He wasn’t ready for bed or ready to face Sarah.
So he settled in at his desk with a stack of documents for another long night.
CHAPTER 5
ETHAN RODE THE ELEVATOR DOWN to the lobby and hurried out of the building. It was just after eight, and he was scheduled to meet Detective Jenkins at the crime scene in less than an hour. Mindy was pacing back and forth when he got to the corner of Fifth Avenue, holding two cups of coffee. “Ethan, you’re late. It took me all day yesterday to set up this survey. Jenkins doesn’t have a lot of time, and I don’t want to keep him waiting. We gotta get going.”
She handed him a coffee.
Ethan smiled sheepishly. “Sorry, I was up most of the night going through documents and slept through my alarm clock. We’ll make it.” He hailed a taxi and they climbed in. “We’re headed to the intersection of Little West Twelfth and Washington Street in the Meatpacking District,” he said, gulping his coffee and scalding his mouth. “Any idea how long it’ll take us to get there?” The cabby didn’t answer. He just hit the meter, gunned the engine, and took off down Fifth Avenue.
“I guess he’s not talking,” Mindy said as the car pulled into heavy traffic.
“Guess not,” Ethan said, opening his briefcase and pulling out a file folder. “Take a look at this and let me know what you think. He handed her a copy of the autopsy report. It was dated March 26 and signed by the deputy coroner—a pathologist named Leonard Toakling.
“I see you’re making your way through the court docket,” Mindy said, scanning the five pages.
“That’s all I’ve been doing—organizing the damn paperwork. It’s driving Sarah and Luke crazy. It’s driving me crazy too,” he said, a thin smile spreading across his face. “At least I’m getting into the story. I didn’t think that was possible. Look, read the last page. I’ve underlined the key paragraph.”
Mindy flipped through the document and read the passage:
The victim was murdered by a single gunshot wound to her upper torso. It entered her body just above her heart and exited the lumbar region of her upper back, shattering her L4 vertebra. No bullet or bullet fragments were found in her body. From the size of the entry wound and the damage at the exit wound, I’ve determined the murder weapon was a handgun, either a Glock 30 or a Beretta 9 mm. The bullet severed the victim’s aorta, stopping the flow of oxygenated blood from her heart to her other organs. The damage caused massive bleeding as noted in the police reports. Death occurred within minutes as her organs shut down. The time of death was approximately 3:30 a.m. The type of death was a homicide.
“So the deputy coroner’s findings confirm she was killed by the gunshot,” Mindy said, handing the document back to Ethan.
“Just like Jenkins wrote in his report.”
“Have you confirmed the bullet came from Feodor’s gun? He was holding a Beretta when they found him.”
“Not yet. I’ve looked through just about everything the DA’s office sent us, but I can’t find the ballistics report.”
“That’s strange,” Mindy said, puzzled. “You’d think they’d give us that piece of information. It’s pretty basic to their case. Maybe it was an oversight?”
“Maybe,” Ethan said suspiciously. “I’ll ask Jenkins if he’s got a copy. We need to make sure the bullet that killed Cynthia came from Feodor’s gun. Then we’ll have the last bit of proof that he actually murdered her.”
It was taking the cabbie a long time to go downtown. Traffic was crawling on Fifth Avenue, and Ethan was beginning to lose patience. “Is there a faster way to get there?” The cabbie didn’t respond. He just stepped on the gas, made a quick turn onto Fifty-Seventh Street, and headed to the West Side Highway. There was even more traffic going crosstown.
“Shit. We’re not gonna make it,” Mindy said, worried.
“Jenkins’ll wait for us. He wants to meet us as much as we want to meet him. This is his big chance to go on national television.”
“You’re damn right he does,” she said, smiling, then scanning a to-do list she’d prepared for the cab ride. “When are we talking to Sampson?”
“Late tomorrow afternoon. His assistant emailed me this morning and confirmed we’re in his schedule at four o’clock. You need to make sure David knows about the meeting.”
“And have you contacted Feodor’s attorney yet?”
“Late yesterday. I’m meeting with him at five o’clock.”
“Do you want me to go with you?”
“No. I need you back at the office pushing the story forward. Ride David and make sure he gets me in to see Nancy McGregor. I’m worried we’re not in her schedule. I’ve got a whole list of questions I wanna ask her and need to lock in her interview.” The taxi stopped for a red light at the corner of West and Horatio streets. “This is close enough,” Ethan said, reaching for his wallet. “Let’s get out and walk the neighborhood.” He paid the fare and watched as the cabbie screeched away from the sidewalk. “That was the weirdest cab ride. That guy never uttered a single word.”
“Nope. Not a one,” Mindy said jokingly. “Not the friendliest of blokes. Now which way do we go, Ethan?”
He punched Fernelli’s Beef and Poultry into his iPhone and pulled up a Google map of the Meatpacking District. “It’s right there, and we’re over here.” He showed Mindy the route they had to take. “Only a couple of blocks uptown and one block east.” They started walking, passing a wholesale meatpacking company where sides of beef were sitting outside an old broken-down warehouse. Clouds of flies hovered over the carcasses as men dressed in bloody aprons stood about shooting the breeze. At the corner of Little West Twelfth, they headed up the block, passing more dead animals standing unattended in crates, waiting to be butchered and packaged. The smell in the hot morning sun was stifling. Fernelli’s was sitting derelict at the end of the block, no longer in business, the doors padlocked, the windows boarded up, the front gate hanging from its hinges.
Detective Edward Jenkins was waiting by the front door smoking a cigarette. A big man with broad shoulders and a narrow waistline, his thick black hair was neatly trimmed and parted on the side. He was dressed in a tailored black suit, white shirt, and gray tie. Except for the bulge under his arm where he holstered his handgun, he looked more like a Park Avenue attorney than a New York City cop.
Ethan disliked him immediately.
“Sorry we’re late,” he said casually. “We got stuck in the rush hour traffic.”
“Not a problem,” Jenkins said, grinning. “It’s always a mess at this hour. Makes you want to move out to the suburbs where life’s a little slower and there’s far less crime.”
Ethan ignored the detective’s feeble attempt at humor.
“So this is where the gun battle took place,” he said pointing at Fernelli’s. “It’s pretty spooky down here. What’s it like in the middle of the night?”
“Even creepier,” Jenkins said. “The perfect place for a drug deal. This neighborhood is one of the last locations in Manhattan where animals are butchered for the retail meat market. So the powers that be at City Hall let things slide because there are no high-end companies complaining about their tax dollars. They don’t fix the potholes. They don’t collect the garbage. And they let the rats run wild. But if you walk a couple of blocks in any direction, you’re gonna find a whole different world. Lots of la-di-da boutiques and specialty stores and high-class restaurants. At night, the streets are teeming with the rich and famous hopping from one club to the next.”
“That’s what Cynthia Jameson was doing the night she was murdered. She was clubbing, right?” Mindy said.
“Yup. She was partying with friends and ended up just around the corner at the Standard Grill. Want me to show you where we found her?”
“In a minute,” Ethan said, trying to get his bearings. “But first, I’d like to see where the gun battle took place.”
“Follow me. I’ll give you the cook’s tour.” Jenkins pushed open the broken gate and headed do
wn the narrow alley bordered by Fernelli’s on one side and a tenement on the other. “The parking lot’s in the back,” he said. “You can’t see it from the street.”
“So it’s private,” Ethan said, looking up and down the alley.
“Totally. It’s tucked away out of sight from prying eyes, the perfect place for a drug deal. That’s why the gang picked it. They thought they could grab the heroin, pay off the dealer, and make their getaway. A quick, simple, and foolproof plan. But something went horribly wrong, and as you know, all hell broke loose.”
“Detective, who owns this parking lot?”
“It took us awhile to figure that out. There were a lot of shell companies protecting the identity of the real owner. We finally traced it to a big international food conglomerate.”
“Which one?”
“I don’t remember,” Jenkins said, averting his eyes. “We didn’t think it was important. So we didn’t pursue the lead and just passed the information on to the Feds. I guess I could get you the name if you think it’s important. I must have it in a file somewhere.”
“No big deal. I’ll call if I can’t figure it out myself,” Ethan said, wondering why the detective didn’t think there might be some connection between Fernelli’s and the gang involved in the shootout. He filed that thought in the back of his mind and pushed on. “Can you show us where you found all the blood?” Ethan said, walking to the middle of the parking lot.
“Mostly over there,” Jenkins said, making his way to a chain-link fence and pointing at the ground. “There were two big pools right here and more splattered over there on the side of this building.” He touched a section of bricks. “But we didn’t find any bodies; not here.”
“And you’re sure all the blood came from just two guys? I think that’s what I read in your police report,” Mindy said inquisitively.
“The lab techs are positive. All the blood came from two guys.”
“And you don’t know who they are, do you?” Ethan said bluntly.
“Nope,” Jenkins said. “We couldn’t match the DNA in any of our databases.”
“But you did find one body,” Mindy said. “The Mexican.”
“He was on the other side of the parking lot near the loading dock,” Jenkins said, walking over to a spot fifty feet away. “He was lying here with most of his head blown off. Probably got shot by somebody at pretty close range. That’s what the CSIs thought after they finished all their measurements.”
“And you don’t know who he is?” Ethan said.
“He wasn’t ID’d either. We just know he was Mexican, probably from one of the cartels.”
“So a total of three guys were either wounded or killed in the gun battle,” Mindy said, sweeping her arms around the parking lot.
“Yup. That’s what I wrote in my report. And, of course, the fourth guy was Pavel Feodor.”
“And where’d you find him?” Mindy said.
“He was in the alley, near the street.” Jenkins walked another fifty feet and stopped. “He was lying right about here, covered in blood and barely breathing. In fact, when I first found him I thought he was dead.”
“And you think that’s why he was left behind?” Ethan said, beginning to feel that Jenkins’s account of the crime scene sounded a little too rehearsed.
“Nobody’s really sure, but the prosecutor believes the other gang members didn’t think he’d last long enough to talk. They must’ve been pretty damn surprised when they heard on the news he was alive and kicking,” Jenkins said, chuckling.
“But Feodor never told you who he was with that night, did he?” Mindy said. “At least that’s what I read in the newspapers.”
“Nope. Just said he was part of some random group of thugs he met at a bar right before the drug deal went down, and that they opened fire when the Mexicans tried to cheat them. He’s a tough little guy. Closed like a book when he doesn’t wanna talk.”
“Okay, I’ve got the lay of the land,” Ethan said, trying to decide how to shoot a reenactment of the gun battle so the audience would think they were a fly on the wall actually watching it. “Now show us where you found Cynthia Jameson’s body.”
“Over this way,” Jenkins said, heading out of the alley and up to Washington Street. “She was lying right here on her back not too far from the front door of the restaurant,” Jenkins said, pointing up the block.
Kneeling, Ethan looked at the Standard Grill and then back at Fernelli’s. “The bullet must have ricocheted back and forth against a couple of these buildings before it hit her. There isn’t a straight line of sight between here and where you found Feodor.”
“That’s what the CSIs believe. You can see bullet holes in the bricks if you look closely.” Jenkins pointed at a building across the street from the restaurant. “The slug that killed Cynthia was embedded over there next to the specialty food store. It was pretty mangled when we found it, but it definitely came from his gun. There was just enough left to make a match.”
Ethan took one last look up and down the block, then turned to the detective. “You know, I’ve searched through the court record but can’t seem to find the ballistics report. I really need a copy for my files. It’s a key piece of evidence, and the GBS attorneys are gonna want to see it when they review my story for accuracy. Do you have a copy by any chance?”
Jenkins hesitated, his eyes blinking spasmodically. “Well, I must have it somewhere, but I can’t give it to you without checking first with Nancy McGregor. I’m under explicit orders not to release any documents to the press without her approval.”
“Well, we’ve got calls into the DA’s office, and I guess we can wait a couple more days until we get in to meet her,” Ethan said as he studied the detective’s face. “I was just hoping you could cut through some of the red tape and get it to me quickly.”
“It would be better if you went through Nancy,” Jenkins said, still blinking.
“Not a problem,” Ethan said, shaking the detective’s hand. “I’ve just got one more question. Would you be willing to come back down here and take us through all this again when I have my cameras?”
“Sure,” Jenkins said, more composed. “I’ll have to run it through my public affairs people, but I can’t imagine they’ll object. Let’s plan on it.”
“Excellent,” Ethan said, turning to Mindy. “Did I miss anything?”
“Not that I can think of.”
“Good. We’ll be in touch,” Ethan said.
They said their good-byes, then hiked the three blocks to Fourteenth Street and hailed a taxi. “So what did you think of Jenkins?” Mindy said, raising an eyebrow.
“He was lying,” Ethan said icily.
“About what?”
“The ballistics report.”
“Why’d you think that?”
“Because he started blinking furiously when I asked him for the document.”
“That doesn’t prove anything.”
“Maybe not, but I wouldn’t bet against me. He’s hiding something,” Ethan said, a distant look on his face. “Nothing he showed us this morning adds up—the gun battle in the back of that parking lot, the location of Cynthia’s body a block away, Feodor lying in the alley. Doesn’t it seem like a stretch that a bullet fired from Pavel’s gun somehow found its way into Cynthia’s body?”
“Come on, Ethan. A jury listened to all the evidence and convicted him. I’m sure he killed her.”
“I know. But something doesn’t feel right,” he said, perplexed.
“Ethan, I’ve seen that look on your face before. What are you thinking?”
“I don’t know,” he said, pulling out a cigarette. “We need that ballistics report. I think it’s important.”
“I’ll have David call his contact at the DA’s office when I get back to the Broadcast Center. See if he can get them to send it right away. Where are you heading now?”
“Home,” he said. “I want to double-check a couple of documents before I go see the public defender.”
“Getting all your ducks in a row?”
“That’s the name of the game.”
“Sure you don’t want me to go with you?”
“No. I got this covered. We’ll talk later.”
After dropping Mindy off at the office, he taxied to his apartment on the East Side. He had four hours until his meeting with Frankie O’Malley.
Just enough time to get ready.
CHAPTER 6
ETHAN DROPPED HIS BLUE BLAZER on the couch and sat down at his desk. The Venetian blinds in his study were half open, and bright sunlight filled the room, casting geometric patterns across the furniture and bookshelves. After checking his email and finding no messages from Paul, he flipped through a stack of folders until he found a packet of crime scene photos buried on the bottom of the pile. He lit a cigarette and carefully read the cover page listing all the pictures the DA’s office had sent him in the court docket. There were eighteen in total, taken by a police photographer and carefully labeled as “Exhibit 21.”
He inhaled a deep drag of smoke, walked over to an empty table, and lined up the photos in three neat rows. The first was a series of tight shots of uniformed police officers drawing circles around pools of reddish-brown blood smeared on the pavement, and crime scene investigators scraping samples to analyze in the lab. There were a handful of medium shots of the surrounding buildings—the bricks covered in more blood splatter and highlighted with more chalk. Ethan closed his eyes, trying to remember exactly what he’d seen, the photos clearly matching what Detective Jenkins had painstakingly pointed out in the parking lot. He opened a page of notes in his iPad and quickly typed several questions for the detective’s interview.
Then he grabbed a half dozen images of Pavel Feodor lying unconscious in the alley—Jenkins standing or kneeling in every shot, examining the gunman, pointing at evidence. Feodor was curled on his side, a blue woolen hat askew on his head, his leather jacket bunched up around his waist. Blood had sprayed in a wide arc around his body, covering his legs and groin. In one shot, Ethan could clearly identify Feodor’s face and see a handgun, presumably the Beretta that killed Cynthia, clutched in his right hand. He remembered reading in the newspapers that Nancy McGregor had used these photos to place Feodor at the crime scene and show the jury he was holding the murder weapon.
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