Jane looked at her phone and frowned. “Allan didn’t text me good night.”
Juliana teased her sister. “Give it a rest, Jane. We all know you have a boyfriend.”
Fiona added, “And we know he’s cute.”
Bridget chimed in. “And he plays on the lacrosse team.”
Jane knew they were winding her up but couldn’t help throwing in “Captain of the lacrosse team.”
Mary Catherine came back out of the kitchen. “That’s enough, girls. Leave your sister alone.”
I closed my eyes for a moment and immediately felt myself start to doze off. Instead, I stood up again. “Gotta shower and get back into the office. Lots to do.” I clapped my hands together as if I was excited about the prospect.
Mary Catherine gave me a stern look. “You can’t sleep for a couple more hours?”
“Afraid not.”
“This case won’t affect our wedding, will it?”
“No way.”
She seemed dubious.
I added, “I promise.”
Mary Catherine knew I wouldn’t break a promise.
Chapter 59
I’d like to say I was more than ready to face another day when I sat down at my desk in the Manhattan North Homicide office. But that would be a lie. Almost as soon as I sat in my new rolling leather chair—Mary Catherine had ordered it from Office Depot after I complained one too many times about city-issued furniture aggravating my aching back—all I wanted to do was put my head down on the desk and go back to sleep. But a twenty-minute nap would do nothing for me. What I really needed was a two-week nap to get back to normal.
To make matters worse, Brett Hollis seemed to be in a very chipper and pleasant mood. He was wearing an even smaller bandage strip across his nose, humming the theme song to Game of Thrones as he reviewed tips that had come in overnight.
I sighed as I looked down at the crime-scene photos from the homicide in SoHo, very impressed that Dan Jackson had already gotten someone to print the images and leave a duplicate set on my desk. It was that kind of cooperative attitude that made the NYPD so effective at solving homicides.
Hollis stepped behind my chair and looked over my shoulder at the photographs. “What did you think of the latest scene?”
“It was most similar to the Staten Island crime scene. Definitely a homicide by a sharp implement of some kind, and the killer stabbed the victim’s eye—but her right one, not her left. And there was blood around the body, but not spread on the apartment walls. No idea yet if any of the blood came from a second sample either.”
“Did you find any rearrangement of the victim’s collectibles, any sort of counting message?”
“Nothing at all.”
Hollis patted me on the back. “It’s all going to work out. You keep saying if we all do our jobs we’ll catch this guy. We’re all doing our jobs now. I’m going to run down a couple of leads from the tip line in an hour or so. That’s my job.”
I let out a chuckle. He was a good kid. Hollis gave me a wave as he walked toward the conference room.
I looked down at my notes from all the homicides in every city we’d identified and then at the new crime-scene photos from Lila Stein’s apartment.
I said a quick prayer for her soul. It was probably the fifth time I had prayed for her since last night.
I craned my neck to glance across the wide squad bay, past a dozen desks with empty chairs. Brett Hollis stood in the conference room, organizing the leads with Task Force Halo. I noticed that Hollis was dressing sharper on the days he worked with the task force. Today he wore a nice Arrow dress shirt with a subtle blue tie. He looked good. I was impressed.
Harry Grissom wanted to recruit the best and brightest into his homicide unit, and as I had already told my boss, Hollis was a keeper. He had that little something extra. He could deal with people. He wrote good reports. And he didn’t seem to get overwhelmed by assignments that were outside the box. This was part of what I, like a football scout, was supposed to do in my role as a senior detective: Identify needs and then find the right personnel to fill them. Keep management in the loop.
I couldn’t suppress a cringe when I noticed the door to the squad bay open and John Macy stalking through the office. That couldn’t be good, though since news of another homicide had broken, I’d expected to see him at some point.
He glanced in my direction but ignored me completely.
He marched past me and into the conference room like a member of command staff. I looked over and saw Hollis, whose expression quickly shifted from pleasant to annoyed and then to angry. He gave me a look I had to interpret through the conference room glass. It was definitely something along the lines of Please come in here.
Which was just about the last thing I wanted to do. If I never had to interact with John Macy again, I’d consider the rest of my career a success. But I couldn’t leave my partner alone. Especially not when he had made it clear he needed support.
I only hoped not to embarrass Harry again.
Chapter 60
I stood up, straightened my shirt, and walked to the conference room with purpose. As soon as I opened the door, I heard Brett Hollis say, “Ask him yourself,” as he cut his eyes to me.
I looked at John Macy and said, “What can I do for you?” It was as professional and direct as I could manage.
Macy fumed and did little to hide his annoyance at having to acknowledge I was a living, breathing person. Finally, he stood tall and puffed out his chest a bit. He said, “I need details on the latest homicide in SoHo from our man.”
I had to think about how to respond. After a moment, I shrugged and said, “There are certain aspects of the murder that make it appear to be the work of the same killer as in our other cases. However, there are also several details that don’t match up. We’re going to have to wait for forensic reports to come back before we can say anything definitive. And even then, we’re still dealing with a killer who’s proven adept at not leaving behind any identifying evidence at crime scenes.”
Macy shook his head in disgust. “Typical.”
“Typical of what?” My voice was taking on a sharper tone already. “Typical of the cop who doesn’t want to be skewered for rushing to judgment? You’re not a fellow cop I can discuss theories with. You’re a politician. I don’t trust you not to run off and tell the mayor about a theory I later discover was mistaken. So all I can do is tell you the facts as I know them.”
Macy folded his arms in front of him and cranked his condescending tone up to say, “What if you took a guess? Something no one can hold you responsible for.” He deliberately slowed down and over-enunciated each of his next words. “Do you think that this homicide is the work of the same killer?”
I looked at Hollis, took a deep breath, and said, “No. I don’t think it’s the same killer.” There, it was out in the open.
For a moment, Macy just stared at me. Then he argued, “I read the initial memo. The victim was fatally slashed and then stabbed in the eye. It has to be our killer.”
“Wrong,” I shot back. “It doesn’t have to be anything. Look, you asked for my opinion and I gave it. Overall, that whole crime scene just doesn’t feel like the work of our killer.”