The Ultimatum: A Jeremy Fisk Novel

by Dick Wolf

  CHAPTER 23

  Fisk found Chay in the FBI cafeteria, at the table where he’d left her prior to the meeting in the SCIF—her cup of coffee still full, her sandwich still in its plastic wrap. She was typing furiously on a tablet computer.

  “How about a fresh cup of coffee?” he asked her.

  “Um . . .” She kept typing. “No, thanks.”

  “Anything?”

  Eyes on her screen, she raised her index finger, for an instant, then returned it to typing.

  Fisk waited. Ten seconds, fifteen.

  Finally she looked up.

  He was only mildly curious about what she was working on, but primarily because interest seemed appropriate, he asked, “Are you writing about the incident at the Museum of Natural History?”

  “There’s not much I could write about that that hasn’t already been on every major news outlet, and every minor outlet. I’ve been trying to come up with a response to the blogger.”

  “Which blogger?”

  She grumbled. “The Mighty Pen.”

  “Should I know the Mighty Pen?”

  “No, definitely not, but, unfortunately, a lot of people do. The Pen thinks of itself as New York’s answer to the Drudge Report, and just about every day they get on the New York Times for being a tool of the liberal elite. Check out their ‘reporting’ on the Museum of Natural History . . .”

  Holding up the tablet, she tapped a headline.

  Times Reporter in Bed with NYPD Intel on Drone Killer Story

  She said, “The story devotes maybe a column inch to the arrangement the paper made with Dubin so that I would withhold the story that the killer was using a drone, his demand that Merritt Verlyn be released, et cetera.”

  “Any idea how they found out about it?” Fisk asked.

  “Leaked by an insider.” Her face tightened, as though she’d swallowed something bitter. “Presumably at the paper.”

  A teachable moment, Fisk thought. But that would rub salt in her wound.

  Returning her focus to the tablet, she said, “This is basically a feature-length insinuation that the Times is now a wholly owned subsidiary of the NYPD, aiding and abetting the department in its cover-ups. And of course that the blood of the Museum of Natural History security guard, Earl Johnson, is on my hands.” She resumed typing. “I’m trying to set the record straight.”

  She had her work cut out for her, he thought. She had lost a major exclusive, and deserving or not, she might well wind up on the metro beat until she could mend her credibility—if she could mend it. Yesterday he would have seen a net gain in this turn of events: he was rid of her on this case, and rooting for her removal from the intel beat, especially the Jenssen story. Today, though, he needed her. And his leverage was depleted. Almost. Taking the chair across the table from her, he played his one remaining card. “The Mighty Pen doesn’t mention Yodeler?”

  She shook her head.

  He asked, “Would you like the exclusive on him, all the way to his capture?”

  She typed another forty or fifty characters, so fast that her fingers were a blur. “That’s awfully nice of you,” she said sardonically.

  “I’ll need one thing in return.”

  “I never would have guessed.”

  “I want to go talk to Verlyn at the U.S. marshals’ office.”

  She stiffened. “Why?”

  “If you ask him if he knows Yodeler, there’s a chance he might answer.”

  Her gaze dropped to her monitor. She typed a few words, then looked up. “I can try, but one thing I need first.”

  Surprise, surprise. “What?”

  “Just a bit of info, on the record, for the story I’m writing.”

  “What do you want to know?”

  “What does the public need to know?”

  “The Department now has reason to believe that a killer has used a miniature unmanned aerial vehicle armed with a rifle in four different killings. We’re requesting the public’s help in bringing Yodeler to justice. I don’t know yet, but I suspect there will be a substantial reward offered for any information leading to his apprehension.”

  Chay returned her attention to her tablet and began typing again. Without looking up, she asked, “Why didn’t you tell the public about this before?”

  “We weren’t certain he was using the UAV until this morning.”

  “Oh, please.” Hitting the return key with much more force than was necessary, she glared across the table. “You suspected it was a drone two murders ago. Otherwise I wouldn’t be here right now.”

  Fisk exhorted himself to remain calm. Without her, Verlyn would only meet if U.S. marshals dragged him to the meeting. “You already agreed that the drone theory was on background only. That’s why you’re here right now.”

  She folded her arms. “Off the record and for my background use only, has this case informed the way you would approach a future case, if you suspected that a serial killer were using a drone?”

  Fisk readied the stock answer, that in a case where the full information was explosive enough to create public panic, it was in everyone’s best interest to withhold information, especially if disseminating the information jeopardized an investigation. But that answer didn’t sit well with him, for some reason. He replied, in all sincerity, “You were right before about giving the public a heads-up.”

  She regarded him with disbelief.

  “Really,” he said. “I wouldn’t have speculated for public consumption that there was a madman with a weaponized drone. But I would have floated a cover story to inform the public of a drone presence, something that implied a risk so that people would be observant, and so that those who did see the drone would keep their distance. The cover story might have been something innocuous enough on the surface, but still have had the effect of keeping them safe. For instance, the device is malfunctioning and could suddenly discharge rapidly spinning and dangerous rotor blades, or crash. So definitely avoid contact, maintain considerable distance from the device, and immediately report any sighting and location to the police.”

  Chay looked him over, as if reappraising him. “I’m impressed,” she said. “Not that many people are willing to admit to their mistakes.”

  Fisk suspected she was talking about something else. “What else do you want?”

  “What else would you ask if you were me?”

  A smart question, he thought, particularly if he were withholding something. “Information on the victim?”

  “Got it already. While you were sitting around upstairs, all of the details that a reporter could ever want came across my Twitter news feed alone—did you know that the victim, Earl Johnson, briefly played second base in the San Diego Padres organization?

  “Already the public demand for Verlyn’s release is so intense, the biggest question I had was whether the discussion would shut the Internet down.”

  “So do you have what you need to write your piece now?” he asked.

  She stood up, in the same motion dropping the tablet into her shoulder bag. “I already filed the story. Let’s go.”

  CHAPTER 24

  While walking with Chay from the FBI to the Metropolitan Correctional Center on Park Row, Fisk wondered if they were witnessing the early stages of a public panic.

  The two-block walk would have ordinarily taken them four or five minutes, but this afternoon, it would be half that time: The Wall Street rush-hour crowd was noticeably thinner than usual. He guessed that many people had left work early. And those out now were literally in a rush, all oddly quiet too—as if no one wanted to be slowed down by chatting. The air seemed to buzz with their tension.

  Foley Square, typically a hive at this hour on summer days with government agency staffers celebrating the end of the workday, was deserted save for stragglers hurrying across it. The hot-dog vendor and Italian-ice vendor huddled in conversation; no customers waited at either of their carts—whatever the hot-dog man said prompted the other man to hurriedly collapse his cart’s su
n umbrella.

  As Fisk and Chay rounded the corner onto Park Row, they heard a screech of tires and a deep and resounding metal-on-metal crash. At the far end of Park Row was a taxi, the hood of which had practically become one with the side of a parked UPS delivery truck. Standing on the street with the UPS man, the cabdriver pointed to the sky, as if in explanation. An NYPD patrolman tried to reach them on foot but was besieged by passersby asking questions, looking over their shoulders and up, or both.

  Chay asked Fisk, “What can we do to keep people from panicking?”

  “One thing.” He pointed to the Metropolitan Correctional Center at the far end of the block and said, “Let them know when we’ve put the killer in there.”

  At first glance, the federal administrative detention facility looked like a modern high-rise. A closer look said something was amiss, or even sinister. Most of the windows were slits, like the rectangular peepholes on the doors to the cells themselves. Other windows were entirely blacked out. The facility’s reputation as a squalid hellhole explained the wide berth it was given by pedestrians. New Yorkers all knew it contained the worst of the worst among its population of eight hundred, crammed into a space for half that many. They’d seen the news clips of Junior Gotti, Bernie Madoff, Ramzi Yousef, and Magnus Jenssen hop-marched through its dark subterranean tunnels, shackled at the ankles, chained at the waist, wrists cuffed.

  Inside, Fisk saw on Chay’s face the same surprise he always saw on first-time visitors: the facility was far from the dungeon they imagined. The common area Fisk and Chay were led past, by a Metropolitan Correctional Center’s escorting officer, resembled those at a modern university student center: airy, done in cheery colors, contemporary IKEA-type tables and chairs, arcade-quality Foosball and air-hockey tables, and a stunning amount of elbow room by Manhattan standards.

  The cells weren’t much larger than the bunk beds inside them, but rather than cramped or constricting, they appeared cozy, like sleeping berths on European trains, everything white, the mattresses surprisingly thick and inviting. Other than security-risk cases, who were limited to tele-visits, inmates here met friends and family members in a common institutional visiting area that accommodated a hundred people at a time. Inmates working with lawyers could qualify for small private meeting spaces within the institutional visiting area.

  A guard took Fisk and Chay to the sixth floor in Private Visitation Room E, “private visitation” serving as a euphemism for interrogation; these rooms essentially belonged to law enforcement officers and prosecutors. Like all of the facility’s private visitation rooms, this one had a two-way mirror fronting an adjacent observation room, and it was wired with concealed video cameras and microphones. Otherwise it was forgettable, a drab twelve-by-twelve-foot space.

  Fisk and Chay took chairs on one side of a sturdy metal table that was bolted to the floor. Soon thereafter, the guard returned with Verlyn, who lit up at the sight of them.

  “Ms. Maryland, Detective Fisk, I hope I haven’t kept you waiting,” he said breathlessly. His lilting voice was at odds with his sturdy, angular Teutonic features. As was so often the case, the dossier, even with its plethora of videotaped interviews, hadn’t captured the subject’s character.

  Fisk had learned that Verlyn was a bright guy from New Canaan, Connecticut, who’d compensated for a lack of social skills with raw intelligence, earning a scholarship to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Despite completing just two semesters at the school, he went on to work in a series of high-profile government systems positions. Now he reminded Fisk of an overly busy party host trying his damnedest to please everyone.

  Striding up to the table, Verlyn extended his right hand until his escorting officer, a big man with tired eyes, cleared his throat. Verlyn’s hand dropped to his side almost immediately. Fisk guessed Verlyn had been excessively sociable more than once before. Physical contact in these rooms was prohibited.

  “Hi, Merritt,” Chay said, but without the familiarity Fisk had expected, or the congeniality he’d hoped for.

  “We’re good,” Fisk told the escorting officer.

  With a nod, the man withdrew, the door thudding shut behind him.

  “Thank you,” Verlyn said.

  “You’re welcome,” said Fisk, although his request for the escorting officer to wait outside hadn’t been made out of consideration for Verlyn, but to allow the inmate to talk more freely. For that same reason, Fisk had also requested an interrogation room without the metal mesh divider between interrogator and inmate. In general, however, Fisk wanted his interrogation subjects to be uncomfortable. For that reason, by design, the chair reserved for Verlyn wobbled, the metal tip on one of the front legs clattering against the tile floor.

  Earlier, per Fisk’s request, a U.S. marshal had removed the leg’s rubber tip. The ideal seating for the subject of an interrogation was a wobbly swivel rocking chair on wheels, with loose armrests, because it amplified the movements of the parts of his body that anchored him, his feet and his elbow and his ass, known as “anchor parts.” People discharge anxiety through their anchor parts, which gives the interrogator an indicator of nonverbal deceptive behavior.

  Verlyn might talk a blue streak. More than anything, Fisk needed to know what was true.

  “So, how are we doing today?” Verlyn asked as he dropped into the chair, his air of enthusiasm unaffected by the wobble. Like this was happy hour at his favorite tavern.

  “Can’t complain,” Fisk said, before starting the interview with a textbook rapport builder: “How are the accommodations here?” He might have instead let fly with Merritt, who the hell is Yodeler? But casual conversation created a nonthreatening atmosphere. Get Verlyn going on neutral topics about which he had no reason to lie, like the weather or what they served here for breakfast, and it would be easier to tell when and if he began to lie.

  “How do I like it here?” Verlyn said, essentially repeating Fisk’s question, which was troublesome. To buy time to think, a person bent on deception often repeats a question or takes an inordinate amount of time before answering. Verlyn had no reason to lie about the accommodations, but he might be attempting to throw a wrench into Fisk’s efforts at establishing a baseline for honesty so that later on, when the small talk was in the rearview, he could pause to buy time with impunity.

  “It’s funny that you should ask that, Detective,” Verlyn went on, his big gray eyes sparkling. “When I first started at the NSA in 2004, I was typically at work by eight thirty in the morning and stayed until after midnight, then spent another forty-five minutes to an hour driving to and from Georgetown, where I’d managed to buy low on a condo. Because that was my routine six days a week, sometimes all seven, there was little time for anything else, on top of which the job itself was quite stressful. Consequently I began to have a recurring dream, the only one that I’ve ever had, in which I was arrested on some odd technicality—like the character Josef K. in Kafka’s The Trial—and then taken to a Spartan penal facility where my cell resembled the room I’d had in the dorms my freshman year at MIT: a single bed, a tiny desk, whitewashed cinder blocks, and that was it. And in the dream, I loved being imprisoned, because I was able to catch up on sleep and reading and thinking; in a way, it was the ultimate intellectual’s vacation. And this place”—he indicated the surroundings with a wave—“has actually been better than the one in my dream, by a fair margin. They have e-book readers, and the food is pretty good . . .”

  This overly specific answer—the question had been simply how were his accommodations, and “fine” would have sufficed in response—put Fisk on guard. He’d seen this before, with subjects bent on deception: they inundate you with unrelated facts intended to enhance your perception of them. In maybe half a minute, Verlyn had dropped MIT (never mind that he’d been expelled after his freshman year for poor grades), his work ethic, a knowledge of modern European literature, that he was an intellectual, and the Georgetown condo he managed to buy at the bottom of the market—what a m
odest guy. When the interview shifted gears, he could now get away with obscuring what he knew of Yodeler by piling superfluous detail upon superfluous detail. Alternately, he was simply insecure and hungry for attention, hence his self-aggrandizing essay-length response, not to mention his star turn as a whistle-blower.

  As Verlyn detailed the Metropolitan Correctional Center food and its surprisingly creative ambience, Fisk looked for other signs of deception. At the Farm, he’d learned to detect dozens. Contrary to popular belief, liars had no difficulty looking you in the eyes. Fisk searched for relative subtleties. For instance, newly incarcerated prisoners typically cleared their throats when lying because they didn’t adequately hydrate behind bars, and anxiety manifests itself as dryness in the throat. Verlyn wasn’t doing that, nor was he shifting uncomfortably in his seat, or grooming himself—smoothing hair, flicking away dust particles, and scratching were also classic means of shedding the anxiety that accompanies lies.

  Of course, Verlyn could know most or all of this. The same CIA polygraph examiner who’d taught Fisk’s three-week interrogation course at the Farm had lectured at Verlyn’s NSA orientation. Then again, professionals with knowledge of lie-spotting techniques often make the worst liars because they have too much to think about while lying.

  “Glad to hear you’re having a good time here,” Fisk said.

  Chay added, “Yes, that’s nice,” but only after Fisk had looked her way, wondering why she was being so quiet. She’d said that journalistic principle precluded her from engaging in police work. But her overriding journalistic objective in this instance coincided with that of the police: find out what the hell Verlyn knows.

  Also odd, Fisk thought, was that Verlyn continued to focus on him rather than on her. It wasn’t as simple as shyness or intimidation. Could they be engaged in some form of subterfuge?

  “I should note that the unexpectedly pleasant accommodations are considerably offset by the knowledge that high-ranking members of the United States government would like to murder me,” said Verlyn. He gripped either side of his seat to precisely push himself into an upright position, at the same time centering himself. Fisk knew such tidying to be another classic means of discharging anxiety.