“The guy must have moved like lightning. I came out of the conference room and everybody was scrambling.”
Mercer was out of breath, having chased the sociopathic rapist who had somehow gotten himself past security and up to the corridor where Gerardo Dominguez’s case was being heard.
“Tanner’s wanted for a handful of violent crimes and escape from his psych facility. Now he slips into the courthouse,” I said, “to the very room where a cop who stopped him on the street and let him go has his own encounter with the law?”
“Not just with the law, Alex. With you, in particular. That’s why this isn’t any kind of coincidence,” Mercer said. “And now there’s not a sign of Tanner anywhere.”
“Did anyone think to horse-collar David Drusin? He may have set the whole thing up. Or try dragging Gerry Dominguez over to Internal Affairs?” I was shaking, and both Mercer Wallace and Nan Toth were trying to calm me down.
“Dominguez is facing state time. You don’t really think Drusin is going to let him talk to IAB, do you?” Nan asked. “I’m taking the case. You going to let me in on the guy’s recipes, or am I flying blind?”
“That would be a recipe for disaster, Nan. And I know you’re trying to lighten me up, but this case is not for you.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. It’s mine.”
“That was before Raymond Tanner showed up today. It has to go to one of the men in the unit. Tanner adds a very sinister undertone of misogyny here. Both he and Dominguez clearly hate women, and touching these case folders is like bringing on a personal vendetta.”
“Alex is right. I got someone at Special Vic trying to dig up a connection between these two men-serial rapist and cannibal cop,” Mercer said. “Till we find it and can prove it, best you stay out of the mix before you wind up in a microwave, Nan.”
“Give me the folder,” she said. “What if I assign it to Evan?”
“Perfect.”
Evan Kruger was a senior trial lawyer, as smart and even-tempered as they come. He would dive into this case-as he had with many others of the toughest in the bureau-and master the facts and legal issues, steering clear of the baiting that David Drusin had stooped to with me.
“Are you going to be reachable?” Nan asked.
“We’re off to the Waldorf,” Mercer said. “Gonna clear her mind with some old-fashioned murder. Call anytime.”
“You might need to fill Evan in on the facts.”
“It won’t take long to do. All the e-mails Dominguez wrote are in the file, and the grand jury minutes with his wife’s testimony takes it the rest of the way,” I said. “He’s going to get slammed with a bunch of bullshit motions, but the facts hold up.”
“Case of first impression?” Nan asked. “Not quite like the Donner Pass.”
“I was just beginning to research an online encounter. He’ll find my notes. The only case on point is about a decade old, in Germany. A guy who trolled the Web looking for an adolescent willing to be butchered,” I said, stopping to brush my hair at the mirror behind the door-mostly an attempt to see if my arm had stopped trembling. “Miewes is the perp’s name. Cut off his victim’s penis and then fried it. They ate it together before he killed the kid.”
“We don’t need to go there,” Nan said.
“Judge Aikens will actually be looking for some support if he needs to be convinced this isn’t just magical thinking. Drusin wants everyone to believe the eating people part is fantasy. Be sure to tell Evan that the website on which Armin Miewes found his victim is called the Cannibal Café. Check out the menu.”
“She’s stalling, Nan,” Mercer said.
“Damn right. I want to be here when they haul Raymond Tanner back in the courtroom. I can’t believe he got very far.”
“He wasn’t sticking around to get cuffed, girl. That little appearance was well orchestrated. You never saw him coming and you saw only the part of him that he wanted you to see, to scare the daylights out of you,” Mercer said. “Seems to be working fine, that plan.”
“But you agree with me, then? Dominguez is behind this.”
“We’ll sort it out. The last place you need to be is roaming the courthouse when we bring Tanner’s sorry ass in here.”
“Too bad Mike’s not back in town,” Nan said, smiling at me. The senior women in the unit were among my closest friends. They had followed the slow path of my relationship with Mike Chapman for years. “Sounds like you’re in need of a bodyguard. That could take your mind off work.”
“He is back, or did I forget to tell you? Besides, his last babysitting job was a disaster, or don’t you remember?”
Mercer laughed. “Good thing you didn’t go into dentistry, Nan. I think you just hit a nerve.”
I tossed my hairbrush into the bottom drawer of my desk and held up my hands. “I’m cool with it. The man’s a wolverine.”
“Aren’t they part of the weasel family?” Nan asked, poking me in the side.
“If they weren’t, they are now,” I said as I passed by her. “Talk later.”
I opened the door and told Laura that Mercer and I were off to the Waldorf.
“Rose called. She said Battaglia needs to see you. He’s very unhappy that you went to court on Dominguez and set off this firestorm with the fugitive.”
“Tell Rose it’s Evan Kruger’s case. I don’t have time for a dressing-down by Battaglia. Tell her you’ll give me the message when you see me.”
“But I am seeing you, Alex. Don’t cross the district attorney.”
“You thought you saw me, Laura. But it’s just a fantasy.”
“I’ll bring her back to you safe and sound,” Mercer said. “Tell the boss I was ordered to get her out of the courthouse.”
We were downstairs in three minutes and in Mercer’s car, headed uptown to the Waldorf Astoria. By 1:00 P.M., we had parked the car and entered through the rear lobby on Lexington Avenue, now well guarded by uniformed cops and additional private security.
We made our way to the basement of the great hotel, still the headquarters for the investigative team.
One of the Manhattan South detectives, Gary Stryker, saw me coming and cupped his hand over his mouth to shout down the hallway. “Hey, Chapman? Your minder is here.”
Gary high-fived me as I walked past.
“He went out without his leash today, Stryker. I had to bring it along.”
“Mike’s roughing up the video techs something awful, Alex. Better get in there and calm him down.”
“I’m fresh out of calm myself. What’s the problem? Mercer couldn’t even get anyone to tell him what’s the latest when he called.”
I reached the cubicle in which two men from the hotel’s AV system were working with Mike and Rocco Correlli.
“I’ll tell you what the problem is, kid,” Mike said, without even straightening up from his position, leaning over the shoulder of the video operator who was sweating bullets. “There are more gaps in this surveillance system than there were between your front teeth before you got braces, Coop. It’s a joke, this system.”
“How so?” I asked as Mercer crowded into the small room behind me.
“Dr. Azeem narrowed the time frame for us. We actually pulled feed from fifty-two cameras. Decided it would double the work to take off every single floor, because the elevators and stairwells would catch the action going from one to the other. These men have been on this-with teams of six detectives backing up the work-for the last twenty-four hours. Not a thing to show for it. Half of them drew blanks.”
“Blanks?”
“Yeah. Either the cameras themselves weren’t working or the software was so outdated that no images were captured. Not one single frame of any use.”
“Show me what you’re talking about.”
“Bring up Monday afternoon for her,” Mike said, wiping the sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand. “High noon, in fact. Show us the elevator that leads to the fortieth-floor suites.”