Apprentice in Death

  “I’ll make the contacts. You’re in EDD? Can you use me up there?”

  “I can always use the She-Body,” McNab said.

  “Awww.”

  “Knock it off.” Eve paced the lab. “We have a target outstanding.”

  “I’m running the initials—actually eliminated some lawyers with them. There are so damn many lawyers,” Peabody added. “And paralegals, and ambulance chasers, and disbarred lawyers, and just passed the bar—”

  “Keep at it. Take a damn dinner break, but keep at it.”

  She paced some more.

  “Five strong possibles. Three ranging Twenty-First and Fifteenth, between Second and Third. Two on Third at Eighteenth.”

  She turned to Feeney, began to scan the data.

  “Two on Lex, between Nineteeth and Fourteenth,” McNab added. “Another two between Lex and Third, one on Twentieth, one on Sixteenth.”

  “Two apartments, two townhouses, one loft above retail space.”

  “I’ve got two apartments, two townhouses,” McNab said.

  Eve scanned the data. “Let’s see the houses first. More privacy, and you’re in control of security. ID on tenants.”

  “On screen.” Eve frowned at the first ID shot when Feeney put it up, then at McNab’s. “Not Mackie. Let’s see the others.”

  “Zip.” McNab grabbed his fizzy, slurped some. “We’ll move farther south, and east to Second.”

  “Wait a minute. The townhouse on Third. Pull that back up, Feeney. Gabe Willowby,” Eve murmured. “Willow, Willowby. Younger said he and the second wife picked Gabriel as a boy’s name.”

  Feeney’s droopy eyes lit. “Too fucking tidy.”

  “Way too. It’s not Mackie in the ID shot, but look at the data. His height. His age bracket, his eye color.”

  “Easy enough to create a dupe ID, one that pops on a search,” Roarke began. “And have another using the same name, that matches your face.” He smiled. “Or so I’ve heard.”

  “Yeah, I bet. McNab, full level-three run on Willowby.” She pulled out her ’link again. “Cancel dinner breaks. Everyone report back to Central for full briefing. We just caught a break. Send me everything you get,” she said as she turned toward the door. “Conference Room A, as soon as you can.”

  Wishing she had Whitney’s elevator bypass, Eve took the glides. And as the wish made her think of Whitney, she tagged her commander—at home—then Lowenbaum, still in Central.

  Peabody ran to catch up when Eve hopped off the glide and arrowed toward the conference room.

  “What break?”

  “McNab’s running a level three on a Gabe Willowby, Third Avenue address. Not Mackie’s face, but same general description.”

  “Willowby. That name—I think that name popped on one of my travel runs.” Peabody pulled out her PPC to check as they entered the conference room. “I just need to— Yeah, yeah, Willowby, Gabriel, and minor son, Colt, on the manifest for a shuttle flight to New Mexico in November.”

  “Colt? That’s the name of a gun manufacturer. She’s passing as a boy. Get Colt Willowby on screen.”

  “That’s not her,” Peabody said when the task was done, “but—”

  “Hair and eye color, an easy change. But this kid could be her cousin. Her cousin of the same age, the same height and weight. Run a level three on that ID, use your PPC. I need the comp.”

  “What are you doing?”

  “Running a face recognition on the kid’s ID—let’s see if anything pops.” As it worked, Eve studied the board, paced in front of it. “He’ll have multiple IDs for both of them. Cashed in his pension, and got an insurance payout for the wife’s accidental death. He could afford them—or a twenty-year vet? He might know how to generate them.”

  “More likely the kid could.” Peabody shrugged. “Kids are just quicker with tech, evolving tech, and a teenager’s always interested in fake IDs, ones that’ll pass a level one anyway. Like this one did.”

  “Either way, he’d have more than one. Rent the place, do some travel using this one. Other travel using another. If he has an account for his finances, that’s in another. Credit cards, ’link account. Mix it up.”

  She spun back when the comp signaled. “There’s the face, and Colt Willowby is actually Silas Jackson, age sixteen, from Louisville, Kentucky. Forget that search, we’ve got them. No, let it run—the more evidence the better—but use the comp now to get me everything you can on the Third Avenue property.”

  “I have that for you,” Roarke said as he walked in. “Already sent.”

  “Handy. Peabody, put it up.”

  “I also ran a facial recognition on Willowby—who is actually Dwayne Mathias, fifty-three, from Bangor, Maine.”

  “That’s cop thinking.”

  “And you insult me,” he said, flicking a finger down the dent in her chin, “when I have a dozen pizzas on the way.”

  “Pizza!”

  Eve gave Peabody and her happy dance a sidelong look.

  “Nobody got that dinner break,” Peabody pointed out. “I grabbed a yogurt bar, but that’s it.”

  “And hungry cops may be more likely to make mistakes,” Roarke concluded.

  “I thought hungry kept you lean and mean. I’m feeling mean.” Eve stared at the blueprints on screen. “But pizza sounds okay.”

  Cop thinking, she mused, and he’d done the work faster than she had. Plus pizza. Hard to complain.

  “Tri-level duplex,” she observed. “Johns on the first and second only, so I’d say: Keep first level clean—they’re going to get deliveries, don’t want weapons or plans in view—sleep second, use third for strategy sessions, storage. Fire escapes, rear, and potential roof access. Third bedroom on the second floor could be used for work, too. Subway’s an easy walk, or run if you need to run. Bus stop’s convenient. It’s a good location, a good HQ.”

  “One that’s showing its age,” Roarke added, “and the effects of poor construction. Willowby rented with an option, and as the asking price is easily fifty thousand dollars over what it’s worth, I’d conclude he didn’t bother to negotiate.”

  “He doesn’t plan to buy it.”

  “I agree with that. The rent’s low in any case.”

  Lowenbaum stepped in, looked at the screens. “You got him.”

  “We will.”

  “Then let’s get to work.”

  Cops came in from the field minutes before pizza. Eve allowed the wolf attack—Roarke was right, cops had to eat—and brought them up to date while they ate.

  “McNab, your level-three results.”

  He swallowed a hefty bite of pizza, loaded. “The ID cruised through a standard level one, and would have passed a sloppy, even a down-and-dirty level two, but it cracked like an egg on three. Totally bogus ID, Dallas, but a decent one. Nobody but law enforcement runs a three—and then generally only when there’s a major crime involved.”

  “Same on the second suspect,” Peabody put in. “Just like the one the suspect used for check-in at the hotel.”

  “That keeps it clean, establishes pattern. Peabody, push the warrant through now. We go with the same op as before. Lowenbaum’s got his team in their ready room. EDD will roll out, using sensors to let us know if the suspects are inside. There’s an art studio on the west side of Third. McNab and Callendar will set up there.

  “Lowenbaum.”

  He rose, used a laser pointer to highlight the projected positions of his men. “Patroni will access the studio with McNab and Callendar. He requested the assignment,” Lowenbaum told Dallas. “He’s one of my best. He’ll stick.”

  “All right then, saddle it up. Peabody, we roll with EDD.”

  —

  This time they rolled in the dark, after a long day of hunting. As they drove across town, Eve went over every step, tried to calculate every possibil
ity.

  “He’ll want to protect his daughter,” Roarke said, but she shook her head.

  “He’s not running this show, he only thinks he is. She may play the student, the apprentice, but she’s driving the ball now. Maybe she’s been driving it for a while.”

  “Do you see them as willing to die for this?”

  “She doesn’t want to die, she wants to kill. He has a mission, fucked-up as it is, and would probably die for it. But she wouldn’t have stopped there. She wants to kill. We’ve taken all but one of the targets off the board. We take them down here, or she’ll find that last target. Then? She can wait. She’s young, she has resources, she has IDs, and likely she can get more. How long can we keep everyone she’s after protected? She’s got time on her side of this. We take them down here and now.”

  When they reached the drop-off point, McNab gave Peabody a finger wiggle and slipped out with Callendar.

  Didn’t look like cops, Eve thought, in the bright coats, patterned airboots. They walked briskly, as anyone would on a windy night in January.

  Eve ran through check-ins from her men, from Lowenbaum and his as Roarke and Feeney got to work.

  “He’s got it barricaded,” Feeney told her.

  “What do you mean, barricaded?”

  “Shields on the doors, on the windows. Stun deflectors. He’s put some work in here, and some serious moola.”

  “Can you get through them?”

  “Not with a stun or a laser on anything under five. He’s got some jammers set up, too, but give us a minute here.”

  “Last stand,” she murmured. “He figured he had more time, time enough to finish the mission, hoped to get out with his daughter. But if and when it came down to it, he’d take his last stand here. Are they in there?”

  “Working on it,” Roarke muttered while Feeney coordinated with McNab and Callendar. “The place may be a pile of shite, but he invested well in his bloody moat. There now, nearly there now. Feeney?”

  “Yeah, I got you. McNab, you following?”

  “Right behind you, Captain. It’s wobbling, it’s sputtering, and . . . we got it. Several heat sources popping, but . . .”

  “I don’t think so,” Roarke said quietly. “Another minute here.”

  “He’s set them up. Counterfeits—it’s false imaging,” Feeney explained. “We can survey and eliminate.”

  “First floor’s generated. No warm bodies there,” Roarke said.

  “Surveying second level.” Feeney nodded at the small screen. “And it’s clear.”

  “We’re on three,” McNab announced. “Knocking down the bullshit.”

  “And that’s one.” Callendar’s satisfied voice came through. “Single heat source third floor, north corner facing west, behind shielded window.”

  “That’s not the girl.” Eve hunkered down for a better look. “Too tall.”

  “She could have gone out for food,” Peabody suggested, “supplies.”

  “I don’t think so. He’s on duty. He’s waiting for us. We’ll give it thirty, in case. If she went out for food, that’s enough time. Baxter, Trueheart, split off, take a walk, check takeout joints, 24/7s, delis, any market still open within a three-block radius. If you spot her, don’t let her make you.”

  “Peeling off now.”

  “If she’s outside, bringing home some egg rolls, we take her down—fast, hard, done. We may be able to bargain Mackie into surrendering if we have her as weight.”

  “But you don’t think so.” Feeney turned to her. “He sent her out, stay covered, stay safe so you can finish the mission. He’s the distraction.”

  “Yeah. Yeah, that’s my gut on it, but we have to see it through. She could be anywhere. Lowenbaum, we need him alive. He can be hurting, but we need him breathing. Have you got a shot?”

  “He knows how to keep covered, Dallas, and that’s what he’s doing. We can punch some holes in the barricades, but right now, we can’t take him out.”

  “Battering ram would take down the door,” she considered, “but give him time for whatever he has in mind by the time we get to the third floor. Taking out as many of us as he can, taking himself out. Worse, targeting civilians.”

  She closed her eyes a moment, held up a hand so nobody spoke and interrupted her thoughts. “Lowenbaum, does Tactical have anything handy that’ll cut through those crappy walls—the common wall?”

  After a beat of silence he answered. “Yeah. Yeah, we’ve got something.”

  “Stay where you are. I’m coming to you. Can you spare Roarke?” she asked Feeney.

  “I think the kids and I can handle things.”

  “You’re with me. You don’t look like a cop.”

  “Why, thank you.”

  “Peabody, give me that stupid coat.”

  “My coat!”

  “Pink coat, snowflake hat.” She pulled it out of her pocket. “I don’t look like a cop.”

  “Beg to differ,” Roarke murmured.

  “I know how to not look like a cop. I need like a . . .” She gestured.

  “Purse?”

  “Yeah, yeah, a bag thing. Tool or tools can go in that. What’ve we got in here?”

  Feeney pulled open a drawer. “McNab’s old satchel.”

  The old satchel was a wild green just short of fluorescent, with a jagged lightning bolt pattern done in Peabody pink.

  “Christ, it’s nearly as bad as one of Jenkinson’s ties.”

  “I heard that,” Jenkinson said in her ear.

  “It’s not a secret. Okay, give me your coat.” Eve took off her much-loved coat, put on Peabody’s girlie pink coat, and dragged her own cap onto her head. “The scarf, too.”

  Eve wound Peabody’s bold, brightly colored scarf around her neck.

  “It actually looks really good with the bag.”

  “Don’t ever say that again.” She hitched the bag on cross-body like a sensible New Yorker, and slipped out of the van.

  “We need to circle the block, come around from the south, hook up with Lowenbaum. Then we’re going to walk fast, hold hands, laugh and talk, straight to the connecting duplex.”

  “So I assumed.” And, though there was no need to do so at this point, he took her hand as they walked west. “There are heat sources in the attached house—three of them. One would be a small dog, possibly a large cat.”

  “We’ll deal with that.”

  “I don’t doubt it.”

  As they walked they passed Baxter, who kept going as he spoke in her earbud. “No sign of her yet. Trueheart?”

  “I’ve hit two places with previous sightings—pizza joint, deli. Nobody’s seen her today or tonight.”

  “Finish the sweep, then retake your positions. Without her as a bargaining chip, odds are slim to nada on talking him out.”

  As they rounded the next corner, Lowenbaum hopped out of the big armored van. “Got battering rams, sledgehammers, torches, but I figured you didn’t want to make that much noise.”

  “Not if you’ve got something else.

  “Laser cutter. She’ll go through those interior walls like shit through a goose. Not as noisy as the other options, but she hums. If he hears it, he’ll know what it is.”

  “We’ll make sure he doesn’t hear it.”

  “I can go in, create an entry.”

  “I need you out here, Lowenbaum. The chances of me taking out a trained sniper most likely in body armor with my sidearm? Low. We’re the distraction, and believe me, we’re going to duck and cover when necessary. I need you to take him down—that’s on you. We’ll get him to move—you tell me when and where—and we’ll make it happen so you can take him down.”

  “You can count on that. Do either of you know how to work a laser cutter?”

  “I do, yes.” Roarke took it, studied it. “And a fine one it is
,” he added as he put inside the satchel.

  “I’m going to call Trueheart and Baxter in. Make sure everyone’s aware there are civilians in the attached house. We’ll get them to a secured area, but stay aware.”

  She started to walk again. “Baxter, Trueheart, back to post. Roarke and I are heading for the corner of Third and Eighteenth, about to move into suspect’s eyeline.”

  “In that case.” Roarke wrapped an arm around her, glued her to his side. “Could we look less concerned about murderers?”

  When they stopped at the corner, she tugged him down to her for a kiss, studied the target location, and murmured against his mouth, “He’s scanning the street, so he’s seen us. But he hasn’t moved to cover the back. Might have some sort of early warning system set up for that.”

  She snuggled in against him as they crossed at the light. “We’re going straight to the neighbors, like we’re expected.”

  “Jan Maguire, Philippe Constant. I looked them up while you were changing coats.”

  “Jan and Phil, got it. Do you want to tell me how come you know how to work a laser cutter?”

  He grinned down at her. “Not at this time.”

  She grinned back, let out a laugh she hoped carried. “Thank God we’re here. I’m freezing! We’re springing for a cab on the way home.”

  “Let’s see how it goes.”

  They walked up the steps and, with their backs to the target, pressed the buzzer.

  13

  Roarke shifted his body to block any possible view from the adjoining duplex when Eve palmed her badge.

  “First trick is to get them to open the door, fast. After that, just move in. We’ll deal with the rest inside.”

  She didn’t need a trick, as the door opened.

  The man, mid-thirties, wearing a gray Mets sweatshirt and jeans with holes in the knees, frowned at the badge.

  “What?”

  “Hey, Philippe!” With a blast of a smile, Eve moved forward. Roarke closed the door at their backs.