by David Wind
Samael, God’s Messenger, watching the scene between husband and wife, smiled. Yes, the driveway floodlight was out, but it had not blown out. A divine bolt had shattered it an hour before.
Samael peered at the bedroom window on the second floor, watching the elongated shadow of Francine Barnes undress. The bathroom light came on. Samael waited patiently. It was important for the woman to return to the bedroom.
Eventually, the bathroom light went off. In the bedroom, the elongated shadow bent over a table.
“Very good,” Samael whispered.
Samael had spent a long time watching this house and its occupants. Samael knew exactly what would happen. In five minutes, Michael Barnes would return.
Moving with stealth, God’s Messenger of Death maneuvered to the vantage point that had been marked out weeks before.
At the prepared spot, Samael lifted the crossbow from the bag and drew the bowstring back, using a special foot attachment.
A wash of headlights turned the corner.
Samael stepped back into the bushes, blending with the darkness.
The car turned into the driveway. Michael Barnes’s arm reached out. In his hand was the remote control for the garage door.
When the car was abreast of Samael, God’s Messenger stepped from the bushes and released the safety. “Michael Barnes,” Samael called.
Barnes stopped to stare at the old man appearing out of nowhere. “Who—”
“It is your time,” Samael said, bringing up the crossbow. “You have postponed your death for long enough.”
Barnes’s eyes widened. He thought of the detective who had come to see him. “Wait,” he pleaded.
Samael smiled.
The bolt struck Barnes in the temple. The sound it made was louder than the crossbow’s release. Barnes’s head jerked back. His thumb ground down on the remote. The door began to open, a low humming in the quiet suburban night.
Samael opened the car door and maneuvered Barnes into the passenger seat. Then God’s Messenger of Death put the Volvo into reverse and backed out of the driveway.
Chapter Twenty-six
The plane arrived a half hour late, but Emma looked fresh. She carried a flight bag over her left shoulder, and walked quickly to Hyte.
He kissed her gently.
“We have to do this more often,” she said lightly. Despite her cool tone, he saw her eyes were bright and dancing with...excitement? Anticipation?
“Yes, we do,” he said, surprising himself by the solemn tone of his statement.
Her face flushed with pleasure. “Been waiting long?”
“Not very.” He started them back toward the terminal.
“How was the trip?”
“I slept through most of it, except the layover in Chicago. The flight from there took off late. Something mechanical.”
“Did you eat on the plane?”
Emma shook her head. “It throws me off more than jet lag. I like to wait until I get back.”
“How does a nice lunch sound?”
“That depends on where.”
“My place.”
He liked the way her smile reached all the way to her eyes. “That sounds wonderful.”
“Yeah,” he agreed as they made their way toward the exit.
They were in the parking lot when Hyte’s beeper went off. Emma froze. Hyte spotted a pay phone. “I’ll be right back.”
He dropped the quarter in and dialed. Sally O’Rourke answered. “Lou, we have another one. Seventy-ninth Street boat basin.”
“Who?”
“Don’t know yet. Just got the call from central.”
“I’m at LaGuardia. Figure twenty-five minutes.”
He turned to Emma. She was staring at him, her eyes narrowed, lips taut. “It’s not your father,” he said. “But there was another killing.”
<><><>
The car was at the edge of the strip overlooking the boat docks. No other cars were nearby. The crime scene unit was in full swing: photographs taken, measurements called out. The Twentieth Precinct captain was present, standing off to one side, talking to a plainclothes detective.
Hyte went toward the car. The precinct captain broke off his conversation and met him. “He was found around ten. As soon as the call came in, I had your office notified.”
“Your people pick up anything?” Hyte asked.
“No. A man walking his dog found him. He said he thought the way the man was sitting was strange. He rapped on the window. When the victim didn’t respond, the dog walker flagged a blue and white. I have my men doing a sweep of the boat residences. If they come up with anything, I’ll notify you.”
“Thanks,” Hyte said.
Sally O’Rourke and Sy Cohen joined Hyte.
“Michael Barnes,” Cohen said. “Shot in the temple. Crossbow. The body’s cold.”
“What the hell was he doing here?” Hyte asked, bending to look at the body.
“He disappeared last night when he took the baby-sitter home.”
Hyte frowned. “Did his wife report it?”
“She called the Clarkstown police. Thought he might have been in an accident.”
“Accident? We notified their day watch commander about Barnes. Why the hell didn’t they notify us when his wife called?”
“I checked with them a few minutes ago. They said it was an oversight. The day man forgot to put it on the night watch sheet.”
“Great.” Fighting off anger, he turned to the assistant medical examiner. “Harry?”
“Within the last twelve to sixteen hours—between midnight and four.”
“Lou,” O’Rourke said, pointing to the barricades.
He saw Deputy Commissioner McMahon step out of a limousine.
“I asked the Rockland County people to hold off notifying Barnes’s family until I got back to them with a positive I.D.,” Cohen said. “Thought you might want to speak to his wife.”
Hyte nodded and turned to the crime scene technician.
“Any prints?”
“Plenty,” he said. “But a lot of blank spots, too. Whoever drove the car was wearing gloves.”
Hyte had expected no less. “Same weapon?” he asked Harry Lester.
“Almost surely, and real close this time. Without opening him up, I’d say the bolt did a lobotomy. I’ll know more when I have him on the table. There’s a little blood on the outside of the driver’s door. He was killed behind the steering wheel and moved to the passenger seat.”
Hyte looked at the car. “That doesn’t make sense.”
“What doesn’t?” O’Rourke asked.
“He was killed near his home. Why the hell was he driven here?”
“You don’t know that for sure,” Harry Lester said.
“Yes I do,” he stated flatly. “Sy, remember what Roberts said about Barnes?”
The detective sergeant nodded. “Barnes would never let himself be a hostage again.”
“Exactly. If someone tried to make him drive somewhere, he would have fought—this time. Sy, stick with it. Brief the DC. Sally, you come with me. Sy, call Rockland. Tell them I’m on my way, and I’ll handle next-of-kin notification.”
He took a final look inside the car. There was a clip for a remote control garage opener on the driver’s visor. He searched the interior. It was not in the car.
They met the deputy commissioner halfway to the barrier. “Was it our killer?”
Hyte nodded. “Sergeant Cohen will fill you in, Commissioner. I have to get to the man’s widow before the press does. Do me a favor?”
“What?”
“The press hasn’t made the connection between the victims yet. I’d like to keep it that way a little longer.”
<><><>
The houses on Barnes’s street were all large, and each sat on at least an acre of land. The homes were expensive. A half a million dollars plus was Hyte’s estimate.
He started the car forward. A local patrol car, with two men in it, was parked one house down an
d across the street from the Barnes’s house. He parked behind the car and got out, O’Rourke following. When he reached the patrol car, he flashed his gold. “Hyte and O’Rourke.”
The driver got out. “Bill Lennox. I’m supposed to go with you.”
“No need,” Hyte said. “There’s nothing in your jurisdiction unless we prove he was murdered here.”
“I was told—”
“Whatever,” he said, starting along the driveway, O’Rourke at his side, the uniformed man five steps behind.
He studied every bush he passed. Small decorative stones covered the earth around the drive. The lawn was carefully tended, the landscaping meticulous. The driveway ended at the garage’s double doors. One door was open, the garage bay empty. Hyte followed the fieldstone walk to the front door and mentally prepared himself for the next part of his job.
The local cop stepped ahead of Hyte and pressed the doorbell.
A woman with dark circles under her eyes opened the door. “Yes?” she asked through the screen.
Hyte showed his identification. “Mrs. Barnes, I’m Lieutenant Raymond Hyte. It’s about your husband.”
Francine Barnes choked back a sob. She opened the door and motioned them in. Then she looked at Hyte. “I remember you,” she half whispered, “from when my husband...the hijacking.”
“This is Officer O’Rourke. Mrs. Barnes, I’m very sorry to inform you that your husband died last night. He was murdered.”
Francine Barnes stared at him. Then she turned away.
Her back shook. She wrapped her arms around herself. He nodded to O’Rourke, who stepped forward, put her arm around the woman, and moved her toward the kitchen.
Hyte watched them, feeling detached yet responsible. Michael Barnes might be alive today if he’d lived in the city, where Hyte could have protected him.
O’Rourke seated Francine Barnes at a butcher-block table. She placed her hand over the woman’s, gently. “The children?”
“At a friend’s,” Mrs. Barnes said. Her voice was hollow.
“I sent them there this morning. I’ve had the strangest feeling ever since Michael didn’t come back last night. And this morning... I didn’t want them here if... Oh, God, this can’t be happening. How can I tell them? They’ll never understand.”
Hyte went into the kitchen. The local cop hung back.
Francine Barnes looked up at Hyte. “Why?”
Hyte saw, as he had too often in the past, the reality of her loss had not yet set in. Francine Barnes was in light shock, able to function behind a veil of disbelief.
“Didn’t he tell you that I sent one of my men to see him on Thursday?”
She looked at him without comprehension.
“Mrs. Barnes, we believe three other people have been murdered by the same man. All three were on the flight your husband was on, the hijacked flight. The detective who saw your husband told him about the killings.”
“He never said anything,” she said in a hollow voice. “I thought all of that was over.”
Sally O’Rourke went to the sink, filled a glass with water, and brought it to the woman. When Francine Barnes took the glass, her hand trembled. “Michael was a good man. He... What am I going to do now?” she asked Sally. “Oh God, the children.”
“Help us find out who killed your husband,” O’Rourke said. “Tell us what happened last night. Everything, every detail, no matter how inconsequential it might seem. Start from the minute your husband came home.”
Francine Barnes looked from Sally O’Rourke to Hyte. “I…there was nothing unusual. Everything was fine.”
O’Rourke put her arm around the woman again and held her. “Is there someone we should call? A friend, a relative?”
She wiped away tears. “My sister lives in Pomona, which is only a few miles away.”
Hyte got her name and address and turned to the local cop. “Can you get her for us?”
“Sure,” the cop said, leaving.
“Mrs. Barnes. Where did you go last night?” Sally asked.
“To the movies. Michael...” She paused. Her eyes became distant. “Michael loved movies. We went to the movies every Friday night. He has a collection of movies, almost a thousand.” Her voice caught. “But he says that it’s not the same—watching a movie on television. You need a big screen to feel the movie.” She stopped as more tears came.
“Did anything unusual happen there?”
“Nothing. We went out for coffee and then came home. Michael took the baby-sitter home, he...he told me to p-p-put on something sexy and he’d be right back. B-b-but I never saw him again.”
“Everything was in order when you got home?”
“The light blew out, but that happens all the time.”
“What light?”
“The driveway light.”
“Did you turn it on when you left?”
“It’s on a timer. It goes on by seven.”
“Mrs. Barnes, I know this is very difficult, and I wish I didn’t have to ask it, but please, think back. Was there anything else?”
She closed her eyes for a moment. “Yes, there was something else. I don’t know if it’s important. This morning, the garage door was open. It happens sometimes. Michael says it has something to do with infra-red codes.”
“Could your husband have opened it before he took the baby-sitter home?”
She shook her head. “He never opens the garage unless he’s pulling in.”
“May I look around?” She nodded. Hyte turned to Sally.
“Stay here until her sister comes. Mrs. Barnes, I’m very sorry for what happened. Very sorry.”
In the garage, he gazed at the painted cement floor. There was nothing on it at all. The garage was as clean as the kitchen had been.
Metal shelves lined the walls. On the far side, behind a small station wagon, was a pegboard filled with tools. He went back outside and looked up at the floodlight. The bulb was shattered.
He bent down over the bushes directly under the light, pushing aside the dense branches. Sunlight reflected from a piece of metal.
He caught the object with a handkerchief and drew it out.
A crossbow bolt! This one was different, though. It was a target bolt, not a broad head.
He doubted the tip was poisoned but handled it carefully nonetheless. As he walked down the driveway, he looked down, his eyes crisscrossing the drive. To his left was a square object lying on the rocks. He went over to it. The remote. It was shattered. He guessed the car might have driven over it. Hyte scooped up the broken device and put it in his right jacket pocket. Maybe the crime scene boys would find something on it.
The police car pulled into the driveway. Before it came to a stop, a woman jumped out and ran to the front door.
Mrs. Barnes’s sister. Even she could not ease the grief, Hyte reflected. Only time could do that.
<><><>
In a convenience store, Hyte bought a box of large baggies and put the bolt in one bag, the remote in another.
When they were on the road again, he explained to O’Rourke where he found each item. “It was well planned,” he said. “Whoever is killing these people is watching his victims. He knew exactly what Michael Barnes did on a Friday night—every Friday night. He was waiting for him.”
“In the garage?”
“The remote device was too far away. Our killer was hiding in the bushes.”
“Barnes was shot as he drove into the driveway?”
“No. He’d stopped.”
“He knew the killer?”
“Or the killer startled him enough to make him stop. Whatever happened, Barnes did the wrong thing.”
“And you were right,” O’Rourke said. “The victims are the full-term hostages.”
Chapter Twenty-seven
“I’m sorry about today,” Hyte said to Emma. “I’d have much rather been with you.”
“It’s all right, really. It gave me a chance to drive up and see my father.” She paused. “Want to
tell me about it?”
“No,” he said. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
Emma poured drinks, returned to the couch, and handed him his. “Not this time, Ray. I know you want to keep your job separate from your private life. It won’t work with me. I’ll live with a lot of things, but I won’t accept being shut out.”
Reflected on her features was the core of inner strength that had drawn him to her from the very beginning. Now, sitting in his living room, he knew either he accepted what she wanted, or he would lose her.
“It’s not as easy as it seems.”
“It’s not as difficult either, it’s called trust. Trust that what you tell me won’t turn me away from you. That’s it, isn’t it? You keep the...the ‘job’ away so I won’t be soiled? What you do is part of you. If you live two lives, one with me, the other with your job, you can never give all of yourself to either of them. I’m not asking for the gory details, I just want to help share some of your burdens.”
He experienced a new sensation. It was as if he was two people. One who watched life, another who acted. He wondered why it was so hard to talk about his work. His reticence destroyed one marriage and, to a degree, cost him his daughter. Looking at Emma, he realized it wasn’t the Job stopping him; it was the fear of contaminating her with the dirt that was part of his work.
“I love you, Emma,” he said suddenly. He saw her eyes widen in surprise. Before she could speak, he sketched out the case.
He did not detail the clinical aspects of the victims’ deaths, the type of weapon, or the poison. Sixteen years of police work, combined with the possibility that Emma’s father was a potential victim, stopped him from spelling everything out.
Emma looked at him keenly. “Why do you think its revenge and not a terrorist retaliation?”
He took her hand in his, and repeated what he’d told Mason when he’d asked for the task force. “It’s the only thing that makes sense.”
“Why so long after the hijacking?”
“Planning takes time. The killer is an expert at planning. He—”
“How do you know it’s a he?”
“That’s the consensus. For instance, he must have been watching Barnes for weeks, maybe months. He knew every move that Barnes made on a Friday night. Barnes helped him by never varying from his routine. As for Flaxman and Samson, it would be easy to find out what flights they flew. The Arab boy was predictable, too. He always hung out at the same place on Friday nights.”
