The Kill Room

by Jeffery Deaver

  He's had emotional issues. Anger primarily...

  "Hey, chill a bit, all right?" Sellitto said. "If we wanted to arrest you, Metzger, you'd be arrested. Listen to the man. Jesus."

  Rhyme recalled, with affection, the days when they had been partnered--Sellitto's, not his own, artificial verb. Their technique wasn't good cop/bad cop. But rather smooth cop/rough cop.

  Metzger calmed. "Then what...?" He reached into his drawer.

  Rhyme noted Sachs stiffen slightly, hand dipping toward her weapon. But the NIOS head withdrew only nail clippers. Then he set them down without clipping.

  Sellitto deferred to Rhyme with a nod.

  "Now, we have a situation that needs to be...resolved. Your organization issued a Special Task Order."

  "I don't know what you're talking about."

  "Please." Rhyme lifted an impatient hand. "An STO against a man who appears to have been innocent. But that's between you, your conscience and--presumably--some rather difficult congressional hearings. That's not our business. We're here because we need to find somebody who's been killing witnesses involved in the Moreno situation. And--"

  "If you're suggesting that NIOS--"

  "Called in a specialist?" Sachs said.

  Metzger flickered again. He'd have to be wondering, How did they know that term? How did they know any of this? He sputtered, "I did not and never have ordered anyone to do that."

  Spoken in bureaucratic euphemism.

  To do that...

  Sellitto barked, "Look at your wrists, Metzger. Look. You in cuffs? I don't see any cuffs. You see any cuffs?"

  Rhyme continued, "We know it was somebody else. And that's why we're here. We need you to help us find him."

  "Help you?" Metzger replied with a momentary smile. "And why on earth should I help people who are trying to bring down an important department of the government? A department that does vital work keeping citizens safe from our enemies?"

  Rhyme offered a sardonic gaze and even the NIOS director seemed to realize the rhetoric was over the top.

  "Why should you help?" Rhyme echoed. "Two reasons leap into my mind. First, so you don't go down for obstruction of justice. You mounted a campaign to stop the investigation. You tracked down Moreno's citizenship renunciation, presumably pulling strings at the State Department. It'd be interesting to see if you followed proper channels for that. We're sure you had Barry Shales, NIOS staff and contractors that you do business with destroy evidence of the STO drone program, you dug up dirt on the investigators. You hacked phones, intercepted emails, borrowed signal information from your friends in Langley and Fort Meade."

  Sachs said in a gritty voice, "You stole personal medical records."

  She and Rhyme had discussed how Captain Bill Myers had gotten from her orthopedist the files about her condition. They concluded that somebody at NIOS had hacked the records and sent them to Sachs's superiors.

  Metzger looked down. A silent confirmation.

  "And the second reason to help us? You and NIOS got set up--to murder somebody. And we're the only ones who can help you nail the perp."

  Rhyme had Metzger's full attention now.

  "What are you saying happened?"

  Rhyme replied, "I've heard some people suggest that you're using this job to kill whoever you think is unpatriotic or anti-American. I don't think so. I think you really believed Moreno was a threat--because somebody wanted you to think that and leaked phony intelligence to you. So you'd issue an STO and take him out. And that would give the real perp a chance to murder the real intended victim."

  Metzger looked off for a moment. "Sure! Moreno gets shot, the others in the room are stunned, scared. The perp slips inside and kills the man he's really after. De la Rua, the reporter. He was writing an expose, corruption or something, and somebody wanted him dead."

  "No, no, no," Rhyme said, though he then conceded, "All right. I thought the same thing at first. But then I realized that was wrong." This was delivered as a confession. In fact, he was still irritated he'd jumped to the conclusion about the reporter without considering all the facts.

  "Then who...?" Metzger lifted his hands, confused.

  Amelia Sachs provided the answer. "Simon Flores, Moreno's bodyguard. He was the target all along."

  CHAPTER 85

  DE LA RUA WAS A FEATURE WRITER for a business publication," Rhyme explained. "We looked over all his recent articles and found out what he was working on. Human-interest stories, business analysis, economics, investment. No investigative reporting, no exposes. Nothing controversial."

  As for the reporter's personal life, well, Pulaski had found nothing that might motivate a killer to take him out. He wasn't involved in shady business dealings or criminal activities, had no enemies and hadn't engaged in any personal moral lapses--there was no controversy about whom he was sleeping with (apparently only his wife of twenty-three years).

  "So when I didn't find a motive," Rhyme continued, "I had to ask what was curious? I went back to the evidence. And a few minutes later something jumped out. Or, I should say, the absence of something jumped out. The bodyguard's missing watch, which was stolen after the shooting. It was a Rolex. The fact of the theft was unremarkable. But why would a bodyguard be wearing a five-thousand-dollar watch?"

  Metzger looked blank.

  "His boss, Robert Moreno, wasn't rich; he was an activist and journalist. He was probably pretty generous with his workers but paying enough of a salary for any of them to buy a Rolex? I didn't think so. A half hour ago I had our FBI contact profile the guard. Flores had accounts worth six million dollars in banks around the Caribbean. Every month he got fifty thousand cash from an anonymous numbered account in the Caymans."

  Metzger's eyes flashed. "The guard was blackmailing someone."

  You didn't get to be head of a group like NIOS without being sharp but this was a particularly good deduction.

  Rhyme nodded, with a smile. "I think that's right. I remembered that the day of the attack at the South Cove Inn, there was another murder in the Nassau. A lawyer. My Bahamian police contact gave me the lawyer's client list."

  Metzger said, "The guard was one of the lawyer's clients, of course. The guard--Flores--left the incriminating information with the attorney for safekeeping. But the man being blackmailed got tired of paying or ran out of money and called up a hit man--this specialist--to kill the guard, kill the lawyer and steal the information, destroy it."

  "Exactly. The lawyer's office was ransacked and looted after he died."

  Sellitto cast a wry glance at Metzger. "He's good, Linc. He oughta be a spy."

  The director regarded the detective coolly, then continued, "Any ideas on how to find out who was being blackmailed?"

  Sachs asked, "Who sent you the fake intel about Moreno, that he was planning the attack on American Petroleum Drilling and Refining?"

  Metzger leaned back, eyes sweeping the ceiling. "I can't tell you specifically. It's classified. Only that they were intelligence assets in Latin America--ours and another U.S. security organization. Trusted assets."

  Rhyme suggested, "Could somebody have leaked bad intel to them and they sent it to you?"

  The doubtful look faded. "Yes, somebody who knew how the intelligence community worked, somebody with contacts." Metzger's jaw trembled alarmingly again. How fast he switched from calm to enraged. It was unsettling. "But how do we find him?"

  "I've been considering that," Rhyme said. "And I think the key is the whistleblower, the person who leaked the STO."

  Metzger grimaced. "The traitor."

  "What have you been doing to find him?"

  "Searching for him day and night," the man said ruefully. "But no luck. We've cleared everybody here with access to the STO. My personal assistant had the last polygraph appointment. She has..." He hesitated. "...reason to be unhappy with the government. But she passed. There are still a few people in Washington we have to check out. Has to have come from there, we're thinking. Maybe a military base." />
  "Homestead?"

  A pause. "I can't say."

  Rhyme asked, "Who was in charge of the internal investigation?"

  "My administrations director, Spencer Boston." A pause, as he regarded Rhyme's piercing gaze, then looked down briefly. "He's not a suspect. How could he be? What does he have to gain? Besides, he passed the test."

  Sachs: "Who is he exactly? What's his background?"

  "Spencer's former military, decorated, former CIA--mostly active in Central America. They called him the 'regime change expert.'"

  Sellitto looked at Rhyme. "Remember why Robert Moreno turned anti-American? The U.S. invasion of Panama. His best friend was killed."

  Rhyme didn't respond but, his mind's eye scanning the evidence charts, asked the NIOS director, "So this Boston would have training in beating polygraphs."

  "I suppose technically. But--"

  "Does he drink tea? And use Splenda? Oh, and does he have a cheap blue suit that's a shade lighter than tasteful?"

  Metzger stared. After a moment: "He drinks herbal tea because of his ulcers--"

  "Ah, stomach problems." Rhyme glanced at Sachs. She nodded in return.

  "With some kind of sweetener, never sugar."

  "And his suits?"

  Metzger sighed. "He shops at Sears. And, yes, for some reason he likes this weird shade of blue. I never understood that."

  CHAPTER 86

  NICE HOUSE," RON PULASKI SAID.

  "Is." Sachs was looking around, a little distracted.

  "So this is what? Glen Cove?"

  "Or Oyster Bay. They kind of run together."

  The North Shore of Long Island was a patchwork of small communities, hillier and more tree-filled than the South. Sachs didn't know the area well. She'd been here on a case involving a Chinese snakehead--a human trafficker--a few years ago. And before that she remembered a police pursuit along some of the winding roads. The chase hadn't lasted long; sixteen-year-old Amelia had easily evaded the Nassau County police, after they'd broken up an illegal drag race near Garden City (she had won, beating a Dodge hands down).

  "You nervous?" Pulaski asked.

  "Yeah. Always before a take-down. Always."

  Amelia Sachs felt if you weren't on edge at a time like that, something was wrong.

  On the other hand, ever since the arrest was blessed by Lon Sellitto and, above him, Captain Myers, Sachs hadn't once worried her flesh, picked at a nail or--this was odd--felt a throb from her hip or knee.

  They were dressed quasi-tactically in body armor and black caps but wore just their sidearms.

  They were now approaching Spencer Boston's residence.

  An hour ago Shreve Metzger and Rhyme had come up with a plan for the take-down. Metzger had told his Administrations Director Boston that there were going to be hearings about the Moreno STO screwup. He wanted to use a private residence to meet with the NIOS lawyers; could they use Boston's house and could he send his family off for the day?

  Boston had agreed and headed up here immediately.

  As Sachs and Pulaski approached the large Colonial they paused, looking around the trim lawns, surrounding woods, molded shrubbery and gardens lovingly, almost compulsively, tended.

  The young officer was breathing even more rapidly now.

  You nervous?...

  Sachs noted that he was absently rubbing a scar on his forehead. It was the legacy of a blow delivered by a perp on the first case they'd worked together, a few years ago. The head injury had been severe and he'd nearly given up policing altogether because of the incident--which would have devastated him; policing was a core part of his psyche and bound him closely to his twin brother, also a cop. But thanks largely to the encouragement and example of Lincoln Rhyme he'd gone through extensive rehab and decided to remain on the force.

  But the injury had been bad and Sachs knew that the post-traumatic stress continued to snipe.

  Can I handle it? Will I fold under pressure?

  She knew the double-tap answers to those questions were, in staccato order, yes and no. She smiled. "Let's go bust a bad guy."

  "Deal."

  They made their way quickly to the door, bracketing it, hands near but not touching their weapons.

  She nodded.

  Pulaski rapped. "NYPD. Open the door!"

  Sounds from inside.

  "What?" came the voice. "Who is that?"

  The young officer persisted. "NYPD! Open the door or we'll enter."

  Again from inside: "Jesus."

  A moment passed. Plenty long enough for Boston to grab a pistol. Though their calculations were that he would not do so.

  The red wooden door opened and the distinguished, gray-haired man peered out through the screen. He absently stroked the most prominent crease in his dry, creased face.

  "Let me see your hands, Mr. Boston."

  He lifted them, sighing. "That's why Shreve called me. There's no meeting, is there?"

  Sachs and Pulaski pushed inside and she closed the door.

  The man brushed a hand through his luxuriant hair then remembered he should be keeping them in view. He stepped back, making clear he was no threat.

  "Are you alone?" she asked. "Your family?"

  "I'm alone."

  Sachs did a fast sweep of the house while Pulaski stayed with the whistleblower.

  When she returned Boston said, "What's this all about?" He tried to be indignant but it wasn't working. He knew why they were here.

  "Leaking the STO to the DA's Office. We checked flight records. You were on vacation in Maine on the eleventh of May but you flew back to New York in the morning. You went to the Java Hut with your iBook. Uploaded the scan of the kill order to the DA. And flew back that afternoon." She added details about tracing the email, the tea and Splenda and the blue suit. Then: "Why? Why did you leak it?"

  The man sat back on the couch. He slowly reached into his pocket, extracted and clumsily ripped open a pack of antacid tablets. He chewed them.

  Reminiscent of her Advil.

  Sachs sat across from him: Pulaski walked to the windows and looked out over the manicured lawn.

  Boston was frowning. "If I'm going to be prosecuted it'll be under the Espionage Act. That's federal. You're state. Why did you come?"

  "There are state law implications," she answered, intentionally vague. "Now tell me. Why'd you leak the STO kill order? Because you thought it was the moral thing to do, telling the world that your organization was killing U.S. citizens?"

  He gave a laugh that was untidy with bitterness. "Do you think anybody really cares about that? It didn't hurt Obama to take out al-Awlaki? Everybody thinks it's the right thing to do--everybody except your prosecutor."

  "And?" she asked.

  He rested his face in his hands for a moment. "You're young. Both of you. You wouldn't understand."

  "Tell me," Sachs persisted.

  Boston looked up with burning eyes. "I've been at NIOS from the beginning, from the day it was formed. I was army intelligence, I was CIA. I was on the ground running assets when Shreve Metzger was having keg parties in Cambridge and New Haven. I was key in our resisting the Pink Revolution--the socialists in the nineties and oughts. Hugo Chavez in Venezuela, Lula in Brazil, Nestor Kirchner in Argentina, Vazquez in Uruguay, Evo Morales in Bolivia." He regarded Sachs coldly. "Do you even know who those people are?"

  He didn't seem to expect an answer. "I orchestrated two regime changes in Central America and one in South. Drinking in shitty bars, bribing journalists, sucking up to mid-level politicos in Caracas and BA. Going to the funerals when my assets got accidentally on purpose killed in a hit-and-run, and nobody could know what a hero they'd been. Begging Washington for money, cutting deals with the boys from London and Madrid and Tokyo...And when it came time for a new director at NIOS, who'd they pick? Shreve Metzger, a fucking kid with a bad temper. It should've been me. I've earned it! I deserve it!"

  "So when you realized Shreve had made the mistake with Moreno you decided
to use that to bring him down. You leaked the kill order and the intel. You expected you'd be his replacement."

  He muttered angrily, "I could run the place a hundred times better than he could."

  Pulaski asked, "How'd you beat the polygraph?"

  "Oh, that's tradecraft one-oh-one. See! That's my point. This business isn't about pushing buttons and playing computer games." He sat back. "Oh, hell, just arrest me and have done with it."

  CHAPTER 87

  SCANNING," THE VOICE HISSED through an earbud. "No transmissions, no signals."

  The whispering probably wasn't necessary. The men were in a wooded area well out of earshot of anyone in Spencer Boston's house.

  "Roger that," Jacob Swann acknowledged, thinking the phrase sounded somewhat ridiculous.

  No transmissions, no signals. This was good news. If there had been other officers around to back up Boston's arrest, the chatter would have shown up on Bartlett's scanner. Bartlett, a mercenary, was as dull as a slug but he knew his equipment and could find a microwave or radio transmission inside a lead box.

  "Any visuals?"

  "No, they came alone. The woman detective--Sachs--and the uniform with her."

  Made sense, Swann reflected, only these two and no backup. Boston was a whistleblower and possibly a traitor but he wasn't dangerous in the resisting-arrest sense. He'd kill you with a Hellfire in Yemen or ruin your political career by planting rumors that you were gay in an ardently Catholic South American country. But he probably didn't even own a gun; two NYPD cops would be plenty to bring him in.

  Swann moved in closer, through the woods to the side of Boston's house, keeping clear of the windows.

  He now checked his Glock, which was mounted with a suppressor, and the extra mags, inverted, in his left cargo pants pocket. On his utility belt, of course, his Kai Shun chef's knife. He pulled down his black Nomex tactical face mask.

  Nearby a commercial tree service was chipping a tree they'd just taken down. The roar and grind were loud. Jacob Swann was grateful for the noise. It would cover the sound of the assault; while he and his team had sound suppressors, it wasn't inconceivable that one of the cops inside might get off a shot before they died. He transmitted, "Advise."

  "Position," Bartlett said, and the same message was delivered a moment later by the other member of the team, a broad-shouldered Asian American named Xu, whose only substantive comment since they'd rendezvoused had been to correct Jacob Swann's pronunciation of his name.