“We have a witness?”
“Two. But I doubt if they’re going to cooperate. Get in the car. I’ll fill you in on all the ugly politics on the way over.”
I got in the car.
“The room where the equipment was stored had a keypad lock on it, but the perps knew the key code,” she said as we headed south on Lexington. “Guess what they found inside when they opened the door.”
I shrugged. “Unless it’s Teddy Ryder, I’m not sure I care.”
“A doctor shagging a nurse,” she said.
“Okay, I care.”
“And he’s not just some randy intern. This doc generated over two million for Murray Hill last year.”
I’ve been attached to Red long enough to figure out why Howard wanted us at the scene. “So it’s politics over police work,” I said. “Howard expects us to keep the doctor’s name out of the investigation.”
“As Howard put it, he’s a witness, not a criminal,” she said. Five minutes later, we pulled up to the hospital entrance on East 33rd Street. One of the mayor’s aides escorted us to an office in the admin section, where Howard Sykes was waiting for us with our reluctant witness.
“This is Dr. Richard,” Sykes said.
“Detectives, I seem to be in a spot of bother here, but Howard assures me I can rely on your discretion,” he said in that proper British accent that immediately cloaks the speaker with an aura of erudition and culture.
He was fiftyish, tall, trim, with silvering hair and what the Brits call bearing. Having spent a lot of my time with men of means, I calculated that his worsted wool Armani suit and his Gucci ostrich-skin loafers would run me at least a month’s salary. There was a gold band on the fourth finger of his left hand.
“Yes, sir,” I said. “Tell us what happened.”
“Unbeknownst to me, there is a band of brazen thieves stealing hospital equipment,” he said. “Had I been aware of the crime wave, I would not have been so quick to choose the room where the new spirometry equipment is being housed. I’m rather mortified to admit that I was in there for a late-night dalliance with a member of the nursing staff, whose name I shall not reveal unless I am remanded to do so by the courts.”
“I assure you that won’t happen,” Howard said, speaking on behalf of the entire criminal justice system. “Just tell the detectives what you can.”
“It was shortly after midnight. They opened the door, and I must say, they were as surprised to see the two of us as we were to see the four of them. They were all wearing scrubs, so I assumed they were staff, but then one of them pulled out a gun.”
“Did you see their faces?” Kylie asked.
“Yes, and my first thought was, Now that I can identify them, they’re going to kill me. But upon closer inspection, I could see that they were wearing masks. Not your typical Halloween fare, but skintight Hollywood-quality silicone. Ingenious disguise, actually.”
“And then what?” I asked.
“The one with the gun spoke. He was very calm, very polite — had a bit of a Texas accent, a little like Tommy Lee Jones. He assured us that we wouldn’t be hurt if we complied. Then two of them bound our hands and feet and covered our mouths with duct tape while the other two put the equipment on a gurney and covered it with a sheet. They were in and out in less than two minutes, but it was six in the morning before my companion and I were found.”
Lucky for us, someone found him. If he had managed to get out on his own, we wouldn’t have had a witness. We thanked him, and he left in a hurry.
“Even though they wore masks,” I said to Howard, “we’d like to check the security footage to see what vehicles they used.”
“There is no security footage,” he said. “They wiped the hard drive.”
“These guys are ninjas,” Kylie said. “Do you know if the hospital backs up their video to the cloud?”
“I’m afraid they don’t. From what I understand, an upgrade is scheduled for next fiscal year, but I’m not on the board here. I only stepped in because the mayor and I are personal friends of the doctor and his wife.”
“Do you want to tell us Dr. Richard’s real name?” Kylie asked.
Howard smiled. “No. Like they used to say on Dragnet, the names have been changed to protect the innocent.”
“Is there any chance we could get to interview his companion, this member of the nursing staff?” Kylie said.
“I certainly can’t help you there, Detective,” Howard said. “I don’t even know her name.”
“Based on the doc’s choice of words and his avoidance of pronouns,” Kylie said, “I don’t even know if it’s a her.”
Chapter 28
“So who do you think wound up with the necklace?” Kylie said as soon as she started the car. “Teddy or our phantom buyer?”
It was a simple enough question, but something about the offhand way she asked it set me off.
“Wait a minute,” I said. “Are we back on our primary case now? Because my head is still jammed up with this drop-everything hospital mission you decided was so critical, and I’m having trouble keeping up every time you change gears. It would really help me if you handed out a schedule first thing in the morning to let me know how you plan to orchestrate my day.”
She turned off the engine and swiveled her body around to square off with mine. “You got a problem with me, Zach?”
I hardly ever get in Kylie’s face, and with her husband running wild, this was definitely not the best time to vent. But it was too late. I lost it.
“Yeah. You’re not my boss. You’re my partner. I understand you can’t always say no to city hall, but next time, check in with me before you say ‘I’ll be right there’ and then drag me along like I’m your pack mule.”
“I did try to call you, partner, but you were too busy licking your wounds, so I made a judgment call.”
“What wounds?”
“Oh please. I walked by the diner this morning, and there you were, wearing last night’s rumpled clothes, pouring your heart out to Gerri. I figured you had a major blowup with Cheryl when you got home. And then a half hour later, you walked into the office looking fresh as a daisy. Did you think I wouldn’t pick up on it? You and I went at it pretty heavy back in the day, so I know what you smell like after you shave and shower, I know that’s the backup shirt you keep in your locker, and I know when you’re pissy because your love life is off the tracks. Plus, I’m a detective with New York’s Finest. A little credit, okay?”
“Fine,” I said, doing my best to spin the word so that it sounded more like “Go fuck yourself.”
She slid back behind the wheel and started the car.
“You want to tell me where we’re going?” I said.
“We’re driving to the Bassett brothers’ to see if they recognize Raymond Davis or Teddy Ryder from their mug shots,” she said. “And if we’re really lucky, maybe they can ID the guy who chased Ryder down the stairs. Does that meet with your approval, Detective—”
“Teddy!” I said.
“Teddy what?”
“Teddy has the necklace.”
“Fifty-fifty chance that you’re right, but how come you sound so sure?”
“You just said it. ‘The guy who chased Ryder down the stairs.’ I think if our mystery man had the necklace, he’d have left the building nice and casual so as not to attract any attention. But this guy went tear-assing down the steps. He was after Teddy, and my best guess is that he never caught him, or we’d have gotten a call informing us that our double homicide has been upgraded to a triple.”