But Rhyme sensed that Baker wasn't particularly interested in Sachs's Bowflex routines--a deduction confirmed when the man asked his next question. "I heard that you guys're . . . going out."
Amelia Sachs was a lantern that attracted many moths and Rhyme wasn't surprised that the detective was checking out the availability of the flame. He laughed at the detective's quaint term. Going out. He said, "You could put it that way."
"Must be tough." Then Baker blinked. "Wait, I didn't mean what you think."
Rhyme, though, had a pretty good idea what the detective was saying. He wasn't referring to a relationship between a crip and somebody who was mobile--Baker seemed hardly to notice Rhyme's condition. No, he was referring to a very different potential conflict. "Two cops, you meant."
The Other Case versus His Case.
Baker nodded. "Dated an FBI agent once. She and I had jurisdictional issues."
Rhyme laughed. "That's a good way to put it. Of course, my ex wasn't a cop and we had a pretty rough time too. Blaine had a great fastball. I lost some nice lamps. And a Bausch & Lomb microscope. Probably shouldn't've brought it home. . . . Well, having it at home was okay; I shouldn't've had it on the nightstand in the bedroom."
"I'm not gonna make jokes about microscopes in the bedroom," Sellitto called from across the room.
"Sounds like you just did, if you ask me," Rhyme replied.
Deflecting Baker's small talk, Rhyme wheeled over to Pulaski and Cooper, who were trying to lift prints from the spool from the florist shop, on Rhyme's hope that the Watchmaker couldn't undo the green metallic wire with gloves on and had used his bare hands. But they were having no success.
Rhyme heard the door open and a moment later Sachs walked into the lab, pulled off her leather jacket and tossed it distractedly on a chair. She wasn't smiling. She nodded a greeting to the team and then asked Rhyme, "Any breaks?"
"Nothing yet, no. Some more strikes on the EVL but they didn't play out. No ASTER information either."
Sachs stared at the chart. But it seemed to Rhyme that she was seeing none of the words. Turning to the rookie, she said, "Ron, the detective on the Sarkowski case told me he heard rumors about money going to our One One Eight friends at the St. James. He thinks there's a Maryland connection. We find it, we find the money and probably the names of some people involved. I'm thinking it's a Baltimore OC hook."
"Organized crime?"
"Unless you went to a different academy than me, that's what OC means."
"Sorry."
"Make some calls. Find out if anybody from a Baltimore crew's been operating in New York. And find out if Creeley, Sarkowski or anybody from the One One Eight has a place there or does a lot of business in Maryland."
"I'll stop by the precinct and--"
"No, just call. Make it anonymous."
"Wouldn't it be better to do it in person? I could--"
"The better thing," Sachs said harshly, "is to do what I'm telling you."
"Okay." He raised his hands in surrender.
Sellitto said, "Hey, some of your good humor's rubbing off on the troops, Linc."
Sachs's mouth tightened. Then she relented. "It'll be safer that way, Ron."
It was a Lincoln Rhyme apology, that is to say, not much of one at all, but Pulaski accepted it. "Sure."
She looked away from the whiteboards. "Need to talk to you, Rhyme. Alone." A glance at Baker. "You mind?"
He shook his head. "Not at all. I've got some other cases to check on." He pulled on his coat. "I'll be downtown if you need me."
"So?" Rhyme asked her in a soft voice.
"Upstairs. Alone."
Rhyme nodded. "All right." What was going on here?
Sachs and Rhyme took the tiny elevator to the second floor and he wheeled into the bedroom, Sachs behind him.
Upstairs, she sat down at a computer terminal, began typing furiously.
"What's up?" Rhyme asked.
"Give me a minute." She was scrolling through documents.
Rhyme observed two things about her: Her hand had been digging into her scalp and her thumb was bloody from the wounding. The other was that he believed she'd been crying. Which had happened only two or three times in all the time they'd known each other.
She typed harder, pages rolled past, almost too fast to read.
He was impatient. He was concerned. Finally he had to say firmly, "Tell me, Sachs."
She was staring at the screen, shaking her head. Then turned to him. "My father . . . he was crooked." Her voice choked.
Rhyme wheeled closer, as her eyes returned to the documents on the screen. They were newspaper stories, he could see.
Her legs bounced with tension. "He was on the take," she whispered.
"Impossible." Rhyme hadn't known Herman Sachs, who had died of cancer before he and Sachs met. He'd been a portable, a beat cop, all his life (a fact that had given Sachs her nickname when she was working in Patrol--"the Portable's Daughter"). Herman had cop blood in his veins--his father, Heinrich Sachs, had come over from Germany in 1937, immigrating with his fiancee's father, a Berlin police detective. After becoming a citizen, Heinrich joined the NYPD.
The thought that anyone in the Sachs line could be corrupt was unthinkable to Rhyme.
"I just talked to a detective on the St. James case. He worked with Dad. There was a scandal in the late seventies. Extortion, bribes, even some assaults. A dozen or so uniforms and detectives got collared. They were known as the Sixteenth Avenue Club."
"Sure. I read about it."
"I was a baby then." Her voice quaked. "I never heard about it, even after I joined the force. Mother and Pop never mentioned it. But he was with them."
"Sachs, I just can't believe it. You ask your mother?"
The detective nodded. "She said it was nothing. Some of the uniforms who got busted just started to name names to cut deals with the prosecutor."
"That happens in IAD situations. All the time. Everybody dimes out everybody else, even innocents. Then it gets sorted out. That's all there was to it."
"No, Rhyme. That isn't all. I stopped at the Internal Affairs records room and tracked down the file. Pop was guilty. Two of the cops who were part of the scam swore out affidavits about seeing him put the finger on shopkeepers and protecting numbers runners, even losing files and evidence in some big cases against the Brooklyn crews."
"Hearsay."
"Evidence," she snapped. "They had evidence. His prints on the buy money. And on some unregistered guns he was hiding in his garage." She whispered, "Ballistics traced one to an attempted hit a year before. My dad was stashing a hot weapon, Rhyme. It's all in the file. I saw the print examiner's report. I saw the prints."
Rhyme fell silent. Finally he asked, "Then how'd he get off?"
She gave a bitter laugh. "Here's the joke, Rhyme. Crime Scene fucked up the search. The chain-of-custody cards weren't filled out right, and his lawyer at the hearing excluded the evidence."
Chain-of-custody cards exist so that evidence can't be doctored or unintentionally altered to increase the chances a suspect will be convicted. But there was no way that tampering had occurred in Herman Sachs's case; it's virtually impossible to get fingerprints on evidence unless the suspect himself actually touches it. Still, the rules have to be applied evenly and if the COC cards aren't filled out or are wrong, the evidence will almost always be excluded.
"Then . . . there were pictures of him with Tony Gallante."
A senior organized crime capo from Bay Ridge.
"Your father and Gallante?"
"They were having dinner together, Rhyme. I called a cop that Pop used to work with, Joe Knox--he was in the Sixteenth Avenue Club too. Got busted. I asked him about Dad, point-blank. He didn't want to say anything at first. He was pretty shaken up I'd called but finally he admitted it was true. Dad and Knox and a couple others put the finger on store owners and contractors for over a year. They ditched evidence, they even threatened to beat up people who complained.
"They thought Pop was going down big-time but, with the screwup, he got off. They called him the 'fish that got away.'"
Wiping tears, she continued to scroll through the computer files. She was reviewing official documents too--archives in the NYPD that Rhyme had access to because of the work he did for the department. He wheeled close, so close he could smell her scented soap. She said, "Twelve officers in the Sixteenth Avenue Club were indicted. Internal Affairs knew about three others but they couldn't make the case because of evidence problems. He was one of those three," Sachs said. "Jesus. The fish that got away . . ."
She slumped in a chair, her finger disappearing into her hair and scraping. She realized she was doing it and dropped her hand into her lap. There was fresh blood on the nail.
"When that thing with Nick happened," Sachs began. Another deep breath. "When that happened, all I could think was, there's nothing worse than a crooked cop. Nothing. . . . And now I find out my father was one."
"Sachs . . . "Rhyme felt painful frustration at not being able to lift his arm and place his hand on hers, to try to take some of the terrible sting away. He felt a burst of anger at this impotence.
"They took bribes to destroy evidence, Rhyme. You know what that means. How many perps ended up going free because of what they did?" She turned back to the computer. "How many shooters got off? How many innocent people're dead because of my father? How many?"
Chapter 16
Vincent's hunger was returning, as thick and heavy as a tide, and he couldn't stop staring at the women on the street.
His mental violations made him even hungrier.
Here was a blonde with short hair, carrying a shopping bag. Vincent could imagine his hands cupping her head as he lay on top of her.
And here was a brunette, her hair long like Sally Anne's, dangling from underneath her stocking cap. He could almost feel the quivering of her muscles as his hand pressed into the small of her back.
Here, another blonde, in a suit, carrying a briefcase. He wondered if she'd scream or cry. He bet she was a screamer.
Gerald Duncan was now driving the Band-Aid-mobile, maneuvering it down an alley and then back to a main street, heading north.
"No more transmissions." The killer nodded at the police scanner, from which was clattering only routine calls and more traffic information. "They've changed the frequency."
"Should I try to find the new one?"
"They'll be scrambling it. I'm surprised they weren't from the beginning."
Vincent saw another brunette--oh, she's nice--walking out of a Starbucks. She was wearing boots. Vincent liked boots.
How long could he wait? he wondered.
Not very long. Maybe until tonight, maybe until tomorrow. When he'd met Duncan, the killer told him he'd have to give up having his heart-to-hearts until they started on their "project." Vincent had agreed--why not? The Watchmaker told him there would be five women among his victims. Two were older, middle-aged, but he could have them too if he was interested (it's a chore but somebody's got to do it, Clever Vincent quipped to himself).
So he'd been abstaining.
Duncan shook his head. "I've been trying to figure out how they knew it was we."
We? He did talk funny sometimes.
"You have any idea?"
"Nope," Vincent offered.
Duncan still wasn't angry, which surprised Vincent. Vincent's stepfather had screamed and shouted when he was mad, like after the Sally Anne incident. And Vincent himself would grow enraged when one of his ladies fought back and hurt him. But not Duncan. He said anger was inefficient. You had to look at the great scheme of things, he'd say. There was always a grand plan, and little setbacks were insignificant, not worth wasting your energy on. "It's like time. The centuries and millennia are what matter. With humans, it's the same thing. A single life is nothing. It's the generations that count."
Vincent supposed he agreed, though as far as he was concerned, every heart-to-heart was important; he didn't want to miss a chance for a single one. And so he asked, "Are we going to try again? With Joanne?"
"Not now," the killer replied. "They might have a guard with her. And even if we're able to get to her they'd realize I wanted her dead for a reason. It's important that they think these are just random victims. What we'll do now is--"
He stopped talking. He was looking in the rearview mirror.
"What?"
"Cops. A police car came out of a side street. It started to turn one way but then turned toward us."
Vincent looked over his shoulder. He could see the white car with a light bar on top about a block behind them. It seemed to be accelerating quickly.
"I think he's after us."
Duncan turned quickly down a narrow street and sped up. At the next intersection he turned south. "What do you see?"
"I don't think. . . . Wait. There he is. He's after us. Definitely."
"That street there--up a block. On the right. You know it? Does it go through to the West Side Highway?"
"Yeah. Take it." Vincent felt his palms sweating.
Duncan turned and sped down the one-way street, then turned left onto the highway, heading south.
"In front of us? What's that? Flashing lights?"
"Yep." Vincent could clearly see them. Heading their way. His voice rose. "What're we going to do?"
"Whatever we have to," Duncan said, calmly turning the wheel precisely and making an impossible turn seem effortless.
Lincoln Rhyme struggled to tune out the droning of Sellitto on his cell phone. He also tuned out the rookie, Ron Pulaski, making calls about Baltimore mobsters.
Tuning it all out so he could let something else into his thoughts.
He wasn't sure what. A vague memory kept nagging.
A person's name, an incident, a place. He couldn't say. But it was something he knew was important, vital.
What?
He closed his eyes and swerved close to the thought. But it got away.
Ephemeral, like the puff balls he would chase when he was a boy in the Midwest, outside of Chicago, running through fields, running, running. Lincoln Rhyme had loved to run, loved to catch puff balls and the whirlygig seeds that spiraled from trees like descending helicopters. Loved to chase dragonflies and moths and bees.
To study them, to learn about them. Lincoln Rhyme was born with a fierce curiosity, a scientist even then.
Running . . . breathless.
And now the immobilized man was also running, trying to grasp a different sort of elusive seed. And even though the pursuit was in his mind only, it was no less strenuous and intense than the footraces of his youth.
There . . . there . . .
Almost have it.
No, not quite.
Hell.
Don't think, don't force. Let it in.
His mind sped through memories whole and memories fragmented, the way his feet would pound over fragrant grass and hot earth, through rustling reeds and cornfields, under massive thunderheads boiling up miles high and white in the blue sky.
A thousand images from homicides, and kidnappings and larcenies, crime scene photos, department memos and reports, evidence inventories, the art captured in microscope eyepieces, the mountain peaks and valleys on the screen of a gas chromatograph. Like so many whirlygigs and puff balls and grasshoppers and katydids and robin feathers.
Okay, close . . . close . . .
Then his eyes opened.
"Luponte," he whispered.
Satisfaction filled the body that could feel no sensation.
Rhyme wasn't sure but he believed there was something significant about the name Luponte.
"I need a file." Rhyme glanced at Sellitto, who was now sitting at a computer monitor, examining the screen. "A file!"
The big detective looked over at him. "Are you talking to me?"
"Yes, I'm talking to you."
Sellitto chuckled. "A file? Do I have it?"
"No. I need you to find it."
&nb
sp; "About what? A case?"
"I think so. I don't know when. All I know is the name Luponte figures." He spelled it. "Was a while ago."
"The perp?"
"Maybe. Or maybe a witness, maybe an arresting or a supervisor. Or even brass. I don't know."
Luponte . . .
Sellitto said, "You're looking like the cat that got the cream."
Rhyme frowned. "Is that an expression?"
"I don't know. I just like the sound of it. Okay, the Luponte file. I'll make some calls. Is it important?"
"With a psychotic killer out there, Lon, do you think I'm going to have you waste time finding me something that's not important?"
A fax arrived.
"Our ASTER thermal images?" Rhyme asked eagerly.
"No. It's for Amelia," Cooper said. "Where is she?"
"Upstairs."
Rhyme was about to call her but just then she walked into the lab. Her face was dry and no longer red, her eyes clear. She rarely wore makeup but he wondered if she'd made an exception to hide the fact she'd been crying.
"For you," Cooper told her, looking over the fax. "Secondary analysis of the ash from what's-his-name's place."
"Creeley."
The tech said, "The lab finally imaged the logo that was on the spreadsheet. It's from software that's used in corporate accounting. Nothing unusual. It's sold to thousands of CPAs around the country."
She shrugged, taking the sheet and reading. "And Queens had a forensic accountant look over the recovered entries. It's just standard payroll and compensation figures for executives in some company. Nothing unusual about it." She shook her head. "Doesn't seem important. I'm guessing whoever broke in just burned whatever they could find to make sure they destroyed everything connecting them to Creeley."
Rhyme looked at her troubled eyes. He said, "It's also common practice to burn materials that have nothing to do with the case just to lead investigators off."
Sachs nodded. "Yeah, sure. Good point, Rhyme. Thanks."
Her phone rang.
The policewoman listened, frowning. "Where?" she asked. "Okay." She jotted some notes. "I'll be right there." She said to Pulaski, "May have a lead to the Sarkowski file. I'll check it out."