Jeffery Deaver - The Kill Room

The officer’s voice was a low, angry whisper: “I eat a late lunch every day.”

“Excuse me?”

“Because of my shift,” Poitier continued harshly. “I eat lunch at three p.m. And do you wish to know where I eat lunch?”

“Do I…?”

“It’s a simple question, Captain Rhyme!” the corporal snapped. “Do you wish to know where I eat my lunch every day?”

“I do, yes,” was all that Rhyme could muster, thoroughly confused.

“I have lunch at Hurricane’s on Baillou Hill Road. Near West Street. That is where I have lunch!”

The line went silent. There was no sound other than a soft click but Rhyme imagined the corporal had angrily slammed his thumb onto the disconnect button.

“Well.” He told the others about the exchange. “Sounds like he might be willing to help us out after all.”

Pulaski said, “Or he’s going to arrest us.”

Rhyme started to protest but decided the young officer had a point. He said, “In case you’re right, rookie, change of plans. Thom and I are going to have lunch and/or get arrested. Possibly both. You’re going to canvass at the South Cove Inn. We’ll rent you a car. Thom, didn’t we pass a rental place somewhere?”

“Avis. Do you want me to go there?”

“Obviously. I wasn’t asking for curiosity’s sake.”

“Don’t you get tired of being in a good mood all the time, Lincoln?”

“Rental car. Please. Now.”

Rhyme noticed that he’d had a call from Lon Sellitto. He’d missed it in the “discussion” he’d had with Poitier. There was no message. Rhyme called him back but voice mail replied. He left a phone-tag message and slipped the mobile away.

Thom found the Avis office via GPS and steered in that direction. Just a few minutes later, though, he said uncertainly, “Lincoln.”

“What?”

“Somebody’s following us. I’m sure of it.”

“Don’t look back, rookie!” Rhyme didn’t spend much time in the field any longer, for obvious reasons, but when he’d been active he had frequently worked “hot” crime scenes—those where the perp might still be lingering, for the purposes of learning which cops were on the case and what leads they were finding, or sometimes even trying to kill the officers right then. The instincts he’d honed over the years of working scenes like that were still active. And rule one was don’t let anybody know you’re on to them.

Thom continued, “A car was oncoming but as soon as we passed, it made a U. I didn’t think much of it at first but we’ve been taking a pretty winding path and it’s still there.”

“Describe it.”

“Gold Mercury, black vinyl top. Ten years or older, I’d guess.”

The age of many cars here.

The aide glanced in the mirror. “Two, no, three people inside. Black males. Late twenties or thirties. T-shirts, one gray, one green, short-sleeved. One sleeveless yellow. Can’t make out their faces.”

“You sound just like a patrol officer, Thom.” Rhyme shrugged. “Just police keeping an eye on us. That commissioner—McPherson—isn’t very happy we strangers’ve come to town.”

Thom squinted into the rearview mirror. “I don’t think they’re cops, Lincoln.”

“Why not?”

“The driver’s got earrings and the guy next to him’s in dreads.”

“Undercover.”

“And they’re passing a joint back and forth.”

“Okay. Probably not.”

CHAPTER 33

FEW THINGS ARE MORE REPULSIVE than the chemical smoke aftermath of an IED plastic explosive detonation.

Amelia Sachs could smell it, taste it. She shivered from the cloying assault.

And then there was the ringing in her ears.

Sachs was standing in front of what remained of Java Hut, waiting—impatiently—for the Bomb Squad officers to make their rounds. She would run the crime scene search herself but the explosives experts from the Sixth Precinct in Greenwich Village always did the first post-blast sweep to check for secondary, delayed devices, intended to take out rescue workers. This was a common technique, at least in countries where bombs were just another means of making a political statement. Maybe Don Bruns had learned his skills abroad.

Sachs snapped her fingers next to each ear and was pleased to find that over the tinnitus ring she could hear pretty well.

What had saved her life and those of the coffee drinkers had at first made her laugh.

She and Jerry, the inked manager of Java Hut, had gone into the small, dimly lit office, where the store’s computer was located. They’d pulled up chairs and he’d bent forward, entering a passcode on the old Windows system.

“Here’s the program for the security video.” Jerry had loaded it and then showed her the commands for reviewing the .mpg files, how to rewind and fast-forward, how to capture stills and write clips to separate files for uploading or copying to a flash drive.

“Got it, thanks.”

She’d scooted forward and looked closely at the screen, which was divided into quadrants, one scene for each camera: two were of the floor of the shop, one of the cash register, one of the office.

She had just started scrolling back in time from today to May 11—the date the whistleblower had leaked the STO from here—when she noticed a scene of a man in the office where they now sat, walking forward.

Wait. Something was odd. She’d paused the video.

What was off about this?

Oh, sure, that was it. She’d laughed. In all the other scenes, because she was scrolling in reverse, people were moving backward. But on the office video, the man was moving forward, which meant that in real time he had been backing out of the office.

Why would anyone do that?

She’d pointed it out to the manager, who hadn’t, however, shared her smile. “Look at the time stamp. That was just ten minutes ago. And I don’t know who he is. He doesn’t work here.”

The man was trim, with short hair, it seemed, under a baseball cap. He wore a windbreaker-style jacket and carried a small backpack.

Jerry had risen and walked to the back door. He’d tried it. “It’s open. Hell, we’ve been broken into!”

Sachs scrolled back farther, then played the video forward. They saw the man come into the office, try to log on to the computer several times and then struggle to pick it up, only to be stymied by the steel bars securing it to the floor. Then he’d glanced at the monitor and must have noticed that he was being filmed. Rather than turn and face the security camera, he’d backed out of the office.

She knew it had to be the sniper.

Somehow he too had learned about the whistleblower and had come here to see if he could find the man’s identity. He must’ve heard her and Jerry approach. Sachs had run the tape again, noting this time that before he left he seemed to place a small object behind the computer. What—?

Oh, hell, no!

He’d left an IED— that’s what he’d planted behind the computer. He couldn’t steal it; so he’d destroy the Dell. Try to disarm or not? No, he’d have set it to detonate at any minute. “Out, everybody out!” she’d cried. “Bomb. There’s a bomb! Clear the place. Everybody out!”

“But that’s—”

Sachs had grabbed Jerry by his ideogramed arm and dragged him into the restaurant, calling for the baristas, dishwasher and customers to flee. She’d held up her badge. “NYPD, evacuate now! There’s a gas leak!”

Too complicated to explain about bombs.

The device had blown just as she’d shoved the last customer out the door, a contrary young student whining that he hadn’t gotten his refill yet.

Sachs had still been inside when she’d felt the detonation in her chest and ears and, through the floor, her feet. Two plate-glass windows had shattered and much of the interior flew into pieces. Instantly the place had been enveloped by that vile, greasy smoke. She’d leapt through the door but stayed upright, sure that if she’d dived to the concrete—à la that clichéd scene in thriller movies—her knee would never forgive her.