Page 53 of NYPD Red 7: The Murder Sorority

She was right. She’d been a valuable source. We couldn’t give her much, but we had to at least make her feel as if she was the most important wolf in the ravenous pack of reporters. We followed the cop to the side street where Megan was parked.

“We’re in a hurry, Megan,” I said. “So if you’ve got questions, ask them fast.”

“No problem, Detective,” she said. “You’re working two crime scenes a mile apart. You have units on the ground, in the air, and this place is crawling with brass. So my first question is, why the fuck isn’t my phone ringing?”

“Your disappointment is duly noted,” I said. “Right now we’ve got sixty seconds. Make the most of them.”

“Who was cuffed to a casket?”

“I can’t give you a name, but he’s under arrest.”

“Under arrest?Wow, thanks. I guess the handcuffs should’ve been my first clue. How is he connected to the Hellmans?”

I shrugged.

“I’ll take that to mean he is connected,” she said. “How?”

“Right now all we can say is, we’re going to take him in for questioning.”

“Once again, I could have figured that out,” she said. “Do you think he’ll talk?”

“He will if he’s smart.”

“And who’s the guy on the bike who wiped out during the car chase? How is he involved?”

It’s a slippery slope when you cut a private deal with the media. I wanted to say no comment. But we owed Megan. I decided to split the difference.

“He’s a material witness,” I said.

“That’s a crumb, Zach,” she said. “I need meat and potatoes.”

“Jordan! MacDonald!”

Kylie and I turned around. It was Cates.

“Now!” she ordered.

“It’s our boss,” I said to Megan. “We’ve got to go. I’ve got your card. I’ll call you later.”

We didn’t wait for an answer. Wedouble-timedit to Cates. “Geoghan has something,” she said.

We followed her to the BearCat, a hulking armored personnel carrier that had delivered the ESU team to the funeral home. Captain Brian Geoghan was waiting for us. Atforty-somethingyears old, he still looked like the classicchisel-jawed,hard-bodied, invincible marine you see in the recruitment posters. Kylie and I knew Geoghan, and even though he was dressed in full SWAT regalia, we knew that we wouldn’t hear a sound if he came up behind us.

“Kylie, Zach,” he said. “Thanks for theheads-up. You said Winstanley was a tough mother, so we went in heavy. He’s seventy years old, but he’s got a hell of a lot of fight in him. He’s on ice now, and we found this in his back pocket.”

He handed me the weapon Winstanley never got a chance to use on us. I ran my fingers over the smooth leather. Then I hefted it, and I could feel the weight of the lead inside. It was old school—silent, easy to hide, and deadly: a blackjack.

“Zach,” Kylie said, the familiarholy shitlook in her eyes. “Alice isup-closefirearms, Barbara is knives, Carol’s the sniper, Denise was poison, and the last one uses blunt objects. Eldon Winstanley is Emily.”

“Brian,” I said, “this is big. What else?”

“There are three bodies downstairs in the crematorium waiting to go into the oven.”

“Any white males?” Kylie asked.

“Yeah, one. Hold on.” He took out a pad and checked his notes. “They brought him in from the Golden Grove nursing home last night. His name is Martin Sheffield.”

CHAPTER 36