by Harker Moore
He sipped for a moment, then looked up at her. “You said the other day that the killer might have wanted the children. What’s he want them for?”
“If we understood that . . . I mean he was into display with the two victims before Margot. But he dumps her, maybe because he knows the kids are the real attention-getter. So why hasn’t he put them up for us to see?”
“Because he hasn’t killed them yet.”
“He doesn’t toy with the women.” She fell into their pattern of challenge and answer. “His style is to kill quickly.”
“He hasn’t killed children before,” he came back. “It’s different.”
“That’s good, Jimmy. That’s a real possibility, especially if he identifies with them, like I said the other day. Maybe they are alive.”
“Then how long do we have?”
“We really haven’t answered your question of why he wants them. Identifying with them is not necessarily to the good. He may be into self-loathing. The real question is what he’s doing with them.”
“You’re thinking dead might be better.”
Her eyes were too bright when she answered. “Aren’t you?”
“Lyle Sanderson’s the man,” the hotel manager said.
Rozelli had expected a list, not one specific name, of guests who had stayed at the Gramercy Park Hotel over a period when the killer could have stalked the Redmonds. “You sure about that, Mr. Merck?”
“Of course I’m sure. I’ve already talked to the police about Mr. Sanderson.”
Rozelli was not quite sure what was going on, but he was willing to play along. “Just for the record, sir, do you mind repeating what you told the other cops about Mr. Sanderson?”
The manager gave him a look reserved for third graders not grasping the concept of long division. “He never checked out. Left without settling up with the hotel. He owed for room service and parking.”
“Did he leave a forwarding address?”
Merck passed him another exasperated look. “We checked, Detective, but it was a phony. So was the name.”
“And the other cops checked out the name and address?”
“Yes, came up empty-handed too.”
“You mentioned something about parking.”
Merck laughed. “Now that should have been a big clue that something was screwy. Illinois address with New York plates. They came up stolen when you guys ran it through.”
“What was he driving?”
Merck checked the file on his desk. “2003 Ford E-350 Cargo.”
Rozelli wrote it down. “Did you ever have the opportunity to speak with Mr. Sanderson?”
The manager shook his head. “Hundreds of people come and go in this hotel, Detective. I wouldn’t be able to recognize Sanderson if he had two heads. But Ed Jones might be able to help you.”
“Detective Rozelli.” He flashed his badge. “Mind if I run a few questions by you?”
“Ed Jones.” The doorman checked out his credentials and smiled. The scrutiny was par, but the smile was not customary for a cop with questions.
“How long you been working here, Ed?”
“My feet say too long. But for the record about twelve years.” Another smile.
“You worked during October and all of November so far.”
He nodded. “All October. Hope to make it through November.”
Rozelli looked across Lexington Avenue to Gramercy Park, the only private park in the city. The small piece of real estate, encircled by a tall iron fence with a locked gate, had been designed to keep outsiders out.
“If I wanted to get into the park, how would I go about that, Ed?”
The doorman pushed back his cap, scratching his forehead as if he’d just been asked a complex question. “Two ways. First, if you live in one of those fancy houses facing the park, you get a key. Second, if you are a guest of the hotel.”
“So hotel guests get a key to the park?”
“Oh no, Detective, it doesn’t work that way. Only one key. And I got it. You want to get into Gramercy Park, I have to let you in.”
“That work out okay with you?”
“Keeps things tight. And since I work days it’s not a problem.”
“How’s that?”
“Park’s only open from seven in the morning to sunset.”
He took another brief look at the park through the traffic. “Remember a guest by the name of Lyle Sanderson? Stayed at the hotel part of October, part of November.”
The doorman nodded his head. “Nice guy. But not much of a talker. Never looked at you when he spoke.”
“He ever go to the park?”
“Lots of times. Liked to go over there and read. Always had a book with him.”
“Ever see him talk to any of the children?”
“Can’t say as I did. I would just let him in, then come right back. But it wouldn’t surprise me, though, if he talked to the kids. Had the impression Mr. Sanderson didn’t care much for adults.”
“So you never got a good look at Sanderson’s face?”
“Now I didn’t say that.” He did that forehead scratching thing again. “One afternoon there was a Halloween party going on. I remember the wind was blowing pretty hard. Shaking some paper lanterns strung up in the trees for decoration. Sanderson noticed them too. He looked up and watched them for the longest. Had a big grin on his face. That’s when I got a good look at him. I’ve seen stranger-looking faces, but none quite like Mr. Sanderson’s.”
The traffic was midday thick as Talbot drove toward the financial district and his hastily scheduled meeting with Reese Redmond. The information that Johnny had picked up this morning had given him the buzz, that slightly jazzed feeling that something major was finally going to break. He cut it off. Don’t get ahead of yourself, Walt. Don’t jinx it.
Because what they had was only the slimmest thread. He’d been at the computer for the past couple hours rechecking it, and there was little doubt that Lyle Sanderson was indeed a false identity. A dead end. The job now, with the clock still ticking on Darius’s kids, was to somehow pick up the trail.
He was pulling away from a red light when his cell phone sounded.
“Talbot.”
“It’s me.” Rozelli in his ear. “I’m headed back in.”
“You finished at the hotel?”
“Yeah. The rest of the staff was deaf, dumb, and blind.”
“What about the nanny?”
“I dropped by to see her, but no help.” Rozelli sounded disgusted. “Said she never saw the guy that close-up, but he could’ve been the one the kids talked to. . . . You on your way to see Redmond?”
“In his office. First day back. He’s there for a couple hours.”
A signature grunt. “Do some good.”
“Has something happened, Officer Talbot?” Reese Redmond seemed to be bracing himself in the leather chair.
“We haven’t found the boys.” He got the words out quickly, trying to allay what he knew was the man’s worst fear. These were not only Darius’s kids, he reminded himself.
“What is it then?”
“We have turned up something, Mr. Redmond, a man who rented a hotel room on Gramercy Park for weeks leading up to . . .”
“What man?”
“The name he registered under was Lyle Sanderson. Gave an address in Illinois. You know this person?”
“No,” Redmond said. “Have you picked him up?”
“We can’t.” He looked away. “Lyle Sanderson turned out not to be his real name. And he hasn’t been seen at the hotel since the morning your family was taken.”
Redmond had shifted to the edge of his seat. He rested his head in his hands now, staring down at his desk. “So this man who may have my boys has just disappeared?” There was a note of disbelief that edged on anger. “What are you doing to find him?” He looked up.
“Everything we can. Which is why I’m here. We have a description, and . . .”
“. . . and I’m delaying your tel
ling me.” A hand pushed at his temple, flattening the hair. “Please go on, Detective. What does this man look like?”
“Tall and thin,” Talbot said, “with brown hair. Possibly a slight Southern accent. But the real identifier is the eyes. According to the doorman, they’re different colors.”
Even as he said it, Talbot knew there would be a reaction. He had felt it building, but seeing the result made the buzz fission in his skull.
The force of it had Redmond standing. “My God, that’s David St. Cyr.”
Sakura knew that David St. Cyr had somehow slipped through the cracks. As the Redmond architect, he was someone new in the family’s life. Someone on the periphery, and not in the red-hot center of their universe. But that was no excuse for not getting to him sooner. Good police work looked at everybody. And everybody was a suspect until cleared. Today he would interview St. Cyr and clear him. Or not.
St. Cyr’s apartment building was an old one brought back to life. One that had accumulated layers of living under high ceilings and above hardwood floors. He imagined that a ghost or two swiveled around marble pillars or tread threadbare orientals at the witching hour. Michael owned and lived in such a building. And it was in such places that he had done most of his carpentry, bringing back, or reconstructing, some stairway or cabinet guaranteed to give the residents a sense of history and make peace with the spirits.
He checked in at the desk and took the elevator to the seventeenth floor. Apartment 1717 was at the end of the hall on the left. For a moment he stood before the door, observing the four large brass numerals, the small peephole, and the narrow nameplate. It was empty.
He knocked. He could sense movement within. A eye to the peephole. An indrawn breath. Then, just as he was ready to knock again, the door swung open. He was hoping for David St. Cyr. He got Michael Darius.
Leaving a man on surveillance at the St. Cyr apartment, Sakura rode back to Police Plaza, with Darius following in his car. The Robby Hudson killing was rattling around his head. Michael had extended the boundaries that day in the alley, just as he had done today, breaking into St. Cyr’s apartment, ransacking it, then waiting all night for the architect to return. And just what would Darius have done had the man returned? He refused to speculate.
Though he could never deny Michael’s instincts, those impulses that worked more often than failed, neither could he overlook some of the negative consequences of those same instincts. Michael was never good at mending fences. Bureaucratic or otherwise. But Sakura himself had learned the hard lessons over the years. Had often paid a high price. A price his former partner had always been unwilling to pay. So if cleanup was a requisite to draw upon Michael’s abilities, it was a sum he readily added to his debt.
Today there was breaking and entering. The end justified the means? It was both a professional and a moral dilemma. He hoped there would be no overt repercussions. But, later and alone, he would have to face his own sins. He’d made sure the apartment was left as undisturbed as possible. And with that, he did as he’d done on other occasions: He turned a blind eye.
And what instinct had brought Darius to the St. Cyr apartment? He’d been prompted by some remark Margot had made about the architect. Something about St. Cyr’s being difficult. Something about a kind of disagreement between them. His impression that Margot thought St. Cyr was strange. Not much to hang murder and kidnapping on. But there was more than gut feelings now.
If they had it right, David St. Cyr was Lyle Sanderson who had paid to stay at the Gramercy Park Hotel from 11 October to 10 November, securing the perfect vantage point for watching the comings and goings of the Redmonds. And as a guest of the hotel, he had been able to gain entrance to the private park where Jason and Damon played most afternoons. He might have even been the man the nanny said approached and talked to the twins.
But the architect had an apartment in the city. So why rent a hotel room if not to watch Margot and the boys? And maybe, most important, St. Cyr shared a physical anomaly with Lyle Sanderson—bicolored eyes, one green, one blue.
If this was one of St. Cyr’s creations, Adelia Johnson wanted no part of it. The house was as cold as a refrigerator. Had as much feeling as a doctor’s office. It was strange what rich white people thought was beautiful.
But the woman across from her was anything but dull. She was a cartoon drawn against a gray background. All movement. Arms, legs, mouth, eyebrows. Artsy, but not artificial. Patrice Attenborough was the real deal.
“What’s he like?”
“David? Strange.” She dragged out the word for emphasis.
Delia remembered something about the pot calling the kettle. “How is he strange, Mrs. Attenborough?”
“Want a drink?”
“No thank you, ma’am. You were saying that Mr. St. Cyr is strange.”
“Enigmatic. Which of course makes him all the more mysterious. But you make all kinds of concessions for genius. David is really talented. Just look at this place.” She did a kind of twirl like a dancer. The gold bracelets on her wrists jingled.
“How did you meet Mr. St. Cyr?”
“Sit, Detective. Relax. Your job must be stressful. Thank God for people like you. And doctors and nurses. I don’t know how you do it. Sit, please.”
Delia walked over to a chair that looked dangerous, and too flimsy for her wide ass. But she sat down anyway, expecting it to collapse. It was surprisingly comfortable.
“Nice, huh?”
“Excuse me?”
“The chair. Looks like something from the Spanish Inquisition. But it’s cozy as hell.”
Damn, it was hard keeping this woman on track. “David St. Cyr.”
“Oh, of course.” She perched on the mate to the Spanish Inquisition chair. Crossed her legs. “Mind if I smoke?” She didn’t wait for an answer, but drew a cigarette from a pack lying on a table and lit up. She took a long drag. “Nasty habit. I’m going to quit after the first of the year.”
“Where did you meet Mr. St. Cyr?”
She threw her head back. “I really can’t remember now.” Blew out smoke. “Maybe everything is an act with David. Except the talent. You can’t fake that. And style. Can’t fake that either.”
“He ever mention his family?”
“Nope. Not a word.”
“Where is he from?”
“Never said. It’s as though he fell out of the sky. Though I suspect he’s from somewhere down South. The accent. Though that could be a put-on.”
“You think he fakes his accent?”
She laughed. A hard sound. “I think David St. Cyr is capable of just about anything.”
Now that was an interesting observation.
“You know, David is very selective about his clients.” Patrice rolled her eyes.
“But he took on the Redmond project.”
“Oh, he was reluctant at first. But I told him how much the family needed to escape the big bad city. How the twins needed some fresh air. Room to grow.” She jammed out the cigarette. “God, I can’t believe Margot’s dead.” She stood, took out another cigarette, reached for the lighter, changed her mind. “You’re going to find the twins, aren’t you?”
“I don’t know, Mrs. Attenborough.”
“What a fucked-up world.” Now she took the cigarette.
“Do you know where Mr. St. Cyr is at this moment?”
“David? In New York, of course.” The last words were stretched out. Suddenly Patrice Attenborough was a street cat, cautious and suspicious.
“Why are you asking all these questions about David? What does David have to do with anything?”
“Routine questions, Mrs. Attenborough.”
“You think David had something to do with Margot’s death and the kidnapping.”
“We have to investigate everyone connected with the Redmonds, Mrs. Attenborough. That’s why I’m talking to you.”
“Then why don’t you talk to David himself?” She chewed on her lip, the cigarette burning unattended in her hand.
“There’s a problem with that.”
“Problem?” The ash had dropped to the floor.
“We can’t seem to locate Mr. St. Cyr.”
Today had started well enough. The twins waking, smiling. Damon dry, not wetting the bed. A first since he had brought the two to the Kingdom. He crushed each to his chest, breathing in their little-boy smells, incubated through the night between sheets and blankets.
Breakfast passed without incident. Cocoa Puffs was fine with both. One bowl left with a small puddle of chocolate-flavored milk, the other drained by lips pressed against the rim. And off to the bathroom. Bladders emptied. Faces washed, teeth brushed, hair combed. Then clothes tugged on. Nothing unsettling the peace of the Kingdom. Until it was time for socks and shoes, and Damon discovered the small blister on his toe.
The words came first. Almost normal, only shaky toward the end. “Mommy fix bobo.” His little fingers plucking the wound. Then a brother’s investigation. A comforting hug.
“Mommy fix bobo. . . .” This time the words a wail, scrambled with tears streaming down cheeks.
“Mommy fix bobo,” Jason echoed, wide blue eyes meeting his own, as if his twin’s plea hadn’t been understood.
“Still sailing.” He tried not to snap. He made the whooshing sound of the imaginary plane.
“Call her.” Jason again. “On the phone.”
Clever, clever kit. He allowed a smile, more genuine than any he’d gotten from Mother. “Your mommy’s in the clouds. She didn’t remember to take her phone.”
He watched the little minds continue to work, the blue eyes like searchlights probing his face.
“Call Daddy,” Jason said.
“Daddy,” Damon mimicked. “Call Daddy.”
“Daddy’s away, on business. He can’t be disturbed,” he said to them both. “Your daddy wants me to take care of you.”
“No!” Jason said.
The force of the word started fresh tears in Damon. He dropped to the turf in a deadweight way that was scary. “Mommy!” He screamed the syllables till they ran together in a horrible humming string. “Mommymommymommymommymommy . . .”