At which point Detective second-class Peter Antonini, attached to Major Cases, did indeed fall silent as Sachs called Sellitto in the command van and told him about the successful takedown. He would in turn relay the news to the brass at One Police Plaza.
You were dead…
Rhyme’s phony death and the obituary had been a last-ditch effort to solve a series of crimes that cut to the heart of the NYPD, though crimes that might have gone unnoticed if not for an offhand observation made by Ron Pulaski a week before.
The young officer was in the lab helping Sellitto and Rhyme on a murder investigation in Lower Manhattan when a supervisor called with the news that the suspect had shot himself. Rhyme found the death troubling; he wanted closure in his cases, sure, but resolution by suicide was inelegant. It didn’t allow for complete explanations, and Lincoln Rhyme detested unanswered questions.
It was just then that Pulaski had frowned and said, “Another one?”
“Whatta you mean?” Sellitto had barked.
“One of our suspects dying before he gets collared. That’s happened before. Those two others, remember, sir?”
“No, I don’t.”
“Tell us, Pulaski,” Rhyme had encouraged him.
“About two months ago, that Hidalgo woman, she was killed in a mugging.”
Rhyme remembered. A woman being investigated for attempted murder — beating her young child nearly to death — was found dead, killed during an apparent robbery. The evidence initially suggested Maria Hidalgo was guilty of beating the child, but after her death it was found that she was innocent. Her ex-husband had had some kind of psychotic break and attacked the child. Sadly she’d died before she could be vindicated.
The other case, Pulaski had reminded him, involved an Arab-American who’d gotten into a fight with some non-Muslim men and killed one of them. Rhyme and Sellitto were looking into the politically charged case when the suspect fell in his bathtub and drowned. Rhyme later determined that a Muslim had killed the victim, but under circumstances that suggested manslaughter or even negligent homicide, not murder.
He, too, died before the facts came out.
“Kinda strange,” Sellitto had said, then nodded at Pulaski. “Good thinking, kid.”
Rhyme had said, “Yeah, too strange. Pulaski, do me a favor and check out if there’re any other cases like those — where suspects under investigation got offed or committed suicide.”
A few days later Pulaski came back with the results: There were seven cases in which suspects died while out on bail or before they’d been officially arrested. The means of death were suicide, accident and random muggings.
Sellitto and Rhyme wondered if maybe a rogue cop was taking justice into his own hands — getting details on the progress of cases, deciding the suspects were guilty and executing them himself, avoiding the risk that the suspects might have gotten off at trial.
The detective and Rhyme understood the terrible damage this could cause the department if true — a murderer in their midst using NYPD resources to facilitate his crimes. They talked to Chief of Department McNulty and were given carte blanche to get to the truth.
Amelia Sachs, Pulaski and Sellitto interviewed friends and family of the suspects and witnesses nearby at the time they died. From these accounts it appeared that a middle-aged white man had been seen with many of the suspects just before their deaths. Several witnesses thought the man had displayed a gold shield; he was therefore a detective. The killer clearly knew Rhyme, since three of the victims were apparently murdered while the criminalist was running their cases. He and Sachs came up with a list of white detectives, aged thirty-five to fifty-five, he’d worked with over the past six months.
They surreptitiously checked the detectives’ whereabouts at the times of the killings, eventually clearing all but twelve.
Rhyme opened an official investigation into the most recent case — the fake suicide that Pulaski had commented on. The scene was pretty cold and hadn’t been well preserved — being only a suicide — but Amelia Sachs came up with a few clues that gave some hope of finding the killer. A few clothing fibers that didn’t match anything in the victim’s apartment, tool marks that might have come from jimmying a window and traces of unusual cooking oil. Those weren’t helpful in finding the killer’s identity, but a few things suggested where he might live: traces of loam-rich soil that turned out to be unique to the banks of the Hudson River, some of which contained “white gas,” kerosene used in boats.
So it was possible that the rogue cop lived near the river in Manhattan, the Bronx, Westchester or New Jersey.
This narrowed the list to four detectives: from the Bronx, Diego Sanchez; from New Jersey, Carl Sibiewski; from Westchester, Peter Antonini and Eddie Yu.
But there the case stalled. The evidence wasn’t strong enough to get a warrant to search their houses for the clothing fibers, tools, cooking oil and guns.
They needed to flush him. And Rhyme had an idea how.
The killer would know that Rhyme was investigating the suicide — it was an official case — and would know that the criminalist probably had some evidence. They decided to give him the perfect opportunity to steal it or replace it with something implicating someone else.
So Rhyme arranged his own death and had the chief send out the memo about it to a number of officers, including the four suspects (the others were told of the ploy and they agreed to play along). The memo would mention the memorial service, implying that at that time the lab would be unoccupied.
Sellitto set up a search and surveillance team outside the townhouse and, while Rhyme remained in his bedroom, Sachs and Sellitto played the good mourners and left, giving the perp a chance to break in and show himself.
Which he, oh so courteously, had done, using a screwdriver that appeared to be the same one that had left the marks on windows of prior victims’ residences.
Rhyme now ordered, “Get a warrant. I want all the clothes in his house, cooking oils and soil samples, other tools, too. And any guns. Send ’em to ballistics.”
As he was now led to the door, Peter Antonini pulled away roughly from one officer holding him and spun to face Rhyme and Sachs. “You think the system works. You think justice is served.” His eyes were mad. “But it doesn’t. I’ve been a cop long enough to know how screwed up it all is. You know how many guilty people get off every day? Murderers, child abusers, wife beaters…I’m sick of it!”
Amelia Sachs responded, “And what about those innocent ones you killed? Our system would have worked for them. Yours didn’t.”
“Acceptable losses,” he said coolly. “Sacrifices have to be made.”
Rhyme sighed. He found rants tedious. “It’s time you left, Detective Antonini. Get him downtown.”
The escorts led him off out the door.
“Thom, if you don’t mind, it’s cocktail hour. Well past it, in fact.”
A few moments later, as the aide was fastening a cup of single-malt scotch to Rhyme’s chair, Lon Sellitto walked into the room. He squinted and gazed at Rhyme. “You don’t even look sick. Let alone dead.”
“Funny. Have a drink.”
The chunky detective pursed his lips then said, “You know how many calories’re in whiskey?”
“Less than a donut, I’ll bet.”
Sellitto cocked his head, meaning good point, and took the glass Thom offered. Sachs declined, as did Pulaski.
The rumpled detective sipped scotch. “Chief of Department’s on his way. Wants to thank you. Press officer, too.”
“Oh, great,” Rhyme muttered. “Just what I need. A bunch of sappy-eyed grateful visitors. Hell. I liked being dead better.”