Page 44 of The Midnight Lock (Lincoln Rhyme 14)

“Got it.” The young officer walked off.

Her eyes scanned once more for the gray Cadillac. No sign of it. Sachs stepped to her Torino, from which she retrieved her dark blue sport coat, pulling it on over the black sweater. She also wore black jeans and boots. Then she walked to a nearby blue-and-white and sat down in the backseat.

“How are you doing?” Sachs asked Carrie Noelle.

“Okay, I suppose.” The woman returned Sachs’s phone and thanked her for its use. Her own, which Sachs had retrieved from the aquarium, would be going into evidence on the off chance that the Locksmith had touched it without gloves.

Noelle said, “I have to ask. How’d you get here so fast? My neighbors heard me calling for help and they said you were downstairs in seconds. How on earth did that happen?”

23

Lincoln Rhyme.

That was the answer to Carrie Noelle’s question.

“We had leads that the Locksmith might have some connection to your block.”

Sachs let it go at that and didn’t share that, as his last act as a criminalist, before he was furloughed, Rhyme considered the evidence collected thus far: the dish detergent, shards of old-time porcelain insulator, the brick dust. Then he’d composed the memo that Sachs—his “special envoy”—had taken downtown to hand deliver to Lon Sellitto, as email couldn’t be trusted. The instructions were to have the lieutenant send patrol officers in Midtown North, the 19, 20, 23, 24 and 28 Houses to search for a demo site involving an old, red-brick building. Those police precincts bordered Central Park, which Rhyme had targeted as a focal point because of the dish detergent used in cleaning the park’s gates.

Early this morning, 4:30 a.m., Sellitto got a report of a possible location. A patrolman responded, telling the lieutenant that his beatincluded the red-brick Bechtel Building on East 97th, half demolished and awaiting a new developer, since the existing one was in bankruptcy. They knew of the structure because it was the site of drug activity and they would occasionally roust the pushers. The resourceful officer had sent pictures of that and surrounding buildings.

Sellitto had in turn forwarded them to Sachs, keeping Rhyme out of the chain, though in the predawn hours she had, of course, shared everything with her husband.

“He doesn’t live in the place,” Rhyme had said as he lay in bed. “And if there’s no active demo going on, he doesn’t work there.”

“Which means he might be using it for surveillance.” Sachs had pointed to one of the pictures—of the apartment at 501 East 97th. “The service door’s right across from one of the windows.”

“Get down there now.”

Twenty minutes later she’d pulled up in front of the Bechtel Building, meeting Ron Pulaski and two blue-and-whites. They’d done no more than huddle to come up with a plan of action, when a call came in from Dispatch, reporting a break-in, in the very building she was gazing at.

She, Pulaski and the uniforms had responded, covering the exits and hurrying upstairs where a hysterical Carrie Noelle sat in a neighbors’ apartment. Escorted by Pulaski downstairs, she’d waited in the back of the squad car while Sachs and the ECTs walked the grid.

The woman described a break-in that was identical to Annabelle Talese’s. She had no idea when the suspect had left.

Sachs asked Noelle the same questions that she’d asked Talese—about stalkers, exes, anyone who might wish her harm.

Sachs suspected the answers would be the same as well: Noelle could think of no one who had a motive to harm or threaten her orinvade her home. Which gave credence to the theory that the intrusions were most likely random, though his purpose was still a mystery.

“It was so terrible,” Noelle whispered. “My job, I sell collectible toys. He put a doll in bed next to me. And he turned on that mobile, you know, over a baby’s crib? The Brahms ‘Lullaby.’ I’ll never be able to hear that music again.” Noelle dug for a tissue in her purse and dabbed her eyes. She opened a bottle of some medication and took two pills, swallowing them dry.

Thirty feet away, Evidence Collection Technician Sonja Montez had removed the Tyvek coveralls. Stripping off the cocoon had revealed a striking woman of dark complexion, bright pink lipstick and blue eyeshadow. She wore a striped black and red blouse and burgundy side-zippered slacks. She caught Sachs’s eye and gave a thumbs-up. Meaning the evidence was in the CSU bus, all the chain-of-custody cards filled out.

Sachs noted a car pulling up. It was roughly the same shade as the Cadillac and, at first, she tensed, but then noted it was a different make. A woman was behind the wheel. She spoke to a uniformed officer and he guided her to the curb. She parked and climbed out. Noelle’s sister, it seemed.

Noelle asked, “Is it okay if I go now? I don’t want to be anywhere near here.”

Sachs recalled Annabelle Talese’s words.

He stole my home. I loved it so much, and he took it away from me …

“Of course. I’ll call if I have any more questions. And if you think of anything else, let me know.” They had exchanged cards.

It was then that she heard a male voice. “Detective Sachs.”

She turned to see Commander Alonzo Rodriguez walking toward her. His dark eyes, close-set in a round and balding head, took in the evidence in the back of the CS bus. With him was a slimman—also balding—in a fine suit. Sachs knew him. Abraham Potter. He had some job in the mayor’s office, probably an aide. He looked imperious but she suspected he didn’t possess particular power, and was probably a skilled tattletale.

Camera crews were filming their way. Rodriguez seemed more than aware of that.