Джеймс Паттерсон: NYPD Red 4

It looked like R2-D2’s taller brother.

“It’s an anesthesia machine. Fifty thousand dollars, and at four hundred pounds, you can’t exactly slip it into a backpack. And yes, it has wheels, but it also has an electromagnetic security device embedded in it, and the hospital has guards at all access points. But it still went out the door.”

“Did Saint Cecilia report the thefts?” Kylie asked.

“No. We had no proof that anything was stolen , and we didn’t report them missing. The hospital decided to write it off and chalk it up to bad security.”

Kylie and I said nothing. Because so far nothing made sense. A low-level crime that the victim didn’t report, and yet the mayor, knowing we were caught up in the Elena Travers murder, asked us to drop everything and get involved.

Howard finally dropped the other shoe.

“I’m also on the board at Mercy Hospital, and two days ago it was hit. This time they got away with a hundred and seventy thousand dollars’ worth of equipment. I don’t believe in coincidences, so I did some digging, and I found out that nine hospitals had been robbed in two months. Total haul, close to two million dollars.” He handed me a printout. “The specifics are all here.”

“And you’d like us to find out who’s behind the thefts,” I said.

“Yes, but not in your usual style.”

“I didn’t know we had a style,” Kylie said, looking at me. “He’s going to have to tell us what it is so we don’t keep doing it.”

Howard smiled and pulled a newspaper clipping from the folder. It was a picture of Kylie and me leaving the Bassett brothers’ house.

“The media loves you,” he said. “It’s one thing to be on the front page when you solve a major crime, but last night you interviewed the people whose necklace was stolen, and you made page five of the Post. You guys get ink wherever you go, and my goal — and Muriel’s — is to keep a tight lid on this investigation. She called the PC this morning, and he’s on board.”

“This is a pervasive crime spree, but it’s the first time we’ve ever heard of it,” Kylie said. “Why is it so hush-hush? And why not tell the public what’s going on? Sometimes they can be our best source of leads.”

“If you ask the head of any one of these hospitals, he’ll tell you that the secrecy is for the well-being of the patients. People want to feel safe when they check in, but if they hear that criminals have stolen a piece of equipment the size of a refrigerator, they’re going to worry. What else can these villains take? My wallet? My laptop? My newborn baby? The prevailing wisdom at the hospitals is that it’s better to keep it quiet. Less stress for the patients.”

“What’s the real reason they don’t want to go public with the thefts?” I asked.

“Because if this shit gets out,” Howard said, a wide grin on his face, “it would put a serious crimp in their fund-raising.”

“Change our style?” Kylie said as soon as she pulled the car out of the mayor’s driveway. “Is he serious? One of the reasons we get press is because we solve crimes. Riddle me this, Batman: how are we supposed to crack this case if we can’t put out any feelers to the public?”

“Because we can solve anything, Girl Wonder. That’s why the mayor of Gotham City picked us,” I said. “Why don’t we start by talking to the people we’re actually allowed to talk to? Get on the Drive, and let’s shoot down to Mercy Hospital and talk to their security people.”

She turned left on 79th, and we headed south on the FDR.

“There’s only one way to get two million dollars’ worth of hospital equipment from New York to whatever third world buyer is willing to pay for it,” Kylie said. “Big fat shipping containers.”

“Good idea,” I said. “Let’s give Howard’s list to Jan Hogle and see if she can run it against the manifests of cargo ships that sailed within a few days of each heist. She can cross-check by weight. If they stole x pounds of equipment, she can flag every shipment that weighs about the same.”

“That wasn’t my idea,” Kylie said. “I was thinking we could go down to the shipyards and talk to the dockworkers. Those guys have eyes and ears everywhere, and a few of them owe us.”

“Sounds like a plan,” I said. “And then our pictures would be in the paper as the first two cops fired by the Sykes administration.”

Kylie’s cell phone rang. We were doing fifty on the Drive, so she tapped a button and the call went directly to speaker.

“This is Detective MacDonald,” she said.

“This is Mike Danehy at Better Choices,” the voice on the other end said. “Is Mrs. Harrington there?”

She grabbed the phone and took it off speaker. “This is Mrs. Harrington.”

She dropped her voice after that so that I could barely hear her end of the conversation, but I could tell by the look on her face that it was bad news. Something was going on with Spence.

A lifetime ago, when Kylie and I were new at the academy, we had a throw-all-caution-to-the-wind sexually liberating affair that lasted twenty-eight days. And then, like the lyrics to a bad country song, her boyfriend got out of rehab, all shiny clean and sober, and she dumped me and married him.

For eleven years, Spence Harrington didn’t pick up a drink or a drug. But then he did. Since then he’d been in and out of rehabs trying to get the monkey off his back. Connecticut, Oregon, and now Better Choices, a day program right here in New York.

“Mike, I know the rules, but they suck,” she said, getting louder as she got more frustrated. “Surely I can do something. Anything.”

She obviously didn’t like Mike’s answer because her response was to hit the gas and blow her horn at the yellow cab in front of her.

“I’m sorry, Mike, but that’s not enabling ,” she said. “It’s called being his wife.”

The taxi in front of us refused to move over, so she swerved around him on the right, almost running him into the divider.

“Okay, thank you,” she said. “Keep in touch.”

She hung up the phone.

“What’s going on?” I said.

“Wrong number,” she said, pulling the car off the Drive at the East 53rd Street exit.

It took less than a minute for us to get to Mercy Hospital on First Avenue. She parked in a no standing zone, killed the engine, turned to me, and said, “Spence is missing.”

It didn’t quite process. “What do you mean, missing?”

“That was his counselor, Mike Danehy. Spence hasn’t shown up at rehab for three days.”

“Did they try calling him?”

“Oh yeah. They called to kick him out of the program, but they couldn’t find him to tell him, so they finally called me.”

“What do they want you to do?”

“Oh, Mike was very explicit. He told me to do nothing. He said Spence has to hit rock bottom before he can find his way back up.”

“That’s good advice,” I said. “But of course you’re not very good at taking good advice.”

She gave me half a smile.

“Do you want help?” I said.

She didn’t answer.

“Kylie, your drug addict husband is missing. Do you want help?”

“Yes, goddamn it, Zach, but I’m too stubborn to ask.”

“That’s okay,” I said. “You don’t have to.”

Walking into his office, you’d never know that Gregg Hutchings was a hero. I’d worked with him and knew he’d racked up a chestful of medals, but here at Mercy Hospital, there was no trace of his service with NYPD.

“Hutch,” I said, “where are all the pictures of PCs hanging ribbons around your neck?”

“This is corporate America, Zach. Nobody cares about my past glories. They’re more interested in my golf scores and how many hundred thousand dollars’ worth of equipment I let slip through my fingertips over the weekend.”