Krewe of Hunters, Volume 1: Phantom Evil ; Heart of Evil ; Sacred Evil ; The Evil Inside

by Heather Graham

  Jude let out a groan and winced.

  “The movie just became an epic,” Whitney said.

  “And who would cash in on that?” Jude asked rhetorically. “Angus Avery, Bobby Walden and the ever-caring Ms. Sherry Blanco. Women are dead, bones have been dug up—and the public is still going to want to see Sherry Blanco,” Jude said.

  Whitney nudged his arm. “Eat.”

  “Before I lose my appetite,” Jude agreed.

  His gaze didn’t leave the television screen, but, mechanically, he took a bite of the shepherd’s pie. It was good—Whitney already knew, having had Jenna’s shepherd’s pie before. The aroma had been enough to make her realize she was starving.

  Jude’s second bite was far more energetic, and while they went through commercials that sold floor cleaners, cars and a product to extend a man’s penis, he wolfed down the food on the plate.

  The anchorwoman came back on; Deputy Chief Green announced that every policeman in the five boroughs was on high alert, that a task force was working all hours and that the FBI had a special unit on the case as well. The chief ended the interview by accepting a question about the House of Spiritualism, and saying that the police were exploring all possible angles. He tried to leave the podium, but one reporter demanded to know if the deputy chief believed that Carrie Brown had been a victim of the Ripper, and he paused, obviously irritated. “I have no personal beliefs on the matter. I’m concerned with what’s happening on our streets right now.”

  “Is he targeting prostitutes?” another reporter called out.

  “All women should take great care with any new acquaintance. It’s a time for extreme vigilance.”

  “But,” cried the same reporter, “it does seem true, doesn’t it? This killer isn’t after affluent women or mothers of kindergarten children!”

  “We still can’t say who the killer will target. Excuse me, that is all I have right now!”

  Deputy Chief Green managed to escape. The anchorwoman came back with a perfectly coiffed Sherry Blanco at her side. Sherry was visibly distressed. “Poor Ginger!” she said, and tears formed in her eyes; one slid down her cheek and she dabbed at it with a tissue. “We were all so heartbroken!” She shivered. “And it could have been any of us!”

  “Will the movie come out as scheduled?” the anchorwoman asked.

  “We filmed today in Brooklyn, so, despite what we all have to bear, we’re working hard to see that the fans and our producers are happy,” Sherry assured her.

  Jude made a sound.

  “Hey!” Whitney protested softly. She took his forgotten dinner plate from his hands and set it on the table. “Don’t blame an entire industry. I know a lot of actresses who are really nice, and would be making real announcements, begging people to be safe.”

  “Luckily, it seems that everyone really kept mum at the site today,” Jude said. “It’s important that all the details don’t get out there.”

  “Well, since it’s in off the street and teeming with cops, the reporters couldn’t get close,” Whitney reminded him.

  “Yet,” Jude said dolefully.

  The anchorwoman directed her audience to watch the clip; it wasn’t one in which Virginia Rockford was featured. Sherry Blanco, in period dress, was trying to head home from O’Leary’s, the fictional pub in the Five Points district, when she was accosted by thugs. Bobby Walden appeared, dominating the screen, sending them off. Sherry’s character looked at him with love and uncertainty in her eyes, and turned to run away while Bobby gazed after her in turn.

  “Enough!” Jude rose, found the remote and changed channels until a National Geographic show on great blue whales appeared. Jude sank back down on the sofa, closing his eyes. Whitney set her own plate down, and took her seat by him again.

  “You’ll find the truth,” she told him. Her voice was filled with certainty.

  He took her hand and squeezed it. She remembered thinking that it would be nice to close her eyes as well.

  The next thing she knew, she woke up.

  Jude was slumped against the end of the sofa. She was slumped on top of Jude. No, she was cuddled up, curled against Jude. He felt warm and solid, vital and alive.

  Someone had put a blanket over them.

  He was still holding her hand, long, strong fingers threaded through her smaller, slimmer ones.

  As her eyes opened, so did his.

  Briefly, there was something different in the gray gaze he gave her.

  Something soft, and electric, at the same time.

  Desire.

  She knew that it had been mirrored in her own.

  And yet…

  There was wariness in his eyes as well.

  She looked away quickly. Well, he was a solid, white cop who was all hard evidence and facts; she was a woman of mixed heritage that included voodoo, and—oh—a ghost buster as well.

  No hope, no future…she thought.

  But, she realized with sadness, desire remained.

  11

  “Crosby! Hey!”

  Startled, Jude sat up, easing Whitney with him to a sitting position just as Ellis Sayer came hurrying into the room.

  “Yes, what is it, Ellis?” he asked. Whitney was trying to compose herself, smoothing down the now-wrinkled cotton blouse she wore beneath her tailored denim pantsuit.

  “I think I have something. Someone. I came here first—you didn’t pick up on the phone, and I figured you might be here.”

  Jude stood. The detective was making no sense. “Who do you have with you, and what did you find?”

  Ellis’s droopy hound-dog features actually shone for once.

  “Come to the porch,” he urged them.

  Jude stepped by him. In the hallway, Angela was still standing by the door, and Jude realized that she had opened the door to Ellis, who hadn’t said a word to her, but had surely seen him and Whitney on the sofa, and just marched right to them. Will was sitting at the bank of screens, looking as surprised as Angela.

  Angela still even had the door open. She stared at Jude, and then followed the trio out to the porch.

  Captain Tyler was standing there wearing a coat that had caped shoulders, much like the kind seen on the killer in every Jack the Ripper movie ever made.

  Captain Tyler’s eyes lit up as he saw Jude, and then Whitney.

  “Captain Tyler,” Whitney said. “You’re supposed to be at a veterans’ shelter.”

  Jude asked, “Captain Tyler, where did you get the coat?”

  Tyler looked confused, not sure who to answer first. “Do you have coffee? Food?” he asked hopefully.

  “Yes, of course,” Whitney said, taking his arm and glancing at Jude. He knew he could be too brusque, and that she had the right touch with Captain Tyler. Whitney had incredible sympathy for the downtrodden, and it seemed that her instincts were usually on the money. He nodded; he understood her silent warning. They needed to take this slowly.

  “First,” Jude said huskily, “we need that coat.”

  “We’ll find another one for you,” Whitney assured him.

  Tyler looked at them, and then shed the coat. Whitney quickly secured a garbage bag for the garment, hoping to preserve what evidence might be left.

  When it was safely sealed, Ellis Sayer let out a sigh of relief.

  “In this case,” he said quietly to Jude, “I didn’t want to drag him in, and we needed the damn coat, but he wouldn’t give it to me. I knew he meant something to you and to the case, of course, and that’s why I came straight here.”

  “Thanks, Ellis,” Jude said.

  “Of course,” Ellis told him.

  Jude set a hand on his shoulder.

  “He’s not our killer, but he may be an essential witness. And you’ll notice his condition. His mind is shot and we’ll have to handle him with kid gloves, so to speak.”

  “I figured,” Ellis said.

  Jackson was in the hallway when they entered the house. He glanced at Whitney, and then walked forward. “Welcome, sir,”
he said to Captain Tyler.

  “Thank you, sir!” Captain Tyler offered a hand to Jackson. “Captain Tyler, retired, sir! And you are…?”

  “Jackson Crow. Please, we’d love to have you join us for breakfast.”

  Breakfast? They’d slept through the night? Jude wondered.

  That was bad, very bad. Except that it had been good. He could still recall his dreams. She’d been with him, and he’d been weary, but she had touched him, and in his dreams, she’d been naked, crawling over him. They’d made love passionately without a word, and he’d felt her against him, the pressure of her breasts against his arm, the softness of her body curved to his…

  The last had been true.

  The first…

  Good God, he could only pray that he hadn’t….

  What the hell was he thinking? They were as far apart in thought and belief as the sun and the moon.

  “Right this way, Captain Tyler, please!” Jackson said.

  They seated Captain Tyler at the breakfast table in the kitchen. Coffee was placed in front of him. “I’ll start the eggs,” Whitney said. “Do you like cheese in them? Ham?”

  “Oh, that would be delightful,” he said.

  Jude sat down across from the man. Ellis stood in the doorway, watching and patiently waiting. Whitney quickly went about scrambling eggs while Jackson popped bread in the toaster and Angela took a seat at the end of the table.

  “Captain Tyler, this is very important. You went to a veterans’ home, right?” Jude asked him. “The deputy chief told me that he’d make sure that you were helped there, and that someone would see to your records and a permanent shelter for you.”

  “Oh, yes, thank you. The police were wonderful,” Captain Tyler said, sounding entirely lucid.

  “So where did you get the coat?” Jude asked.

  “In a Dumpster off Broadway,” Captain Tyler said. “Of course, it’s not exactly up to standards in today’s style, but it’s warm. It’s a wonderful coat.”

  “Yes, it’s a wonderful coat,” Jude told him.

  Tyler stiffened. “Sir! It was my only coat now. I gave the pea jacket to old Harry, who hangs around the new subway station.”

  “I’m going to make sure you have a coat, maybe even a stylish new coat,” Jude told him. “But it’s very important that you tell me the exact location.”

  “In a Dumpster. About a block north of Trinity,” Captain Tyler said.

  “Thank you. Now, one more question, Captain Tyler,” Jude said. “How did you wind up back by Trinity if you were at a shelter in another borough?”

  Tyler’s white brows arched high, and then furrowed. His hands began to shake around his coffee cup.

  Jude reached out a hand and gently touched his. “Captain Tyler?”

  Tyler looked up at him. “I—I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t remember anything. I was at the home…there were very nice people there. I had a very long shower, and it was so good. I went to sleep, in a bed, with clean sheets. I…”

  “It’s all right…drink your coffee, Captain.” He looked down the table at Angela. “Jenna Duffy is an RN, right?”

  Angela nodded, rose and went into the hallway. They could hear her calling up the stairs. “Jenna? Are you awake? Could you come down, please?”

  The eggs were cooked; Jackson added toast to the plate Whitney prepared and she set it in front of Captain Tyler. “Don’t be upset. Just relax.”

  “Yes, just relax, Captain. Your memory will be better if you don’t force it.”

  Jenna Duffy came into the kitchen. Angela indicated Captain Tyler.

  “Captain,” Jude said. “This is Agent Duffy, and she’s a nurse. She’s going to take a look at you, if she may.”

  Tyler saw Jenna and his eyes lit up with appreciation. “Yes!” he said simply.

  Jenna walked around the table to him. “I’m not going to hurt you, Captain Tyler. I just want to see your eyes, if I may?” She lifted his lids, studying the man’s bloodshot eyes.

  “Thank you,” she told him.

  “As you wish, young woman. Beautiful accent! Irish, of course,” he said.

  Jenna nodded.

  “My mother, bless her soul, was an Irishwoman!” Captain Tyler said.

  Jenna took his eggs away, and he stared at her like a child who had been slapped—through no provocation—by a parent. “He’s been drugged,” Jenna said. “I can’t tell you what is in his system, but I’d get some tests done on him before allowing him to eat anything.”

  “What?” Captain Tyler demanded.

  Jude stood. “Sir, I’m so sorry, but this is incredibly important. I have to take you to see a doctor.”

  “But I’m not sick! I’m hungry,” the man said, indignant.

  “I know, and I’ll get you food just as soon as I can.” Jude took Tyler’s arm and started out of the kitchen and along the hallway.

  “Ellis, can you drive us?” Jude said. “I’d thought we were dealing with his usual loopiness, but Jenna believes he was drugged.”

  “Of course. I go where you send me. Where to? Headquarters?”

  “The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner,” Jude said.

  Captain Tyler balked. “But I’m not dead yet, young man!” he protested.

  “No, sir, of course not. They have wonderful laboratories there. And it won’t take long. And then we’ll get you something to eat.”

  “All right, all right. Just so long as you know that I’m really not dead yet,” Tyler said.

  As they walked, Jude spoke to Ellis, telling him to get his men busy on the Dumpsters that needed to be searched.

  “Jude, you know that we had Forensics all up and down the street the day that Virginia Rockford’s body was discovered. I swear, there was no Dumpster left unturned that day,” Ellis said.

  “I know. But it needs to be done again,” Jude told him.

  He got to Ellis’s unmarked simple black sedan and looked back. Whitney was at the door. He realized that they were both a mess; they hadn’t changed since they’d made the discovery in the foundations, dug into the earth, worked all day and fallen asleep on the sofa. If he was a mess, maybe she didn’t mind being a mess.

  “Agent Tremont?” he said.

  He saw Whitney look at Jackson; their team was tight. Jackson nodded, and Whitney hurried down the steps.

  “Agent Tremont will be with us. I’m getting accustomed to working with her,” Jude told Ellis.

  Jude slid into the backseat with Captain Tyler while Whitney sat up front with Ellis. It didn’t take them long to cover the distance to the Office of the Medical Examiner, only this time, Jude didn’t head for the morgue. Instead, he headed to the lab of Dr. Gil Sullivan, with whom he had worked many times before. Of course, he had usually brought him mysterious substances, rather than a living subject.

  Jude explained how Ellis had found Captain Tyler downtown, wearing the coat, and that, as Dr. Sullivan could well imagine, they needed the coat tested as well as Captain Tyler himself. The coat he would bring to One Police Plaza, but he was pretty certain Captain Tyler needed to be tested quickly.

  “Captain, how are you? I’ll be kind and quick,” Dr. Sullivan told him.

  “Thank you.”

  “I’m retired navy myself, sir,” Sullivan assured Captain Tyler, leading him into one of the rooms where the captain could lie down on a white-sheeted bed.

  Jude, Whitney and Ellis were left in a small employee lounge. Jude dug in his pockets for change and found enough for three cups of watery coffee. Better than nothing at this point.

  “I should get going,” Ellis said. “I’ll get with the men on the Dumpsters.”

  “Great, thanks, Ellis. But get some rest, too. Either that,” he said ruefully, “or fall asleep on the job.”

  Ellis actually laughed. “Yeah, I’ll get some sleep somewhere along the line. Keep me posted on anything you need.”

  Whitney was surprised when he smiled at her. “Agent Tremont,” he acknowledged and nodded good
bye.

  When Ellis had gone, Jude sat next to Whitney. He had to smile. There was a large smudge of dirt on her cheek. He reached out with his thumb, rubbing it off. She watched him with her huge golden eyes as he did so. He started to speak, and he wasn’t sure what he was going to say, but it didn’t matter, because his cell phone rang.

  It was Ellis Sayer on the line already as he was driving.

  “I’ve put a ‘Crosby needs it now!’ on the forensics for the limos,” Ellis said. “I have the drivers on alert that you’ll be talking to them. Right now, they’re making comparisons to tissue and blood samples from our Jane Does to the blood we’ve managed to extract from the foundations.”

  “The House of Spiritualism?”

  “We’ve got a twenty-four-hour watch on the property now. The bodies have all been…exhumed? Anyway, they’re at the morgue.”

  “Well, then, I’ll take a look while I’m here,” Jude told him.

  “I’m thinking that the coat probably came from the movie’s costume department. We’ve gone through every thing they had and haven’t found a thing,” Ellis said.

  “And they didn’t note that one was missing?” Jude asked.

  “All of theirs are present and accounted for—unless someone in costuming is lying,” Ellis told him.

  “Interesting. Thanks,” Jude said. He hesitated. “And no new victims yet?”

  “Not that we know about.”

  “Thanks, Ellis.” He was thoughtful a minute. “Let your men handle the Dumpsters. I need you to get to the veterans’ home where Captain Tyler was taken. I need to know exactly what he ate, if he was given any drugs, if anyone came to see him and exactly who reported to work and was in the building in the last twenty-four hours.”

  When they hung up, he knew that Whitney had heard the majority of the conversation.

  “What do you think?” he asked her.

  “About?”

  “The coat,” Jude said. “What’s the deal with costuming?”

  Whitney was thoughtful a minute. “They keep close tabs on costumes, they’re expensive. If one was missing and I were the wardrobe mistress…I have to admit, I’d think about lying. If a coat was missing and she hadn’t reported it, she—or he—could be in trouble. Trouble as in losing a job if it came up later that a costume had just disappeared and nothing was done.”