The Steel Kiss

  "Detectives got me the next day at the station house. I just confessed. That was it."

  "You gave up everything, your whole life? Your years on the force? Just like that?"

  He whispered harshly, "He was my brother! I didn't have any choice!" Then his face softened. "You remember what we talked about then? About me being on the force, not sure about it?"

  She did. Nick didn't have blue in his soul. He wasn't a cop the way she was, or her father was... or Lincoln Rhyme had been. He was biding his time until he could find something else--a business, a restaurant. He'd always wanted a restaurant.

  "I wasn't meant to be a cop. I was going to get out sooner or later. I could do the time and live with that."

  She thought back. "And Donnie did get clean, right?"

  After he'd gone to jail Sachs had stayed in touch with the family, though not Nick. She'd attended Harriet Carelli's funeral and Donnie had indeed been sober there and every other time she'd seen him. She and the younger brother fell out of touch, however, after she met Lincoln Rhyme.

  "He did. For a while. But it didn't stay that way. He didn't do any more work for Delgado that I heard but he went back on C and then H. He died a year ago."

  "Oh, no. I'm sorry. I didn't hear."

  "Overdose. He hid using pretty good. They found him in a hotel in East Harlem. Been there for three days." Nick's voice caught.

  "I did a lot of thinking inside, Amelia. I thought I did the right thing, and I guess I did. I kept Donnie alive for a few years. But I decided I want to prove I'm innocent. I don't care about a pardon or anything like that. I just want to be able to tell people I didn't do it. Donnie's gone, Mom's gone. I don't have any more family might be disappointed to hear the truth. Delgado got capped years ago. His crew's gone. And I want you to know I'm innocent too."

  She saw what was coming.

  He continued, "There's evidence in the case file that'll exculpate me. Contacts, detectives' notes, addresses, things like that. There'll be people out there still who know I didn't do it."

  "You want the file."

  "I do."

  "Nick..."

  He touched her arm, lightly and fast. His hand receded. "You've got every right to walk right back inside and close the door. Never see me again. After what I did."

  And the sin wasn't just the crime. What he also did was cut everything off from her, from the instant of his arrest. Yes, he'd done it to protect her. He was, by his admission, a crooked cop. And waves spread from people like that, lapping against anyone nearby. She, an ambitious, rising star on the force, might have been tainted if they'd remained in contact.

  So? she asked herself. Walk right back inside and close the door?

  She said, "I have to think about it."

  "That's all I'm asking."

  She steadied herself for an embrace, or a kiss, prepared to resist, but all Nick did was stick his hand out and shake hers, as if they were business associates who'd just concluded a successful real estate deal. "Wish Rose the best... if you want to tell her it was me here."

  He turned and strode away.

  She watched him go. After half a block, he looked back at her fast, and on his face was that boyish smile she remembered so clearly from so many years ago. A nod, then he was gone.

  CHAPTER 14

  Attorney Evers Whitmore logged onto one of Rhyme's computers and loaded Skype.

  He typed in an account and Skype's electronic da-da-da tone of dialing filled the room. Rhyme moved closer so that both he and Whitmore were visible to the callee, as they could see in the bottom right-hand corner of the monitor.

  "Juliette?" Rhyme asked. "Do you want to move closer?" She was out of view of the webcam.

  "No," she said. And remained where she was.

  A moment later an image fluttered onto the screen. A balding man in a white shirt with rolled-up sleeves was glancing at some papers in front of him. The desk he sat behind was paved with stacks of documents.

  He looked up at the webcam. "You're Evers Whitmore?"

  "That's right. Attorney Holbrook?"

  "Yes."

  "Now, I will tell you that also present are Lincoln Rhyme and to my right, though not visible, Juliette Archer, who are consultants working with me."

  Cooper and Thom were absent. Whitmore had thought it best an NYPD detective and a civilian with no connection to the case might hamper the conversation that was about to happen.

  "Accordingly, I am invoking the work-product doctrine. Are you willing to accept that they are cloaked by the attorney-client privilege as well?"

  Holbrook looked up, handed a document to someone who had fire-engine-red nails and then returned to the lens of the camera. "Sorry. What?"

  Whitmore repeated his request.

  "Yeah, sure," Holbrook said. There was a tone of "Whatever" in his voice. Even though he was chief general counsel of Midwest Conveyance, maker of the deadly escalator, the man seemed far from either defensive or aggressive. Distracted mostly. And Rhyme now knew why.

  The attorney concentrated on his webcam once more. "Been expecting to hear from somebody who represented Greg Frommer and his family. You're the attorney of record?"

  "I am."

  "I've heard about you," Holbrook said. "Your reputation, of course. Trans Europe Airlines, B and H Pharmaceuticals. You brought them to their knees."

  Whitmore gave no response. "Now, Attorney Holbrook..."

  "Damien's fine."

  Good luck with that, Rhyme thought.

  Whitmore: "Yes. You understand why I'm calling?"

  "The press conference was a half hour ago. I assumed the attorney representing Frommer's family would hear. And therefore I'd get a call." Holbrook turned to the side and said, "I'll be right there. A few minutes. Get them some coffee." Back to the camera. "Do you have any theories of defect?"

  "We do."

  Holbrook offered, "Design flaw, no interlock to shut off the motor if the access panel opened accidentally?"

  Whitmore glanced toward Rhyme then returned to the webcam. "I'm not prepared to discuss our theories."

  "Well, that's a good one. And I'll go one further. The spring-loaded access panel." The lawyer actually chuckled. "Our design department added that because of workers' comp claims from maintenance people who claimed lifting the door pulled out their backs. Probably spurious... But we went with a spring anyway. And you'll probably find out, after the accident, our safety team went to every location that had escalators with spring-loaded access panels installed and detached the springs--before the city inspection. I know, sir, this's a case made in heaven for your client. You could have introduced post-accident modification to show admission of defect on our part. Under other circumstances we would've written a check, and a big one. Mrs. Frommer's going through a rough time, I'm sure. And my heart goes out to her. But, well, you did hear the news. I'm sorry."

  "My paralegal hasn't gotten to bankruptcy court yet. We haven't read the filings."

  "It's Chapter Seven. Full liquidation. We've been in trouble for a while. Chinese competitors. Germans too. Way of the world. The accident, your client's husband, well, that accelerated our decision, sure. But our bankruptcy was going to happen in the next month or the month after anyway."

  Whitmore said to Archer and Rhyme, "In filing for bankruptcy Midwest is protected by an automatic stay. That means we can't sue unless we go to court and have the stay lifted." Back to the screen and Holbrook. "I'm hoping for some courtesy information here."

  Holbrook shrugged. "I'm not going to throw up walls if I don't have to. What do you need to know?"

  "Who's your insurer?"

  "Sorry. Don't have one. We're self-insured."

  Whitmore's face might have registered dismay at this. Rhyme couldn't tell.

  The in-house counsel continued, "And I have to tell you, there's nothing left, asset-wise. We've got probably a million in receivables and forty million in hard assets. Zero cash. Zero stock. Versus nine hundred million debt, most of it sec
ured. Even if you get the bankruptcy stay lifted and the judge agrees you can file the suit and you win--which, I'm sure you know, the receiver'll fight tooth and nail--you'll walk away with a judgment that won't even cover your photocopy costs, sir. And that'd be two or three years from now."

  Whitmore asked, "Who would have maintained the escalator?"

  "I'm afraid to say--for your sake--we did. Our parts and service division. No outside maintenance company for you to bring an action against."

  "Was the mall involved at all with the unit?"

  "No. Other than superficial cleaning. And as to the contractors who installed the units, I can tell you our safety team inspected every unit carefully and signed off on them. It all falls on our shoulders... Look, sir, I truly am sorry for your client. But there's nothing here for you. We're gone. I've worked for Midwest Conveyance my whole life. I was one of the founders. I rode the company down to the end. I'm broke."

  But you and your loved ones are alive, Rhyme thought. He asked, "Why do you think the access panel opened?"

  The lawyer shrugged. "Take ten thousand car axles. Why do they work fine, except one, which cracks at eighty miles an hour? Why are twenty tons of lettuce perfectly harmless but a few heads from the same field are contaminated with E. coli? In our escalator? Who knows? Something mechanical about the latch, most likely. Maybe the bracket on the access panel was mounted with a screw made in China of substandard steel. Maybe the retracting pin missed tolerance but wasn't rejected by the quality-control robot because of a software hiccup. Could be a thousand things. Fact is, the world's not perfect. You know, sometimes I'm amazed that things we buy and put in our homes and stake our lives on work as well as they do." A pallid smile. "Now our outside counsel's arrived. I have to meet with them. It's no consolation, sir, but there are a lot of people here who will have many a sleepless night about Greg Frommer."

  The screen went dark.

  Archer snapped, "Was that bullshit?"

  "No. It's an accurate statement of the law."

  "There's nothing we can do?"

  The lawyer, completely unemotional, was jotting notes in his microscopic writing, all block letters, Rhyme noted. "I'll check the filings and court documents but he's not going to lie to us about confirmable information at hand. Under bankruptcy law a judge will sometimes lift a stay if there's an outside insurance company--one that could pay a liability claim like ours. Being self-insured, though, no stay. The company's immune. Judgment-proof."

  "He said we could try other defendants," Archer said.

  Rhyme pointed out, "Though he wasn't very damn encouraging about that."

  Whitmore said, "I'll keep looking but"--a nod at the blank screen--"Mr. Holbrook had every incentive to try to blame someone else, for his company's reputation, if nothing else. He didn't see a likely cause of action, and I don't either. This is a classic product liability situation, and we're helpless to pursue it. I'll go see Mrs. Frommer and give her the news in person." The lawyer rose. Fixed both buttons on his suit jacket. "Mr. Rhyme, please submit a bill for your hours. I'll pay that myself. I thank you all for your time and effort. It would have been a fruitful experience."

  Sachs, here's the thing. I'm out of the business. Well, the criminal business.

  After dropping her mother back at the town house, following her doctor's appointment, Sachs had driven to Manhattan and was alone in their war room at One PP, her task to make sense of the evidence in the Unsub 40 case and to prod the new officer at the Crime Scene Unit (an older woman technician who was not as good as Mel Cooper) to complete the analysis she needed: the examination of the White Castle napkins that might contain their perp's friction ridges and additional DNA, and to identify the sawdust and varnish from the earlier scenes.

  Well, that was her ostensible mission.

  In fact, she was staring out the window, recalling Rhyme's words to her of a month ago.

  I'm out of the business...

  She'd argued with him, tried to pry open the clamshell of his determination. But he'd been adamant, irritatingly deaf to the bullet points of her side of the debate.

  "Everything comes to an end," her father had told her one crisp, glary Saturday afternoon as he took a breather from their joint project of installing a rebuilt carburetor in their Camaro. "It's the way of the world and it's better to accept that. Dignify, don't demean." Herman Sachs was, at the time, on a leave of absence from the NYPD, undergoing a series of cancer treatments. Sachs accepted almost everything the calm, shrewd and humorous man had taught and told her, but she furiously declined to buy either of those points--the ending and the acceptance--despite the fact that he proved himself right, at least as to the first, by dying six weeks later.

  Forget it. Forget Lincoln.

  You've got work to do. Staring at the evidence charts.

  CRIME SCENE: 151 CLINTON PLACE, MANHATTAN, CONSTRUCTION SITE, ADJACENT TO 40deg NORTH (NIGHTCLUB)

  - Offenses: Homicide, Assault.

  - Victim: Todd Williams, 29, writer, blogger, social topics.

  - COD: Blunt force trauma, probably ball-peen hammer (no brand determined).

  - Motive: Robbery.

  - Credit/debit cards not yet used.

  - Evidence:

  - No friction ridges.

  - Blade of grass.

  - Trace:

  - Phenol.

  - Motor oil.

  - Profile of suspect (Unknown Subject 40).

  - Wore checkered jacket (green), Braves baseball cap.

  - White male.

  - Tall (6'2" to 6'4").

  - Slim (140-150 lbs.).

  - Long feet and fingers.

  - No visual of face.

  CRIME SCENE: HEIGHTS VIEW MALL, BROOKLYN

  - Relevance to case: Attempted apprehension of subject (not successful).

  - Additional elements of profile of suspect.

  - Possibly carpenter or works in trades?

  - Eats large amounts of food.

  - Likes White Castle restaurant.

  - Lives in Queens or other connection with borough?

  - High metabolism?

  - Evidence:

  - DNA, no CODIS match.

  - No friction ridges sufficient for ID.

  - Shoeprint, likely unsub's, size 13 Reebok Daily Cushion 2.0.

  - Soil sample, likely from unsub, containing crystalline aluminosilicate clays: montmorillonite, illite, vermiculite, chlorite, kaolinite. Additionally, organic colloids. Substance is probably humus. Not native to this portion of Brooklyn.

  - Dinitroaniline (used in dyes, pesticides, explosives).

  - Ammonium nitrate (fertilizer, explosives) - With oil from Clinton Place scene: Possibly constructing bomb?

  - Additional phenol (precursor in making plastics, like polycarbonates, resins and nylon, aspirin, embalming fluid, cosmetics, ingrown toenail cures; unsub has large feet, so--nail problems?) - Talc, mineral oil/paraffinum liquidum/huile minerale, zinc stearate, stearic acid, lanolin/lanoline, cetyl alcohol, triethanolamine, PEG-12 laurate, mineral spirits, methylparaben, propylparaben, titanium dioxide.

  - Makeup? No brand determination. Analysis to return.

  - Shaving of metal, microscopic, steel, probably from sharpening knife.

  - Sawdust. Type of wood to be determined. From sanding, not sawing.

  - Organochlorine and benzoic acid. Toxic. (Insecticides, weaponized poisons?) - Acetone, ether, cyclohexane, natural gum, cellulose (probably varnish).

  - Manufacturer to be determined.

  - Napkins from White Castle, probably unsub's. Will resubmit for additional evidence.

  - Stains suggest unsub drank several beverages.

  CRIME SCENE: WHITE CASTLE RESTAURANT, ASTORIA BOULEVARD, ASTORIA, QUEENS

  - Relevance to case: Unsub eats here regularly.

  - Additional elements of profile of suspect.

  - Eats 10-15 sandwiches at a time.

  - Had been shopping at least once when ate here. Carried white plastic bag, some
thing heavy inside. Metallic?

  - Turned north and crossed the street (toward bus/train?). No sign he owned/drove automobile.

  - Witnesses didn't get good view of face, probably no facial hair.

  - White, pale, maybe balding or crew cut.

  - Used a car service on Astoria Blvd. around day of Williams's murder.

  - Awaiting word from owner of gypsy cab company.

  From what was found at the scenes, Sachs and Pulaski had concluded Unsub 40 might be a tradesman. But even if so, did workers carry around tools late at night, especially a rare one like the ball-peen hammer he'd used to kill Todd Williams? And if a tool like that had nothing to do with his job, his carrying it suggested design--a perp on the hunt for a victim. But why? What the hell are you up to, Mr. Forty? How much money could Todd Williams've had on him to justify killing? You didn't use any of his credit or debit cards, or sell them--they would have shown up by now. Stolen plastic has a very short shelf life. You didn't try to suck his bank account dry. Williams had been straight, for the most part, but she'd learned from friends of a few gay encounters. There was a rough-trade club about three blocks from the construction site where he was killed, yet extensive canvassing of the place uncovered no evidence that Williams had ever been there.

  Any other reasons for the unsub to kill you?

  Williams had been a former programmer by profession and now he wrote about social issues on his blog but there was nothing controversial that she'd seen. Environment, privacy. And as for the bomb making and poisoning theories--related to terrorism possibly--the evidence was sketchy and her instinct said those were dead ends.

  Maybe the motive was that which was the least helpful to investigators: Williams had witnessed some other crime and the lean perp--maybe a hit man, maybe a professional burglar--had seen him and clipped him. And yet... and yet...

  Come on, Rhyme...

  She needed somebody to brainstorm with. But it can't be you now, can it?

  Out of the business...

  And what was up with Ron Pulaski? He'd been acting particularly odd. He'd questioned the wisdom of Rhyme's retirement, firmly calling his boss on the decision. ("It's crazy!" To which he received back: "I've decided, Rookie. Why bring it up for the thousandth time. Quit. Asking.") Was this his distraction? Though maybe Ron's mood had nothing to do with Rhyme. She again considered illness in the family. Or the officer himself. His head injury. Then too: He was a husband and father, trying to make ends meet on a patrolman's salary. God bless...