Patterson Array - NYPD Red

“Give me a top line.”

“Gabriel Benoit, thirty-four, only child, born in Stuttgart, Germany, father was an officer in army intelligence. Family bounced around-South Korea, Alabama, Georgia-and eventually Dad wound up at the Pentagon. Gabriel went to high school in northern Virginia, where he was a B student with a keen interest in film studies. Dropped out of college in his freshman year. After that, it’s spotty till he moves to New York, where he’s in hundreds of movie and TV productions, using his real name and Social Security number. Two years ago, his mailing address changed from an apartment to a PO box, and finally to a mental health facility, which is where we tracked him, but he vacated a few months ago.”

“Two years ago he either became so paranoid he didn’t want anyone to find him, or that’s when he started planning these murders,” Cheryl said.

“Or both,” I said.

“Email me whatever you have on him. I’ll try to make sense of it when I get home tonight and I’ll meet you at the diner in the morning. Is five too early?”

“Not for this case. Thanks, Doc. Sorry to interrupt your dinner.”

“Don’t apologize,” she said. “He totally understands. He’s a cop too.”

She hung up.

He? She was having dinner with a guy? And he’s a cop? It sure as hell didn’t take her long to replace Fred. I wondered how this guy felt about opera.

Kylie and I worked another two hours, and I crawled into bed at midnight. Four hours later, my cell phone rang. Caller ID said it was Kylie, but I knew better.

“Hello, Spence,” I said.

“This is not Spence,” Kylie said. “I read him the riot act yesterday. ‘If you have any bright ideas in the middle of the night, don’t wake Zach, wake me.’”

“Well, tell Spence thanks for not waking me,” I said.

“Listen up, I’m serious,” she said. “I brought home a copy of the video of Benoit tossing the Molotov. I’ve watched it a dozen times. Sometimes Spence is in the room, sometimes he’s not. Tonight he wakes me and says, ‘I just figured it out.’”

“Colonel Mustard in the conservatory with the candlestick?”

“Zach, I know you think Spence is…I don’t know…creative. But this time I think he has something.”

“Sorry. I’m listening.”

“I don’t know about you, but when I watch that tape, I tend to zero in on Benoit. Spence did a freeze-frame on the Molotov cocktail. There’s no wick on it. No oily rag. No flame.”

“So?”

“So according to Spence, that’s one of the tricks of the trade. If the bottle is flaming, you can’t hand it to some megastar actor who’s insured for millions. Rather than have a stuntman stand in for the shot, they go wickless. We know Benoit had an accomplice in the robbery, so maybe his partner is a special effects guy.”

“I don’t mean to shoot down another one of Spence’s middle-of-the-night epiphanies, but any kid with a chemistry set and a mean streak can make a basic incendiary device-with or without a tampon for a wick. The simplest way is to take brake fluid, Drano-”

“A kid didn’t make this, Zach. Spence said it looks very professional, and whatever else you think about him, give him some credit for knowing the film business.”

“Kylie, let’s not argue. We’re both exhausted. Tell Spence I appreciate the input.”

“He gave me a list of special effects guys he thinks fit the specs. There are only six of them, and even if they’re all clean, one of them may see something in the video that points us to the guy who built it. I know it’s grasping at straws, but what other clues do we have?”

“Okay, I’m meeting with Cheryl Robinson in about an hour,” I said. “After that we can track down these special effects guys and talk to them.”

“You didn’t tell me you were meeting with the profiler,” Kylie said.

“I’m meeting her at five in the morning. I thought you might want to get some sleep.”

“Hell no. Besides, I’m awake now anyway. Where are you guys meeting?”

“Gerri’s Diner on Lex around the corner from the precinct.”

“Great. I’ll see you there. Order me some coffee and a toasted English.” She hung up.

And just like that, I had plans for breakfast. Just me, the beautiful old girlfriend I was trying to get over, and the beautiful new woman who, the more I thought about it, might be just what I needed to help me get over the old one.

I got down on the floor and unrolled my yoga mat.

I decided I’d show up ten minutes late. I figured it would give Cheryl and Kylie a chance to get to know each other. I also thought that if I got there last, it might be less awkward-even though I was the only one who saw this little threesome as awkward.

I was wrong. As soon as I walked in the door, Gerri Gomperts came out from behind the counter and cornered me.

“What’s going on?” she said, wiping her hands on an apron that already showed the signs of a hectic morning behind the grill. “The lady shrink was waiting for you, and that other one plops down right next to her.”

“That’s Detective Other One to you,” I said. “She’s my new partner.”

“I don’t care who she is,” Gerri said. “Pick one.”

“Tough call,” I said. “They’re both smart, beautiful, and fun to be with.”

“Trust me, kid,” Gerri said. “Go for the one without the wedding ring.”

I ordered coffee and a bagel and sat down at the booth. Kylie and Cheryl were in the middle of an animated conversation. I don’t know what it is about women. They barely knew each other, and they were already bonding.

“I just let Cheryl in on Captain Cates’s theory,” Kylie said.

“And it’s frighteningly plausible,” Cheryl said.

“Did you get a chance to look at the backgrounder on Benoit?” I said.

“I went through it twice. The army officer father is always a red flag. I hate to stereotype, but that’s what profilers do. Military fathers can be hard on their sons. Gabriel probably had very little control over the events in his life, especially if Dad was abusive or controlled him to the extreme. He would develop significant rage, which he had to suppress in order to survive. So he created a world he could control-a world of fantasy.”

“I thought all kids had fantasies,” I said.

“We all had imaginary friends, but in Benoit’s case the movies he played out in his head became more reality than fantasy. He was the writer and the director. He controlled everything. The problem probably began when he started working in the real-world movie business.”

“Where he controlled nothing,” Kylie said.

“Exactly. He’s an extra, practically superfluous. It’s not his fault that he’s not a star. He blames those Hollywood people-especially the ones at the top. They’re the oppressive force preventing him from succeeding.”

“Let’s face it,” Kylie said. “In real life, those goons prevent a lot of people from succeeding.”

“And in real life they get away with it, but in Benoit’s script, he gets to kill them off.”

“Do you have any guess where he’ll hit next?” I said.

“Cates’s theory makes a lot of sense, and if she’s right, his next scenario will be huge. He started with a quiet little poisoning, escalated to a shooting, then ratcheted up to a firebomb with color commentary by Ryan Seacrest. Our boy is not going to go back to spiking someone’s tomato juice. He’s playing this out for his audience, and the murders will get more dramatic, more cinematic, and probably have a higher body count as he moves along. If I were talking to my fellow psychologists, I’d probably say he’s suffering from psychogenic paranoid psychosis. But cop to cop, he’s a sicko killer with a vendetta. And he’s about to do something really nasty, so get him off the streets fast.”