time of death?”

“Probably about seven this morning.”

I feel a peculiar shock of surprise. “So the crime happened in daylight. Lots of people moving around then. Getting their
Times-Picayune,
leaving for work.”

He stares at me in an odd way, then shakes his head. “It’s Sunday, Cat. Nobody’s leaving for work.”

“Church, then,” I say quickly, my cheeks coloring with embarrassment.

Sean’s gaze doesn’t waver, and I sense that he’s ruthlessly gauging my mental state. “No witnesses so far,” he says at length. “We canvassed like crazy. We’re still trying to locate a couple of neighbors, but so far, nobody saw anything.”

“The killer could have entered the house during the night,” I point out. “And only left during the day.”

“Let’s get off Calhoun for a minute,” Sean says, tapping a pen on some papers in front of him. “The whole string—all five victims—what are you thinking? Just off the top of your head.”

“I think it’s Malik. And if he didn’t do Calhoun this morning, somebody’s helping him.”

“That’s who’s leaving the bite marks? An accomplice?”

“Maybe, but not necessarily. That could still be Malik.”

Sean squints as though he doesn’t understand. “Yesterday you said something about the killer using fake teeth to make the marks. I didn’t really catch all that. And when you got home…” He trails off, not wanting to mention the awful scene we played out while I was drunk.

“I said the killer could be using someone else’s teeth.”

“What did you mean? Like dentures?”

“Dentures would work.”

“But how would he make the marks look real? Wear them over his own teeth?”

“He could do that. But he’d get his own saliva in the wound doing that. There’s another way. When dentists make dentures, they’re attached to a hinged metal device called an articulator. It simulates the opening and closing of the jaw. That’s how we fine-tune the dentures for proper occlusion.”

“Occlusion?”

“The way the teeth come together. The bite. Malik could make the marks with that.”

Sean looks intrigued. “How easy would it be for him to get one of those?”

“He could order one off the Internet. Or as I said yesterday, he could have stolen one out of Dr. Shubb’s office lab. You should check and see if Shubb has lost an articulator in the past couple of years. He might not even have noticed it missing.”

Sean makes a note in a small wire-bound pad. “And the dentures?”

“Same thing. Malik could have stolen them. Or they might belong to a relative, like Francis Dolarhyde’s grandmother.”

Sean looks blank. “Who?”

“The killer in
Red Dragon.
”

“Oh, yeah. You mentioned that. I saw the movie, but I don’t remember anything about dentures.”

“You should have read the book. It was a big deal psychologically, those teeth. But for us, the point is that Malik could be using dentures, and he could get them almost anywhere. A family member—living or dead—is one possibility. I want to go through everything you know about Malik’s family.”

“Just a minute. You couldn’t tell the bite marks were made by dentures as opposed to real teeth?”

“No.”

“What about the saliva in the wounds?”

“Again, that could still be Malik’s. But it’s more likely to belong to an accomplice, if there is one. Or the killer could even be swabbing in someone else’s saliva.”

“Where the hell would he get that?”

I shrug. “One of his patients? All we know from the saliva so far is that the DNA in it belongs to a Caucasian male.”

Sean mulls this over. “I guess all Malik needs is some spit from a guy he knows we’d never check. I can see it.” He takes a sip of coffee. “The paralyzing gunshot keeps coming back to me.”

“It’s not always paralyzing.” I shuffle through the autopsy reports of previous victims. “Call it incapacitating.”

“That’s splitting hairs. The point is, excellent marksmanship.”

“The fax you sent me said Malik served in Vietnam. As a medic, I think. Which means he probably saw action.”

“That doesn’t make him a good marksman. Especially with a handgun.”

“Does Malik have any handguns registered in his name?”

“One. A .45 automatic.”

The murders were committed with a .32-caliber pistol. “And they searched Malik’s house already?”

“Top to bottom. No other weapon found.”

“What
did
they find? A shrink’s house…had to be some weird stuff in there.”

Sean waves his hand as if he doesn’t want to be distracted. He’s always been more linear in his thinking than I have. “Let’s stay with the gun for now. Funny weapon for this kind of crime, you ask me.”

“More of a Saturday night special than an organized killer’s weapon.”

He nods. “Or maybe a cop’s throwdown gun.”

“Well, it obviously does the job.” I point at a photo of Colonel Frank Moreland’s naked corpse, a neat hole drilled through its forehead. “We should find out if Malik visits any shooting ranges around here. See if anyone knows how good a shot he is.”

“The task force is already on that. We need to get outside the box, Cat. Think of things they’ll miss. Like the dentures thing.”

“Are you going to tell the task force my theory about that?”

“Sure,” Sean says casually. “I’m talking to John Kaiser. He’s a good guy, for a Fed.”

“Are you going to tell him I came up with it?”

Sean freezes, his face uncertain. “Do you want me to?”

“What if I say yes?”

“If you say yes, I’ll tell him.”

I hold his gaze without blinking. “Yes.”

“Okay, then. I’ll tell him.” Sean looks sincere, but I wonder if he’ll follow through.

Colonel Moreland’s photo brings another thought to mind. In some serial murder cases, close analysis of the first murder scene ultimately breaks open the case. The reason is simple. Serial killers, like any other hobbyist, get better with practice. They’re frequently very anxious during their first murder—they may not even have meant to kill their first victim—and they make stupid mistakes. Mistakes they never repeat at later scenes. But the NOMURS killer is different.

“First-victim angle,” I say, knowing Sean will understand my shorthand.

“Yeah?”

“It’s led us nowhere.”

“Right.”

“Why?”

“The guy’s a prodigy.” Sean shakes his head with something like respect. “It’s like he walked out of nowhere onto the pitcher’s mound at Yankee Stadium and threw a no-hitter. And he’s thrown nothing but no-hitters ever since.”

“What does that tell you?”

“Either he’s killed before, or…”

“Or he knows a lot about murder,” I finish.

Sean nods. “Yeah.”

“Who would know that?”

“A cop.”

“Who else?”

“Crime-scene tech. Forensic tech. Pathologist. True-crime reader.”

“Psychiatrist,” I say softly.

Sean looks unimpressed. “Maybe. What’s your point?”

“My point is that
every
killer makes mistakes the first time out. Maybe not a technical mistake. Maybe it’s just his choice of victim. Why was Colonel Moreland killed first? Was he random? I don’t think so. There’s got to be a reason.”

“Kaiser’s all over that kind of thing, Cat. The task force is taking apart every victim’s family.”

“Just bear with me. Any likely suspects in Moreland’s family? He’s not from here, right? Just retired here.”

“Yeah, but he’s got a daughter living here and a son in Biloxi. Daughter is Stacey Lorio, a registered nurse.” Sean shuffles through the pile of paper on the table and comes up with a five-by-seven photo. It shows a blonde woman in her midthirties with a hard-looking face. “Thirty-six years old, divorced. Works two jobs. A private clinic and nights at Touro Infirmary.”

“Alibis for the murders?”

“Rock solid.”

“The son?”

Sean comes up with another photo, this one a wallet-size shot of a good-looking man in a blue uniform. “Frank Moreland Junior. A major in the air force. Stationed at Keesler Air Force Base. Big family man. Medals out the yinyang. His alibis are bulletproof.”

“Neither one has any connection to Malik?”

“Not that we can find.”

“Shit.” I shift in my chair and take a sip of coffee. “Okay, forget that for now. Let’s talk about Malik’s patients. Do you know yet if James Calhoun has any family members who’ve been treated by Malik?”

The hint of a smile plays across Sean’s lips. “You’re gonna love this.”

“What?”

“Malik’s still refusing to hand over that information.”

“He hasn’t given you the names of his patients yet?”

“Nope. He’s arguing doctor-patient privilege.”

“That won’t hold up in a case like this, will it?”

Sean shakes his head. “No. We can show a judge a strong likelihood that the killer is choosing his victims from Malik’s patient base. That creates a situation of imminent danger, which is a public safety issue. That should override the privilege.”

Sean knows what he’s talking about. Three years ago, he earned a law degree by going to night school. He didn’t really want to, but after being wounded in the line of duty, he let his wife persuade him that a career change was in order. Hoping to improve his marital situation—not to mention his financial one—Sean attended night school while working full-time as a detective. He graduated seventh in his class, retired from the force, and went to work for a criminal defense firm. In less than six months he was going crazy. His wife pleaded with him to try working for the district attorney, but Sean despised the man. He told her he was going back to police work, and that she would have to deal with it. She did not deal with it well.

“Our UNSUB isn’t actually killing Dr. Malik’s patients,” I point out, using the FBI’s jargon for “unknown subject.” “He’s killed
relatives
of two patients. That’s all you can prove. Maybe Malik is relying on that to shield his records from the police.”

“Won’t hold up,” Sean says with certainty. “A judge will consider the privacy issue, but with our UNSUB killing so frequently, we’ll get the names of Malik’s patients, at the very least.”

“But not the records?”

“We should get those, too. Everything but private notes Malik takes during sessions.”

“Couldn’t those be important?”

“Obviously. But we won’t get them. Lots of precedent for that.”

I stand and begin to pace my kitchen. “The real question is, why is Malik holding this stuff back?”

“He claims his patients’ lives could be destroyed if things they’ve told him in confidence become public. He says some of them are at risk if it even becomes known they’re in therapy.”

Yesterday I suggested this rationale to Sean myself, but today—given the new victim—it seems a stretch. “At risk from whom?”