Terminal City (17 page)

“You two figured this one out yet, Alex?”

“This second kill has thrown us way off track, Paul.”

“You’re sure it’s the same guy?”

“Or team,” Mercer said. “No doubt.”

“You’ve got a young woman in a top-tier hotel, throat slit and body violated. Good family, important job. Now tell me about this guy.”

Mercer had done a quick study of the criminal history. “Carl Condon. Twenty-six years old. Originally from Apalachicola, Florida. Dropped out of FSU and moved here six years ago. Four collars for larceny and three for prostitution.”

“Common denominator?”

“Marks on their bodies,” I said. “Drawings that might represent train tracks.”

“
Might?
I can’t do a stand-up on
might
. The department never declares a serial case till there are three crimes. Why go on two?”

“I agree with the commissioner this time, Paul. People have to be made aware before the body count grows. Maybe these few clues will resonate with someone who knows the killer. They are especially brutal crimes.”

“There’s a homicide that isn’t brutal?”

“I’d say there’s a good chance that Carl Condon was an accomplice in getting the Thatcher girl into the Waldorf. He might have stolen the trunk—”

“I get that,” the DA said, blowing me off and turning to Mercer. “Did this guy really live in a hole in the ground? In a tunnel?”

“Yes, sir.”

Battaglia leaned forward, on the scent of a hit. “Were you there? Did you see it yourselves? Am I safe in actually saying people make their homes down there?”

“Alex and I went in this morning, with an officer from Grand Central. It was only Chapman who actually saw where Condon lived.”

“But the moles Alex described last night,” he said to Mercer, “they actually exist in numbers?”

“No question about it. We met a few dozen of them.”

“So the mayor’s been in office almost nine months,” the sixth-term incumbent noted. The DA’s office relied heavily on funding from the city, and the new mayor had not been Battaglia’s candidate. “He’ll get pummeled on his homeless problem once this gets out, am I right?”

“In all likelihood, sir.”

Paul Battaglia leaned back, sensing a hole in the mayoral armor. “All his blather about New York as a tale of two cities, and he hasn’t done a goddamn thing about the homeless problem yet. It’s an absolute disgrace on a human level, driving the murder rate back up after all the successes of my crime-strategies approach.”

“But, Paul—,” I said, trying to interject a thought.

“Cavemen lived underground, Alex. Troglodytes and other subhuman cultures burrowed into cliffside dwellings. Egyptian slaves lived and died in their mines. Cimmerian monks cut their cells into rocks, coming out only to minister to passing pilgrims.”

Battaglia was revving up a speech for his fall appearance at Riverside Church. I tried not to choke on his rhetoric as I stared at the sign hanging behind his head, reminding me that he couldn’t play politics with people’s lives.

“Scully and I may have two homicides to answer for this week, but City Hall has allowed the larger problem to exist, to flourish under this new leadership.” The cigar bobbed up and down furiously, marking the tempo of Battaglia’s prattle. “And if the mayor thinks that by spending all his time trying to raise taxes on my most loyal constituents while every John Doe Lunatic takes up residence in a train tunnel, he’ll be a one-termer faster than you can say
Jimmy Carter
.”

“Is there a problem you want to tell us about?” I asked.

Paul Battaglia had known Mercer for almost as long as he had known me, and trusted him as the loyal NYPD partner that he was.

“My application to the city council for twenty million dollars for the international cyberbanking initiative I want to create—remember that?”

It was part of the program for my counterparts in the white-collar crime unit of the office, which was Battaglia’s pet division. They did more intellectual work than street crime, cleaner and without any element of violence. “It was discussed at the last bureau chief’s meeting. That’s all I’ve heard.”

“The Speaker called me yesterday and told me the mayor’s going to veto it. Straight-out veto. No discussion, no money for this office.”

If the mayor wasn’t yet familiar with Battaglia’s form of payback, he was in for a rude awakening.

“He and I—Keith Scully, too—have been invited to the reception for the president when he arrives for the special UN meeting. You need to solve these cases before that. Let the mayor be the one who’s embarrassed about the homeless. His policies allow the situation in this city to deteriorate, while the commissioner and I tackle all the scum thrown our way.”

“You can’t put these homicides in the middle of a political skirmish,” I said. “That’s way too transparent for your style.”

The district attorney of New York County rarely left fingerprints, but this mix of money and murder was a formula that could lead him onto the rocks.

“The reception is Monday night. Get everything else off your plate, Alex. Give Rocco what he needs to get this done. There’s only one clown in town,” Battaglia said, “and unfortunately for me he’s running City Hall. I want results from you before the weekend’s over.”

SEVENTEEN

“Don’t mess with him, Alex. Hand off the Dominguez case to Catherine or Nan,” Mercer said, referring to two of my closest friends in the bureau.

“Let me run up to the courtroom and see what Drusin is filling the judge’s head with. It’s just some motion nonsense, I’m sure. If there are immediate issues to deal with—substantive ones—I will put someone else on it.”

“I hear you.”

“Would you mind getting an update from the team at the Waldorf? Do we have any idea whether they’ve seen anything on the surveillance cameras they’ve been checking? We should certainly know more by now.”

“We’d have heard something for sure if they’d gotten lucky. I’ll do the catch-up.”

Over the years, the route to the courtrooms from the DA’s office had become more circuitous, even though we occupied several floors in the massive building. I jogged down the staircase one flight from the executive wing on eight, since the only direct entrance was by way of the lone security guard at the seventh-floor desk.

The thirteenth-floor hallway—which held eight trial “parts,” as they were called—was beginning to fill up with defendants, lawyers, families and friends of the accused, and some of the court-watchers who hung out, hoping for salacious proceedings to fill the long, quiet days of their retirement. Some of them were like Sex Crimes Unit stalkers who knew if one of my colleagues showed up, there might be enough references to sexual acts to keep them awake and engaged—better than the best soap operas on television.

I headed for Judge Aikens’s part, although I saw no sign of my adversary.

As I pulled open one of the double doors, there was a sudden burst of laughter behind me. I turned to see a group of eight or ten men emerging from the restroom, led by Gerardo Dominguez. I didn’t look long enough to study faces. One of the old men who followed my trials for all the wrong reasons—perverse sexual acts, foul language, and endless talk of body parts—was calling to me, coming at me from the other direction.

“Ms. Cooper! Ms. Cooper! I didn’t see your name on any of the calendars today. What have you got going?”

I pretended I didn’t hear him and let the courtroom door swing shut behind me.

David Drusin was standing at the bench, talking with the judge.

“Good morning, Alexandra. Thanks for coming up so promptly,” Judge Aikens said. “It’s apparent from the news that you have a lot on your plate.”

“Not a problem, Judge. Thank you both for waiting. I see, David, that your client made bail.”

“COMET.”

“Did you say
comet
?”
I asked.

“I did. Cannibals of Metro New York—Cooper Chapter. I formed a new nonprofit yesterday, to make it easier for you to find these guys. There are so many flesh-eating figments of your imagination out there, ready to chomp on the ladies, that they all chipped in to raise Gerry’s bail. Dinner is at eight tonight, if you’d like to join them.”

I smiled at Drusin. “Nice way to get rid of me.”

“You’re too tough to eat, Alex. Though a bit of grilling might tenderize you.”

“Step back, both of you,” the judge said. “Let’s go on the record.”

Officer Dominguez had entered the courtroom. Half a dozen men sat in the front row as he made his way to counsel table to sit beside his lawyer.

I glanced around at the group. Each man had his police officer’s shield flapped over the pocket of his sports jacket. I was not at all surprised that the solid blue line of cops would support a colleague in trouble. I was in for some stonewalling should I need anything from the precinct in which Dominguez patrolled.

“Once again, good morning to you all,” the judge said, after the case was called into the record. “It appears that the issue of bail has been resolved, Mr. Drusin. I’m going to remind your client that there are orders of protection for his wife and child. There is to be absolutely no contact between them. None attempted.”

Gerry Dominguez clasped his hands together in front of him, fidgeting in place, nodding his head to let the judge know that he understood the terms of his release.

The cops in the front row were whispering to one another, trying to unsettle me. Judge Aikens banged his gavel and demanded silence.

“I understand, Mr. Drusin, that you’ve prepared some of your motions already. Quick work.”

“I told you I’d have them to you as soon as possible. First is the motion for the dismissal on First Amendment grounds. All we have here is speech, which is supposed to be free.”

“May I give you examples of the language, Your Honor?” I asked, pulling documents from the folder. “E-mails that said Mr. Dominguez was looking forward to ‘cramming a chloroform-soaked rag’ in his wife’s mouth. A document titled ‘A Blueprint for the Abduction and Devouring of Alba Dominguez.’”

“He was sending these e-mails as part of a fantasy, Judge. A game.”

“His cyber life was bleeding into reality. He wasn’t just chatting with these men, he was the provocateur of the conversations. Mr. Dominguez took overt acts,” I said. “I will respond to these motions with all the supporting documentation so the court can see what the facts are.”

“On an expedited schedule, Ms. Cooper,” Judge Aikens said, playing to the cops in the front row. “I’m not dragging my feet on this one. If Dominguez is a good officer—and if you cannot prove any overt acts in this conspiracy charge—then we need to get him back on our streets as soon as possible.”

There was applause from the defendant’s supporters. I looked over my shoulder. My sole cheerleader was the elderly court-watcher, a staple in my small posse of regulars, who leaned forward in hopes of more specifics from me.

“Thank you for that, Your Honor. And most important, I would very much like to have you remove Ms. Cooper from the prosecution of this case, as I mentioned yesterday. Let me give you some of the reasons I have to add to my preliminary remarks.”

My spine stiffened at the idea of Drusin throwing any more personal venom into the formal court record.

“Actually, Judge Aikens, I’ve just come from Mr. Battaglia’s office, as you know. Mr. Drusin may withdraw his motion and keep his litany of personal peeves to himself.”

“But, Judge, I’m entitled to make a record about Ms. Cooper in support of my application.”

“That won’t be necessary. I’ve been assigned to handle a breaking double homicide that will require my complete attention, around the clock, until a suspect or suspects are apprehended and then swiftly charged. I’m in the process of reassigning the Dominguez matter to a colleague in the Special Victims Unit.”

“Very wise of you, Ms. Cooper,” the judge said. “I assume this won’t delay the proceedings?”

“Wait a minute,” Drusin said. He seemed upset not to be able to throw some ad hominem attack about me on the record. “I’m not finished.”

“No, but you’re defanged on this issue, Mr. Drusin,” I said. “By noon today, there will be a new prosecutor handling this matter. And no disruption in the expedited-motion schedule. Anything else I need to deal with, or am I free to step out of the well?”

“We’re officially adjourned,” the judge said, banging his gavel to underscore that point. “Thanks for coming up, Alex. And, you, David, got half of what you wanted right off the bat. You ought to stop being so vituperative.”

I stepped away from the table and turned to walk out of the room as the judge left the bench.

The six officers stood up as I passed them, muttering epithets at me, causing my lone supporter to try to catch up with me.

“Ms. Cooper,” he called after me, “you shouldn’t have to give up the case. You could nail this guy.”

I gave him a thumbs-up as I left the courtroom but walked faster to avoid the conversation he wanted to have. There was still a small pack of men huddled in the corner of the long hallway, and I assumed they were Dominguez supporters. I wanted to get away from the entire crew.

I pressed both
DOWN
buttons on each side of the elevator bank, hoping one of the eight oversized sets of doors would open before the old guy caught up to me and tried to bend my ear.

The one farthest from the corridor—closest to the window—creaked apart, and I ran to get on it. There were several prosecutors and witnesses in it, descending from one of the higher floors. The heavy steel doors, several inches thick, started to close as I greeted the others and pressed for the seventh floor.

Before the doors could shut completely, a man whose footsteps I’d heard coming up behind me—I thought it was the overanxious court-watcher—thrust his arm between the two sides.

I reached for the
OPEN
button before the viselike grip of the solid doors could cause any injury to the man’s forearm, which was too well muscled and too dark-skinned to be that of my elderly admirer.

The doors sprung several inches apart. The man withdrew his arm and the doors slammed shut again before I could see his face and apologize to him. But not before I saw the words
KILL COOP
tattooed on the skin of his hand.