Page 43 of The Midnight Lock (Lincoln Rhyme 14)

“Detective Sachs!”

“Was there aDaily Heraldpage here too?”

She said nothing and began stripping off the overalls.

Ron Pulaski approached. The young officer ran a hand through his short blond hair and absently worried the scar on his forehead. He’d suffered a head injury on the job years ago, and it had been a long slog back to full health.

“Sucks about Lincoln.”

“Yeah. Any luck with locksmithing shops?”

“No. Just that they were all impressed at the perp’s skill.”

Sachs scoffed. “Not helpful.”

“No.”

She glanced up toward the window that would be Noelle’s. “He was drinking her wine. Just like he ate Annabelle Talese’s cookies. Sitting on the couch with his feet up on her coffee table.”

“Drinking?” Pulaski was frowning. “He’s careful about friction ridges. But careless about DNA?”

“Maybe. Maybe not. We’ll have to see.”

“Brother. What’s the guy about?” He thought for a moment. “I think he’s flaunting. Home invasion, sitting there, throwing the intrusion into the victims’ faces.”

“Throwing it in our faces too.” Sachs had run serial perp cases before. Narcissism was a key component to their personalities. They believed they were special; they could play God.

Her eyes slipped to the reporters.

She happened to glance behind the throng and notice a gray Cadillac, one of the newer ones. It was stopped in a traffic lane, which wasn’t odd, since there were other curious drivers slowing or pausing as they or their passengers eyed the police action. Given the dark windows, she wasn’t one hundred percent certain but it appeared that the driver—in shades and a black hat—was videoing or photographing her. While others in the crowd were filming the ambulance, the crime scene van, the police cars and the white-gowned techs, his phone was aimed directly her way. She knew that it was not uncommon for the perp to return to the scene during an investigation. Sometimes this was to glean what the cops were discovering. Other times, it was to bask in their handiwork.

Narcissism …

When he seemed suddenly aware she was observing him, he set the phone down, put the car in gear and sped on. Sachs stepped into the street but caught only the tag’s state—New York—not the number, before it disappeared around the corner.

“Something?” Pulaski asked.

“The gray Caddie. More interested in us than I would’ve liked.”

“You think our perp drives aCadillac?”

“Why not? Locksmithing’s just a hobby, according to Benny Morgenstern. Who knows what he does for a living? You find anything here?”

Pulaski said, “We’ve talked to a couple dozen neighbors, businesspeople, deliverymen. Nobody’s seen anything.”

He and a half-dozen officers from local precincts had checked escape routes the Locksmith might have taken. It appeared that he’dbroken a window in the back of the building and dropped into an alley to escape. The fact that he hadn’t used either the front entrance or the service door meant he’d left just minutes earlier—the police presence would have surprised him.

“Security cameras?”

“None that’re working.”

Half the cams one sees in stores and on the street are fake or not hooked up. Recording security video is a time-consuming and complicated job. And cameras and boxes can be expensive.

“What we talked about before,” she whispered. “You okay helping?”

“Absolutely, Amelia.”

“Fourth floor. East stairwell.” Sachs nodded at Noelle’s. “Then the Bechtel Building. Front lobby.”

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