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Authors: Alafair Burke

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212 LP: A Novel (9 page)

BOOK: 212 LP: A Novel
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PART II
“GO AHEAD. LIE TO ME.”

10:15 A.M.

D
espite two large coffees and a cherry Danish, Ellie still felt like she’d been hit over the head with a sledgehammer and then strapped to an all-night merry-go-round.

She had gotten the tears under control by the time she and Jess made their way back to her apartment last night, but the emotions that had led to the outburst were still raw enough that she’d made the mistake of adding two Rolling Rocks at home to the two rounds of whisky she’d already consumed at Plug Uglies.

And then of course there had been the telephone call to her mother.

Her nightly calls to Wichita were never what she’d call the highlight of her days. At best the calls were short, just long enough for a telephonic kiss good night. At worst, they were hour-long reminiscences, with Ellie’s mother lamenting her status as a widowed bookkeeper whose happiest days were long behind her. Last night’s call fell on the crummy end of the spectrum.

And whether it was because of the whisky, the bad jail memories, the conversation with her mother, or a combination of the three, Ellie had slept in fits and spurts for a second consecutive night.

The case certainly wasn’t doing anything to help her stay awake.
She was poring over Robert Mancini’s financial records and telephone logs while Rogan was at the courthouse briefing Judge Bandon.

Ellie looked up to see Lieutenant Robin Tucker standing next to her desk, hands on hips in a tailored white shirt and black pantsuit.

“Rogan’s not back yet?”

Ellie glanced at the readout on her desk phone. Ten-fifteen. Rogan was supposed to meet Max in the judge’s chambers at nine.

“Should be done soon,” she said.

“Good. Call him. You two are up.” She handed Ellie a piece of paper with an address on it. East Fourteenth Street. Somewhere near Union Square Park.

Ellie scanned the squad room and saw several other teams of detectives working away in paired sets of desks.

“Rogan and I were hoping to take a new look at where we are on the Mancini case.”

“I told you two you’re not protected. New callouts just like everyone else.”

Ellie scouted out the squad room again, this time less subtly. “I’m not sure when Rogan will be done, Lou.”

“You’re a big girl, Hatcher. Your partner will find you soon enough. Now scoot. Your body’s a dead college girl. Right up your alley. Who knows? If she’s from Indiana, you might just earn yourself another medal.”

 

Her lieutenant’s quip referred to the murder last spring of a mid-western college student. The case had earned Ellie a Police Combat Cross for what the commissioner had called her “extraordinary heroism while engaged in personal combat with an armed adversary under circumstances of imminent personal hazard to life.” At the ceremony, Ellie had known the commissioner was simply reading the standard language that defined the award itself, but she had committed the words to memory anyway. They provided a palatable description of that case’s unflinching violence, both in the
killer and ultimately in Ellie when she had taken his life. Robin Tucker could mock the recognition if she wanted, but Ellie knew that the finest thing she’d ever done in her life was to bring some measure of justice to that Indiana family.

The address that Tucker had handed her turned out to be on the southwest corner of Union Square Park. Ellie approached the address from the east, hit her dashboard emergency lights to flip a mid-block U-turn, and then pulled the Crown Vic in front of a fire hydrant on Fourteenth Street. Around the corner on University Place, she saw three patrol cars, an ambulance, another unmarked fleet vehicle, and the medical examiner’s van. The gang was all there.

The apartment building itself was a new condo, erected like so much new construction on top of a bank branch. On the other side of double glass doors off of University, she spotted a young Asian patrol officer with a crew cut inside the tiny lobby, his gaze apparently fixated on the abstract painting that filled the wall opposite the building’s elevator. She pulled on one of the doors. It was locked, but the sound of her attempt caught the patrol officer’s attention, and he pushed the door open for her.

Ellie flipped opened the badge holder clipped to her waist. “Apartment 4C?”

With a silent nod, he pressed the call button. She stepped inside and watched the digital readout track her trip to the fourth floor. The quiet of the elevator was immediately disrupted when the doors parted.

“God damn it, how the fuck did the EMTs wheel the other girl out of here?”

Ellie turned to see a short, heavyset man with a dark mustache and thick neck struggling with a gurney in the narrow hallway. She quickly counted four apartment doors—three closed, one held ajar by a uniformed patrol officer who was still staring at the black heavy-grade plastic body bag flopped on top of the aluminum gurney.

“Coming through,” the man said. Short of breath, he pushed the gurney farther toward Ellie and the elevator. “No one’s supposed to
be up here anyway. Damn it,” he cried out to no one in particular, “someone call that stupid fuck in the lobby and remind him his one and only fucking job this morning is to serve as a human shield between these apartments and any more people to get in the way.”

“Looked like he was doing his job to me.” Ellie flashed her detective’s shield to the harried technician. “Besides, what’s the rush? Doesn’t look like you’ve got much hope of saving her.”

“Hey, sorry about that.” He offered a gloved hand on instinct. “Gabe Berry. ME’s office.”

She wrinkled her nose at the sight of his extended hand, and shook her head.

“Oh, yeah, right.” He wiped the perspiration from his brow with his palm. “You’re from Homicide?”

“Yep. You said the EMTs took a girl out of here already?”

“Yeah, now
that
was a rush. They were hauling ass out of the lobby when I pulled up. Taking her to St. Vincent’s, I think.”

“She supposed to make it?”

“No clue. From what I could see, there was big-time bleeding. She managed to crawl to the phone and dial 911, but it didn’t look so good. They found a pulse, but it was slow and weak. Could still be a DOA.”

“Anyone else we need to keep track of?”

“Nope. Just this unlucky one and the other less unlucky one.”

“And you were going to take my body before I got a look. How could you do that to me, Gabe?”

He shrugged. “A lot of detectives don’t give a sh—don’t care. We bag and tag. They get the details later from the ME.”

“Not me. I want to see her.”

Plenty of detectives were content to leave the technical aspects of a case—the inspection of the body, the crime scene analysis, the collection of physical evidence—to the teams of specialists assigned those tasks in any large police department. But seeing the victim’s body wasn’t just a matter of science. It was the first—and often, only—introduction to a human being whose life had been taken. This was Ellie’s chance to see the person before all color was gone.
Before a forensic pathologist cut a Y incision into her torso, removed her internal organs, and sawed open her skull. While there was perhaps still some lingering sign of the spirit that had been lost.

“I want to see her,” she repeated.

“Here?” He looked at both sides of the narrow hallway. The idea of him navigating his broad body on either side of the gurney was clearly unimaginable.

She turned sideways and wiggled herself around the edge of the aluminum cart, careful not to place any pressure on the side of the body, and then pulled the bag’s zipper halfway down. She peeled apart the covering of the plastic to reveal the girl’s face.

She was young. Early twenties, max. Perhaps even still a teenager. Tucker had told Ellie to expect a college girl, so it made sense that she was young.

She was plain, at least in this condition. She had long, straight, blond hair, and Ellie could tell that this seemingly rushed technician had taken the time to arrange it around her shoulders, away from her eyes and face. Her skin was the color of Silly Putty, marred by streaks of dried red blood, but Ellie could tell that the girl’s complexion had been clear and clean. This was a girl who had taken care of herself. A few freckles darkened the bridge of her nose.

“Who is she?”

“Ask them.” Berry looked over his shoulder toward the apartment. Ellie noticed that the patrol officer who had been holding the door ajar was no longer there. “Like I said, I bag and tag. Some college chick, from what I heard.”

On another day, Ellie might have told the guy to show some respect—this woman didn’t deserve to be called “some chick.” But then Ellie looked at the girl’s shiny hair, so neatly straightened inside the body bag. Berry’s demeanor came with the territory, but he had treated this girl as a person, even in death.

She unzipped the bag farther to reveal more of the body. Ellie looked past the damage that had been inflicted by the knife, forcing herself to focus first on the person, not on the violence.

The girl wore a ribbed cotton V-neck T-shirt and a pair of dark
blue jeans. She was in good shape, with slim arms and a flat stomach. The jeans hit her just beneath the belly button, not the kind of pelvis-revealing denim for which so many young, fit women opted these days.

No jewelry except for a dainty chain holding a tiny heart that rested just beneath her collarbone. It was the kind of necklace a girl this age would have been given by either a mother or a boyfriend. She made a mental note to find out which.

She scanned the body one more time and swallowed a lump forming in her throat. Someday she’d get past this. One day she might complete this ritual—this need to be introduced to the victim at the beginning of a new case—without letting it get to her. But she honestly didn’t know whether she’d still be the same person when that day came.

For now, she did her best to hide her emotions from Berry and gave a silent nod to the girl in the bag. Now it was time to take a more analytical look at the body.

What had been the girl’s bright white T-shirt was soaked through with near-black blood. Beneath slashes in the cotton fabric, Ellie saw several deep gashes in the abdomen, sides, and chest. She counted at least six. Some of them appeared to be long but shallow slices, perhaps inflicted in a struggle. But one wound in her chest and another near her liver evidenced deep, forceful, and, most likely, the fatal stabs.

Ellie’s inspection was interrupted by the cheerful
ding
of the elevator beside her. The doors opened, and J. J. Rogan stepped into the hallway.

“You were gonna let them cart away our body before Double J got here?”

“Christ,” the technician said. “Let me guess. This is your partner?”

11:00 A.M.

I
nside Apartment 4C, Ellie counted three officers from the crime scene unit. One was photographing copious blood patterns—a combination of spatter, drips, and pools—on the bleached bamboo floors in a small dining area just inside the apartment’s entrance. Another stood in the galley kitchen, carefully placing a drinking glass inside a plastic evidence bag. A final CSU officer was on her knees, dusting a door leading from the right side of the living room for fingerprints.

The apartment itself was luxurious—floor-to-ceiling glass windows, high ceilings, stainless steel kitchen appliances—but its furnishings were not much different than what one would expect for a college student, or at least one who could afford new purchases instead of the Goodwill merchandise that Ellie still depended on. Past the dining table, the main living area was just large enough to house a brown upholstered sectional sofa, a glass coffee table, and a television stand. Ellie was fairly certain that she recognized at least some of the furniture from an IKEA catalog she had browsed the previous week before throwing it into the recycling bin.

The patrol officer who had held the door for Berry and his gurney stood awkwardly near the dining table, on the opposite side of the
blood. He had dark, wavy hair and a prominent nose. The sleeves of his uniform pulled against biceps that had clearly seen some time at the gym. According to a nameplate on the left side of his chest, his name was A. Colombo.

“Did he finally manage to get the meat cart into the elevator? I thought that dude was going to stroke out from the physical exertion. Geez, jog a mile or something, dude.”

Ellie gave him her best deadpan look. Rogan wasn’t going to let it go with just a look.

“Did someone ask you for your stand-up routine, Bob Saget?”

“Just offering some levity, Detectives. You know, comic relief. They say it helps with, you know, the morbidity.”

“Laughter cures diseases, does it?” Rogan asked.

“Huh?”

“You said it helps with the morbidity, which refers to the rate of a disease or illness. It does not mean a mood that is morbid, which is the concept I believe you intended to convey, Officer.”

“I’m sorry. Huh?”

“Forget it. You know the backstory here or not, Colombo?”

“The victim’s parents called the precinct this morning wanting us to check in on her.”

“They’re sisters?” Rogan asked.

“Who?”

“The victims. You said the victims’ parents. Are you saying they were sisters?”

“No, sorry. At least, I don’t think so. The one victim’s parents—the one who died—”

“She have a name?”

“Um, yeah.” He stole a glance at his notebook and then tucked it back into his chest pocket. “Megan Gunther, according to the super. Anyway, that vic’s parents were trying to call her, and she wasn’t answering the phone. They got the brush-off from the dispatcher, so then they called the condo’s super. He used the building’s keys to enter and found…well, you can get the picture. Turns out the
other vic had crawled her way to the phone to call 911 after the bad guy left, and paramedics showed up right behind him. Me and my partner responded, too.”

Ellie jumped in before Rogan could correct Colombo’s grammar. “Your partner’s posted downstairs?”

Rogan wasn’t usually so critical. Either this officer had done something to earn a place on Rogan’s shit list, or something else was bothering her partner. She had a bad feeling his mood might be related to his trip to the courthouse that morning to brief Judge Bandon on the Mancini case.

“Yeah. Making sure no one’s coming up except authorized personnel.”

“And you’re keeping a log of who’s going in and out of here?” she verified.

He patted the pocket that held his notebook. “Just need to add the two of you.”

“Good man,” she said. “Got to keep track of the crime scene.”

“Hey, you look pretty young. How long’d it take you to make it to Homicide? Cuz, you know, that’s basically my dream. I mean, with a name like Colombo, you just got to go for it. I’d get the tan trench coat and everything.”

“Just keep the log. Detectives Hatcher and Rogan. Manhattan South Homicide. In at eleven-oh-two a.m. Write it down.”

 

Maintaining the crime scene log was not the only thing that Officer Colombo had done right that morning. He had also instructed the building’s superintendent to return to his office on the building’s second floor.

Ellie knocked on the office door. She detected a European accent in the voice that instructed her to come in.

“You’re Gorsky?”

“Yes. People around here call me Andrei.” The man’s eyes were red-rimmed.

“Ellie Hatcher. I’m a detective with the NYPD’s homicide unit. It’s not easy walking into a scene like that upstairs.”

“No. It was not easy.”

“My understanding is that one of the girls’ parents asked you to check up on her? Megan Gunther?”

“Yes, that is right. The tenant’s name was Megan. My phone was already ringing when I walked into the office this morning. It was Megan’s mother saying her daughter was not answering her telephone. She wanted me to check on her.”

Ellie glanced at her watch. “So this was what time?”

Gorsky stared at the black cordless phone on his desk. “The first time, it was probably just before nine o’clock in the a.m.”

Ellie let silence fill the room, knowing that the superintendent would eventually explain what he meant by the first time.

“I try to tell her that it is not up to me to check on the residents. This is not a college dormitory, you know. If they want someone to be the guardian to their children, they shouldn’t buy them their own apartments.”

“All right, Mr. Gorsky. I think I understand. But you went upstairs to check on Megan?”

“Eventually, yes, I said I would do it. But I have workers here this morning to install a new cooling system. I have another resident locked out of her storage unit crying in the lobby that she will lose her job if she doesn’t get it open and find a very important file of some kind that she is missing. I have to find another resident’s keys for a realtor who is coming but I cannot find them. And at first, you know, Mrs. Gunther wanting me to check on her daughter did not seem so important.”

“So she called more than once.”

“Four times she called me in twenty minutes before I went upstairs. We are not even supposed to go in. The parents, they pay for the apartment. But the legal resident is the daughter. I am not even supposed to go—”

She knew where the man’s thoughts were taking him. Police and paramedics had shown up right after he entered the apartment.
The phone call from the parents had given him a twenty-minute head start. Twenty minutes might have made the difference.

“You couldn’t have saved them, Mr. Gorsky.” She wasn’t convinced, but said it anyway, for his sake. “And it’s possible you could have gotten yourself hurt instead.”

His eyes remained fixed on his telephone, but she assumed all he was seeing was a replay of the scene he had encountered when he opened the apartment door. He’d see it tonight in bed before he slept, and again in his dreams. He’d continue to see it forever. It was just a question of how frequently and how vividly.

“She was a good girl, Megan was. We have more young people in this building than you would think. The parents, they buy, like an investment. Then the kids live on their own. Megan was a good girl, not spoiled like a lot of them. She always said hello. She used my name to talk to me like a human being, not a servant. She would even bring fresh coffee sometimes if she saw me working in the lobby.”

“There was a second girl in the apartment.”

“She was the roommate. Just moved in a few months ago.”

“Was she the same kind of ‘good girl’ as Megan?”

The cordless phone on Gorsky’s desk broke out into a loud chirp. Even though he’d been staring at the phone, the noise clearly startled the man, but after a quick flinch, he jumped back into the conversation.

“She seemed like a nice girl. Quieter than Megan. Not as outgoing.”

“Do you need to get that?” she asked, looking at the ringing phone.

He shook his head just as the phone finally silenced.

“And what was the roommate’s name?”

“Heather. I’m not sure if I ever knew her last name.”

“Don’t you need a name for her to live in the building?”

Again, the phone began to ring. And again, Gorsky ignored it and continued to speak.

“As a matter of technicalities. But the Gunthers were responsible
financially for the apartment, and I trusted Megan. She told me she was getting a roommate, and that was the end of the conversation. Some of these other people, I would’ve wanted credit checks, a deposit…don’t get me started.” He waved a hand at the thought.

“Do you know if either of the girls had any problems recently? Boyfriends? Drugs? Money?”

“Megan would come in and out of the building with the same boy for a very long time, but he has not been here since, well, since around the time the roommate came.”

“A breakup?”

Gorsky smiled and nodded his head. “I don’t keep this job with the same management company for so long by talking to residents about their romances. Could be breakup. Could be he doesn’t get along with the new girl. I have no idea.”

“You know anything about him? Name? Address?”

He shrugged. “I wish now I had asked. Tall, skinny. Had these things, you know, through his—” Gorsky pulled at his lower lip.

“A pierced lip.”

“Yeah, but in two places. On both sides. Now
that—that
I noticed.”

“Anything else? Hair color? Eyes?”

“Dark brown hair. Probably brown eyes, I guess. I don’t know, kind of like mixed looking. Maybe he was part ethnic of some kind. He hasn’t been around.”

The phone was ringing once again.

“I’m sorry, sir, but if you’re not going to answer that, I’d appreciate it if you could turn off the ringer. It’s a little distracting.”

He fumbled with a button on the phone, and the chirping quieted to a subtle jingle. “I do not know how to turn it off.”

“No, that’s much better,” she said. “Thank you. Now, the lobby entrance was locked when I came in. Is that twenty-four/seven?”

“Yes. You have to call up to a resident and be buzzed in by them to enter.”

“Do you have any way of knowing who buzzed people in this morning?”

He shook his head.

“What about cameras? Any film from the lobby or the elevators?”

Ellie had not spotted any cameras in the building, but with security advancements, the equipment might not be visible.

Gorsky shook his head again. “In the bigger buildings, our company uses cameras. Not one of this size. I am sorry I cannot be more helpful. You know, right before nine o’clock, there’s a lot of foot traffic on the street. People coming and going. It’s not hard to walk in after someone leaves.”

“What would really help is if you could give me whatever you have in the way of a file for Megan’s apartment. I assume her parents’ contact information will be there?”

He handed her a manila envelope from the top of his disheveled desk. “Already done.” He stared at his phone, which had finally gone silent. “I have been sitting here for over an hour staring at this telephone. I have lost count how many times it has rung.”

“Given the tenacity of whoever’s on the other end of that line, I’d suggest you either answer it or leave town.”

“I do not want to answer it, because I know it must be her. Mrs. Gunther. I am afraid to speak to her and tell her what I saw.” He sighed quietly. “I am a coward. It is the girl’s mother. She should know.”

“You’re not a coward, Andrei. You don’t need to be the one to tell her. I will tell them. I will tell Megan’s parents what happened and what you saw. It is my job, not yours.”

He finally took his eyes off of his phone and looked up at Ellie. “After today, I will never complain again about my work.”

As it turned out, Ellie was going to deliver the news sooner than she realized.

BOOK: 212 LP: A Novel
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