Kill Again

by Neal Baer

  Nick gazed up and down the block of converted tenements, having to move his head and body more than he was used to so he could see everything. He felt an uneasiness coming over him that grew stronger by the second. “I don’t get it,” he said.

  “Get what?” Wilkes asked.

  “He could’ve scattered the bones in those woods on Staten Island and it would’ve taken weeks of grid searching to find them, if we ever did. Instead, he dumps them in a garbage can in broad daylight, on a street three blocks from Yankee Stadium in a neighborhood with more cameras than a busload of Japanese tourists.”

  Dolan turned his head as if to find the cameras of which Nick spoke, and three caught his eye. “He’s got stones, whoever this psycho is,” said the chief. “ME needs to rush the DNA.”

  “They gotta extract DNA from the bones first before they can process it,” Wilkes replied glumly. “We’re not gonna have a positive ID on those bones for a month.”

  “We don’t have a month,” Dolan shot back. “We have until someone leaks word that the bones are Rosa Sanchez’s. Someone’s gonna remember the cases from seventy-seven, the media’s gonna get hold of it, and folks are gonna panic that a serial killer we didn’t catch thirty years ago is back.”

  He turned to Nick. “Until we positively ID those bones as Rosa Sanchez’s, not a word of this to your Doctor Waters. We clear?”

  “Yes, sir,” Nick answered.

  “Good,” Dolan said, sounding almost dismissive. “You’ve been a big help. Escort the two sanitation guys downtown in the radio car and up to Major Case. You don’t need to ask them any questions. Inspector Wilkes’ll have his guys take over from there.”

  “That’s it?” Nick asked, unable to keep his disappointment to himself. He was being sidelined again.

  But Dolan was done with Nick and turned to Wilkes. “MCS will handle this as a kidnap-murder,” he said. “Choose five detectives you trust and set them up in a spare office. Tony Savarese will run them. We need to keep this as contained as possible.”

  Realizing Nick was still standing there, he grew cold. “You have your orders,” the chief said, “and this time you’ll obey them. I’ll see you at your desk when I get back to the office.”

  Nick walked away before he said something he’d regret. He removed his shield from around his neck and climbed into the front seat of the radio car. The two sanitation workers were already settled in the rear. He couldn’t understand why Dolan had humiliated him in front of Wilkes, but had no problem at all understanding why he’d been dismissed. Dolan valued loyalty and trust above all else. This was Nick’s payback for breaking his deal with the chief.

  The problem, though, was that Nick Lawler never started a job he didn’t finish. As he tuned out the blaring siren and stared out the windshield while the radio car weaved through traffic, he vowed to himself he wouldn’t let this be the first time.

  And once again, that would require disobeying the chief’s direct orders.

  Claire sat in a booth in the back of the Chelsea Diner, a stainless-steel-clad structure that looked like a dining car of old, and sipped her black coffee, recoiling as it burned her tongue. She gazed out the window onto Tenth Avenue, now nearly empty of traffic at eleven o’clock at night, and wondered why Nick hadn’t answered his phone all afternoon. He’d finally called back three hours ago, saying he couldn’t talk where he was and arranging to meet at the diner. But all those hours with no news had left her in a downright panic about Rosa’s well-being.

  She took in the nearly empty diner as a waitress filled the salt shakers and ketchup bottles to prepare for the next day. Claire thought of the last time she and Nick were here together, glad that at least now it wasn’t her life in danger but still aching to know what had happened to Rosa.

  She was just reaching into her purse to pull out her phone when she heard the door squeak open. Looking up, she saw Nick enter, his face indicating he’d been through hell—and, if that weren’t enough, he had his night-vision dog, Cisco, on a leash to guide him.

  “Over here,” Claire called.

  Nick turned, his eyes still adjusting to the light. Cisco headed toward Claire, recognizing her scent from her visit to the apartment, his tail wagging happily as they approached her.

  “Sorry I’m late,” Nick said as he slipped into the seat across from her, eyeing the chipped brown china mug of black coffee Claire had the server pour for him at least ten minutes earlier.

  “You may want to freshen that up,” she said.

  Nick lifted the cup and sipped. “It’s fine,” he said. “And look, I’m even sorrier I couldn’t answer your calls. I’m under strict orders not to say a word to you about anything that went down today.”

  Claire sat back in the booth, crushed. Was this all for nothing? But Nick wasn’t finished. “Relax,” he said. “Just because I got those orders doesn’t mean I’m gonna follow them.”

  That’s the Nick I know, Claire thought. “What happened?”

  “Not so fast. I’m already in hot water with the chief of detectives for breaking our deal. He finds out I disobeyed him again, I’m on the street.”

  “Nobody else ever has to hear what you tell me.”

  Nick took a breath. “You need to prepare yourself, because it isn’t pretty.”

  Claire was already prepared for the worst. “Rosa’s dead,” she said, a tear falling from her right eye.

  “We’re pretty sure,” Nick began, launching into the day’s insanity, leaving out only the two similar murders from thirty years ago. Claire tried her best to take what he said as clinically as possible, but when she heard Rosa’s bones were dumped in a trash can her tears fell more rapidly.

  “What about her family?” Claire asked, trying to compose herself. “Her mother needs to know.”

  Nick put a hand on Claire’s. “She can’t right now. And you can’t tell her or anyone you know about this or I’m toast. I’m not even supposed to be on a case.”

  “So you’re going to make Rosa’s mother wait and hope that her daughter’s alive,” Claire said, pulling away. “That’s cruel.”

  “All we have are bones, Claire,” Nick said. “You only know this because you know me. In any other case we’d make a positive ID before we tell the family. Once we have that, Inspector Wilkes will make the notification.”

  “You’re going to need a DNA sample from a family member.”

  A loud group of a dozen boisterous, laughing, drunk men and women in their twenties burst into the diner, almost drowning them out and annoying Nick as they sat too close for his comfort. Cisco, who’d been lying on the floor at Nick’s feet, suddenly sat up, on guard, ready to protect his master.

  “I can’t ask Rosa’s mother to give us one,” Nick reminded her, as he lifted his mug and took another sip of his lukewarm coffee. “I’m officially out of the loop. It’s gonna take a month to extract and profile the DNA from those bones. Until they have the results, they don’t officially exist as far as the police department is concerned.”

  Claire knew Nick was holding back. “What aren’t you saying?” she asked, controlling her temper.

  Her eyes followed Nick’s around the room, clearly checking out the diner’s clientele. He wants to tell me, Claire realized. But there are too many people here.

  As if reading her thoughts, Nick signaled their server for the check.

  “Outside,” he said.

  They came through the door and walked down the street. A fresh, cool breeze blew from the Hudson River just a block away, bringing relief from the oppressive humidity of the day. Claire realized that with Cisco on his leash, she and Nick could easily be mistaken for a couple from the neighborhood out taking a late night stroll. When Nick was convinced there was no one nearby, he began.

  “Fewer than ten people know what I’m about to tell you, and it has to stay that way,” he said, and proceeded to relate the story of the two killings from 1977. When he was done, Claire looked at him, stunned.

  “And you’r
e thinking the same person killed Rosa?” she asked.

  “Why not? He was never caught, and the victims were never identified.”

  “Well,” Claire began, her mind racing at full speed, “if it’s the same killer he’d be pretty old by now. And you know, a serial killer taking a nearly four-decade break between murders is unheard of, right?”

  “But not impossible,” said Nick, his mind churning as fast as hers. “He could’ve been doing time for a different crime and recently paroled—the guys’ll have to check. Or it could be a copycat.”

  Claire was skeptical. “Copycats usually emulate a known criminal because they want to be like them or be better,” she said. “And you have no idea who committed the original murders.”

  “Good point,” Nick admitted. “I gotta believe our people are searching the evidence warehouse for the bones from the first two girls—if they weren’t buried in Potter’s Field years ago. If they can find the bones and extract their DNA, maybe we have a shot at finding out who the victims were. And besides,” he said, a thought popping up in his brain, “who’s to say there aren’t more of this guy’s victims in shallow graves all over the Tristate? Problem is, the two cold cases were barely investigated back then because of Son of Sam. We—I mean, they,” he corrected himself, “don’t even know where to start.”

  “They can start with Rosa Sanchez,” she said as they waited for the traffic light at the corner of Twenty-Third Street, “and work their way backward. But all they seem to want to do is cover this up so nobody knows how badly they screwed up forty years ago.”

  The light changed. Claire started to cross the street at the same time Cisco pulled Nick off the curb, making him stumble and grab onto Claire’s arm so he wouldn’t fall.

  “Sorry,” said Nick, righting himself.

  “It’s okay,” said Claire, an electric shock running through her from Nick’s touch. A shock that wasn’t unpleasant.

  “This isn’t political,” said Nick. “They’re not trying to cover anything up. They don’t want the city in a panic and I don’t blame them. But they can only hold back for as long as it takes to positively identify Rosa. Which gives them a month.”

  “Not if I can help it,” Claire said.

  “What does that mean?” Nick asked, worried that Claire would leak the news.

  “I’m going to try to identify her sooner.”

  This scared Nick. “You’re not even supposed to know she’s dead. Don’t throw me under the bus and make me sorry I told you.”

  Claire appreciated the risk he took for her.

  “Let me put it another way,” she said. “What would you say if I told you I might be able to ID Rosa sooner?”

  “Does it involve breaking any laws?”

  “Do you really want me to answer that?”

  For the first time since their conversation began, Nick smiled. “Of course not,” he replied, his tone making it clear she had his unofficial blessing. “And if anyone asks, I’ll say that we never had this conversation.”

  Claire grinned back. “What conversation?”

  CHAPTER 9

  Claire walked quickly down the hallway to her office, but not so fast that she’d attract attention from the occasional custodian mopping the floor. It was after midnight, the wing of the hospital housing the doctors’ offices was empty, and even though the sneakers she wore made little noise, Claire felt vulnerable walking alone under the glare of the ceiling lights.

  Her goal was to ID Rosa and tell her family. That she was doing it late at night was no accident. The building teemed with patients and doctors during regular business hours. But at this hour the odds against getting caught rose in her favor. She knew well that what she was about to do could cost her the medical license for which she’d worked tirelessly, not to mention exposing herself and the hospital to a huge lawsuit.

  She reached her office, quietly unlocking the door and purposely not turning on the light. She entered and closed the door behind her, plunging herself into darkness. She regretted having closed the blackout window shades before leaving that day as she made her way to her desk. All went well until she bumped her leg into the corner of her traditional, comfortable couch, which, though overstuffed, still hurt. She winced at the pain and thought about Nick. Soon he’ll be living in total darkness.

  She felt her way to the desk and switched on the lamp, which wouldn’t bleed light through the crack under her door as much as the overhead fluorescents. Any doctor could find a reasonable explanation for working late. But if confronted, she’d need to talk fast to justify the next step. It would be the most dangerous part of tonight’s mission, and it would unfold in another part of the hospital.

  But only if she was right.

  Claire unlocked her desk. The click of the lock reverberated through the room, reminding her that she had one last chance to turn back. But Rosa’s memory drove her forward. She opened the bottom left-hand drawer, pulled out a thick folder, and flipped through, finding the section she was looking for, confirming she’d remembered correctly. She made a few notes, ripped the paper off the pad, and stashed it in her purse. Then she switched off the lamp and headed for the door, making it there without further mishap, confident she was doing the right thing.

  And knowing, whether or not she succeeded, that it had to be done.

  Nick welcomed the air conditioner’s relief when he entered the aging building on First Avenue that housed the medical examiner’s office. Though it was only eight in the morning, the city air was once again heavy with heat and humidity. On sweltering days like these Nick longed for the cool blast from the AC of the Impala he used to drive.

  He reached into his pocket for his shield and ID to show to the security guard at the desk, but before he could open his wallet, the door buzzed. He looked up to see Lester, an old-timer with tufts of white hair springing from the sides of his otherwise bald head, behind the glass, waving him in. After so many years in homicide, Nick was hardly a stranger here. The doctors and staff were old friends.

  He waved to Lester, pushed open the heavy metal door, and as always headed for the stairs to the basement, where the autopsy rooms were located. Today, however, was different. He wasn’t supposed to be there. None of the bodies in the ME’s refrigerators “belonged” to him.

  A phone call from Claire, a little over an hour after they left the diner, had brought him here despite the warning from Chief Dolan to stay off the case. Their conversation had been brief. Claire told Nick what she needed and was about to tell him why when he cut her off.

  “I don’t need to know,” he’d said. “I’ll get it for you tomorrow.”

  Then he hung up.

  Nick’s problem now was that he didn’t know who could give him what Claire needed.

  He reached the basement and started down a tiled, brightly lit hallway lined with empty gurneys. He couldn’t help but think it was a slow night in the “chop shop;” on a busy night those cots would be laden with body bags filled with New York’s freshly dead. But the body he sought now wasn’t that of a victim who’d been killed, it was that of a particular assistant ME named Pam. Pam of the killer body, who’d made it very clear she’d jump Nick’s bones any time for the asking. But she had a face made for radio, so Nick had yet to take her up on the offer. He was about to turn down another hallway when he heard a male voice behind him:

  “What, you don’t love us anymore?”

  Nick didn’t have to turn around to know the voice.

  “Who said I ever loved you?” he asked, turning to face Doctor Rich Ross, an assistant medical examiner whose thick mane of dark red hair and pointy features always reminded Nick of a fox. The comment was a joke between them; for years Nick had no love lost for this man, but was now indebted to Ross for providing him with the crucial lead to one of the biggest cases of Nick’s career.

  Ross walked over and the two men shook hands. “Thought we’d never see you back here,” he said.

  “You don’t see me here,” Nic
k replied. “I’m serious,” he added when Ross gave him a quizzical look. “Anyone at the Puzzle Palace finds out, I’ll be drawn and quartered.”

  “So the golden boy is in a jackpot again,” said Ross, his voice thick with friendly sarcasm.

  Nick stepped closer. “No, but I need your help.”

  “Oh, so you want to put me in a jackpot,” Ross quipped. Then Ross lowered his voice. “Long as it has nothing to do with that bag of bones that didn’t come in here yesterday.”

  Nick’s expression told him otherwise.

  “I was afraid you weren’t gonna say that,” Ross said.

  “I saw the damn things in the back of a garbage truck,” Nick said.

  “Funny that you’re not one of the three guys on the ‘need to know’ list.”

  “Your ‘need to know’ list? They gave this case to you?” Nick asked, incredulous at his good fortune.

  “Yeah. Lucky me, huh?”

  “Is the victim’s name on the bones?” Nick asked.

  “Nope,” Ross said, reducing his voice to a conspiratorial near whisper. “They’re logged in as belonging to a Jane Doe.”

  “Anything interesting about ’em?”

  “Besides all the secrecy? I haven’t checked them out yet. All I know is they came in late last night and the boss saved ’em for me. Remind me to thank him when this is over.” He smiled at Nick, delivering the best news for last. “Oh, and it’s a complete skeleton.”

  This was the piece of information Nick had hoped for. “Any chance you can get me some X-rays?”

  Ross let out a cynical laugh. “You know, Nicky, if this job doesn’t kill me, I’m pretty sure the trouble you’re about to get me into will,” he said. “You want those films before or after I send the bones to the lab for DNA extraction?”

  “You may not have to extract anything if you get me those X-rays.”

  “Goddammit, you know who she is, don’t you?”