J. Robb - Delusion in Death

Through the open door she saw the heaps and tangles of bodies—including the one facedown half in, half out of the café.

“Get that barricade up. Peabody, call for MTs.”

“We got them coming,” one of the uniforms shouted. “We called for more backup, Lieutenant.”

“For Christ’s sake.” She grabbed one wrestling man by the shirt collar, dodged a flailing fist, didn’t quite dodge a jabbing elbow to the ribs. “Peabody, goddamn it!” She managed to get a boot on the chest of the second man, rocked as he bucked. “Stop! Cut it out or I swear to God I’ll knock your empty heads together.”

She ignored the expected versions of “He started it.”

“Make a move, and you’re in restraints and headed for a holding tank. One move. Don’t test me.”

Ribs throbbing, she turned. “Listen up! I said, listen up !” Laying a hand on the butt of her weapon, she raised her voice over the din of the crowd. “I’m Lieutenant Dallas, NYPSD. You will not cross the barricade. You will cease and desist any attempt to interfere with these officers or you will be arrested and charged with hampering an investigation, creating a public nuisance, obstruction of justice and anything else I can toss in to screw up the rest of your day.”

“People are hurt!” someone screamed.

“Medicals are on the way.”

“Fucking cops stunned unarmed people. I saw it. I recorded it.” He waved his ’link like a trophy.

“And I’m here to determine what happened. My partner will take your statement.”

“Then cover it up. Fucking cops.”

Enough, Eve decided, and stared hard into the bystander’s eyes. “Pal, I’ve got people bleeding on the ground and officers in harm’s way. Record this.” She held up her badge. “That’s Dallas, Lieutenant Eve. Get the badge number? This fucking cop is telling you to clam it until my partner takes your statement. If you continue to attempt to incite a riot you’ll be restrained and charged, and transported to Central.”

When he opened his mouth again, her eyes went to ice. “Go ahead, say something. Once you do, get ready to tag a lawyer.”

She waited until he broke eye contact and stared at the ground.

“Officers will take statements, but anyone who’s a doctor or medical professional please step forward, and this officer will enlist your aid for any wounded. Call in the rest of the team. Start talking to people,” she told Peabody. “Get statements, keep them talking, and make sure you confiscate that asshole’s ’link for evidence.”

“Yes, sir, and won’t that be a joy.”

“Who owns the damn building?”

“Not Roarke.”

“Small blessings. Keep that line secured,” she ordered the droid. “And you”—she gestured toward the second uniform—“report.”

“We were on patrol and observed several individuals running from this location. One ran into our vehicle as we pulled to a stop. He stated people were killing each other inside Café West. We called it in, approached the scene.”

He took a breath.

“Lieutenant, when we opened the door it was crazy. People were lying on the floor getting trampled while other people were fighting. Bare hands, knives—Jesus—forks, broken glasses. People screaming, howling like animals. Some of them laughing like mental defectives.

“We called out warnings. Some of them came at us. That guy didn’t lie, sir. Some of them weren’t armed, but they were coming at us, and still going at each other. We had to deploy stunners.”

“Is there going to be anything on that asshole’s ’link vid you can’t stand up to, Officer?”

“No, sir, Lieutenant. No, sir.”

“Then don’t worry about it. Continue.”

“Okay. They’d go down, and more would come at us. I don’t know how many we stunned before we got some control, because some of them didn’t go down on the first stream. By the time we did, we had a riot brewing out here, with people who’d seen, some who’d started to go inside and got attacked before they managed to get out again.”

He nodded toward the black-and-whites that pulled up. “There’s backup. And the MTs.”

“What time did you stop at this location. Be precise.”

“Logged the stop at thirteen-eleven, sir.”

Fourteen minutes. Odds were they’d be clear.

“All right. Work with Detective Peabody. Get statements, names, contacts.”

She moved toward the arriving uniforms, snapped out orders.

“You—” She pointed at a pair of MTs. “I need you to start moving the wounded out. Seal up first. With me.”

She stepped inside, noted cracks and breaks in the entrance door. Might’ve saved some lives, she thought.

Beside her the MT sucked in his breath. “We’re going to need more transpo.”

“Get it.” She sealed up herself, moved carefully through the café, around bodies, crouching now and again to check for vitals.

She began to mark the dead as she had at the bar.

As she worked the moans began, and the weeping. A hard sound, she thought, and still, it meant life.

“Reineke and Jenkinson are on scene,” Peabody said as she came in. “They’re getting statements. I logged Mr. Costanza’s ’link into evidence. Watched it with him first. He sort of changed his tune when he viewed it with me. It clearly shows the officers under attack.”

“I’m not worried about that. Does it show anything we can use?”

“Not much. It’s from outside, on the sidewalk, but you can see people fighting inside, the movements, hear the screaming.”

She had to swallow. “It’s pretty awful.”

Peabody crouched as Eve had when someone reached up to her. “Help’s coming,” she comforted. “You’re going to be okay. We’ve got you now. They’ve got about a dozen wounded out, Dallas.”

“Smaller place, not as many people. Somebody smashed the glass in the front door. It may have helped dilute some of the agent.”

“Might be why so many people out there were ready to rumble.”

“That’s just New York. Forty-one dead. Start getting IDs, TOD, COD.”

She moved outside again. “Baxter, Trueheart, with Peabody.” She spotted McNab—a celery stick in his green cargos—ducking under the tape. “Inside,” she told him. “Start bagging electronics.”

She walked over to the comfortably rumpled Feeney. “Not as bad as the first. Smaller place, and they got outside air from the broken door, more when the cops broke in. I didn’t spot any cams inside. One on the front door, another on the alley exit, but I haven’t checked them.”

“We’ll take it.”

As Feeney glanced around, Eve noticed the dried blood smeared on the cuff of his trench coat. From yesterday, she realized. Only yesterday.

“I didn’t figure he’d hit again so fast,” Feeney said.

“And I figured when he hit again, he’d go bigger. So he goes faster and smaller. But he’s sticking to the same general area. Places he knows. People he knows?” she speculated. “Heavy on the business crowd again. Lots of dead suits in there.”

“Happy hour rush, lunch rush.” His basset hound eyes went grim. “He’s hitting prime times.”

“We haven’t got a line on him, Feeney. He’s scored over a hundred and twenty dead, and we haven’t got a line.”

“Start at the top, work it through again. There’s always something there, kid.”

“Yeah.” She let her gaze skim over the heads of the crowd to the buildings. Somewhere around here , she thought. You’re somewhere around here, you fuck .

Reineke jogged over. “Lieutenant, there’s somebody over here you’re going to want to talk to.”

She walked through the busy medicals to where Jenkinson stood with a plump blonde. Tears and tissues had smeared her eye makeup into black and lavender bruises. She wore New York black—jacket, sweater, pants, with short-heeled boots, and trembled as she bit at her nails.