She slowly slipped her right hand into her purse and felt the handles of her garrote. The young man was oblivious as he engaged Janos.
Alice tried to assess if she really needed to eliminate a witness or just thought she might enjoy it. If she was honest with herself, she didn’t mind feeling people struggle under the power of her arms and shoulders focused on the wire of the garrote.
To be on the safe side, she pulled it from her purse. Both hands ready to go.
Janos had all the information he needed. He thanked the young man and took a few steps down the stairs to the street.
Alice was still in a perfect position to act.
Then the young man said, “I’ve applied to Columbia. Do you think you guys could help me?”
Before Alice could do anything, he jumped right into his pitch. It covered his academic career since middle school. He had two years of college and was hoping to get in and finish at Columbia.
The young man brushed hair out of his eyes as he finished up. “I have enough financial aid lined up, along with money from my parents. I’m not a computer genius like Oscar or Jennifer, but I have really good grades and I’m interested in business.” He sounded proud of himself as he finished his list of accomplishments, from being in the marching band in high school to having straight As at SUNY Brookhaven.
Alice held up her homemade garrote. Then she caught Janos waving her off. Her partner said to the young man, “You seem like a good kid. But you need to aim lower.” Janos gave him a thumbs-up and added, “Hang in there.”
Alice decided the conversation was too bizarre for the young man to ever think they would be involved in crime. She slipped the garrote back into her purse and hurried down the stairs to catch up with Janos.
Janos had a wide grin on his face and said, “Did you hear my good American accent? That kid totally believed I worked for Columbia University.”
Occasionally Alice really enjoyed working with her goofy partner.
CHAPTER 26
IT FELT GOOD to be back on the job. And having a different assignment helped make it interesting. If you don’t get something out of your job other than money, what’s the point? One of the things I love about police work is that you never know what might happen. I live my life in a constant state of surprise and excitement. Not a bad way to spend your time.
Over the years, I’d explored the idea of applying to the FBI or pursuing promotions within the NYPD. But days like this always convinced me that being a detective was the best possible position. Not just any kind of detective, but an NYPD detective. To roam over this great city and meet interesting people made me excited to start work almost every day.
I had a list of names the mayor had given me. They were acquaintances or friends of Natalie’s. I had spoken to the mayor’s ex-wife, who now lived north of Albany. She knew more about her daughter’s day-to-day life and friends but offered nothing of great importance. At least nothing that looked important at the moment. I’d seen divorce ruin families. I got the idea that the divorce was only part of this dynamic, though the mayor himself had taken the blame.
The mayor’s ex-wife had started to worry about her daughter a while ago. She felt the rising fear of a parent. She didn’t care what I did or who I was as long as I found her daughter.
I spoke to a bright young woman named Allie Andrus, who was a senior at NYU. She had been friends with Natalie since middle school. I thought I’d get some real insights, but all she said was that they had drifted apart. Now Natalie hung out with a group of computer hackers. Allie used the phrase “cyberpunks.” That sounded a little dismissive to me.
I spoke to two other friends on the phone and then landed on the name Thomas Payne.
When I ran the name through NYPD computer indexes, I was shocked to learn he was the victim of a homicide. His body had been found a few blocks from Penn Station.
That changed everything. It could be a coincidence. But if you believe in coincidence, you probably shouldn’t be a cop.
I immediately got on the horn and reached Detective Ed Arris. He gave me directions to Payne’s apartment and said he’d meet me in a few minutes.
Ed and I went back a few years. He was six foot four but had more bulk than me. Some of it had to do with his football career. He’d played at Hofstra about the same time as their best-known NFL player, Wayne Chrebet.
He shook my hand, then enveloped me in a bear hug. “Good to see you, Mike. We’ve all been worried about you.”
I waved off the sentiment, but it touched me. I had to change the subject, quick.
I said, “How do you like Manhattan South?”
“You know how it is. I’d been up in the Bronx a while. NYPD likes to spread out their black detectives. This is a pretty easy gig compared to the Bronx. I figure I’ll pull the plug in the next ten years anyway.”
I noticed how well kept the building was as we walked to the front door of the apartment. There was no doorman, but the electronic security was outstanding. Four different cameras caught the front of the building. An expensive awning covered the sidewalk leading to the entrance.
Ed said they had no leads. Just a body that had been strangled with a ligature. In this case, he thought it was some kind of wire.
Ed said, “Screwed up the victim’s neck pretty bad. Deep laceration, but it didn’t sever any arteries. The poor kid choked to death. He was dead at least twelve hours before someone from a restaurant next door noticed the body jammed up against a wall behind a row of parked cars. The kid’s family is devastated.”
Every homicide detective knew the feeling, talking to a family who had just lost someone. Death notifications were one of the worst parts of the job.
Ed fumbled with the keys, then we ducked under some yellow crime-scene tape across the doorway.
As soon as we stepped into the apartment and I saw the two TVs and all of the computer equipment, I knew this was related to the missing Natalie Lunden.
CHAPTER 27
IT’S ALWAYS A surreal experience to be in the apartment of a dead person. Their life is told in the belongings they left behind. Secrets are held in correspondence and emails. Even their TV viewing habits might be looked at. Anything that could give a detective a hint of what led to the homicide.
Cops like to say a good homicide detective is born, not made. The gift has more to do with the determination to keep looking at things until they make sense. With all the new forms of communication, from instant messaging to email, investigations have changed dramatically. More opportunities to catch a killer also means much more information to pore over. Cases, at least more complicated cases, take longer.
I believe experience is what makes a good detective. Varied experience, not the same one over and over. Experience is a tricky thing. You never realize how important it is until you gain it. The ultimate catch-22.
This was a very nice two-bedroom apartment most professionals would kill to live in. Somehow a twenty-four-year-old computer whiz had found a way to pay for it.
Ed proceeded to brief me as we walked through the apartment. He said, “We found an airline ticket to Estonia.”
Immediately I thought about the wire from Danske Bank in Estonia that paid for Natalie Lunden’s apartment. Things were starting to pop.