The Zimsky Effect, Chapter Two of The Unusual Suspects
Title: The Zimsky Effect, Chapter Two in The Unusual Suspects
Author: CelesteAvonne
Disclaimer: For Fun and Fun Alone!
Spoilers: References to all 10 episodes of The Unusuals.
Pairing/Characters: All canon pairings, including Shraeger/Davis, Walsh/Beaumont, Delahoy/Crumb, and Banks/Demopolis
Rating: PG13
Word Count: ~10,000 (split between posts)
Summary: The situation intensifies as the Second Squad learns that the Hand Writing Killer is now targeting the people connected to them rather than random strangers.
Listen up, Second Precinct, Christmas is only eight weeks away. Just FYI, I’m interested in Eastern Philosophy, vintage waffle irons, and my sweater size is six petite.
Eddie Alvarez returned to his desk. No one was in the main office now, except for Officer Maynard and Sergeant Brown. He knew Cole and Beaumont were interrogating Mr. Fish. Banks and Delahoy were off on the Chelsea snatch-and-grab case. Walsh and Shraeger were clocking time on the Hand Writing Mugger.
Eddie Alvarez took out his file in his lap drawer. He noted the times and the cases. As he was replacing the folder, he noticed an odd oblong shape behind the frame photo of Nicole.
“What the-?” he began. He poked at it with a pencil, and just as he did, the shape began to vibrate. “It’s a bomb,” he whispered. “All right. Don’t panic. Evacuate.” Then, raising his voice, he yelled, “Attention, people! Everybody out! This is not a drill! Someone has planted a bomb in this office! Repeat, this is not a drill!”
~~~
The park was full of birds. Since the rain stopped, doves and cardinals ruffled through the lawns and sidewalks, flitting and fussing and scratching in the dirt.
Leo Banks watched them, wordless, while the birds picked at the earth.
“Man you gotta say... something,” Delahoy said.
“How long?” Banks said.
Delahoy smoothed his mustache. “I dunno.”
“Did you get a second opinion?” Banks asked.
“That was the second opinion,” he answered.
“No,” Banks said.
“No?”
“No. You-you’re thirty-seven.”
“Like that matters?”
“How can you be so calm about this? It’s your life-”
“-Yeah, it is-”
“-Yeah. So... It’s 2009. We’re at the cutting edge of medicine,” Banks said. Delahoy was shaking his head; Banks went doggedly on. “Yes,” he said. “There are surgeries, treatments. Chemo. Radiation. Acupuncture?”
“No. None of that.”
“Why not?” Banks shouted.
“Because it is my life,” Delahoy shouted back.
Banks leapt from the bench, scattering the birds into flight. He turned back to Delahoy, who was sitting with his elbows on his knees, looking up at him like he always did, like he thought his partner was just this side of Crazytown.
“How long?” Banks asked again.
Delahoy shrugged.
“You have to know. The doctor must have said-”
“What? You want timeline? I just told you, I don’t know,” Delahoy said again.
“All right then, dead end.” Banks winced. Poor word choice. He sat back down. “What about this Dr. Crumb? What about the other thing she said today at lunch?”
“The kid,” Delahoy said.
“Yeah, the ‘kid,’” Banks snapped. “You seen a test? You asked for proof?”
“What are you, sick?” Delahoy said. “First off, it’s Monica. And second, I’m not gonna do that-”
Banks threw up his hands. “Wh-? Why not?”
“Because,” Delahoy answered. “Because - and I’m asking in all seriousness - what could she possibly gain by lying?”
“Man, think about it,” Banks said. “She’s seen your MRI. She knows you’re - ill, or whatever. She’s out of a job. She coulda pulled your personnel file, seen that you live alone. She could be using you. I’m surprised she hasn’t proposed.”
Delahoy looked sheepish.
“Say you’re kidding me.”
“I ... may have offered,” he said.
“You did? Wh--?”
“She didn’t accept.”
“Eric, what are you thinking?”
Delahoy brought his hands together and stared at his thumbs. “I’m thinking I’m gonna have a half-Asian kid that I’m never gonna see.” A muscle in his jaw twitched. “That’s what I’m thinking.”
Banks got up again. “No,” he said.
“Again, no?”
“No. It’s not happening,” Banks said, walking away. “This isn’t happening. We have a case, a snatch-and-grab in Chelsea. I turned Alvarez’s phone into a duct tape briquette. Those things are real. That’s what’s happening. This? This. It’s not-”
“-Leo-”
Banks raised a hand but didn’t turn back. “I’ll see you back at the precinct,” he said. He continued out of the park, still talking to himself, still gesturing wildly, until he rounded the corner and Delahoy could no longer see him.
“Well,” Delahoy said to no one. “That went well.”
~~~
Walsh and Shraeger stood in front of storage locker number 314.
“Kowalski’s storage locker,” Shraeger said.
“Yep. The number written on Cynthia Patronelli’s hand,” Walsh said. He blew out a breath. To the gangly day clerk, he said, “We’re gonna need rental records for this locker for the last year, going back to a Burt Kowalski.”
“Got it, sure,” the clerk said. She pushed her glasses back on her nose. “This is a programmable lock. We sell them here, and the renter then enters their own security code. Of course, I can cut the lock off for you...”
“Uh, we have the code,” Walsh said.
“Oh?” the clerk asked.
“Yes we do,” Shraeger answered.
Walsh’s face was set in grim lines. He palmed the lock and entered the four-digit code, which had been written on Lupe Carbajal’s index finger: 2153.
A green LED light flickered on the lock as the hasp popped up. He and Shraeger exchanged a look. He pulled a flashlight from his coat pocket.
“Stand back,” he told them as he pulled up the louvered gate.
The storage area had been scrubbed and repainted since their last visit. This time, instead of the charred remains of Kowalski’s hidden records, it was empty save for three brown file folders side by side in the middle of the floor.
Walsh went right in. Shraeger said, “Shouldn’t we wait for forensics-?” but he was already kneeling, reaching for the files. “Guess not.”
She saw that he did have a latex glove in his hand. He hadn’t slowed down to put it on, but he was taking proper precautions.
“These are meant for me,” he said. “The numbers. The objects. These files. It’s a message.”
“What is it? What’s the message?” Shraeger asked. She stepped into the storage area to peer over his shoulders at the files.
He flipped open the first. It contained pictures, data tables, pages of printed notes. He trained the flashlight over the files and swore.
“Hannah Kowalski,” Shraeger said. “That’s-”
“Burt’s wife,” he finished.
Shraeger knelt beside him. “What is all this?” she said, pointing at one of the spreadsheets.
“May 18th, 9:12 a.m., St. John’s chapel, with Mom. May 18th, 10:18 a.m., Simon’s Grocery, alone. May 19th, 4:13 p.m. Leslie’s Hair & Nail - it’s a schedule,” Walsh said. “Look, there’s...” He flipped through the pages. “It goes on for months. See? That’s Saturday: 6:46 p.m., Brenda’s Boutique, with Carmen and Jen.”
“That’s a disturbing level of detail,” Shraeger said. “What about the others?”
Walsh picked up the second file, flipped it open. “Dr. Monica Crumb.”
“That’s the ME,” Shraeger said.
“Was the ME,” Walsh reminded her. “She was replaced by that Zimsky guy.” He turned past the photos of her and went directly to the data. “It’s the same here. Months of detailed surveillance. Dates, times, places she went, people she saw.”
“What’s the connection between her and Ms. Kowalski?”
“She performed Burt’s autopsy. Beyond that...” Walsh shrugged. “Maybe this’ll tell us.” He reached for the third file. Both let out a small breath upon seeing the photo of the woman inside.
“That’s Amy,” Shraeger said. “Walsh, that’s Cole’s fiancée.”
Walsh sat back on his heels. He spread the three files out before them, open to the page containing the photos of the three women. After a long moment of silence, he said, “It’s us.”
“You and me?” Shraeger asked.
“No. Second Squad,” Walsh said. “We’re the connection between them. And they’re his next targets.”
~~~
The first red flag of alarm came when Leo Banks saw the flashing lights of two fire engines parked on the sidewalk of the precinct building. The second flag came when he saw the crowds of people - his co-workers - gathered and milling across the street from the front entrance. The third came when he heard a confirmed 10-79 on a police radio, meaning there was a bomb in the building.
He spotted Alvarez, Beaumont, and Cole flanking the fish perp and jogged up to them.
“Ah, good, Banks,” Alvarez said, clapping him on the shoulder. “You’re accounted for. You got a 10-4-7 on Delahoy?”
“Yeah, we’re on a case,” Banks said. He turned to Cole and Beaumont. “What happened?”
“We don’t know exactly,” Cole said, his eyes wide. “We were questioning Gil here when Alvarez called for the evacuation.”
“There was a bomb,” Alvarez said. “Delivered to my desk-”
Beaumont caught Banks’ eye and gave a barely perceptible shake of her head.
“Oh,” Banks said. “Oh, this is... that’s... bad.”
“Yes, well, Eddie Alvarez cleared the building and called the bomb squad,” Alvarez said. “It could have been worse, believe me. I think I may have triggered the mechanism when I jabbed it with my pencil. We’re very lucky I found it in time.”
“Wow,” Banks said.
“At least it’s stopped raining,” the fish observed.
They all turned to look at him, but surprisingly, no one said a word.
“What?” Trout said. “No fish out of water jokes? Sheesh.”
Moments later, Walsh and Shraeger badged through the cordon and joined them, but before anyone could bring them up to speed, two bomb technicians exited the building. One approached Alvarez; the other cut across the parking lot to talk with Sergeant Brown.
“Well?” Alvarez said. “Is it safe to return? Has the bomb been diffused?”
“It was a cell phone,” the tech said. He passed Alvarez the phone.
“My phone?” Alvarez said.
“Oh it’s your phone, is it?” the tech asked. “And you’re the guy who called this in. Big waste of our time, Detective. We’ll be sure your CO hears about this-”
“Walsh,” Alvarez hissed. “This is your work!” Alvarez turned on Walsh and made a wild-eyed, hook-clawed lunge for him, but Banks, Cole, and Beaumont all jumped in at once, and suddenly they were all shouting until Walsh out-yelled them all.
For several seconds, they stood in a tense, silent circle with Alvarez on one side, Walsh on the other. “We don’t have time for this, Eddie,” Walsh said. “Cole, when was the last time you spoke to Amy?”
Cole blinked. “This afternoon,” he said. “She had an appointment with the caterer at four-”
“-Call her,” Shraeger said. “Tell her to stay put until you can meet her.” Cole peeled away and immediately tried his phone.
Beaumont said, “Jason, what’s going on?”
“The Hand Writing Mugger turned killer this afternoon,” he said. “Now he’s left us a few clues about his next targets.”
“And Amy’s among them?” Beaumont asked.
“Yeah,” Shraeger said. “Along with Hannah Kowalski and Dr. Crumb, the former ME.”
“Jesus,” Beaumont swore.
“We called Ms. Kowalski on the way over,” Walsh was saying. “She’s fine; uniforms are on their way over-”
“-Excuse me,” Banks said. “Did you say Crumb? As in Monica Crumb?”
“Yes, why?” Shraeger said. “We tried to reach her, but...”
Banks wiped his forehead. “This can’t be happening.”
Cole returned. “I can’t reach Amy.” Panic lit his eyes. “I tried her cell, her house phone, even her Mom’s. There’s no answer.”
“It doesn’t mean anything,” Beaumont soothed. “Maybe she’s just busy finalizing the menu-”
“-Okay, team,” Alvarez said, cutting in. “This is what we’re gonna do. Cole, Beaumont, you get to Amy’s last known. Banks, you and Delahoy find and secure Dr. Crumb. Walsh, Shraeger, get to work on finding out what this guy wants with these targets in the first place. We’ll debrief at twenty-hundred.”
After an uncertain pause, Walsh said, “Sure thing, boss.”
“Good. Then... we’ll worry about the phone business at a later time,” Alvarez said. “Trout: you’re with me. Seems we have bigger fish to fry.”
Alvarez collared the fish and headed back into the building, along with the other evacuees.
A moment later, Walsh said, “Well, you heard him.”
“Twenty-hundred,” Beaumont said. And they all broke and headed off as assigned.
~~~
“Eric, it’s Leo. Look, man, about earlier.” Banks adjusted his seatbelt over his Kevlar vest. “Just, call me back. There’s something weird...”
The call waiting tone sounded. Banks thumbed the receiver to answer.
“What?” Delahoy said.
“Dude, where are you?”
“I’m in Spain.”
“Just tell me where you are-”
“-Where you left me ten minutes ago. Where else would I be?”
“Fine. Stay put. I’m on my way.”
~~~
Dusk darkened the stairway of Monica’s building, painting deep pools of shadow in the corners and doorways.
“Creepy building,” Banks observed as they approached her hallway.
Delahoy’s mouth had gone dry, so he nodded, cleared his throat, and continued along the corridor. When they arrived at her door, his stomach lurched.
“It’s been forced,” he said. He drew his gun and nudged the door. The jamb had splintered inward, and one hinge was split.
“Crap,” Banks whispered.
Delahoy gestured with two fingers, indicating to watch the loft as he squeezed through the busted door and swung in to cover the living area and kitchen beyond. Banks trained his gun on the loft as Delahoy went to the ladder, tested it, then climbed up.
Empty. He dropped down and scanned the living room. Table overturned, books scattered, settee shoved against the mantle.
Banks crept along the wall to the kitchen then pushed the bathroom door open. Also empty. “Clear,” he said, letting out a shaky breath.
“Someone was here,” Delahoy said. He peered through foggy window glass at the fire escape. “Someone was here, man-”
“-Call her again,” Banks said.
Delahoy pulled out his phone, dialed. Waited. “No answer,” he muttered. He kneaded his fists in an attempt to keep from flinging dishes across the kitchen. He knew they’d need to leave things as they were, so the team could come in and dust for prints. Oh, but he wanted to do some damage, and everything in Monica’s place looked highly breakable.
“Hey, man, calm down,” Banks said. “Deep breath.”
Delahoy ground his teeth.
“C’mon,” he said. “You need a break? Need to sit down?”
“No I don’t need to sit down,” Delahoy bit out. “All the sudden you’re my Mom?”
Banks opened his mouth to speak. Delahoy waved him off. He said, “Who is this guy? This Hand Writing... Mugger, Killer, whatever? What’s he want?”
“All I know is Walsh says there are three targets: Hannah Kowalski, Crumb, and Cole’s fiancée.”
“So a sick bastard.”
“Basically.”
“Cole’s fiancée, Kowalski’s wife, and Monica.” Delahoy shook his head. “Targets for what, do we know?”
“I’m guessing it’s not tickets to Disney World.”
“Just shut the hell up, all right,” Delahoy snapped.
Banks raised his hands in surrender. Then he said, “Look, we gotta call this in.”
“I know,” he said. “Just, gimme a minute okay. I’m... she’s... she’s not normal people-sized, y’know?”
“No. That’s weird.”
“I’m scared for her. She’s...” he made a gesture with his hands, like, ‘this high’.
“We’ll find her,” Banks said.
Both heard the creak of a floorboard outside. Both trained their guns on the door.
A tiny voice on the other side said, “If someone’s in there, I have pepper spray.”
“What?” Delahoy said. “No.” He swung the door open and Monica, startled, squeaked and dropped her keys to the floor.
“Eric?”
He dragged the door back. “What if someone had been in here?” he shouted.
“There is someone in here.”
“Someone not us!” he yelled. “Leo, tell her.” Banks started to speak; Delahoy steamrolled over him. “You see your door caved in, you get out of the building and you call 9-1-1! You do not come in announcing you have pepper spray. Do you even have pepper spray?”
“No,” she said.
“You don’t answer your phone?”
“I went to my mother’s. Did you do this to my door?” she asked.
“No. What? No.” Then he pulled her into an awkward engulfing hug.
After a few seconds, she mumbled into his chest, “Then who did?”
“We don’t know,” Delahoy said. “But get your stuff, okay? You’re gonna have to come with us. It’s not safe.”
Monica nodded, but he didn’t let go.
“Okay,” he said. He smoothed her hair. “Okay.”
~~~
Cole wrung his hands. Beaumont patted his shoulder. The evening sun lanced through the front windows of Fabiani’s Catering, turning the five-tiered wedding cake in the display case into a fountain of white gold.
“I don’t like this,” he muttered.
“Me neither, Sweetie,” she answered.
Eliza Brown came to the counter. “Hello, Detective Cole,” she beamed. “Amy finalized everything, it all looks fantastic. You ready for your big day?”
“Yes’m,” Cole said. “But I’m afraid I’m here on business. Can you tell me, at what time did Amy leave here this evening?”
Ms. Brown’s face shifted from interest to concern. “Not too long ago,” she said. “Everything all right?”
Cole’s face whitened. When he didn’t answer, Beaumont said, “We have reason to believe she may be in danger, Ms. Brown. Can you recall a specific time when she may have left?”
“Oh dear.” Ms. Brown glanced at the clock. It was 6:20 p.m. She said, “Had to be around 5:30,” she said. “She was our second to last appointment of the day, but we did hang on and talk a while. Such a lamb. But, it was 5:30 at the latest.”
Cole squirmed with worry. “Did she say she might be heading somewhere else after?” he asked. “Another appointment perhaps?”
“Not that she mentioned,” Ms. Brown said. “I’m sorry.”
“Yes ma’am,” Cole said absently.
Beaumont touched his arm. “Thank you, Ms. Brown,” she said. “Here’s my card. Call us if you hear or remember anything.”
Outside, Cole checked his phone again. “He’s got her,” he said. “I just know it, he’s got her.”
“Hey, we don’t know that, okay?”
Cole stared at her and looked for a moment like he was going to say something when his chorus of angels ringtone interrupted him.
“Detective Cole,” he answered. His eyes flashed. “Yes, she is my bride-to-be - Yes - Is she all right? Sure - we’ll be right there.”
He ended the call. “They’ve got her at the one-five,” he told Beaumont. “She’s been mugged.”
~~~
Attention Second Precinct, this is dispatch. Be on the look out for a Peeping Tom dressed as Willy Wonka. If you see him, tell him I’m still waiting for my Golden Ticket.
Walsh said, “Cole and Beaumont found Amy. She’d been mugged by a man wearing a mask-”
“-Our guy?” Shraeger asked.
“Yep. Apparently, he wrote the number 143 across her collarbone.”
“143.” Shraeger sucked air over her teeth. “She all right?”
He nodded. “Traumatized, but...”
“Did he leave an object?”
“Not this time,” he answered. “They’re taking her to Memorial. Cole says they’re sending over the paperwork.”
“Walsh,” she said, pushing the file folder aside. “It could’ve been so much worse.”
He leaned in. “It is worse. We’ve got another victim here and no description on this guy. Only thing we got from graphology is that he’s most likely well-educated and right-handed. We’re still waiting on the sweep of Kowalski’s storage unit, but I’m betting we’ve got a big zero in the way of prints or physical evidence.”
“We have these,” Shraeger said, gesturing to the case files.
Walsh gave her a bland look.
“Look,” she said, re-opening Amy’s folder. “We have detailed information about three very different women. The only thing linking them is their connection to Second Squad, right?”
“Right. So?”
“So...” Shraeger said. “Wouldn’t it be possible to reconstruct his whereabouts based on the information he’s gathered on them? Maybe we can pinpoint certain locations, cross-reference footage from traffic cameras, and check for repeat visitors. It would narrow the search.”
Walsh looked doubtful. He said, “That could take days. This guy’s moving fast. We had four victims in twelve hours...One of them a homicide.”
Shraeger went to the map on the wall. She marked the address of Delancey Produce, where Cynthia Patronelli had been attacked. “Patronelli said she takes the same train to school every day, right?”
“The A Train, 7 a.m.,” Walsh said.
Shraeger drew a circle encompassing Delancey Produce and the train station. “And...” she marked the construction site where Lupe Carbajal worked. “Carbajal mentioned being a regular kind of guy, meaning he... did his business at a certain time every day.”
“Like clockwork,” Walsh said.
“Then we have Ryerson. We know that his body was found on Greenwich and Houston, which is outside of our parameters, but that doesn’t mean he wouldn’t fit the pattern.” Shraeger drew a wider circle around the remaining three locations. “What if our guy didn’t just keep tabs on these three women?” she asked. “What if he watched the other victims as well? People are creatures of habit. He could have picked them for that reason, because they kept the same schedule every day.”
“That would mean he’d have to live close to them to track their patterns so well.”
“And judging by the level of detail in the surveillance he kept on Kowalski, Crumb, and Burch, he’d have to be unemployed, or maybe self-employed. What else would allow him so much time to freely stalk all these people?”
Walsh rocked back in his chair. “He’s got our number, too. Going all the way back to Kowalski. He knows our patterns. Our habits. Maybe someone with a grudge.”
“Maybe a grudge against Kowalski?”
Walsh shrugged.
“So the guy’s close to us.” Shraeger narrowed her eyes. “That just shrinks our search radius,” she said. She inscribed a circle that encompassed Second Precinct, Delancey Produce, and Carbajal’s construction site.
Delahoy and Banks came in at that moment, with a troubled-looking Dr. Crumb between them.
“Someone broke into her apartment,” Banks said. “We called in a team-”
“-Oh! She’s gonna need to be there,” Shraeger said.
Delahoy balked and Dr. Crumb was shaking her head.
“How come?” Banks asked.
“Because the burglar may have left something,” Walsh explained. “A chess piece or figurine.”
“I don’t understand,” Dr. Crumb said.
“You know what, I got this,” Delahoy snapped. “She’ll go back to her place when it’s light out and when she hasn’t been through total hell, all right? Enough for today. We clear?”
Banks and Walsh exchanged a look. Shraeger held up her hands. “Sure. Of course. We’re clear.”
“Sergeant Brown secured rooms for Crumb and Ms. Kowalski at the Belvedere,” Walsh said. He scribbled the information on a scrap of paper. While he wrote, he said, “You all right? You look pretty rough.”
Delahoy plucked the note from the desk. “Yeah, okay,” he said. He looked at Crumb. She looked at him. They left.
To Banks, Shraeger said, “Is he all right, though?”
“Yeeeah-no,” Banks said. “It’s been a helluva day.”
Shraeger re-traced the circle on her map and said, “Tell me about it.”
CONTINUED IN THE NEXT POST
Author: CelesteAvonne
Disclaimer: For Fun and Fun Alone!
Spoilers: References to all 10 episodes of The Unusuals.
Pairing/Characters: All canon pairings, including Shraeger/Davis, Walsh/Beaumont, Delahoy/Crumb, and Banks/Demopolis
Rating: PG13
Word Count: ~10,000 (split between posts)
Summary: The situation intensifies as the Second Squad learns that the Hand Writing Killer is now targeting the people connected to them rather than random strangers.
Listen up, Second Precinct, Christmas is only eight weeks away. Just FYI, I’m interested in Eastern Philosophy, vintage waffle irons, and my sweater size is six petite.
Eddie Alvarez returned to his desk. No one was in the main office now, except for Officer Maynard and Sergeant Brown. He knew Cole and Beaumont were interrogating Mr. Fish. Banks and Delahoy were off on the Chelsea snatch-and-grab case. Walsh and Shraeger were clocking time on the Hand Writing Mugger.
Eddie Alvarez took out his file in his lap drawer. He noted the times and the cases. As he was replacing the folder, he noticed an odd oblong shape behind the frame photo of Nicole.
“What the-?” he began. He poked at it with a pencil, and just as he did, the shape began to vibrate. “It’s a bomb,” he whispered. “All right. Don’t panic. Evacuate.” Then, raising his voice, he yelled, “Attention, people! Everybody out! This is not a drill! Someone has planted a bomb in this office! Repeat, this is not a drill!”
~~~
The park was full of birds. Since the rain stopped, doves and cardinals ruffled through the lawns and sidewalks, flitting and fussing and scratching in the dirt.
Leo Banks watched them, wordless, while the birds picked at the earth.
“Man you gotta say... something,” Delahoy said.
“How long?” Banks said.
Delahoy smoothed his mustache. “I dunno.”
“Did you get a second opinion?” Banks asked.
“That was the second opinion,” he answered.
“No,” Banks said.
“No?”
“No. You-you’re thirty-seven.”
“Like that matters?”
“How can you be so calm about this? It’s your life-”
“-Yeah, it is-”
“-Yeah. So... It’s 2009. We’re at the cutting edge of medicine,” Banks said. Delahoy was shaking his head; Banks went doggedly on. “Yes,” he said. “There are surgeries, treatments. Chemo. Radiation. Acupuncture?”
“No. None of that.”
“Why not?” Banks shouted.
“Because it is my life,” Delahoy shouted back.
Banks leapt from the bench, scattering the birds into flight. He turned back to Delahoy, who was sitting with his elbows on his knees, looking up at him like he always did, like he thought his partner was just this side of Crazytown.
“How long?” Banks asked again.
Delahoy shrugged.
“You have to know. The doctor must have said-”
“What? You want timeline? I just told you, I don’t know,” Delahoy said again.
“All right then, dead end.” Banks winced. Poor word choice. He sat back down. “What about this Dr. Crumb? What about the other thing she said today at lunch?”
“The kid,” Delahoy said.
“Yeah, the ‘kid,’” Banks snapped. “You seen a test? You asked for proof?”
“What are you, sick?” Delahoy said. “First off, it’s Monica. And second, I’m not gonna do that-”
Banks threw up his hands. “Wh-? Why not?”
“Because,” Delahoy answered. “Because - and I’m asking in all seriousness - what could she possibly gain by lying?”
“Man, think about it,” Banks said. “She’s seen your MRI. She knows you’re - ill, or whatever. She’s out of a job. She coulda pulled your personnel file, seen that you live alone. She could be using you. I’m surprised she hasn’t proposed.”
Delahoy looked sheepish.
“Say you’re kidding me.”
“I ... may have offered,” he said.
“You did? Wh--?”
“She didn’t accept.”
“Eric, what are you thinking?”
Delahoy brought his hands together and stared at his thumbs. “I’m thinking I’m gonna have a half-Asian kid that I’m never gonna see.” A muscle in his jaw twitched. “That’s what I’m thinking.”
Banks got up again. “No,” he said.
“Again, no?”
“No. It’s not happening,” Banks said, walking away. “This isn’t happening. We have a case, a snatch-and-grab in Chelsea. I turned Alvarez’s phone into a duct tape briquette. Those things are real. That’s what’s happening. This? This. It’s not-”
“-Leo-”
Banks raised a hand but didn’t turn back. “I’ll see you back at the precinct,” he said. He continued out of the park, still talking to himself, still gesturing wildly, until he rounded the corner and Delahoy could no longer see him.
“Well,” Delahoy said to no one. “That went well.”
~~~
Walsh and Shraeger stood in front of storage locker number 314.
“Kowalski’s storage locker,” Shraeger said.
“Yep. The number written on Cynthia Patronelli’s hand,” Walsh said. He blew out a breath. To the gangly day clerk, he said, “We’re gonna need rental records for this locker for the last year, going back to a Burt Kowalski.”
“Got it, sure,” the clerk said. She pushed her glasses back on her nose. “This is a programmable lock. We sell them here, and the renter then enters their own security code. Of course, I can cut the lock off for you...”
“Uh, we have the code,” Walsh said.
“Oh?” the clerk asked.
“Yes we do,” Shraeger answered.
Walsh’s face was set in grim lines. He palmed the lock and entered the four-digit code, which had been written on Lupe Carbajal’s index finger: 2153.
A green LED light flickered on the lock as the hasp popped up. He and Shraeger exchanged a look. He pulled a flashlight from his coat pocket.
“Stand back,” he told them as he pulled up the louvered gate.
The storage area had been scrubbed and repainted since their last visit. This time, instead of the charred remains of Kowalski’s hidden records, it was empty save for three brown file folders side by side in the middle of the floor.
Walsh went right in. Shraeger said, “Shouldn’t we wait for forensics-?” but he was already kneeling, reaching for the files. “Guess not.”
She saw that he did have a latex glove in his hand. He hadn’t slowed down to put it on, but he was taking proper precautions.
“These are meant for me,” he said. “The numbers. The objects. These files. It’s a message.”
“What is it? What’s the message?” Shraeger asked. She stepped into the storage area to peer over his shoulders at the files.
He flipped open the first. It contained pictures, data tables, pages of printed notes. He trained the flashlight over the files and swore.
“Hannah Kowalski,” Shraeger said. “That’s-”
“Burt’s wife,” he finished.
Shraeger knelt beside him. “What is all this?” she said, pointing at one of the spreadsheets.
“May 18th, 9:12 a.m., St. John’s chapel, with Mom. May 18th, 10:18 a.m., Simon’s Grocery, alone. May 19th, 4:13 p.m. Leslie’s Hair & Nail - it’s a schedule,” Walsh said. “Look, there’s...” He flipped through the pages. “It goes on for months. See? That’s Saturday: 6:46 p.m., Brenda’s Boutique, with Carmen and Jen.”
“That’s a disturbing level of detail,” Shraeger said. “What about the others?”
Walsh picked up the second file, flipped it open. “Dr. Monica Crumb.”
“That’s the ME,” Shraeger said.
“Was the ME,” Walsh reminded her. “She was replaced by that Zimsky guy.” He turned past the photos of her and went directly to the data. “It’s the same here. Months of detailed surveillance. Dates, times, places she went, people she saw.”
“What’s the connection between her and Ms. Kowalski?”
“She performed Burt’s autopsy. Beyond that...” Walsh shrugged. “Maybe this’ll tell us.” He reached for the third file. Both let out a small breath upon seeing the photo of the woman inside.
“That’s Amy,” Shraeger said. “Walsh, that’s Cole’s fiancée.”
Walsh sat back on his heels. He spread the three files out before them, open to the page containing the photos of the three women. After a long moment of silence, he said, “It’s us.”
“You and me?” Shraeger asked.
“No. Second Squad,” Walsh said. “We’re the connection between them. And they’re his next targets.”
~~~
The first red flag of alarm came when Leo Banks saw the flashing lights of two fire engines parked on the sidewalk of the precinct building. The second flag came when he saw the crowds of people - his co-workers - gathered and milling across the street from the front entrance. The third came when he heard a confirmed 10-79 on a police radio, meaning there was a bomb in the building.
He spotted Alvarez, Beaumont, and Cole flanking the fish perp and jogged up to them.
“Ah, good, Banks,” Alvarez said, clapping him on the shoulder. “You’re accounted for. You got a 10-4-7 on Delahoy?”
“Yeah, we’re on a case,” Banks said. He turned to Cole and Beaumont. “What happened?”
“We don’t know exactly,” Cole said, his eyes wide. “We were questioning Gil here when Alvarez called for the evacuation.”
“There was a bomb,” Alvarez said. “Delivered to my desk-”
Beaumont caught Banks’ eye and gave a barely perceptible shake of her head.
“Oh,” Banks said. “Oh, this is... that’s... bad.”
“Yes, well, Eddie Alvarez cleared the building and called the bomb squad,” Alvarez said. “It could have been worse, believe me. I think I may have triggered the mechanism when I jabbed it with my pencil. We’re very lucky I found it in time.”
“Wow,” Banks said.
“At least it’s stopped raining,” the fish observed.
They all turned to look at him, but surprisingly, no one said a word.
“What?” Trout said. “No fish out of water jokes? Sheesh.”
Moments later, Walsh and Shraeger badged through the cordon and joined them, but before anyone could bring them up to speed, two bomb technicians exited the building. One approached Alvarez; the other cut across the parking lot to talk with Sergeant Brown.
“Well?” Alvarez said. “Is it safe to return? Has the bomb been diffused?”
“It was a cell phone,” the tech said. He passed Alvarez the phone.
“My phone?” Alvarez said.
“Oh it’s your phone, is it?” the tech asked. “And you’re the guy who called this in. Big waste of our time, Detective. We’ll be sure your CO hears about this-”
“Walsh,” Alvarez hissed. “This is your work!” Alvarez turned on Walsh and made a wild-eyed, hook-clawed lunge for him, but Banks, Cole, and Beaumont all jumped in at once, and suddenly they were all shouting until Walsh out-yelled them all.
For several seconds, they stood in a tense, silent circle with Alvarez on one side, Walsh on the other. “We don’t have time for this, Eddie,” Walsh said. “Cole, when was the last time you spoke to Amy?”
Cole blinked. “This afternoon,” he said. “She had an appointment with the caterer at four-”
“-Call her,” Shraeger said. “Tell her to stay put until you can meet her.” Cole peeled away and immediately tried his phone.
Beaumont said, “Jason, what’s going on?”
“The Hand Writing Mugger turned killer this afternoon,” he said. “Now he’s left us a few clues about his next targets.”
“And Amy’s among them?” Beaumont asked.
“Yeah,” Shraeger said. “Along with Hannah Kowalski and Dr. Crumb, the former ME.”
“Jesus,” Beaumont swore.
“We called Ms. Kowalski on the way over,” Walsh was saying. “She’s fine; uniforms are on their way over-”
“-Excuse me,” Banks said. “Did you say Crumb? As in Monica Crumb?”
“Yes, why?” Shraeger said. “We tried to reach her, but...”
Banks wiped his forehead. “This can’t be happening.”
Cole returned. “I can’t reach Amy.” Panic lit his eyes. “I tried her cell, her house phone, even her Mom’s. There’s no answer.”
“It doesn’t mean anything,” Beaumont soothed. “Maybe she’s just busy finalizing the menu-”
“-Okay, team,” Alvarez said, cutting in. “This is what we’re gonna do. Cole, Beaumont, you get to Amy’s last known. Banks, you and Delahoy find and secure Dr. Crumb. Walsh, Shraeger, get to work on finding out what this guy wants with these targets in the first place. We’ll debrief at twenty-hundred.”
After an uncertain pause, Walsh said, “Sure thing, boss.”
“Good. Then... we’ll worry about the phone business at a later time,” Alvarez said. “Trout: you’re with me. Seems we have bigger fish to fry.”
Alvarez collared the fish and headed back into the building, along with the other evacuees.
A moment later, Walsh said, “Well, you heard him.”
“Twenty-hundred,” Beaumont said. And they all broke and headed off as assigned.
~~~
“Eric, it’s Leo. Look, man, about earlier.” Banks adjusted his seatbelt over his Kevlar vest. “Just, call me back. There’s something weird...”
The call waiting tone sounded. Banks thumbed the receiver to answer.
“What?” Delahoy said.
“Dude, where are you?”
“I’m in Spain.”
“Just tell me where you are-”
“-Where you left me ten minutes ago. Where else would I be?”
“Fine. Stay put. I’m on my way.”
~~~
Dusk darkened the stairway of Monica’s building, painting deep pools of shadow in the corners and doorways.
“Creepy building,” Banks observed as they approached her hallway.
Delahoy’s mouth had gone dry, so he nodded, cleared his throat, and continued along the corridor. When they arrived at her door, his stomach lurched.
“It’s been forced,” he said. He drew his gun and nudged the door. The jamb had splintered inward, and one hinge was split.
“Crap,” Banks whispered.
Delahoy gestured with two fingers, indicating to watch the loft as he squeezed through the busted door and swung in to cover the living area and kitchen beyond. Banks trained his gun on the loft as Delahoy went to the ladder, tested it, then climbed up.
Empty. He dropped down and scanned the living room. Table overturned, books scattered, settee shoved against the mantle.
Banks crept along the wall to the kitchen then pushed the bathroom door open. Also empty. “Clear,” he said, letting out a shaky breath.
“Someone was here,” Delahoy said. He peered through foggy window glass at the fire escape. “Someone was here, man-”
“-Call her again,” Banks said.
Delahoy pulled out his phone, dialed. Waited. “No answer,” he muttered. He kneaded his fists in an attempt to keep from flinging dishes across the kitchen. He knew they’d need to leave things as they were, so the team could come in and dust for prints. Oh, but he wanted to do some damage, and everything in Monica’s place looked highly breakable.
“Hey, man, calm down,” Banks said. “Deep breath.”
Delahoy ground his teeth.
“C’mon,” he said. “You need a break? Need to sit down?”
“No I don’t need to sit down,” Delahoy bit out. “All the sudden you’re my Mom?”
Banks opened his mouth to speak. Delahoy waved him off. He said, “Who is this guy? This Hand Writing... Mugger, Killer, whatever? What’s he want?”
“All I know is Walsh says there are three targets: Hannah Kowalski, Crumb, and Cole’s fiancée.”
“So a sick bastard.”
“Basically.”
“Cole’s fiancée, Kowalski’s wife, and Monica.” Delahoy shook his head. “Targets for what, do we know?”
“I’m guessing it’s not tickets to Disney World.”
“Just shut the hell up, all right,” Delahoy snapped.
Banks raised his hands in surrender. Then he said, “Look, we gotta call this in.”
“I know,” he said. “Just, gimme a minute okay. I’m... she’s... she’s not normal people-sized, y’know?”
“No. That’s weird.”
“I’m scared for her. She’s...” he made a gesture with his hands, like, ‘this high’.
“We’ll find her,” Banks said.
Both heard the creak of a floorboard outside. Both trained their guns on the door.
A tiny voice on the other side said, “If someone’s in there, I have pepper spray.”
“What?” Delahoy said. “No.” He swung the door open and Monica, startled, squeaked and dropped her keys to the floor.
“Eric?”
He dragged the door back. “What if someone had been in here?” he shouted.
“There is someone in here.”
“Someone not us!” he yelled. “Leo, tell her.” Banks started to speak; Delahoy steamrolled over him. “You see your door caved in, you get out of the building and you call 9-1-1! You do not come in announcing you have pepper spray. Do you even have pepper spray?”
“No,” she said.
“You don’t answer your phone?”
“I went to my mother’s. Did you do this to my door?” she asked.
“No. What? No.” Then he pulled her into an awkward engulfing hug.
After a few seconds, she mumbled into his chest, “Then who did?”
“We don’t know,” Delahoy said. “But get your stuff, okay? You’re gonna have to come with us. It’s not safe.”
Monica nodded, but he didn’t let go.
“Okay,” he said. He smoothed her hair. “Okay.”
~~~
Cole wrung his hands. Beaumont patted his shoulder. The evening sun lanced through the front windows of Fabiani’s Catering, turning the five-tiered wedding cake in the display case into a fountain of white gold.
“I don’t like this,” he muttered.
“Me neither, Sweetie,” she answered.
Eliza Brown came to the counter. “Hello, Detective Cole,” she beamed. “Amy finalized everything, it all looks fantastic. You ready for your big day?”
“Yes’m,” Cole said. “But I’m afraid I’m here on business. Can you tell me, at what time did Amy leave here this evening?”
Ms. Brown’s face shifted from interest to concern. “Not too long ago,” she said. “Everything all right?”
Cole’s face whitened. When he didn’t answer, Beaumont said, “We have reason to believe she may be in danger, Ms. Brown. Can you recall a specific time when she may have left?”
“Oh dear.” Ms. Brown glanced at the clock. It was 6:20 p.m. She said, “Had to be around 5:30,” she said. “She was our second to last appointment of the day, but we did hang on and talk a while. Such a lamb. But, it was 5:30 at the latest.”
Cole squirmed with worry. “Did she say she might be heading somewhere else after?” he asked. “Another appointment perhaps?”
“Not that she mentioned,” Ms. Brown said. “I’m sorry.”
“Yes ma’am,” Cole said absently.
Beaumont touched his arm. “Thank you, Ms. Brown,” she said. “Here’s my card. Call us if you hear or remember anything.”
Outside, Cole checked his phone again. “He’s got her,” he said. “I just know it, he’s got her.”
“Hey, we don’t know that, okay?”
Cole stared at her and looked for a moment like he was going to say something when his chorus of angels ringtone interrupted him.
“Detective Cole,” he answered. His eyes flashed. “Yes, she is my bride-to-be - Yes - Is she all right? Sure - we’ll be right there.”
He ended the call. “They’ve got her at the one-five,” he told Beaumont. “She’s been mugged.”
~~~
Attention Second Precinct, this is dispatch. Be on the look out for a Peeping Tom dressed as Willy Wonka. If you see him, tell him I’m still waiting for my Golden Ticket.
Walsh said, “Cole and Beaumont found Amy. She’d been mugged by a man wearing a mask-”
“-Our guy?” Shraeger asked.
“Yep. Apparently, he wrote the number 143 across her collarbone.”
“143.” Shraeger sucked air over her teeth. “She all right?”
He nodded. “Traumatized, but...”
“Did he leave an object?”
“Not this time,” he answered. “They’re taking her to Memorial. Cole says they’re sending over the paperwork.”
“Walsh,” she said, pushing the file folder aside. “It could’ve been so much worse.”
He leaned in. “It is worse. We’ve got another victim here and no description on this guy. Only thing we got from graphology is that he’s most likely well-educated and right-handed. We’re still waiting on the sweep of Kowalski’s storage unit, but I’m betting we’ve got a big zero in the way of prints or physical evidence.”
“We have these,” Shraeger said, gesturing to the case files.
Walsh gave her a bland look.
“Look,” she said, re-opening Amy’s folder. “We have detailed information about three very different women. The only thing linking them is their connection to Second Squad, right?”
“Right. So?”
“So...” Shraeger said. “Wouldn’t it be possible to reconstruct his whereabouts based on the information he’s gathered on them? Maybe we can pinpoint certain locations, cross-reference footage from traffic cameras, and check for repeat visitors. It would narrow the search.”
Walsh looked doubtful. He said, “That could take days. This guy’s moving fast. We had four victims in twelve hours...One of them a homicide.”
Shraeger went to the map on the wall. She marked the address of Delancey Produce, where Cynthia Patronelli had been attacked. “Patronelli said she takes the same train to school every day, right?”
“The A Train, 7 a.m.,” Walsh said.
Shraeger drew a circle encompassing Delancey Produce and the train station. “And...” she marked the construction site where Lupe Carbajal worked. “Carbajal mentioned being a regular kind of guy, meaning he... did his business at a certain time every day.”
“Like clockwork,” Walsh said.
“Then we have Ryerson. We know that his body was found on Greenwich and Houston, which is outside of our parameters, but that doesn’t mean he wouldn’t fit the pattern.” Shraeger drew a wider circle around the remaining three locations. “What if our guy didn’t just keep tabs on these three women?” she asked. “What if he watched the other victims as well? People are creatures of habit. He could have picked them for that reason, because they kept the same schedule every day.”
“That would mean he’d have to live close to them to track their patterns so well.”
“And judging by the level of detail in the surveillance he kept on Kowalski, Crumb, and Burch, he’d have to be unemployed, or maybe self-employed. What else would allow him so much time to freely stalk all these people?”
Walsh rocked back in his chair. “He’s got our number, too. Going all the way back to Kowalski. He knows our patterns. Our habits. Maybe someone with a grudge.”
“Maybe a grudge against Kowalski?”
Walsh shrugged.
“So the guy’s close to us.” Shraeger narrowed her eyes. “That just shrinks our search radius,” she said. She inscribed a circle that encompassed Second Precinct, Delancey Produce, and Carbajal’s construction site.
Delahoy and Banks came in at that moment, with a troubled-looking Dr. Crumb between them.
“Someone broke into her apartment,” Banks said. “We called in a team-”
“-Oh! She’s gonna need to be there,” Shraeger said.
Delahoy balked and Dr. Crumb was shaking her head.
“How come?” Banks asked.
“Because the burglar may have left something,” Walsh explained. “A chess piece or figurine.”
“I don’t understand,” Dr. Crumb said.
“You know what, I got this,” Delahoy snapped. “She’ll go back to her place when it’s light out and when she hasn’t been through total hell, all right? Enough for today. We clear?”
Banks and Walsh exchanged a look. Shraeger held up her hands. “Sure. Of course. We’re clear.”
“Sergeant Brown secured rooms for Crumb and Ms. Kowalski at the Belvedere,” Walsh said. He scribbled the information on a scrap of paper. While he wrote, he said, “You all right? You look pretty rough.”
Delahoy plucked the note from the desk. “Yeah, okay,” he said. He looked at Crumb. She looked at him. They left.
To Banks, Shraeger said, “Is he all right, though?”
“Yeeeah-no,” Banks said. “It’s been a helluva day.”
Shraeger re-traced the circle on her map and said, “Tell me about it.”
CONTINUED IN THE NEXT POST