Lincoln Rhyme: The Kill Room Part 31

She had been inside Lincoln Rhyme's town house now for hours. She'd finessed the phone call issue, switching prepaid mobiles every few hours, it seemed-everybody on the team was using them now-and she had a wiretap alert on the landline into the town house, which there was no way to defeat without physically breaking into the central switch.

But with her being the lead investigator she'd have to emerge sooner or later.

He reflected on her partner, Rhyme. Now, that was a setback. It had cost his organization nearly two thousand dollars to eliminate the man, his male nurse and another cop. But his contacts down there from the dock crowd had blown the attempt. They'd asked if Swann wanted them to try again but he'd told them to get the h.e.l.l off the island. It would be very difficult to trace them back to Swann and his boss but it could be done.

He was sure there'd be another opportunity to take care of Rhyme. The man certainly couldn't move very fast to get away from the Kai Shun. Swann had looked up Rhyme's condition, quadriplegia, and discovered that the criminalist had no feeling whatsoever in most of his body. Swann was intrigued with the idea of the man's just sitting still and watching someone flay his skin off-and slowly bleed to death-while feeling no pain.

What an interesting idea: butchering a creature while it was alive.

Curious. He'd have to- Ah, but here is our beautiful Amelia.

She wasn't coming from the direction he'd expected her-the L-shaped cul-de-sac for deliveries behind the town house, near where her Ford Torino was parked. She'd apparently left via the front door, which faced Central Park West. She was now walking west along the crosstown street's sidewalk, across from the diner.

He'd hoped to get her in the cul-de-sac; there were too many pedestrians, stragglers on their way to work, here at the moment. But finding her alone would be only a matter of time.

Swann casually wiped the utensils and coffee mug, smearing prints. He paid by slipping a ten and a five under the plate, rather than taking the check to the cas.h.i.+er. He'd gotten these bills in change from a hotel concierge across town; cash from an ATM is frighteningly traceable, so he'd engaged in a little micro money laundering, leaving a generous but not overly so tip.

Now he was out the door, climbing into his Nissan.

He observed Sachs through the winds.h.i.+eld. Vigilant, she looked around carefully, though not toward him-only at those places where an attacker might come from. Interesting too: She looked up, scanning.

Don't worry, Swann thought to her. That's not where the bullet's going to come from.

As she fished for car keys her jacket slipped away from her hip and he noted she wore a Glock.

He started his car at the same time she did hers, to cover the sound of his ignition.

As Sachs's Torino sped away from the curb, Swann followed.

His only regret was that her fate would be that bullet he'd just been thinking of; using the Kai Shun on her silken flesh wasn't an option in the present recipe.

CHAPTER 50.

MYCHAL POITIER WAS SPEAKING to the manager of the South Cove.

"But, Officer, I thought you knew," said the tall, curly-haired man in a very nice beige suit. He was presently frowning creases deep into his rosily tanned forehead. His accent was mildly British.

"Knew what?" Poitier muttered.

"You told us we could reopen the room and clean it, repair the damage."

"I? I never said any such thing."

"No, no, not you. But someone from your department. They called me and said to release the scene. I don't remember his name."

Rhyme asked, "He called? No one came here in person?"

"No, it was a phone call."

Rhyme sighed. He asked, "When was this?"

"Monday."

Poitier turned and looked at Rhyme with a dismayed gaze. "I gave very strict orders that the scene should have remained sealed. I can't imagine who in the department-"

"It wasn't anybody in your department," Rhyme said. "Our unsub made the call."

And the accomplice, of course, was the manager's fervent desire to eliminate any sign that a murder had been committed here. Crime scene placards in hallways do not make for good public relations.

"I'm sorry, Corporal," the manager said defensively.

Rhyme asked, "Where's the carpet, sofa, the shattered window gla.s.s? The other furniture?"

"A rubbish tip somewhere, I should suppose. I have no idea. We used a contractor. Because of the blood, they said they would burn the carpet and couch."

All the trash fires...

Pulaski said, "Right after he killed Annette, our unsub makes one call and, bang, there goes the crime scene. Pretty smart, you think about it. Simple."

It was. Rhyme looked into the immaculate room. The only evidence of the crime was the missing window, over which plastic had been taped.

"If there's anything I can do," the manager said.

When no one said a word, he retreated.

Thom wheeled Rhyme into the suite and, since the Kill Room wasn't wheelchair-accessible, he was helped down two low stairs by Poitier and Pulaski.

The room was pale blue and green-the paint still wet on several walls-and measured about twenty by thirty feet, with two doors leading to what appeared to be bedrooms to the right. These too were empty and were primed for painting. To the left upon entering was a full kitchen.

Rhyme looked out one of the remaining windows. There was a trim garden outside the room, dominated by a smooth-trunked tree that rose about forty feet into the air. He noted that the lower branches had all been trimmed back; the leaves didn't start until about twenty or more feet off the ground. Looking straight over the garden, under the canopy of leaves, he could clearly see the infamous spit of land where Barry Shales had fired from, and where the men in the room now had nearly died.

He squinted up at the tree.

Well, we may just have a crime scene after all.

"Rookie!" Rhyme called.

"Sure, Lincoln."

Pulaski joined him. Mychal Poitier did too.

"Notice anything odd about this scene?"

"One h.e.l.l of a shot. That's an awfully long way away. And look at that pollution he had to fire through."

"It's the same shooting scenario we saw yesterday from the other side of the water," he grumbled. "Nothing's changed about it. Obviously I'm not talking about that. I'm saying: Don't you see something strange about the horticulture?"

The young officer examined the scene for a moment. "The shooter had help. The branches."

"That's right." Rhyme explained to Poitier, "Somebody cut those lower branches so the sniper would have a clear shot. We should search the garden."

But the corporal shook his head. "It is a good theory, Captain. But no. That tree? It's a poisonwood. Are you familiar with it?"

"No."

"It's just like the name suggests, like poison oak or sumac. If you burn it, for instance, the smoke will be like tear gas. If you touch the leaves you can end up in the hospital from the irritation. They are flowering trees and very pretty so the resorts here don't cut them down but they do trim all but the highest branches so people don't touch them."

"Ah, well, nice try," Rhyme muttered. He absolutely hated it when a solid theory crashed. And, with it, any hope of a proper crime scene to search.

He told Pulaski, "Get some pictures, take samples of the carpet right outside the door, soil samples from the beds around the front sidewalk, dust the k.n.o.bs here for prints. Probably useless but as long as we're here..."

Rhyme watched the young man collect the evidence and slip it into plastic bags, doc.u.menting where it had been found. Pulaski then took perhaps a hundred pictures of the scene. He lifted three latent prints. He finished and deposited what he'd collected in a large paper bag. "Anything else, Lincoln?"

"No," the criminalist grumbled.

The search of the Kill Room and the inn was perhaps the fastest in the history of forensic a.n.a.lysis.

Someone appeared in the doorway, another uniformed officer, skin very dark, face circular. He glanced at Rhyme with what seemed like admiration. Perhaps Mychal Poitier's copy of Rhyme's crime scene manual had recently made the rounds of the Royal Bahamas Police. Or maybe he was simply impressed to be in the same room as the odd cop from America who had in a series of simple deductions transformed the case of the missing student into a murder investigation.

"Corporal," said the young officer to Poitier, with a deferential nod. He carried a thick folder and a large shopping bag. "From a.s.sistant Commissioner McPherson: a full copy of the crime scene report and autopsy photos. And the autopsy reports themselves."

Poitier took the folder from the man and thanked him. He nodded at the bag. "The victims' clothing?"

"Yes, and shoes. Evidence that was collected here just after the shooting too. But I have to tell you, much has gone missing, the morgue administrator told me. He doesn't know how."

"Doesn't know how," Poitier scoffed.

Rhyme recalled that the watches and other valuables had vanished between here and the morgue, as had Eduardo de la Rua's camera and tape recorder.

"I'm sorry, Corporal."

Poitier added, "Any word on the sh.e.l.l casings?" He cast a glance through the window at the spit of land across the bay. The divers and officers with metal detectors had been at work for the past hour or so.

"I'm afraid not. It seems the sniper took the bra.s.s with him and we still can't find where the nest was."

A shrug from Poitier. "And any hits on the name Barry Shales?"

As they'd driven here Poitier had had his intelligence operation see if Customs or Pa.s.sport Control had a record of the sniper entering the country. Credit card information too.

"Nothing, sir. No."

"All right. Thank you, Constable."

The man saluted then gave a tentative nod to Rhyme, turned and, with impressive posture, marched from the room.

Rhyme asked Thom to push him closer to Poitier and he peered into the shopping bag, noting three plastic-wrapped bundles, all tightly sealed, attached to which were chain-of-custody cards, properly filled out. He clumsily reached in and extracted a small envelope on top. Inside was the bullet. Rhyme estimated it as a bit bigger than the most common sniper round, the .338 Lapua. This was probably a .416, a caliber growing in popularity. Rhyme studied the bit of deformed copper and lead. Like all rounds, even this large caliber, it seemed astonis.h.i.+ngly small to have caused such horrific damage and stolen a human life in a fraction of a second.

He replaced it. "Rookie, you're in charge of these. Fill out the cards now."

"Will do." Pulaski jotted his name on the chain-of-custody cards.

Rhyme said, "We'll take good care of them, Corporal."

"Ah, well, I doubt the evidence will be useful to us. If you arrest this Shales and his partner, your unsub, I don't think your courts will send them back here for trial."

"Still, it's evidence. We'll make sure it's returned to you uncontaminated."

Poitier looked around the pristine room. "I'm sorry we don't have a crime scene for you, Captain."

Rhyme frowned. "Oh, but we do. And I suggest we get to it as quickly as we can before something happens to that one too. Propel me, Thom. Let's go."

CHAPTER 51.

HE RESEMBLED A TOAD.

Henry Cross was squat and dark-complexioned and he had several visible warts that Amelia Sachs thought could be easily removed. His black hair was thick and crowned a large head. Lips, broad. Hands, wide with ragged nails. As he talked he would occasionally lift a fat cigar and stick it in his mouth to chew the unlit stogie enthusiastically. This was gross.

Cross said, with a shake of his head, "It sucks, Roberto dying. Sucks big time." His voice had a faint accent, Spanish, she supposed; she recalled Lydia Foster said he spoke that language and English perfectly-like Moreno.

He was the director of the Cla.s.srooms for the Americas Foundation, which worked with churches to build schools and hire teachers in impoverished areas of Latin America. Sachs recalled that Moreno had been involved in this.

Blowing up the balloons...

"Roberto and his Local Empowerment Movement were one of our biggest supporters," Cross said. He stabbed a blunt finger at the gallery of pictures on a scuffed wall. They showed the CAF offices in Caracas, Rio and Managua, Nicaragua. Moreno was standing with his arm around a smiling, swarthy man at a construction site. They were both wearing hard hats. A small group of locals seemed to be applauding.

"And he was a friend of mine," Cross muttered.

"Had you known him long?"

"Five years maybe."

"I'm sorry for your loss." A phrase that instructors actually teach you at the police academy. When Amelia Sachs uttered these words, though, she meant them.

"Thank you." He sighed.

The small dark office was in a building on Chambers Street in lower Manhattan. The foundation was the one stop on Moreno's trip to New York that Sachs had been able to track down-thanks to the receipt from Starbucks she'd found at Lydia Foster's apartment. Sachs had checked the office sign-in sheet in the building that housed the coffee shop and found that on May 1 Moreno was visiting CAF.