by Robert Pobi
Kehoe took back the reins. “We are checking with all mineral suppliers, mineral collector message boards, and other sources. Laterally, we’re going after the initial off-the-shelf Nosler rounds. We have already sourced purchases.”
In a state with lax or almost nonexistent gun laws, like Alabama or Tennessee, this would be impossible. But under the New York SAFE gun act, the acquisition of ammunition was a documented process; it was impossible to purchase powder, primers, slugs, cartridges, or ammunition without recording the transaction. Internet purchases were also monitored—it was against the law for any out-of-state seller to ship ammunition to a private citizen; it had to be shipped to a registered gun dealer, where it was recorded.
Problem was, ammunition and gun dealers were notoriously cagey when it came to talking to law enforcement; they tended to see it as an interaction with the very government whose tyranny they purported to be on the watch for. The laws helped, but their stoicism was a continual battle.
Kehoe once again nodded, and the image changed, this time to a page of text. “In the past three years, there have been six-hundred-and-thirteen shipments of Nosler’s AccuBond to addresses in New York State, not including store purchases. If this guy’s shooting skill and lack of trace evidence are any kind of an indicator of his personality, he got his ammunition some other way. Out-of-state dealer or gun show.” Besides sifting through packing slips and delivery signatures, they’d move on to lateral databases, beginning with government records and working down to social media accounts; it was astounding what people posted about their lives—and their ideas—on social media.
Kehoe hit the end of his walk and turned slowly on his heel. “Out of six-hundred-and-thirteen shipments in the past three years, there are four-hundred-and-twelve individual buyers. Of those, thirty-eight have died.” Another nod, and a screen changed again, this time coming up with a list of hard stats about the deaths. “We’re looking at all of them.”
Kehoe repeated his trick, and the screens behind him once again changed images, this time to an aerial photograph of number 3 Park Avenue. “The first crime scene is at the upper end of pedestrian surveillance, but there are no high-risk residents, so there has never been a need for top-shelf security. The elevators and stairwells are public access; the loading docks, service elevators, and maintenance points are all key access—Medeco commercial-grade registered keys. They are camera heavy, but it’s not state of the art. One of their stairwells to the roof is not on feed, and it’s not hard to get there if you know the building. But there is a camera monitoring the rooftop door, and this is where things get a little muddy.
“The access doors to the roof are monitored by IR cameras on a twenty-four-hour loop; it’s impossible to step onto, or off, that deck without being filmed. We’ve gone over the footage, and no one went up during the full twenty-four hours before Agent Hartke’s murder. More troubling still is that we have no footage of our subject leaving the rooftop. Imaging is taking the available video apart frame by frame, and we’ll have an initial report in a few hours to see if it was manipulated in any way. We’re also doing comparative counts with facial recognition software. We haven’t placed the Frenchman in the city, let alone on-site.”
Kehoe pointed up at number 3 Park Avenue. “Approximately 33,000 people circulate through the building each day. That is a lot of data to analyze. We identified one-hundred-and-sixty-one people with outstanding warrants against them. Most of those were for typical nonsense: failure to make child support payments, outstanding parking tickets, and the like. But we identified nineteen felons; all were in and out of the building hours earlier in the day. NYPD was able to locate eleven of them, and we’re satisfied that they had nothing to do with the shooting. The other eight are still at large, but none of them fit the MO, although we’re not writing anything off.
“We’ve employed a basic biometric registry for crowdsourcing, but when we factor in winter hats and scarves and balaclavas, we end up with a lot of dropouts. What we do know is that whoever killed Agent Hartke is on footage somewhere. But again—no Froissant.”
Lucas watched Kehoe closely, paying attention to his inflection, body language, and delivery, and he couldn’t shake the feeling that he was being used. Or was he just being paranoid?
“Which brings us to the second murder, committed from the Manhattan side of the Roosevelt Island Tramway station.” Another nod, and the monitors brought up the second rooftop. “All the entry doors are monitored—both pedestrian and maintenance—but that’s where it stops. With estimated traffic of a thousand people per day, it’s a much smaller digital footprint to comb through. Again, no evidence that the Frenchman was there. The problem is the garage; the entrance is recorded, but it has sight holes. We’ve pulled footage from every camera in a two-block radius. Again, our suspect had to get there from somewhere. So far, no Frenchman.”
Kehoe took a sip of tea and paused for a moment before turning to the victims. “As a precaution, we’re looking at all law enforcement shootings over the last five years—both at home and abroad—to see if we have a similar MO or ballistics match. So far, nothing has come up.”
Kehoe was silent for a moment before the screens changed again, this time to images of three sections of fence they had removed from the Queensboro Bridge. “The only physical evidence we have so far are three lengths of flagging tape left on the Queensboro Bridge as wind and distance markers. No prints or trace evidence of any kind. It’s a popular PVC tape that can be purchased everywhere from Walmart to Bass Pro Shops. The only distinctive characteristic we found was that it was cut with a serrated blade. Simple knots were used. That’s all that this guy has left behind so far.
“Which brings us back to our suspect.” The screens lit up with a photo of Philippe Froissant. “We’ve got a BOLO out for him. He was born into a very good family—industrial fortune with manufacturing in North Africa, former Eastern Bloc countries, and China. There’s a full bio accompanying the rest of this brief. I want you people to find this prick, and I want him brought in.”
Kehoe’s focus shifted to Lucas, and the monitors pixelated again, this time coming up with the dark silhouette of a man over a white background, a question mark in the middle of his chest. “We also have a second suspect—an unknown. This is off theory with the Frenchman narrative, but we’re keeping our options open. Don’t become myopic out there.” And with that, he ended the brief.
The room shifted back into work mode, and Kehoe made a beeline to the back of the room, coming straight to Lucas. “You and Whitaker in my office. Now.”
30
Kehoe sat on the edge of his desk, arms crossed over his chest, platinum Breguet gleaming under the cuff of the bespoke shirt. The guy made most of the younger agents look dumpy. His blend of body language and delivery had been honed at the best schools, and it was no secret that he was heir to a California agricultural empire that spanned three counties of the Golden State.
Kehoe pointed a fountain pen at Lucas. “One of the AccuBond purchasers—one of the dead AccuBond purchasers—bought enough ammunition to wage his own personal war. His name was Billy Margolis.”
Kehoe picked a file up off his desk and handed it to Whitaker. “Mechanic. Lived on 142nd and Riverside. We went back three years in purchase records, and during that time, he bought enough supplies to load twenty-two thousand rounds of .300 Winchester Magnum.”
Lucas did the math; the numbers worked out to just over 141 rounds a week. There were plenty of hobby shooters who put 500 rounds down the pipe every week.
Kehoe continued, “We took it back another five years, and during that time, Margolis purchased another twenty thousand rounds of the Nosler AccuBond, all in the latter two years.”
Whitaker tapped the file. “I take it there’s more than just a mountain of ammunition that put him on our to-do list?”
Kehoe simply said, “He was killed during a home invasion. The NYPD cracked his social media accounts, email, cell phone records, and ha
rd drive during the investigation. It turns out that Margolis was a major player in the Patriotic Citizens’ Militia of Manhattan.”
“There’s a militia group on the island?”
Kehoe nodded at Whitaker. “Ask our resident expert.”
Whitaker nodded. “Same kind of assholes that took over the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon. At least theoretically they’re the same kind. Since oh-eight, when Obama took to the Oval Office, there’s been a massive surge in militia enrollment. They all like to use words like patriot, truth, and freedom, but not a single group seems to have any kind of cohesive philosophy. Or even a very basic understanding of the Constitution. They like guns, say they hate the government but love America, seem to dislike people of color and the concept of paying for the infrastructure that they enjoy using. They call any kind of government intervention tyranny. And they complain. Constantly. Basically, they’re pissed because people who are smarter than they are, or who work harder than they do, have more than they do. They spew a libertarian line about every man for himself and it’s up to the individual to map their own path, yet they blame immigrants for their woes. Zero personal responsibility and zero self-awareness. What they’re really pissed off at, but can’t verbalize, is that the government isn’t regulating things in their favor.”
Lucas used the voice he reserved for the kids when they argued against some basic house rule. “They sound swell.”
“They don’t have that much backbone; a lot of these guys are wannabe cops or soldiers but can’t pass the psych tests. A lot are borderline personalities with an unusually high percentage of addicts and depressives in their ranks. They think they’re tough guys and they love gun culture, but they’re classic bullies. You can thank irradiation by right-wing media for these dimwits.”
Kehoe cut her editorializing off with a single blink of his eyes. “You and Page are going to talk to the investigating detective from the Margolis murder, a man named Atchison from the Thirteenth Precinct. I spoke to his CO earlier; he’s undercover on a job, but they’ll pull him in for us. It will be soon, but I can’t guarantee a time. I want you to siphon his brain dry.” He nodded over at a capital file on the table by the door.
Lucas examined the stained manila folder, then turned back to Kehoe. “Did they find Margolis’s murderer?”
Kehoe shook his head. “And they didn’t find a single round of ammunition in his home.”
31
The Upper East Side
Whitaker stuck her hand across the console. “Not bad for your first day back,” she said.
Lucas stared at the polished nails for a second, wondering how he should handle this. He stuck out his prosthetic and rotated his wrist, which forced the green fingers to assume a more or less neutral position that Erin called karate chop mode. Whitaker took it and shook like she had done it a thousand times. “Sorry for being—”
“A supreme grouch?”
“I was going to say slightly irritable, but under the circumstances, I’ll give you that one.”
She looked out the window at the house, at the lights inside the living room window. “I try not to be nosy when I’m off the clock, but how does a university professor manage to own what has to be an eight-figure chunk of real estate in such a swanky neighborhood? Unless the pay is better than I imagine, that is.”
“Can’t you just do that thing and divine the answer out of thin air?” He gave her an irritated look.
Whitaker smiled and shrugged. “I can only do that with questions, not answers.”
“I won the lottery,” he said, pulling the handle. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” he added as his boots touched the snow. He closed the door, sealing the big 4 × 4 with a hermetic thunk.
* * *
Erin opened the door before his key was at the lock, and she pulled him inside. She wrapped him in a hug and kicked the door closed in a well-choreographed move that was mindful of his balance. His stance was always solid, and his prosthetic was better than a natural leg when it came to tensile strength, but it had no give, requiring a cantilevered weight distribution. He could throw it around, but if someone else did, the whole house of cards could come down.
“Did you catch him? Did they get what they want? Are you home to stay?” she asked, punctuating each question with a kiss.
He kissed her back and realized how cold his skin had become on the short walk from the car to the door. In what—thirty seconds?—twenty-five? It took hardy genes to spend time outside in weather like this; it couldn’t be learned. “No,” he said. “No. And no.” He wondered what the hell he was doing, running around on frozen bridges when he had a warm place to be. Where no one was getting shot.
The kids were in the study, decorating the tree. He could smell the pine and hear ornaments clinking. They finished kissing, and Alisha came barreling over, Lemmy following in a slow-motion trot, her silent wingman. “Mr. Lucas! You back!”
“Hey, Alisha. Are you sure the dog isn’t bothering you?” Lucas and Erin unclenched, and he did his best to crouch down. He took off his sunglasses and kept his head straight so his eyes wouldn’t misalign—his line of sight weirded out most kids, and Alisha was still new to their little world.
Alisha skidded to a halt. Behind her, Lemmy hit the brakes, but he was just too much weight moving too quickly, and the carpet bunched up under him. The Persian runner surfed under Alisha, and she toppled sideways. Lucas reached out and caught her.
“No, sir, Mr. Lucas. Lemmy is the most best. We’re friends. As long as I don’t feed him no chocolate.” She glanced up at Erin.
Lucas turned his head, following the little girl’s gaze up at Erin. How the hell did she manage to pack so much learning into each day? “Well, that’s good advice. Chocolate is very bad for dogs. I wonder if it’s good for little girls?”
She clapped her hands. “Oh yes, Mr. Lucas. It’s the most bestest, too!”
“Well, I know where we keep the Hershey bars.”
Four voices from the study piped in with a pretty good harmony of, “Me, too, please.”
Erin threw him one of her looks—first off, it was too close to supper; second, she hated when he bribed the kids. “So, just what are you doing home?”
“It’s the end of the day. I need some rest. There’s nothing else I can do right now; it’s up to the regular bureau people to do what they were trained to. Me? I’m going to relax with my family.”
“And to hand out some Hershey bars!” Maude hollered from the study.
“Did Maude get her algebra test results yet?” Lucas whispered to Erin.
She shook her head. “She’s been checking her phone every three minutes. They’re posting them tonight.”
Maude was having a particularly difficult time with algebra, and Lucas had been tutoring her. She was working very hard to break its back but it was a difficult process for her; she was a very artistic child but math was just not a natural talent. In absolute terms, Lucas didn’t care if she passed or failed—not in any real sense. But he hoped that some of what they had worked on had stuck in that she could use a little confidence right now. Especially right now, as she was making the transition from girl to young woman.
Erin headed off to the kitchen as Lucas moved to the deco hall stand by the door to the dining room and began to take off his boots. His gait had changed the instant Kehoe handed him the shield—it felt as if they had returned a piece of his body. There was something unsettling about the sensation, as if maybe he wasn’t more than the sum of his parts. Was that all it took? A piece of brass-plated nickel? Had he really been craving the recognition that much? If so, what did that say about the strength of his character? His self-worth?
The kids had pimped out the tree with enough decorations to shame a Mardi Gras float. Maude was working on the lights while Hector and Damien put ornaments on the higher branches. Laurie was by the fire, eating a clementine and holding a fistful of tinsel.
Erin had lugged the Christmas Tupperware containers upstairs,
and they were open, red and green and silver and gold spilling out. This year they had the gnomes out, a little bearded army of ZZ Top members; all that was missing were the Marshalls and groovy dance moves. The change in the room from the night before was startling, and Lucas realized that he needed to finish with Kehoe’s people and come home. Christmas was one of the few times where he could spend more than a day or two with the kids. And he had promised a full two weeks this year.
Erin came back, followed by Alisha and Lemmy. She had a stack of Hershey bars in her hand. She handed one to each of the kids and gave the last one to Lucas. “Just because I love you,” she said as she pressed it into his hand.
“You know I don’t eat chocolate.”
“It’s for your new partner.”
“I don’t think she eats chocolate.” He dropped one of his boots onto the tray and went to work on the other one.
“Is she a woman?”
For a second, Lucas thought it might be a trick question. “I believe so, yes.”
“Then she eats chocolate.”
He didn’t want to argue. “Okay. You win.”
He was about to kick off the other boot when the doorbell sounded, a loud musical bing-bong that all the kids—including Alisha—mimicked with operatic cadence.
“It’s the woman who just dropped you off,” Maude said from the front window.
Lucas shrugged as Erin gave him another one of her looks—the kind he didn’t like.
Lucas walked over, the boot still on his prosthetic throwing his gait into clonk-clonk-clonk mode. He opened it to Whitaker trying to look like it was good news, which, he knew, it wasn’t.
“We got that meeting with the detective from the Thirteenth.”