Page 20 of Bulletproof Jack: Hunting Lee Child's Jack Reacher

“Possibly. The victim entered the building about thirty minutes before I found him.”

“How’d he get inside? Don’t you have a doorman? Was he sleeping or something?”

“All good questions,” she grimaced, swigged the last of the coffee, and tossed the empty cup into a trash barrel on the way past. “Wish I could offer equally good answers.”

Russell led the way up the stairs to the front door and pressed the call button for Dr. Samuel’s suite of rooms. A video cam, correctly positioned, offered someone inside a clear view of the entrance. The door lock was released with a buzz.

Russell opened the door and Kim walked through, pulling her bags across the threshold.

“The doorman was away from the desk. He’s a temp. Our regular guy has been out sick for a couple of weeks. I don’t know the temporary guy,” Kim said, answering Russell’s questions while waiting for another elevator.

“Maybe he needed a bathroom break or something,” Russell replied.

The elevator arrived. He stepped inside and held the door with his arm while she pulled her bags into the car.

“Possibly.” Kim lifted her gaze to the elevator buttons. Samuel’s offices were on the fourth floor.

“You think there’s a nefarious explanation?”

The elevator door closed slowly, and the old elevator began its creaky ascent.

Kim shrugged. “Mr. X entered using a key card. He kept his face hidden. The cameras didn’t get a single clear view of him. Not even after he fell against my front door.”

She waited for Russell’s analysis, which she expected would confirm hers.

“So not a hapless visitor wandering the hallways looking for the home of a friend or colleague,” Russell said slowly. “Not a crime of opportunity, either. He was prepared. He had advance recon on your building and where you lived, how to gain access, and how to avoid discovery once he was inside.”

“That’s how it looks,” she said as the elevator bounced to a stop at the fourth floor and the doors opened wide.

She pulled her bags toward the entrance to Samuel’s office.

“What about the shooter? Did you locate him on the video footage?” Russell asked.

Kim stopped at Samuel’s door and turned to face him. “I went back two weeks. Couldn’t find where the shooter entered my building. He was able to avoid the cameras in my hallway last night, too. Not even a partial view of him before, during, or after the shooting.”

Russell cocked his head, pressed the bell, and waited. “So you’re thinking the shooter and the victim are both pros. They know what they’re doing. They both successfully, but separately, breached your state-of-the-art security, for reasons unknown. One died. The killer escaped.”

“Seems like the only reasonable explanation at the moment,” Kim replied just before Dr. Samuel opened his office door wearing a clean lab coat and paper booties over his shoes.

“Good morning. Follow me, please,” he said, leading the way to the morgue.

Samuel pressed a pass card hanging from a lanyard around his neck, followed by his left palm, to a biometric reader. The frosted glass door lock released with a loud click.

“You can leave your bags there,” he said, pointing to a nearby corner where spare personal protective equipment hung on hooks. “You’ll want to slip those lab coats and booties on, to save your clothes and reduce trace in the mortuary. Grab gloves as well.”

They did as he suggested. The lab coat supplied to Kim was way too big. It covered her from shoulder to ankle. The one Russell donned barely closed in front and hung just above his knees.

“This way,” Samuel said, pushing through another set of double frosted glass doors using the same security measures.

They approached a man’s body covered to his shoulders by a green paper drape lying prone on a stainless steel table. Dr. Samuel had cleaned the blood from his head, which made him look slightly better than when Kim had found him dead in her doorway.

Seeing him with his head wounds again was startling. She’d almost expected to see the altered images she’d created on her laptop last night.

Human faces are fairly symmetrical. Specialized software could copy the intact side of the face and duplicate it to match on the injured side. Then the software automatically manipulated the images to create a full-face image of her would-be visitor.

The software Kim used wasn’t as sophisticated as forensic facial reconstruction systems used by pathology labs. But it served her quick needs well enough.

The computer-generated image could then be run through specialized facial recognition software. The database would rapidly shoot through driver’s licenses, passports, mug shots, social media sites, and more to find a match that would identify the corpse.

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