Murder By Misdirection

by Debra Snow

  “That sounds like paranoia, Mister Martin,” Chu replied.

  “But as I told you, I called Louie and set up the appointment with him after I left my apartment—I mean Mrs. Thompson’s apartment this morning. It was just going to be a friendly chat. Lou and I are old friends. I thought together we could figure out the identity of the man who stole my trick.”

  “I thought Albert Floss stole your trick,” Chu asserted.

  Max shook his head. “He was just the middle man. Al was good, but he doesn’t have the knowledge to recreate an illusion on the level of Prism.” Max leaned back in this chair. “But Lou, he’d have the inside knowledge of who in New York could do it. Don’t you see, that’s why he was killed. He probably figured out who recreated the techniques of my effect.”

  “This is all well and good, but so far, you’re the only constant in this case. Everything points to you!”

  Max went on. “I’m telling you, find the man who drew those plans, and you will have your killer.”

  “Unfortunately, at this time, that appears to be you, Mister Martin. End interview!”

  Chu stood up from the chair, took his folder with him, and stepped to the door as Pro buzzed it open.

  He slammed the door behind him and pointed at a nearby officer. The man was very tall, at least six-foot-eight. He had a square chin and a taut, lean body that gave the appearance of a normal man stretched out to the extended height. “Jacobs?”

  “Yes, sir, detective.”

  Chu pointed his thumb at the door he’d just exited. “Get this man into holding, and be alert, he’s tricky.”

  “Yes, sir,” the officer said and walked to the door, which Pro buzzed open.

  Using his long arms, Jacobs held the door open and guided Max out, taking him in the direction of the precinct’s holding cells.

  “Tom,” Pro said as her annoyed partner drew near. “What if he’s…I dunno…on to something?”

  “What he’s on to is a rap for two counts of Murder One,” Chu griped. “I hope he enjoyed his one day outside, because I think I will keep him in a cell from now on.”

  “Can we hold him?”

  “Up to seventy-two hours on suspicion. I intend to use every hour of that.”

  “Okay,” Pro said and turned away, suddenly feeling guilty.

  “Look, Pro, it’s for his own good,” Chu explained, sensing his partner’s conflict. “If he’s here in a cell and any other magicians are killed with the same MO, it will exonerate him.”

  “I see that,” Pro divulged to her partner. “I just don’t know what to do with him here. He makes me so angry, and then I feel guilty that I get mad. A part of me wants to strangle him and another part just wants to sit down with him over coffee.”

  “So you have mixed feelings.”

  “Very mixed. And I don’t like it. I’m usually the person in control.”

  Chu sat at the corner of Pro’s desk. “I know, and you’ve got the smarts that keep your temper in check. But, this has been a struggle for you.”

  She shook her head. “I all but lost it this morning when I went to Mom’s apartment and there he was. I felt like all the years where Joe worked so hard to give us a life and a strong family had been erased by an intruder.”

  “Family can be difficult,” Chu pondered. “I mean, I was raised by traditional Korean parents. Every day after school, I had violin lessons and Tae Kwon Do. When I decided to go into law enforcement as a cop instead of becoming a lawyer, you would have thought I had committed a high crime. To this day, my folks are always comparing me to their friends’ more successful children who are doctors and lawyers.”

  “At least your parents stayed together.”

  “Yeah, and there were other advantages. I acted as my parents’ translator from the time I could talk, which came in very handy at parent-teacher meetings. But our parents are who they are, just like we have to be who we are.” He shrugged. “I’m a cop.”

  “Mom wasn’t happy when I decided to go to the academy, but Joe was so proud I would’ve sworn he was gonna bust.”

  “And I’m sure Max is proud of you, too.”

  Pro sighed. “I guess so. Man, so many memories have been coming up since he arrived. I’ve been thinking back, and he was right, I did tell him I didn’t want to see him anymore when I was a teenager. I guess that hurt him.”

  “You were angry because he left you and your mom.”

  “And I never understood why Mom didn’t get angry about it.”

  “Maybe she did and didn’t want to let you see it.”

  Pro paused and looked at the floor in thought. “I think maybe it’s time I talked to her about it.”

  “Might be the right time,” Chu said, and glanced over as Jacobs walked into the room. “Where did he end up, Jacobs?”

  Jacobs moved closer and peered down at Chu and Pro. ”I came by to tell you that he’s in holding cell three, but it was strange, detective.”

  “Strange in what way?” Chu responded.

  “You know how a prisoner turns over all his belongings at the processing desk. Well, all of his pockets were empty: no wallet, no money, only a pair of glasses—said he needs them to read.”

  Pro stood. “Nothing in his pockets? How about a deck of cards?”

  Jacob frowned. “Nothing.”

  Pro looked at the tall officer and her eyes moved to his chest, which showed both of the pockets of his uniform in one unbroken space of very dark blue.

  “Crap, crap, crap,” Pro muttered.

  Chu stared at his partner. “What is it?”

  “C’mon,” Pro pressed urgently and began to move. “We have to check on him, right now.”

  “What?” Chu said, confused but following Pro. “He’s in holding. Where could he go?”

  “It’s Max, dammit. Misdirection,” Pro said as they walked through the hallways quickly.

  “What’d you mean?” Chu wondered. “What does misdirection have to do with him being in holding?”

  “His pants,” Pro said as she picked up the pace.

  “What about them?”

  Pro stopped in the hall near the processing desk. “They had a stripe down them. I didn’t think about it until I looked at Jacobs’ uniform.”

  Chu frowned. “What was wrong with his uniform? He looked fine to me.”

  Pro lowered her voice. “His badge backer was missing.”

  “What?”

  “Sh! His badge backer, the thing that holds his badge, name tag, and citation ribbons.”

  “I know what it is. I was in uniform once.”

  They turned and headed to lockup, where a very heavy steel door waited. An NYPD officer watched the door and had to buzz them in.

  As they stepped into holding, which was in a ‘T’ shape, there was a center corridor with cells on both sides. This went ten feet and split into two passageways, one to the right and one to the left, and more cells. Pro leaned over to peek at the lock on the first barred door.

  “Will you tell me what is going on?” Chu said, annoyed.

  “I’m afraid you’ll see for yourself in less than a minute,” Pro said, her voice tense. She walked up to holding cell number three, which was to the right at the corner where the hallway split.

  It was empty.

  Chu looked in the unoccupied cell. “So, Jacobs got the wrong number.”

  “I’ll wait here. Go and check at the processing desk.”

  Chu shook his head and walked to the locked door which was opened by the officer on the other side. He walked to the processing desk. Behind the counter were monitors with a camera trained on the ten different-sized cells in the holding area.

  “Where did Max Martin end up?” Chu asked the man behind the desk.

  The officer had gray hair and a heavy mustache and seemed to think he was the Latin-lover type with his slicked back hair. “Him?” the man said with a slight accent. “He ended up in a nice solo—holding cell three.”

  “He’s not there,” Chu said.r />
  “Yeah, right,” the man chuckled. “Don’t tell me, he disappeared. Come on, detective, I got work to do.”

  “I’m serious,” Chu said. “The cell is empty.”

  The man’s demeanor changed and he grew serious. He rose from the desk and grabbed a set of keys. “Hey, Tony, I gotta check somethin’.”

  The man stood and came through a nearby door, as Tony took his place at the desk. He joined Chu and the two went down the hall to the locked door and soon stood before the empty cell with Pro.

  The processing desk officer, who wore sergeant stripes and a name tag that read “PALOS,” used his keys to open the door and the three cops stepped into the empty cell.

  “Geez!” Palos said. “I thought you guys were pullin’ my leg.”

  Pro stepped past the befuddled sergeant and went right to the bed that was bolted to the wall. It appeared rumpled, and she quickly pulled it up. Under the mattress she located the brown jacket and the turtleneck Max had been wearing.

  “That guy really was a magician,” Sergeant Palos proclaimed. “He just friggin’ disappeared!”

  8. Book Test

  Within fifteen minutes, a hastily assembled group had been formed that included Pro, Chu, Officer Jacobs, as well as Sergeant Palos. Since there had been such a breach of security, Lieutenant Dunton had also been called in.

  Pro had promised an explanation. She sat in front of the monitors as a man sitting at the computer keyboard replayed several videos from earlier.

  “It was the pants that clued me. I didn’t think anything of it when we picked him up at the crime scene, but once we got him into interrogation, I knew there was something wrong with them. Play the tape of the interrogation,” she said to the man at the keyboard.

  It showed Max talking to Chu.

  “There, freeze it,” Pro said. “Look at his pants. Can you blow that up?”

  The image grew larger.

  “Look at the color. It is a dead-on match for NYPD Blue, the standard issue uniform used all over the city. I don’t know where he got it, maybe went to a uniform store or something. And look at the stripe down the side.”

  “I can barely see it,” the Lieutenant grumbled from the back of the room.

  “It isn’t very obvious, even when a cop is in full uniform,” Pro said. “Now play the video of holding cell three.”

  The image was of the front of the cell, and Max was brought in by Jacobs; Max’s hands were restrained in front of his body with plastic cuffs.

  “Hold it,” Chu said.

  The video stopped moving again.

  “When did those get put on him?” Chu said.

  “When I took him out of interrogation, he was already in them,” Jacobs explained. “I assumed you did it.”

  Pro looked at Chu. “Those must have been the ones from which he’d already escaped. You and I were talking, so neither of us saw him slip them back on. Keep going.”

  On the video, Max turned out as the door was closed and offered his hands. Jacobs pulled a tool from his belt and bent to get close to Max’s hands, restrained by the bars.

  “Hold it,” Pro said. “Zoom in.”

  The photo grew larger, and it was clear that Max’s hands were touching Jacobs’ badge backer.

  “That’s when he lifted the badge and credentials,” Pro explained. “While you were taking the restraints off, he was swiping your badge. Continue!”

  The video began to move again, and Max expertly lowered his hands with the badge and blocked it with his body as Jacobs stood and walked out with the cut restraints. Max walked out of camera view toward where the bed and the open toilet sat.

  “Do we have cameras in that part of the cell?” the lieutenant asked.

  “No, sir,” grumbled the officer at the computer. “That corner cell has limited visuals.”

  “I believe the suspect knew that from the previous day when he had been put in the same cell,” Pro suggested.

  “Great,” the lieutenant said with crossed arms. “So, how did he get out?”

  As the Lieutenant spoke, Max crossed back to the cell door and hung his hands through the bars and hung his head, as if depressed by his state of affairs.

  “Freeze it,” Pro demanded. “Now blow up the area around his hands.”

  The picture grew larger and the hands filled the screen. When looking at the regular image, all you noticed was a man looking sad. But now that the hands were the focus, you could see a slender rod going into the door lock.

  “What is that, what is he doing?” Chu said.

  “He’s picking the lock,” Pro explained, “and he tried to look depressed to draw the attention of anyone watching away from his hands.”

  “But where did he get picks?” Sergeant Palos complained.

  Pro sighed. “I’m guessing, but I would suggest he brought tools in either one or both of the heels of his shoes.”

  “Geez!” Palos barked. “How were we supposed to know that?”

  “Keep going on the video,” Pro said. “I think the answer is that we weren’t expecting this. But Max…Mister Martin…was.”

  On the video, Max stepped away from the door and back into the hidden part of the room.

  “Focus on the door,” Pro told the man at the keyboard. “I believe it was open at this point.”

  The keyboard operator moved the zoom in, and when the image drew closer, you could see that the door was slightly ajar.

  “I’ll be damned,” the lieutenant muttered.

  “Still that doesn’t explain how he got out of there,” Palos noted.

  “We’re coming to that,” Pro said. “Zoom back.”

  The camera view moved to the standard view of the cell. Into the frame and inside the cell came what appeared to be a completely different man. He seemed taller and walked with confidence. The hair was different, black and short, not the slightly longer cut Max wore. But he was in an NYPD uniform, complete with badge, name tag, and badge backer on the left front of the shirt and NYPD patches on both arms.

  The man walked to the door, opened it, and stepped into the hall, where you could now see a pair of glasses on his face. Between the glasses and the hair, it didn’t look like Max Martin, aka Max Marvell, at all.

  “Move the view to the outer door, same time frame,” Pro said.

  The monitor switched view, and the man stepped to the door. The officer on the other side glanced over and opened it. The disguised Max stepped out of camera view.

  “So the bastard disguised himself as an NYPD officer?” Lieutenant Dunton snapped. “So was that how he got out? He just traipsed out of here?”

  Pro’s jaw tightened. “I think so, LT. My supposition is that he wore a shirt with NYPD patches on the arms under his turtleneck. Once he pinched Officer Jacobs’ badge backer, it was all he needed to look like a cop. You noticed he wore a wig. I can only assume he hid it in the lining of the jacket or in the small of his back. No metal detector would have been set off by it.”

  The lieutenant rose first. “Okay, first thing. The information that he escaped and how he did it does not leave this room!”

  There was a murmur of agreement by the other officers.

  “Christ!” Dunton went on. “If this gets out to the press, we are going to be a laughing stock and Internal Affairs will be all over our ass!”

  “Yes, sir,” Sergeant Palos said from his seat. “Should we issue an APB?”

  “That goes without saying,” Dunton snarled. “The all-points bulletin should include that he might be disguised as a police officer.”

  “Sir, that won’t be necessary,” Pro said. “I think he will dump the disguise as soon as possible.”

  “Include that anyway,” Dunton demanded. “Now, Pro, I heard a rumor that this guy is your father. Is that correct, detective?”

  “My biological father, sir, yes,” Pro responded.

  “Well, if you get word to him, by whatever means, you tell him to surrender himself…and quickly, or he is going to be in a cell
for a very long time. We have resisting arrest, impersonating a police officer, assaulting a police officer—”

  “He didn’t assault me, LT,” Jacobs said defensively.

  “Shut up, Jacobs,” Dunton ordered. “He stole your badge! You better pray I don’t have you walking a beat for the next ten years.”

  “Yes, sir,” Jacobs muttered sullenly.

  The lieutenant turned back to Pro and Chu. “And I think personal feelings are getting in the way of you two doing your job.”

  “Sir, it’s my fault,” Pro said. “I wasn’t as diligent as I should have been—”

  “Put a sock in it, detective,” Dunton roared. “I’ll give you two forty-eight hours to solve these murders and capture that second-rate magician—”

  “LT, Max Marvell is not a second-rate magician, sir,” Pro objected. “That’s why he fooled an entire precinct of officers.”

  Dunton’s face became an unhealthy shade of red. “Just find him!” he hissed through clenched teeth, then stormed out of the room.

  The meeting broke up, and Pro and Chu headed back to the bullpen.

  “Tom, I am so sorry…”

  “Why? You didn’t know he was going to do this.” He stopped and looked at her. “I mean, you didn’t, did you?”

  “No,” Pro vowed, “and I can’t figure out where he would have gotten NYPD arm patches. You can’t just go into a store and ask for them.”

  “I have no idea. But we’d better catch Max—and fast. He’s now a fugitive, and if someone is a little too trigger-happy, it could end badly.”

  Pro stopped walking, her face frozen in realization.

  “What?” Chu asked, surprised by the look on her face.

  “Mom!”

  “What?”

  “I have to call my mother,” Pro said and moved away from her partner.

  “Ask if she’s seen Max, will you?”

  Pro walked to a quieter corner of the precinct and pulled out her cell phone and hit the memorized number. Elisha picked up on the first ring.

  “Mom, it’s Pro.”

  “Yes, dear. Are you coming for dinner?”

  “What? No, no,” Pro said, remembering that Saturday night was typically dinner with her mom. “Have you heard from Max?”