“I’ll come home right now, open it up myself.”
Greg started lecturing, pompously. “Cycle, this is the difference between a responsible property owner and a temporary renter. You need to pay attention! And obey rules, which are clear.” Tom heard Greg, voice slightly fainter, say to someone else, “Eduardo, break in.”
“Understand the rules?” Tom repeated, thinking fast.
“That’s what I said.”
“Like laws about beating up women?”
“Eduardo! Hold up a second, okay?”
The silence on the other end became breathing; Tom saw Rebeca go crimson, and he heard footsteps over the line, as if Greg was walking away from whoever he had been performing for. Sure enough, when the voice came again it was softer.
“What did you say, Cycle?”
“You heard me. Rules? Let’s see what the police do with the rules when they hear about Rebeca.”
Tom Fargo was in an anguish of rage. If Greg busted into the darkroom, he’d see the insects, the breeding pans and equipment, the maps, the prayer mat. It would be over in minutes.
But then Greg said, “How fast can you get here?”
“Oh, I can take a cab. Fifteen minutes.”
Silence. Then Greg said, softly, and with hatred, “Eduardo will spray apartment 506 first. Hurry.”
Tom Fargo took Rebeca by the elbow and went outside and locked up. There was no way to wait for Singh now. On 6th Avenue, a few unmarked gypsy cabs were usually trolling, drivers charging five times the usual fare during the emergency. Bloodsuckers. As a black Chevy pulled to the curb Tom caught sight of Singh’s silvery delivery truck, R.R. SINGH & SONS, TRANSPORT SPECIALISTS, rounding the corner, heading for the shop, which they would find locked.
Rebeca was crying softly, humiliated.
He called Singh from the backseat of the car. No answer. Maybe he could have the boxes delivered to the co-op. He tried again. No answer. He tried five minutes later. Singh’s voice mail was full, a brand new recording said.
Unfortunately, we just got a call that our trucks are being recalled to the spray center, and will probably be there all day tomorrow. Your shipments will not be available for at least another day.
Which meant Tom was stuck here. Unbelievable!
He would have to live with a delay.
Handle this emergency. You can do this, Tom Fargo thought. Just keep your head.
All because of Joe Rush!
SIXTEEN
Eddie took each death even harder than the rest of us, probably because of what had happened to him in Brazil. We slowly took off our surgical masks. The nurses slumped, and one started crying. The dead girl on the bed was a fifteen-year-old high school track star who had been bitten at home in Riverdale, after leaving her bedroom window open. The insect that killed her was probably still free.
Eddie and I had been on shift at Columbia-Presbyterian Hospital for the past seven hours.
“I told you Ray would screw us over,” Eddie grumped.
“He’s a good investigator.”
“He’ll be accessible anytime? Call him on the special number? We haven’t gotten through in days. That assistant of his is as helpful as an automated operator.”
“He gave us our own unit, Dos.”
“As a way of telling us to fuck off,” Eddie said, as we waved off reporters in the waiting room. The vultures were counting up each new death, ratcheting up fear. The whole world was waiting for the next attack. The FBI had no new clues, reporters claimed.
It was an hour before I would finally realize what I’d missed noticing in Brazil.
“Ray’s revenge,” Eddie said as we dressed to leave. “If we’re not at the hospital, he buries us in minutiae.”
I wanted the med work, but five days after we’d arrived in New York, Ray had sidetracked our investigation the rest of the time with public appearances and paperwork: tax forms for staffers; office requisition forms; reimbursement for expenses; signature required if a federal agency employs a minor, our intern Aya.
“You can still put yourself under another group,” Ray had told me when I actually reached him for fifty seconds, days ago.
“That won’t work.”
“Then when you finish at the hospital, the Mayor requested that you do a few more interviews. People listen to you. There have been attacks on Muslims. Calm ’em down.”
“A few interviews? They never stop,” Izabel grouched.
Izabel had been assigned a desk overlooking Broadway, but was rarely there; a ghost disappearing into the city, or keeping up with her police contacts in Brazil. Eddie had recovered swiftly. I was glad to have him back. Aya, pulled back to Washington by her mother, worked for me remotely from a cubicle at the FBI.
“I’m monitoring Customs reports coming in from Brazil, like you asked,” she’d told me. “There’s thousands of them. The agents here treat me like I’m eight years old. The interns are stuck in the basement. The other kids are doing stupid stuff. Getting coffee for agents.”
“Aya, did you ever see a movie where a cop acts dumb on purpose, to get information?”
“What does that have to do with this stupid place?”
“And this behavior works for the cop, right?”
“So?”
“So, if people treat you like a kid, play the kid. If they underestimate you, that’s a tool. Who cares if other interns have dumb jobs. Keep on those Brazilian shipments. You find things that even trained investigators miss.”
Silence. I could almost hear the slow smile spread on her face. Only God knew what she was imagining. Then the imaginary smile was gone as she dove into the next subject.
“That Brazilian policewoman was on the news with you.”
“Izabel is a member of our unit. Use her name.”
“Do you like her? The interns here say she’s hot.”
“I like everyone we work with.”
“Really? You mean Ray Havlicek, too?”
“I like him. He and I just disagree sometimes.”
“Do you like that Brazilian woman better than Mom?”
“We’re not having this discussion. Your mother is engaged to Ray. I think you should accept it.”
“On ABC you held hands with that Brazilian woman.”
“That was during a funeral service for victims. Everyone there held hands. Good-bye, Aya.”
Thirty-one minutes before I realized what clue I’d missed on the island, we were in the back of an NYPD unmarked Chevy, being driven to my next talk. The city was too quiet. Spray trucks were not out anymore as pesticides were used up. National Guard troops protected a mosque. Restaurants were closed and parks empty. Many pet owners were not walking their dogs at dawn or dusk anymore, or they paid professional walkers seven times the usual rate.
“Joe, you’re a doctor,” Ray had soothed. “That’s what you do best. Give the talks. You really think I’d let you run around and mess up real investigators? You don’t know a subpoena from a suture. You sidelined yourself when you demanded your own private unit. You and your damn ego, Joe. Don’t blame me for that.”
“Izabel Santo has a hell of a figure,” Eddie said, as we headed across town on 96th, made a left on West End and a right on 88th. The Riverside Park area housed some of the Mayor’s wealthier supporters. Detective Jamal al-Azawi, our driver/liaison, was a tall, balding man who’d been told to provide any assistance. The NYPD was a good ally, happy to have us there.
“Izabel? Stop it, Eddie. I just went through this with Aya.”