The Squad Room

by John Cutter

  “I don’t know, I guess I might have been.”

  “That’s a pretty nice car you have,” Kasak said, changing topic.

  “Damn right it is,” Rutherford said under his breath.

  “I’m sorry?”

  Rutherford smirked. “I said yes, it is.”

  “How long have you had it?”

  “Couple of years now.”

  “Got it new?”

  “Of course. You think I’m buying used?”

  “Does anyone else ever use it, besides you?”

  “What are you, crazy? No one touches my things. That’s why they’re mine.”

  “I see,” said Kasak. “So when you visit the city, where do you go?”

  “I don’t know—we just tool around looking for cool things to do.”

  “‘We’? Who’s we?”

  “Myself and Brian Anderson, the guy you have in the next room.”

  “How long have you two been friends?”

  “As long as I can remember, pretty much.”

  “And do you often visit the city together?”

  “Whenever I’m there, I’m there with him.”

  “But you don’t let him use your car.”

  Rutherford gave a little laugh. “Like I said, Detective, he’s always with me. He never needs to use my car, because I’m the one driving us. Aren’t you listening?”

  Kasak returned his smile, striving to keep down his disgust. This kid was going to be tricky.

  “All right,” he said evenly. “Fair enough. Let’s talk a little about the places you’ve visited in the city, shall we?”

  Bill Morrison watched with concern through the two-way mirror of the interview room. It had been an hour already, and Rutherford hadn’t slipped up once—a fact that was obviously beginning to wear on his interviewers’ composure. The pace of the interview had accelerated noticeably, and particularly with Marchioni, it was starting to look as though the Coke Brothers’ old-school patience was about to give way to their old-school ruthlessness.

  Morrison cursed under his breath. Why hadn’t he had Medveded do this guy? He’d known Rutherford was going to be more difficult to break; what the hell had he been thinking? Alex had the patience to play cat-and-mouse for hours; Leo and Mike—as good as they were—were more likely to lose it with this rich punk and his attitude. He’d have to keep a careful eye on things; if Kasak and Marchioni got too aggressive, Rutherford could shut down and ask for a lawyer.

  Kasak had had a folder sitting in front of him through the whole interview so far, which several times had attracted Rutherford’s eye. Now Kasak opened it, taking out a few photos and placing them on the desk in front of Rutherford.

  The first was of Abigail Johnson, the woman from Jamaica Estates. It wasn’t a crime-scene photo, but one taken from her home, showing her before she’d ever met her killers.

  Rutherford looked at the photo for a long moment before shaking his head.

  “Nope, never seen her,” he said flippantly.

  Kasak placed additional photos on the table—of Victoria Adams, the woman from Sutton Place, Jennifer Burnett from 63rd Street, and Giovanna Palmiere from Park Avenue South. All of them were beautiful women, with bright, sunny smiles. Both detectives noticed that Rutherford barely glanced at the last photo before he answered again.

  “Sorry to disappoint you,” he said. “I don’t know any of these broads.”

  Marchioni had had enough. Slapping his notebook face-down on the table, he picked up the folder and drew out a few more photo-graphs—this time crime-scene pictures of the same women after their gruesome murders. He spread them out unceremoniously in front of Rutherford.

  “Maybe this’ll help you remember them, you fucking animal,” he snarled. “This is how you last saw them, after you had your fun.”

  Rutherford stared back at him, the smile gone from his lips but still dancing maddeningly in his eyes.

  “I’m sorry, Detective,” he said. “I really don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “The fuck you don’t!” Marchioni shouted, slamming his palm down on the table. Kasak looked over at his partner with a silent warning, but Marchioni was too pissed off to notice it. He gestured at the pictures in disgust. “You know, you must be one sick motherfucker to do that. Real sick. And you think you’re getting away with it?”

  “This conversation is starting to bore me,” Rutherford said evenly. “If you aren’t going to put me under arrest, I think I’m—”

  He was cut off by the noise of the interrogation-room door swinging open. Morrison leaned in to talk to the two detectives.

  “Can I speak to you both outside for a moment?” he asked in a stern tone.

  Kasak and Marchioni stood stiffly and walked out. Morrison had hoped Rutherford’s ego would be flattered enough by this display of internal conflict that he’d stick around for the next round, and it was. Rutherford leaned back in his chair, smiling triumphantly.

  “See you later, suckers,” he scoffed.

  Marchioni turned back toward him with a murderous look in his eyes. Morrison grabbed his arm.

  “Mike, that’s enough,” he said, pulling the door shut behind them.

  “Wish I had a goddamn bottle of Coke right now,” Marchioni grumbled.

  25

  Detective Tina Koreski opened the door and went in.

  Rutherford was holding the photos of the victims, flipping through them nonchalantly in an apparent effort to show indifference toward whoever was here to speak to him.

  “Like what you see?” she asked as she sat.

  Now he looked up, startled for a moment by the feminine voice. In an instant he’d recovered, and gave her the elevator eyes.

  “I do, now that you’re here,” he said cockily.

  She smiled coyly, beginning to gather up the crime scene photos in a distracted way. “I’m flattered; I don’t normally appeal to everyone’s taste.”

  “Yeah, well, my taste isn’t everyone’s.”

  She didn’t follow up with the obvious question, but held his eyes for just a moment, long enough to make him think his comment had interested her in a decidedly non-professional way.

  “Adam,” she said, appearing to brush off whatever thought had been going through her mind, “I want to apologize for the behavior of my colleagues. That wasn’t how this was supposed to go; this is meant to be a friendly conversation.”

  “I’m glad they sent in somebody friendlier, then,” he said, not taking his eyes off her.

  She looked up at him again, pretending to be momentarily mesmerized by his charms.

  “Well,” she said more slowly, “I think they maybe just don’t understand people like you—”

  “What do you mean?” he interrupted.

  “Well, just someone with it all: I mean, you have money, and power, and looks”—she appeared to catch herself in a smile—“I mean, most of the people we talk to aren’t, uh, quite so—”

  “I get it,” he said, smiling. This was obviously what he was used to: insecure girls who stroked his ego and went weak in the knees when he paid them any attention. “Well, it’s nice to meet you, Miss—”

  “Tina,” she blurted out; then seemed to recover. “Koreski. Tina Koreski.”

  “Tina,” he said. “Lovely to meet you. You seem so young to be doing this, Tina.”

  To cover her repulsion, she giggled a little and looked away, playing with her hair. “I mean, I guess,” she said. “This is sort of a trial run for me—”

  “A trial run?”

  “Yeah, I guess so.”

  He looked at her warily. “Doesn’t sound like they’re taking this very seriously.”

  “Well, I mean, it’s not like you’re under arrest or anything. Then it’d be different. And besides—” She faltered a bit, then gave a What the hell kind of laugh. “I sort of asked.”

  He smiled again, and she knew his ego was hooked.

  “Okay, Tina,” he said, giving her the up-and-down again. “
Is it Officer Tina?”

  “Detective,” she said.

  “Wow, okay—Detective.” He raised his eyebrows. “Does that mean you still carry handcuffs?”

  “Of course,” she laughed, then lowered her voice as she met his eyes again. “Day and night.”

  “All right then, Detective Tina,” he said, “what do you want to talk to me about?”

  She appeared to shake herself back to the job at hand. “Well, right now,” she said with a breath, “these women.” She nodded toward the pictures left on the table.

  “Ugh, these bitches again,” he said languidly. “Well, go ahead.”

  “Bitches?”

  He sighed, catching himself. “They just look like bitches, is all; the type of women I’ve met a million of. That type of women, they never get me. Not many of them do, though—not like you seem to.” He smiled again, obviously used to this sort of thing working.

  She smiled back. “Well, if you had to pick one of them out as most attractive, which would it be?”

  He laughed. “What kind of a question is that?”

  “Just answer it,” she said with a flirty laugh.

  He looked at the photos again and picked up victim number four, Giovanna Palmiere.

  “I don’t know about most attractive, but I can tell you, this one sure isn’t my speed.” He tossed the photo aside.

  “All right, down to three, then. Which one?”

  “I don’t know; they’re all pretty much the same to me.”

  “Seriously? You’re telling me you don’t find any of them more attractive than the others? Don’t you have a type?”

  He laughed, thinking he’d drawn her out. “Not in these photos,” he said; then added, “in this room, maybe.” Thinking he’d made her speechless with so brazen a come-on, he let it hang for a moment before going on. “To be honest with you, they all look like nasty, snobby bitches to me. I wouldn’t kick them out of bed, but none of them really do it for me.”

  “All right,” she said. “I mean, you have to admit, they’re beautiful women.”

  “Sure, they’re fine,” he said. “That shirt you’re wearing is doing more for me right now, though.”

  She looked down, acting surprised, and went to button the top buttons.

  “No, no,” he said, “leave ’em. You look great.”

  She pretended to be flattered and sat up straight again, leaving the buttons undone. This guy was going to be putty in her hands.

  “Let’s talk about something else,” she said coyly. “What do you like to do when you come to the city?”

  Morrison and the Coke Brothers watched from the other side of the two-way mirror. None of them could believe what was happening. Certainly none of them would be capable of interrogating anyone in this fashion. Yet they were all impressed. Unorthodox as it was, Tina’s improvised method had already brought out a few very interesting statements from Adam Rutherford—including an offhand mention of 63rd Street as a place where he’d parked his car, and an admission that he’d been to Jamaica Estates, apparently to visit a friend whose last name and address he couldn’t recall—and through it all, she hadn’t missed a beat. Better still, despite her traumatic past, even Rutherford’s most insulting comments and egregious pick-up lines had failed to throw her off or make her visibly uncomfortable; she’d somehow managed to weave them seamlessly into the increasing flirtation between them. And after hours of it, she still showed no sign of slowing.

  “So, can you remember the last time you were in Manhattan?” she was now asking.

  “Oh, I can’t remember the exact date, but it was a Wednesday.”

  “Can you remember roughly the date range?”

  “January—somewhere between the second and the tenth.”

  “Did you come alone?”

  “No, Brian came with me.”

  This statement put both of them in the city during homicide number three. Tina brushed over it with a flirtation. “No lady friends?”

  Rutherford bit. “None that I can remember.”

  “Good,” she said faux-self-consciously. “And how about before that—do you remember when you were there last?”

  “We were in around Christmastime.”

  “Do you remember what days, specifically?”

  “Let’s see: we came down just before the twenty-fifth, and were there for a couple of days.”

  Another bingo. This put both of them in the city during the Sutton Place and Jamaica Estates murders. The guy wasn’t getting any less cocky, that was for sure. Koreski remembered from her training that a lot of serial killers believed they were smarter than the police—or anyone else, for that matter—and often derived enjoyment even from getting caught, in that they were able to push the envelope with their adversaries just a little more.

  “How about after that last time in January—did you visit the city after that?”

  “No, that was the last time we were there.”

  She noticed that he was looking again at the pictures spread out on the table, including the more gruesome crime-scene photos. It wasn’t lost on her that he invariably spent more time looking at those pictures than at the ones taken of the victims before they were killed. It seemed to her the appropriate time to start giving him some hardball questions—they’d just have to be gone about very delicately.

  “Tina,” he said, interrupting her train of thought, “I need to use the men’s room, if that’s all right with you.”

  “Of course,” she smiled. “I’ll have someone escort you.”

  “You could always escort me yourself,” he suggested with a sleazy smile. “You know, hold it for me.”

  She laughed lightly, looking down in an effort to appear charmed. “I’d love to, but I don’t think my boss would appreciate that,” she said. “Just give me a sec; I’ll grab someone for you.”

  She stepped out to ask two of the BPD detectives to escort him. When they’d brought him to the restroom, Morrison emerged from the next room where he’d been watching the interrogation, and called her out into the hallway.

  “Tina, you’re doing great in there,” he said quietly. “Thanks, Cap—that means a lot, coming from you.”

  “Forget me,” he chuckled. “Kasak and Marchioni can’t stop talking about how well you’re working this guy.”

  Koreski smiled. “For real?”

  “No bullshit. They’ll probably never tell you, but I wanted to let you know. You’re gaining some serious points. And by the way,” he added, “here’s some news that might help you. Medveded got the other guy to confess to everything—including a homicide in La Jolla, California, months before they started their killing spree out here.”

  “Are you kidding me? California?”

  “Yeah. We already spoke to San Diego PD, and everything Brian told us matches one of their unsolved homicides to the letter.”

  “Unbelievable. I’ll definitely use that—thanks, Cap. I’d better get back in there.”

  “Yeah, go ahead. Keep up the good work, Detective!”

  She went back into the room and waited for Rutherford to be brought back in. La Jolla, California—! She’d have to be careful with how she played that particular hand, but it was undoubtedly information she could use.

  After a much longer interval than she’d expected, Rutherford reentered the room, and the two detectives closed the door behind him.

  “You know, I missed you in there, Tina,” he said in an oily voice when he’d sat. “It wasn’t the same without you. You should’ve come with me.”

  He winked as this last emphasis passed his lips, and a sudden lightheadedness came over Detective Koreski. Where had she heard that before—? At once it hit her. That filthy hotel room. They were the very words he’d said to her, that fat, disgusting pig from Scarsdale, as he pressed his weight down on her, the cheap bedcovers scratching against her face…

  With an effort, she snapped back to the present.

  “Listen,” she said, striving to keep the flirtatious edg
e in her voice, “All jokes aside, I have to ask you something.”

  “No jokes here,” he said, still smiling. “Go ahead, Tina.”

  “You’ve said these women look like bitches, and I believe it,” she said, lowering her voice to a whisper. “Based on our time together today, I think I see what the problem was.”

  “Yeah? And what’s that?”

  “You’re not a man to be disrespected, and they disrespected you.”

  Adam Rutherford sat stock-still, the smile still hovering on his face in an eerie mask of self-satisfaction.

  “Now look, this is between us,” she went on. “When you went to the bathroom I told them we were done. I’m supposed to be finishing up with you now. Just tell me, because I need to know: am I understanding you right? Just yes or no; you don’t have to say anything.”

  After what seemed an eternity, he gave just the quickest hint of a nod. She moved her chair closer to him. “I knew I did,” she said quickly, as though in a rush of excitement. “I felt it when you came in. You’re not a man to be fucked with, are you, Adam?”

  “No, I’m not,” he said, the smile unmoving.

  “No, it’s obvious,” she said. “I almost wish I’d been there, for—but we don’t have to talk about that, if you don’t—”

  “They didn’t know what hit ’em,” he whispered proudly, his eyes gleaming.

  She was almost too shocked to respond. Fortunately, the energy of her performance kept her going.

  “Of course they didn’t, the stupid bitches,” she said with a little laugh. “They didn’t know the first thing about a man—what you do, what you need.”

  “Are you saying you do?” he asked.

  “Come on, Adam,” she said, her voice sultry. “Of course I do. I know all sorts of things men need.”

  “Yeah? Big words, Tina.”

  “When we get out of here, I’ll show you. I do know how to find you, you know.”

  “Yeah, I bet you do,” he smirked. “Crazy little bitch, aren’t you?”

  “The craziest,” she said. “Bet you didn’t think some of us were cops, huh?”

  “No, I know some of you are,” he said. “I’ve got first-hand experience.”