Page 22 of The Midnight Lock (Lincoln Rhyme 14)

At one point, when Sachs adjusted her jacket, she inadvertently revealed her pistol; Talese noted the weapon and relaxed a touch.

Sachs produced a pad of paper and a pen. And a digital recorder, which she set on the dashboard. “You okay with this?” Indicating the slim Sony.

“Yes, anything.”

Sachs pushed the button and a cyclops eye glowed red.

“Now you’re absolutely certain no one could have keys?”

“Positive.”

It wasn’t an apartment, but a co-op; she owned the place and was able to put her own locks in, which she’d done about six months ago.

“Who installed them?”

She gave the name of the company.

The recorder sucked up decibels, while Sachs took notes.

Benny Morgenstern had sent the names of the victims in the Village in February and on Ninth Avenue in March. Sachs displayed her phone and asked, “Do you know them?”

“No, never heard of them.”

She leaned toward the likelihood that the invasions were random. But that didn’t mean he had targeted, or was going to target, one particular individual, and the others were misdirecting camo.

“That newspaper he left?”

“It’s garbage. I don’t read theHerald.”

“You know anybody at the paper? Or their TV station?”

“Oh, the WMG channel? That’s crap too. And, no, I don’t.”

“The articles?”

Sachs displayed a photo of the page.

“They don’t mean anything.”

“The word on the paper: ‘reckoning’? It suggests somebody wanted to get even. You think of anybody in your life like that?”

“My God, no.”

“Do you think the intrusion was meant to intimidate you? Have you been a whistleblower? A witness to a crime?”

“No, nothing like that.”

Sachs didn’t know how the Locksmith came to learn of the other women who’d been his victims earlier, but she suggested it was possible Talese had come to his attention through her influencing job. “I’ve seen some of your videos. They’re good. They look professional.”

“Thanks.”

“Any fans who could be stalkers?”

“It’s possible, I guess. I only use my first name but it’s pretty easy to get my last—and an address. All that data-mining stuff.”

“Can you go through comments and pick out the inappropriate ones?”

“Oh, I have the comments turned off. You can only look at my vids. It’s the smartest thing when you’re influencing. I’ve talked to a couple other girls in the business, friends of mine. They leave the comments on. You should see what people post; some of it’s disgusting.”

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