While they closed again, she drew her weapon. Another scan of the street before she slid out of the car.
A sack—and she knew bloodstains when she saw them—with a note dangling from the tie that secured it.
She took out her comm with her free hand. “Dallas, Lieutenant Eve. Send a couple of beat cops to my residence. Now.”
She slid the comm away, crossed to the bag.
She smelled blood. She smelled death.
Tipped the note up with a fingertip.
Curiosite killed the cat.
Your next!
“Can’t spell worth a—Oh Christ, no, no, no.”
She didn’t seal—didn’t think of it, but ripped at the tie.
The cat, the cat. Her cat.
The cat—but not her cat—had been gutted, its throat slit.
Pity and relief churned through her as she straightened up, turned on her recorder, turned to get her kit out of the car.
And then she saw him. As with Roarke, he made sure of it.
He stood a block away so she saw him throw his head back as he laughed.
She ran, full-out. And so did he.
10
As she ran, Eve yanked out her comm.
He whipped east, as she’d have done, pumped into the great park.
“Officer needs assistance in pursuit of suspect. Male, Caucasian, brown hair, man bun, age forty-two. Six feet, a hundred and ninety. Black pants, black hoodie. Pursuing on foot, into Central Park at West Eighty-third. Son of a bitch!”
She made up ground, she knew she made up ground. He wouldn’t win any sprints, but he’d positioned himself well for the chase. He wanted the chase, no question.
“Suspect is Lorcan Cobbe,” she barked out as she charged into the park. “Consider him armed and dangerous. Get me some fucking backup! Alert park security to locate him on cam.”
Her comm beeped in her hand.
“Get me backup!”
“Why are you running?” Feeney demanded. “Why are you in Central Park?”
“In pursuit of Cobbe. Get me fucking backup.”
“Done.”
She had to stop, not to catch her breath, but to gauge that ground. A perfect spring evening welcomed tourists, natives, families, and kids—lots of kids. People strolled, lounged on benches, walked dogs, licked ice cream from cones, embraced in the green shade of leafy trees.
And one, with a puzzled expression, held a black hoodie.
Eve ran toward her, watched the woman’s eyes widen in alarm—and remembered she held her weapon.
She yanked out her badge. “Police officer, where did he go, the man who dropped the hoodie?”
“He—he just sort of flung it off when he was running.”
“Which way?” Eve snatched the hoodie for evidence. “Which direction?”
“I’m not sure. I think …” She pointed vaguely north.
Eve clipped on her badge, ran north.
“He ditched the hoodie,” she told Feeney, “pursuing north.”
Somebody played a guitar. Somebody sang. Some kid laughed like he’d bust a gut. Another carted an airboard, limping along on scraped knees that dribbled blood.
She spotted two park security officers jogging her way.
She stopped because the son of a bitch was gone. Just gone.
“I need the security feed for this sector,” she snapped. “And I need security to comb in for the suspect.”
Frustrated, she jammed her weapon away. “Send me a copy of the feed. And any feed that shows the suspect. Dallas, Lieutenant Eve, Cop Central. Homicide. Get me the feed and start a video and foot search. Now, goddamn it.”
“We’ll need to get clearance from—”
Eve resisted—very narrowly—grabbing the park cop by the throat. “You want somebody gutted in here on your watch like the woman in Washington Square Park? Because this is that guy. This is that fucking guy.”
“Yes, ma’am. We’ll get right on it.”
“And don’t fucking ma’am me,” she bit off as she stalked away.
“Lost him,” she told Feeney. “I’m heading home.”
“Backup’ll meet you. What the hell happened?”
“Fill you in later,” she said, disgusted. “I need to get the manhunt started.”
Went north, she thought, and then cut west and walked right back out of the park again. That’s what she’d have done anyway. Have a vehicle nearby, or just walk over to Columbus, catch a cab, a bus, hit the subway.
He’d wanted to see what she’d do. And she’d shown him.
A couple more cops—NYPSD uniforms—ran in as she strode back. She unclipped her badge, held it up. “Come with me.”
As she walked, she used her comm to order a search from West Eighty-eighth south to Roosevelt Park—since he seemed to like damn parks—and from Central Park West to Columbus Avenue.
Maybe, just maybe, since he got his jollies off, he’d be even more careless. And they’d get lucky.
When she started to cross to the gates, she saw they were wide open, and Summerset stood between her car and the dead-cat bag.
“What are you doing out here! Don’t touch that bag! Goddamn it!” She sprinted across. “Get in the car. Get in the damn car.”
“It’s not Galahad. He’s in the house.”
“You touched the bag.”
“Of course I touched the bag,” he snapped right back. “The gates opened, then shut again, and the monitor showed your vehicle out here and that thing. I—”
“Get in the car.” Frustrated, furious, she grabbed his elbow—sharp point. “Do you understand you’re a target?”
“Do you understand you are?”
“In the car before I cuff you. I swear to God.”
With considerable dignity, Summerset got in the car.
Struggling for calm, she ordered sweepers, snapped out those instructions as she stormed to the trunk. She sealed up, got evidence bags and boxes.
She tossed the boxes at the uniforms. “Put those together.”
She put the reversible jacket in an evidence bag, and, crouching, she took the dead cat out of the bloodied burlap.
“Sick fuck does that,” one of the uniforms commented.
Saying nothing, she used tweezers from her field kit to remove several hairs from the body, bagged those, took swabs of blood, bagged those, bagged the cat, labeled the bags. She put the sack and note in another.
Taking the boxes, she boxed, sealed, and labeled.
“You’re going to take the body to the morgue, tagged for Morris.”
“You want the ME to autopsy a cat?”
“Isn’t that what I said?”
“Yes, sir.”
“The jacket, the hair, the blood, and the bag and note go to the lab. The hair is tagged for Harvo, the rest for Berenski. They’re priority. All the fuck of them are priority. Is that clear?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You’re on foot?”
“Yes, sir.”
She pulled out her comm again, ordered a cruiser to pick up the beat cops.
“Do you want someone to stand by the gates, keep the scene secured?”
“No.” No point, she thought. No real point in the sweepers, either, but she’d cover all the bases.