Page 80 of The Midnight Lock (Lincoln Rhyme 14)

Michael Xavier, his age somewhere from thirty to forty-five, sat on the edge of his bed, chewing his lips—from the antipsychotic drugs—and muttering to himself. He was not alone in this. Xavier was a bulky man. He was in a T-shirt that revealed arms that were both fat and muscular. He had an unruly beard. On his feet were shabby leather shoes. These matched, unlike the footwear of Alekos Gregorios’s killer. But leads had to start somewhere.

Tye Kelly was big and imposing and his brows met in a line. They were arched high above his unsmiling eyes, all of which made him look like an irritated boxer. Wilson was petite and affected a gentle expression, both amused and curious, giving her the appearance of a first-grade teacher, not first-grade gold shield. He let her talk.

“Mr. Xavier, I’m Detective Wilson and this is Detective Kelly.” Badges were displayed. Across the hall came a shout, “Get the fuck out!” But it was apparently directed to something invisible floating near the ceiling.

The man grunted, looked them over and said, “Is what it is.”

“I wonder if you could tell us where you were last Tuesday night? Do you recall? Around nine p.m.?”

He chewed some more and stared at them. He muttered something.

“What was that, sir?”

Xavier fell silent and played with a fingernail.

“Where did he say he saw it?” Kelly asked Wilson.

His partner answered, “Under the bed.”

Kelly got down on one knee and swept the beam of his small tactical flashlight under the cot. Damn. Cleaner than the floor at home.

Detectives from the 112 House had called a dozen shelters—located within five miles around the home of murder victim Gregorios—and asked if any staff had seen bottles of any brand of cherry-flavored chlorine dioxide, the fake medicine, in the possession of any white male residents who matched the description of the homeless man that Gregorios’s son had told them about.

The director of Deloitte had seen the email and called the 112 and reported seeing a bottle of cherry-flavored Miracle Sav.

After Lincoln Rhyme had told him that there’d been trace of the stuff found on Gregorios’s clothes—and none recovered in the man’s house—Kelly had looked the substance up and, while it could be used as a legitimate cleanser, some people were stupid enough to drink it like medicine, causing kidney failure, vomiting, shedding of internal mucous membranes. It had even been given as enemas to children to cure autism and had seriously injured scores and killed several. (Kelly wished he’d been called in to run one ofthosecases.)

“Mr. Xavier, do we have permission to go through your locker?” she asked.

This was dicey. If the bottle were inside and could be linked to the murder scene, a defense counsel would leap on the search as unconstitutional because, in his current mental state, Xavier was not able to give consent.

On the other hand, the vicious nature of the killing meant that if he were the perp, he needed to be collared—and now.

“Is what it is, is what it is, is what it is …”

She sat on the unoccupied bed across from his. “Mr. Xavier?”

Kelly then froze. He said, “Never mind. Glove up and open it.”

“But …” she protested. She’d be thinking probable cause. And, because she was in law school at night, Fourth Amendment.

“We got it. Plain sight.”

He’d shined the light up into the springs of the cot and saw something tucked under the mattress. He pulled on blue latex gloves and reached in, removing the bloodstained wallet.

It was Alekos Gregorios’s.

Wilson opened the locker. Underneath two mismatched shoes was a bottle. She lifted out the Adidas-Nike pair of joggers, and the partners looked down at a bloodstained knife, about eight inches long, and a bottle of Miracle Sav.

In bold red print was the legend that reported that, among eliminating other maladies, the potion had been “proven to cure all forms of mental illness and dementia.”

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Lon Sellitto was on the speaker.

“The Apollos’re the lead suspects.”

He explained that after the hit-pieceDaily Heraldarticle about the “women haters” had come out and senior members had gone into hiding, the officers whom Sellitto had assigned to find the potential suspects were having trouble tracking them down. “They’re posting plenty of threats, though. One guy in particular, nicknamed ‘Chosen,’ is calling for Whittaker’s beheading.”