Page 68 of NYPD Red 7: The Murder Sorority

“Elmhurst Hospital!” I said, tapping the screen just below the two markers where Barbara got the summonses.

“Great minds...” Kylie said. “I’ll get the car keys.”

“I’ll call the local squad and find out who’s in charge of hospital security,” Koprowski said.

It was an easytwenty-minuteride over the Ed Koch Bridge into Queens. We were halfway there when Kylie sandbagged me.

“What’s going on with you?” she said.

“Me?” I said. “Nothing.”

“Zach, you totally spaced out when I was explaining how the lab came up with a partial plate number on Barbara’s car. And don’t expect me to believe that crap about your brain being caught up with all the details about Alice. What’s really going on?”

There was no way I was going to tell Kylie about my relationship with Theo’s mother. Not yet. Maybe not ever. “All right. You want to know the truth?” I said, my mind racing to come up with a better lie. “Cheryl and I had a fight last night.”

“About what?”

“Our living arrangements,” I said, grabbing a totally plausible explanation out of thin air. “I think she should give up her apartment and move in with me permanently. She’s dragging her heels.”

Kylie laughed. “Jordan, you are such a bad liar. If that were really what was bothering you, you’d have dumped it on me as soon as we got in the car. If you don’t want to tell me what’s going on, fine. But don’t expect me to believe your—”

My cell rang. It was Koprowski. I put him on speaker.

“I talked to a friend of mine at theOne-Ten,” he said. “The head of security at Elmhurst Hospital is Clayton Rayborn. Do you know him?”

We both responded with a quick no.

“Deputy Inspector Rayborn was the CO at theOne-Ten,” Koprowski said. “He retired two years ago and stepped into the top spot at Elmhurst. I called him, told him what’s going on, and he’s expecting you.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“One more thing,” Koprowski said. “Rayborn waswell-liked. The word is, he doesn’t act like a boss, and when the shit hits the fan, he doesn’t hesitate to jump in the trenches with the troops.”

“Good to know,” Kylie said. “Because if it turns out that the man who murdered Curtis Hellman works at Elmhurst Hospital, DI Rayborn is going to need a very big shovel.”

CHAPTER 46

Clayton Raybornwas waiting for us in his office. As soon as we entered, he stood up and came around his desk. He was in hismid-fifties, aboutsix-two, solidly built, wearing a tan suit, white shirt, and gray tie that worked well against his chestnut skin.

“Inspector,” I said.

“Thank you for that,” he said, “but civilians don’t have rank. Call me Clay.”

He shook our hands and closed his office door. “The fewer people that know about this, the better.”

He might be a civilian, but he thought like a cop.

“Detective Koprowski filled me in,” he said. “Wesley Varga, former medic, wanted killer, and based on his parking violations, it’s possible he works here at Elmhurst.”

We sat down, and he swiveled his computer screen so Kylie and I could see it.

“He’s not in our database,” Rayborn said. “I went through the names of past and present employees going back five years. I came up with sixteen people named Vargas with anS. Nine of them male, none of them Wesley, and no one in the system named Varga. But he could still be here under a different name. Do you have his

picture?”

Kylie handed him a copy of Varga’s driver’s license. “His code name is Barbara.”

“Jeez,” Rayborn said. “Barbara’s a little long in the tooth, isn’t he? But then again, so are most of my favorite rock bands.”