by Tim Stevens
When he’d dived out of the car earlier a moment before the fuel tank went up, he’d hit the ground headfirst and for a second feared he was going to black out. But he hadn’t, and as far as he could tell his brain and nervous system had survived the thump intact. The advancing ring of cops had persuaded him that shooting his way out wasn’t a realistic option, so Royle had played unconscious, waiting for his moment.
Waiting for one of the cops to get sloppy.
He ran through warrens of alleys, not taking time to orient himself. He believed the ambulance had been heading toward the Lower East Side. But identifying his exact location could wait until he was clear.
The events of the last half hour were a setback, nothing more.
Yes, the police had seen Royle’s face. But his appearance could be changed. He was a master at it. He carried no ID on him, so the police had no name for him or other details about him.
And yes, the Colby woman had escaped again, abetted once more by her mysterious savior. But this only piqued Royle’s interest.
Most of the killings he undertook were, if he was honest, deathly dull. They involved the straightforward dispatching of people who never had any hope of defending themselves. Royle tried to vary his methods of killing, both to make it more difficult for any investigating agencies to identify patterns, and to make his job more interesting. But however innovative the method of assassination he came up with, his targets almost never fought back.
For an intended victim to escape, not once but twice on the same night, was unheard of.
The challenge fired Royle’s enthusiasm, stirred his blood. He’d find somewhere to clean off the blood, assess the damage to his scalp from where his head had hit the ground, and alter his appearance subtly.
He’d lost his gun back there at the site of the exploded car, which didn’t matter as the weapon was of course untraceable. But he had the cop’s gun, a Smith & Wesson 9 mm pistol. Standard cop firearm. He had access to several stashes of cash he’d left around the city in lockers and various other places, in preparation for just such an eventuality.
And he had his wits.
Chapter 28
Venn watched as Dr Colby sketched on the napkin she’d spread out over the table.
‘This is the synapse,’ she said, indicating what looked like a channel of water between two landmasses. ‘The gap in between the neuronal – that’s nerve cell – endings.’
She drew a bunch of tiny crosses on one of the landmasses, and a smaller number within the channel.
‘These are neurotransmitters. The things that convey information from one neuron to the next, and then the next, in a chain. They have to cross the synapse to get from one neuron to the next. And that slows things down.’
Venn listened, but he wasn’t looking at the diagram. Instead, he was looking at Dr Colby. At the way her auburn hair hung over one eye. At the slant of her cheekbone as she pored over the drawing, engrossed.
‘The research the Prof – Professor Lomax – and I are working on, involves speeding up neurotransmitter delivery across the synapse. By enhancing receptor expression on the postsynaptic neuron, we’re looking to facilitate neurotransmission.’
She looked up, and Venn glanced away from her face, embarrassed at having been caught staring at her. But she seemed to take his look for bewilderment, because she gave an apologetic half-smile.
‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘Tech talk. Basically, we’re looking to make neuroactive and psychoactive drugs – drugs that work on the central nervous system via neurotransmitters – work better. Better and faster. Medications for depression, for schizophrenia, for Parkinson’s disease. Even Alzheimer’s. Instead of a lag of weeks before the full therapeutic effect is seen, as currently happens with a lot of these meds, we’re aiming at beneficial effects within hours.’
‘Sounds pretty impressive,’ said Venn.
‘It’s revolutionary.’ She was warming to her theme. ‘The biggest breakthrough in neurochemistry this decade. Maybe for the last fifty years. People’s suffering alleviated on a massive scale. Not to mention the economic benefits. The huge savings in hospital bills and treatment times.’
‘So you’re, what - designing drugs to enhance the effects of other drugs?’
‘Yes.’ Dr Colby nodded. ‘Only we’re not designing them. They’re already there. We’re conducting phase three trials. Trials in human volunteers, who’re taking either the active drug or a dummy, a placebo. So that we can gather data about the efficacy and safety of the drugs.’
‘And if they work, and don’t have too many side effects... these drugs could be on the market soon?’
Dr Colby smiled ruefully and shook her head. She had a nice smile, Venn decided. With the trace of a dimple on one cheek.
‘I wish,’ she said. ‘But, no. This is only a pilot study. A small trial, being conducted here at the university with a limited number of subjects. If the preliminary data are good, the company that manufacture the drug will organize much bigger studies. International ones, with thousands of subjects, spanning several continents. Those studies will take two or three years, minimum. Only then will the FDA consider granting the drug a license. Assuming the trial outcomes are favorable.’
Venn thought about it.
‘Dr Colby,’ he said. But she interrupted him.
‘Beth.’
‘Beth. Would you say the work you and Professor Lomax are engaged in, is important enough that someone might abduct him over it?’
‘Yes. It’s possible.’ She looked to one side. It gave Venn a chance to study her face again. ‘I’ve been thinking about it ever since you told me the Prof was missing. But I don’t know who might have done it.’
‘A rival drug company?’ Venn offered.
‘I don’t think so,’ said Beth. ‘The competition between these firms is pretty intense, and you see sharp practise and ethically dubious manoeuvers from time to time... but kidnaping? It’s too blatant. Too openly criminal.’
‘A foreign government, then.’
Now she looked into his eyes. He was struck by the fear he saw there.
Also, by the blue of her irises, pale against the black of her wide pupils.
‘This is beyond my experience, Mr Venn.’
‘Please. Joe. Or just Venn. Most people call me that.’ In fact, the only person who’d called him Joe in the last year or two had been Corcoran, earlier that night.
‘Venn, then. A foreign government? Are you talking about... spies?’ Her voice had an edge of wonder, with an underlay of fear.
‘Something like that,’ he said. ‘Maybe. Or, it could be a freelance group. Some kind of non-governmental, terrorist organization. One that’s planning to hold the professor to ransom. Or sell him to the highest bidder.’
She stared at him for a long few seconds, then ran her hands through her hair. The movement arched her back a little, and Venn dropped his eyes for an instant to the swell of her breasts against the thin material of her top.
Get a hold of yourself, man, he told himself.
‘Something doesn’t make sense,’ she said, watching his face again.
A lot of it doesn’t, he thought. But he said, ‘What’s that?’
‘If whoever these people are have abducted the Prof... why are they trying to kill me?’
Venn said nothing. He’d been thinking the same thing.
‘Because they were, weren’t they?’ Beth continued. ‘That man back at my apartment, and again on the street. He was trying to shoot me. Not just to wound me, but to kill me.’
‘Yes,’ said Venn. ‘He was. And I agree. It doesn’t make sense.’
He ran his gaze over the diner once more. Nobody had come in, nobody had left. The two construction workers were still there. One was asleep in his booth. The other was drinking coffee, refill after refill, like there was no tomorrow. He probably had some overtime ahead of him.
‘Who else was involved in this drug trial?’ Venn said. ‘Aside from you and Professor Lomax?’
Beth nodded, as if she’d already considered the question. ‘A handful of research assistants. Four, to be exact. Two secretaries, who handle the admin work. The drug trial volunteers themselves. We’ve recruited six so far, out of a proposed total of ten. And Dr McNeill.’
‘Who’s that?’
‘She’s Professor Lomax’s chief collaborator. The co-designer of the trial. They both came up with the study design, between them. I’m responsible for running it, on the ground. Recruiting subjects, overseeing it, monitoring for side effects and benefits.’
‘We need to pay this Dr McNeill a visit,’ said Venn.
‘I don’t know where she lives,’ Beth said.
Venn reached into the inside pocket of his leather coat and brought out the battered Filofax he’d found at the professor’s house.
‘This might tell us.’
And it did. Under M, in Professor Lomax’s crabbed scrawl, was the doctor’s name, address and phone number.
Venn said, ‘She’s in Brooklyn.’
‘Assuming she hasn’t disappeared too,’ said Beth.
And assuming she’s still alive, Venn thought.
But he didn’t say it.
Chapter 29
For the second time that evening, Detective Mike Gomez looked close to losing it, Shelly thought.
Again she’d run fruitlessly down alleys and back up once more, her eyes scanning the shadows for signs of the fugitive. There was nothing. Not even a blood trail. And from the speed at which he’d been running, she guessed he wasn’t injured at all.
He’d been faking. And he’d played them for fools. Every single one of them.
Including her.
Detective Second Grade Shelly Anderson did not like being played for a fool.
Eventually she’d given up and gone back to the main street. Gomez was leaning in through the open doors of the ambulance, which had stopped in the center of the road. Uniforms were cordoning off the street. Just like they’d done elsewhere, a few minutes earlier.
‘Jesus Christ,’ Gomez muttered.
Shelly looked. The inside of the ambulance was a bloodbath. Gore and brain material spattered the roof, blood was daubed across the walls. There was only one body in there. Officer Clark’s, his head shot away. The fugitive had thrown the other two, the EMTs, out onto the road.
Shelly and Gomez had been riding in the car immediately behind the ambulance when the vehicle ahead of them had started to lurch. Before Gomez, who was riding shotgun, had a chance to draw his sidearm, the doors had been flung open and the first of the paramedics’ bodies came tumbling out. It smashed against the windshield and Shelly had just trodden on the brakes when she felt the front wheels rock over the second corpse.
By the time they scrambled free from the car, the guy was weaving away, dodging the light traffic, already on the other side of the street.
‘Look at this,’ said Gomez through clenched teeth. ‘Another cop down. And two EMTs. Ah, shit.’
‘We’re wasting our time looking for this guy ourselves,’ Shelly said. ‘The word’s out. Every cop in the city’s going to be out there now.’
Gomez turned to stare at her.
‘We need to pursue the Lomax link,’ Shelly went on. ‘Now, while everybody’s attention is elsewhere and no-one’s going to get in our way. That doctor, Beth Colby, is the link.’
‘Yeah,’ Gomez said. ‘And God knows where she is. Or the guy who took her.’
‘But we know she was working with the professor on something,’ said Shelly, stepping away from the ambulance as the crime scene techs approached, laden with equipment. ‘And now somebody’s trying to kill her.’
‘So?’
‘So, Colby may not be the only one this killer’s after. They may be others. Other doctors or researchers who’re collaborating with her and Lomax, and who are next on the list.’
‘And we find this out – how, exactly?’
‘We call around.’
Gomez said, ‘It’s four in the morning.’
‘All the better,’ said Shelly brightly. ‘It means people will probably be home.’
They persuaded a pair of the uniformed cops who’d arrived on the scene to loan them a squad car. Shelly’s and Gomez’s Crown Vic was out of action, the windshield and hood caved in by the body that had struck it.
The two of them headed back to their station house, the one where they were based, on Second Avenue, rather than the one where they’d met Beth Colby. Inside the station, the desk sergeant was surprised to see them.
‘Some pretty serious overtime, huh?’ he remarked.
Shelly and Gomez made their way over to their adjoining cubicles in the open-plan office. A couple of night-shift cops looked up, nodded, and went back to their typing.
‘You happy to check out Dr Colby?’ Gomez said as they waited for their respective desktops PCs to boot up. ‘I’ll have another look at the professor’s work contacts. We can compare, see if there’s anything in common.’
Shelly nodded.
It took them fifteen minutes. Shelly found Beth Colby on the website of the hospital where she worked. There was a list of scientific publications there, some of which had Professor Lomax’s name on it as well as hers, but the most recent was dated last year. There was no clue to current work they might be engaged in. Shelly recalled Gomez asking Dr Colby about her current collaborative work with the professor, and wished now she hadn’t cut him off.
From the list of publication references, Shelly compiled another list of names of people Colby seemed to work with regularly.
‘Any of these come up on your radar?’ she said to Gomez, and began to read out the list.
Gomez was searching the meager database they had compiled about Professor Lomax’s recent and current activities. It would have been bigger, if the plug hadn’t been pulled on their investigation of the professor’s disappearance when the Feds had stepped in and taken over.
‘Hold it,’ said Gomez. ‘That name. Margaret McNeill. We have a meeting noted between her and the professor four days before his disappearance. And another one the previous week.’
Shelly pulled up the details. Dr Margaret McNeill was a fellow neuroscientist at the university. Her research interests included neurotransmitters, and she was noted to have collaborated with Lomax on a number of large-scale pharmaceutical trials.
‘Think she might be worth a look?’ said Gomez.
‘Nothing to lose.’
Shelly printed off McNeill’s address and both home and cell phone numbers.
She looked across at Gomez. ‘You think we should call her?’
‘It might spook her. If she’s a potential target, like Colby, then her home might be under surveillance. A call could drive her out, and she might be followed.’
‘So we pay her a visit.’
‘Guess so.’ He was already on his feet.
‘Early-morning knocks on the door by the police.’ Shelly shook her head. ‘It’s like Soviet Russia.’
‘We could save her life.’
Chapter 30
DeeDee Rosetti sat staring at the broad expanse of her desk, looking for something to throw. There was a hideous glass ashtray some distant relative had once given her as a gift, but if she smashed that she’d have nothing to grind her dogends into.
Looking up, she stared at the two men on the carpet across from her. There was Zach Infante, the dumb but loyal kid she used as her gofer. And there was Billy Vincenzo, older, in his forties, who’d been with her crew since she’d taken over 12 years ago.
He didn’t look scared shitless like Infante. Vincenzo had learned to cope with Rosetti’s volcanic temper over the years.
‘Son of a bitch,’ she snarled.
The two men said nothing.
‘It’s almost five AM. I put out the hit at, what, nine yesterday evening? And there’s still no word. No hint that this Colby, this girl, is dead yet.’
‘We don’t know that she isn’t, boss,’ said Infante, ne
rvously licking dry lips. Beside him Vincenzo shot him a warning look.
Rosetti stared at Infante, feeling the heat rise within her. ‘Come again?’
Infante glanced helplessly at Vincenzo, who looked away. He wasn’t going to bail the kid out.
‘It’s just that... well, maybe the woman’s on ice and we just haven’t been told yet.’ Infante tried a laugh that came out as a whinny. ‘I mean, no news is good news, right?’
Rosetti’s stare bored into the kid, even though he was unable to hold her gaze. She let the silence build up. Three seconds. Four.
‘I am being paid one of the biggest fees I’ve ever been offered, to dispose of a woman. Not the President, not some Delta Force veteran, but a female physician. I send two – not one, but two – freelancers into the field, and hours later neither of them has been able to do the job. And you... you spout clichés at me?’
Her voice had gradually lowered and become quieter as she went on, adding to the menace.
‘I didn’t mean any –’ Infante started to say. Then he thought better of it, and shut his mouth.
Rosetti slapped both palms down on the desk top with a crack. ‘Enough, already. These outsider douchebags can kiss my ass. We do the hit ourselves.’
‘Boss.’ Vincenzo didn’t talk much. But he also wasn’t afraid to challenge Rosetti when he felt it necessary. She respected that in him. She knew also that it made him dangerous, a potential threat to her authority one day.
Well, she’d deal with that at the time.
She raised her eyebrows at Vincenzo.
He continued. ‘Do you think that’s wise? It’s a sensitive job. The instructions were explicitly to subcontract it out. If word gets out that we do the hit, we might not get paid.’
‘Then we’ll have to be discreet, won’t we?’ Rosetti reached for her smokes, lit one up. ‘The way things are going, we’re not going to get paid anyhow. The girl seems to have evaded those other goons. No. We do the job properly, and we do it ourselves.’
Vincenzo nodded. That was another thing Rosetti respected about him. He wasn’t afraid to disagree with her, but once she’d made her final decision, he went along with it. Totally and unquestioningly, with no bitching, no passive-aggressive drama.