ALEX BARCLAY
The Caller

Copyright

This is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

HarperCollinsPublishers

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

Published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2007

Copyright © Alex Barclay 2007

Daphne Du Maurier quote reproduced with permission of the

Curtis Brown Group Ltd on behalf of the Estate of Daphne Du Maurier

copyright © Daphne Du Maurier 1938

Cover design layout © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2016

Cover photographs © Shutterstock.com

Alex Barclay asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books

Source ISBN: 9780008180881

Ebook Edition © SEPTEMBER 2008 ISBN: 9780007279425

Version 2016-05-13

Praise for Alex Barclay

‘The rising star of the hard-boiled crime fiction world, combining wild characters, surprising plots and massive backdrops with a touch of dry humour’ Mirror

‘Tense, no-punches-pulled thriller that will have you on the edge of your deckchair.’ Woman and Home

‘Explosive’ Company

‘Darkhouse is a terrific debut by an exciting new writer’ Independent on Sunday

‘Compelling’ Glamour

‘Excellent summer reading … Barclay has the confidence to move her story along slowly, and deftly explores the relationships between her characters’ Sunday Telegraph

‘The thriller of the summer’ Irish Independent

‘If you haven’t discovered Alex Barclay, it’s time to jump on the bandwagon’ Image Magazine

Dedication

To Ciaran, Ronan, Lorraine and Damien

With screaming eyes

And weakened breath

’Twas not for life

He begged,

’Twas death.

Anonymous

Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Praise for Alex Barclay

Dedication

Epigraph

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Epilogue

Acknowledgements

Keep Reading …

About the Author

Also by Alex Barclay

About the Publisher

PROLOGUE

The room was eight by ten and windowless. Weak shafts of light stretched through the bars that ran from floor to ceiling across one wall. The small television, mounted on a black shelf outside, was full-volume white noise. On a tray by the door lay the shriveled remains of an overcooked dinner.

The bed, pushed against the right-hand wall, was perfectly made, each corner tight under the thin mattress, the coarse green cover smooth except for where he sat, hunched and focused. Sweat darkened the folds and underarms of his blue shirt, the odor mixing with the rising stench from the discarded food.

He opened his eyes and turned to the desk lamp beside him, flicking the switch. Under the brilliant white light, he held a model; a plaster replica of the thirty-two human teeth he could recall so easily as he traced his thumb over the contours; the imperfection of a prominent incisor, a pointed canine tip, the uneven surface of a chipped premolar. Only once had he seen the teeth in a smile: at the beginning, a quick flash before the terror struck. For hours afterwards, they had been clamped shut in agony or visible only as the lips curled back from them in a silent scream.

He bent forward and slid a box from under the bed, pulling it up to rest on his knees. Twisting his body, he removed a key from his pocket, then unlocked the box. He looked at the model one last time, then set it down inside with the others. One, two, three. Four.

The day after you watch your first victim die is not very different to the day before. You still wake up. Maybe you skip breakfast, even lunch, but you will eat … eventually. And you’ll sleep. And you’ll slip into a rhythm. Not identical to the one before; there might be an erratic beat, but at least it’s a silent beat. Yours.

He pushed the box under the bed, where other reminders lay – of lives taken and lives spared. He closed his eyes and breathed in the warm, captive air.

My prison is a tool, a training ground, a stopover. I look at the bars behind me, the space around me, the confinement. I think of where you are and how tragic for you it is that here I am, there you are, but oh so quickly, there I am. Right with you.

Entrance. Exit.

He switched off the desk lamp. He returned the key to his pocket, stood up and walked to the door. He slid back the bolt and stepped outside. He reached up and turned off the television, watching as the light was sucked into a tiny circle at the center and turned to black. Then he walked across the floor and up the steps, pausing as he crossed the threshold into his bright, air-conditioned home.

She was twenty-nine years old, small and slender, dressed in a white tank, pale pink cardigan and jeans, her dark hair twisted and secured with a dragonfly clip at the nape of her neck. Her skin was sallow, her eyes winter blue. Beside her was a doll, made from instructions that lost her interest before the mouth was sewn and the brown wool hair could be bunched and tied with bows. Beside that lay a clay ashtray, half-painted and dented by pressured thumbs.

She couldn’t remember why she had sat down. She opened the desk drawer and took out a laminated prayer card and red St Pio rosary beads. Wrapping them around her fingers, she bowed her head and began to pray. She told St Joseph that she dare not approach him while Jesus reposed near his heart.

From nowhere, it rose, a familiar unsettling pressure in her stomach. Her only relief was that somewhere mixed in with the fear came a euphoria she had never found anywhere else. But only the fear washed over her now. Her left hand shot out and slammed down onto a notepad. She slid it across the desk towards her, her head feeling free from her body as she tried to make use of what was happening to her. A dark reel unwound behind her eyes; edited razor-sharp, black and gray shapes, a frenzied acceleration of badly lit scenes. Her right hand groped the air, her fingers searching for two short vertical lines that would make it all pause, then backwards arrows to make it rewind. But this was nothing she could control. Coursing through her was the impulse to stay in the moment, not to go back, not to cast any light onto dark half-memories. But before she got a chance to write, she was gone, sliding to the floor, dragging paper and pens and pencils on top of her. The last thing she saw was her friend, standing in the doorway, shrunken to the size of a child.

Detective Joe Lucchesi sat with his head between his knees, tears streaming down his face and dripping onto the carpet below him. His face was gray, his forehead dotted with sweat and newsprint from the fingers he had pressed against it before the real pain had kicked in. Half an hour earlier he had arrived at his dentist’s office for emergency treatment – with pain he had gauged level eight. Now it was off the scale and rising. Nausea ripped through him, but he stayed doubled over, letting out a growl that choked in his throat.

‘Joe? Joe?’ A receptionist rushed in from the hallway. ‘Stay with me, sweetheart.’

She glanced around the waiting room. ‘Did anyone see what happened?’

‘He was sitting right there reading the newspaper, he took a call on his cell. He sat back down and then he started not to look too good.’ Joe knew it was the voice of a kind-faced older man who was sitting opposite him when he arrived.

The receptionist laid a hand on Joe’s shoulder. ‘Dr Makkar will be along right away. Is there anything I can get you in the meantime?’

‘Would he maybe take a glass of water?’ It was the man again. He had stood up – Joe could see his brown suede loafers on the carpet in front of him. Joe managed to raise a shaky hand that said no to both offers.

‘I don’t think he was even able to talk to whoever called him,’ said the old man.

But Joe knew it wasn’t the pain that had stopped him from talking. He just had no answer for the voice that came twisting its way back into his life, drawling and heavy and laden with unfinished business.

‘Detective Lucchesi? Every time you look at the scars on your wife’s pretty little body, right down … low down on that tight little belly. Or when you flip her over onto her front. She’s light, you can flip her easy, can’t you? There’s some scars there too – makes me feel like I’m the gift that keeps on giving. Well, what I want to know is this: when you see them scars? Do you still want her?’ He paused. ‘Or do you want me more?’ He laughed long and loud. ‘Tell me. Who’s gonna get it in the ass? Little Anna Lucchesi or Big Bad Duke Rawlins?’ His breath was gone, lost in a dead silence. Then his voice struck up, one last time. ‘And Detective? You’ll never bury me. I. Will. Bury. You.’

ONE

Detectives Joe Lucchesi and Danny Markey stepped into the elevator that would take them to the sixth floor office of Manhattan North Homicide. They were three hours into an eight to four tour. A short skinny man shot in after them, jumpy and light on his feet.

‘You know, I can read futures by your hands.’ He had weathered skin and a droopy left eye. He stood an inch from Joe’s chest and looked up at him with a gentle smile. Joe looked at Danny and held his palm out.

The man stepped back, banging his head on the elevator doors.

‘Not your palm!’ he shouted. ‘Not your palm! The back of your hand! I will know you from the back of your hand.’ Joe turned it over.

‘The other one too. You too,’ he said, looking at Danny. ‘Both hands. Both hands. Many hands make Jack dull.’

Joe and Danny smiled and did what he said.

‘You’re laughing too early,’ said the guy. ‘This could be bad news, what I see here. This could be too many ducks spoiling the bush.’

‘We don’t want to hear no bad news,’ said Danny. ‘Right?’

‘Right,’ said Joe.

‘Right,’ said the man. ‘But I’m not just the messenger here. You gotta appreciate that. I’m how it all begins. I’m what sets it all in motion. I’m, like, bang. And the future I see will start from right here in these nine stitches.’

Joe nodded slowly.

The man reached up and adjusted the purple crocheted hat on his head, pulling the ear flaps around so one of them hung in front of his face. He rotated it again, then looked back at their hands.

‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘I’m seeing things. I definitely am,’ said the man. ‘My name is One Line, by incident. One Line. King of Madison Avenue. Your product in one line. Your brand in one line—’

‘You were a copywriter?’ said Joe.

‘Your future in one line,’ said the man, staring at the hands in front of him.

‘OK,’ said Danny. ‘So what is it?’

The bell chimed and the elevator doors opened on the sixth floor. Joe and Danny got out. As the doors slid together, One Line pushed his face close to the gap.

‘One line: you’re fucked, both of you. Is that two lines? Could that be two?’ The doors closed.

They laughed.

‘Another EDP for the HPD,’ said Danny. An EDP was an Emotionally Disturbed Person. The HPD was the Department of Housing Preservation and Development – one of their jobs was to give out Section 8 housing subsidies.

‘Let’s send him into Internal Affairs, let him tell them they’re fucked,’ said Danny.

‘I’d like him to come up with a whole jingle for that,’ said Joe.

Sixteen detectives worked in three teams out of Manhattan North Homicide, a modern open plan space with a small glass-walled office in the corner, shared by the sergeant and the lieutenant. The NYPD was one of the only law enforcement agencies in the country whose officers weren’t put through regular fitness checks, leaving Sergeant John Rufo free to work his way up to 230 pounds and into his current predicament of trying to work his way back down.

‘Your mental agility is being impaired,’ he said, pointing at Joe and Danny with something beige speared on a fork.

‘Is that tofu?’ said Danny.

‘No it is not tofu. It is marinated steamed chicken. Tofu. Gimme a break.’

Joe and Danny exchanged glances.

‘It’s eleven o’clock in the morning,’ said Danny.

‘Eat little and often,’ said Rufo. ‘Them’s the rules.’ He pointed to his plate. ‘Vegetables, protein …’

‘Yeah, boss,’ said Danny. ‘Tomato sauce, meatballs: I got it covered already.’

‘How do you stay so trim?’ said Rufo.

‘You mean, “Have I been working out?”’ said Danny.

Rufo rolled his eyes. Then poked his fork through his salad. ‘Who’s up today?’

‘Me,’ said Joe. ‘And I eat well, by the way.’

‘You gotta watch that French food,’ said Rufo, looking up at him. ‘It’s tasty …’ he raised a finger in warning, ‘… because it’s rich. Your wife is genetically wired for it. You might not be. You’re in shape now, but who knows down the line …’

Joe laughed. ‘Yeah, Sarge, thanks for looking out for me.’

‘A varied diet,’ said Rufo, ‘that’s what—’

The phone interrupted him. ‘Ruthie, yeah – put him through.’ He nodded. ‘How you doing? OK. Yeah. OK.’ He listened, then scribbled on a notebook in front of him. ‘Right away. Detectives Joe Lucchesi and Danny Markey. Yeah. Uh-huh. Take care.’ He put down the phone. ‘Gentlemen, we have a homicide on West 84th Street. Here’s the address. Guy found in his apartment.’ He ripped out the page and handed it to Joe. ‘The Two-Oh is at the scene already.’

Joe and Danny crossed Broadway to the parking lot under the railway bridge.

‘Who says “trim”?’ said Danny.

‘People who aren’t,’ said Joe.

‘It’s unbelievable,’ said Danny, ‘we get sucked into food talk every time we go in his office. I wind up starving.’ Danny was short, wiry and had no extra weight. He’d been wearing the same suit size since he was eighteen. He had pale skin and fading freckles, light brown hair and blue eyes. Joe was six-three, dark and broad.

Joe stopped. ‘Aw, shit …’

‘What?’ said Danny.

‘Would you look at that?’ Joe walked over to a silver Lexus. ‘That fucking shit.’ He pulled his keys out of his pocket and opened the door of his car, popping the glove box. He took out a cloth and started rubbing at a lump of tar on his windshield.

‘I’ve a pain in my fucking ass with that crap,’ he said. He looked up at the bridge from where the tar dripped in the heat.

‘Least it was a fresh one,’ said Danny. ‘How come you don’t have the ghetto sled?’ The ghetto sled was a detective’s B-team car, the one he could park two blocks from the projects and not have to worry about.

‘We got a meeting at Shaun’s school today, I’m going straight there. Or at least I would have been. Anna’s going to have to go it alone.’ Shaun was Joe’s eighteen-year-old son.

‘She won’t like that,’ said Danny. ‘What’s he been doing now?’

Joe shook his head. ‘You name it.’

‘He’s been through a lot.’

‘Yeah, but it’s fucking wearing me down. And Anna doesn’t need this kind of shit, going up to the school every month to answer to this asshole teacher fifteen years younger than us.’

‘Shaun’s a good kid,’ said Danny. ‘He’ll be in college next year, you won’t have to worry. Try having four under ten. I love them, but, man …’ He breathed out. ‘Now, come on. Say goodbye to the nice car and get into the shit one.’ There was a pool of five cars at Manhattan North. Any damage during a tour and the driver was left to face a bawling out by Rufo. The newer the car, the more likely Joe would take the wheel. Today, they had the oldest car – a gray Gran Fury; ‘You get a scratch on it, who gives a shit?’ said Danny. They pulled out and joined the traffic heading south on Broadway.

‘Can I ask what happened with Dr Mak?’ said Danny.

Joe grunted. ‘I staggered in, I got more Vicodin, I walked out.’

‘That’s it?’

‘That’s it,’ said Joe.

‘You mean that’s all you let it be, right?’

‘Who are you? Psych services?’

Danny ignored him. ‘I’m guessing you went in, told him you were real busy, just needed a prescription, gotta go.’

‘What else am I going to do?’ said Joe.

‘Let him treat you,’ said Danny.

Joe had TMD – Temporo Mandibular Joint Dysfunction. The least it would do was make his jaw crackle when he opened his mouth, the worst – spark excruciating pain all over his head. For years, Danny had watched him pop over-the-counter painkillers and decongestants. He’d recently moved on to Vicodin.

‘It’s getting worse,’ said Danny.

‘Yeah, so are you.’ Joe turned away. Yesterday’s phone call had jerked him back too far – to events he had spent wasted months trying to forget: the botched rescue of an eight-year-old kidnap victim and the near-destruction of his family. The little girl had been returned to her heartbroken mother and the two clung to each other, happily, desperately. Seconds later, the scene turned to graphic, bloody images he still couldn’t shake – the kidnapper had blown them up in retaliation for calling the cops. Joe confronted him moments later and pumped six bullets into his chest. His name was Donald Riggs.

After the case, Anna wanted Joe to take time out. She was offered a job in Ireland and they went with Shaun. After eight great months, everything went wrong. Donald Riggs had an associate – Duke Rawlins – a killer he had spent years on a murderous spree with, someone who wouldn’t let Riggs’ death go unavenged. Fresh from a maximum security prison, he had caught up with Joe and tried to destroy his family. During their time in Ireland, Shaun’s girlfriend, Katie, had been murdered. Shortly after, Rawlins had abducted Anna and left her so physically and mentally scarred, she struggled every day to get past it.

They pulled up by the patrol car outside the apartment block on West 84th Street. A well-dressed couple stood under the green and gold awning, aware something was going on, but more concerned about where they were going for brunch. The doorman inside was a neatly groomed older man with a mustache and a badge that read ‘Milton’.

‘Terrible,’ was all he said, shaking his head, gesturing with a white gloved hand to the elevators.

‘Has someone spoken with you yet?’ said Danny.

Milton nodded.

‘All right,’ said Danny. ‘We’ll be back down to you in a little while.’

‘Why were you shouting at him?’ said Joe when they got into the elevator.

‘Didn’t he look a little deaf to you?’

Joe raised his eyes to the ceiling. They got out at the third floor and walked down a gray tiled hallway to apartment 3E. A detective in a navy blue suit walked out, his eyes on the notebook in his left hand. His right hand was pressed to his stomach. He turned slowly their way. Danny and Joe made their introductions.

‘Tom Blazkow from the Two-Oh,’ he said. The twentieth precinct covered everywhere from 59th Street to 86th Street, west of Central Park. Blazkow was in his mid-forties and bulked-up, with a gray buzzcut, a massive jaw and bloodshot blue eyes. He turned to the detective walking out of the apartment behind him.

‘This is my partner, Denis Cullen.’

They all nodded. Cullen was in his early fifties and dressed in a limp brown suit and a tie from a bowling league with a stars-and-stripes pin. He had pale red hair thinning on top and broken veins across his nose and cheeks. He looked eager, but worn out.

‘So what have we got?’ said Joe.

Blazkow spoke. ‘Ethan Lowry, graphic designer, DOB 04/12/71, married with a young daughter. 911 got a call from his diet delivery people. Every morning, they bring his meals for the day. He didn’t open the door. First time in eleven months he didn’t. Delivery guy saw a drop of blood in the hallway, got a bad smell.’ He pointed to a pale, wheezing teenager. ‘The two uniforms tried the bell, banged on the door, no answer, went around the back, climbed up the fire escape, couldn’t see nothing through the window, so they called ESU. Body was right inside the front door. No sign of forced entry. Balcony door was locked. No response from the wife’s cell phone. We got a uniform down by the elevators. He knows who to look out for. You’re going to have to knock.’ He pointed to the apartment. ‘Careful going in. You might slip on a chunk of face.’

Joe reached into his jacket pocket for a handkerchief and a small bottle of aftershave. He shook some drops onto the white cotton and held it to his nose, taking in a few deep breaths. He knocked on the door and they walked carefully into the apartment. Ethan Lowry lay on his back, naked, his body pressed up against the baseboard behind the door. His arms were stretched out above him. His head was turned to the right, but there wasn’t much of a face to face that way. Ethan Lowry had been savagely beaten, more blows than were needed to kill someone who had clearly been finished off with a bullet. The damage was entirely to his face. Where the skin wasn’t plumped up and tight, it was pulped. His nostrils were plugged with dried blood.

‘What’s in his mouth?’ said Danny.

‘His mouth,’ said Joe.

‘Aw, Jesus,’ said Danny, leaning in closer. Lowry’s mouth looked like it had been turned inside out. It covered his whole chin and left side of his face like raw meat. Only one tooth was visible. The rest were hidden under the swollen mess, broken or lying alone on the floor beside numbered evidence cards. Joe sucked in a breath. The skin was split at Lowry’s left eye socket where a gun had been fired point-blank.

‘Hey,’ said Danny to Kendra, a smiley, bulky crime scene technician, who was squatting on the floor beside him.

‘Hey, Joe, Danny. I’m having an MTV Cribs moment. Here is the hallway. And this is where the magic happened. See all this?’ She gestured around the body and in an arc above it. ‘We’ve got expirated mist on the floor, on the wall. We’ve got cast-off blood on the ceiling. We’ve got it all basically. Over there we’ve got high-velocity spatter from the gunshot wound. Small caliber.’ She shook her head.

‘And—’

‘God bless you, but God slow you down too,’ said Joe. ‘Just give us a moment.’

‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘I get so—’

‘Cheery,’ said Danny.

Kendra turned to him. ‘I love my job,’ she said. ‘And if that’s an emotion that for some reason confuses you …’ She shrugged.

‘How could you not love this?’ said Danny, pointing to the body. Beside Lowry’s head was a black, blood-streaked cordless phone. Joe put on a glove, picked it up and hit the dialled calls button.

‘Someone was alive in here last night at 10.58 p.m.,’ said Joe. He took down all the incoming and outgoing calls.

‘Let me call Martinez,’ said Joe. ‘Unless you’d like to.’ He smiled. The year before, on his year out, Aldos Martinez filled in as Danny’s partner. Now, with Martinez’s partner, Fred Rencher, they made up the D team at Manhattan North, the only four-man team.

‘Hey, Martinez, it’s Joe. Do me a favor – could you do a victimology on an Ethan Lowry, 1640 West 84th Street, DOB 04/12/71. Thanks. Great. See you in a little while.’ Joe paused and looked over at Danny. ‘Yeah, he’s here. You need to talk to him?’

Danny shook his head violently.

‘Oh, OK,’ said Joe. ‘See you later.’

‘What did he want?’

‘Just to say he misses you.’

‘Look at this,’ said Danny. He was crouched down beside Lowry’s wrists, pointing with his pen to a series of holes in the floorboards. ‘His arms must have been restrained by something hammered in here. There are two holes on each side of each wrist.’

‘Did you find anything he could have used to do this?’ said Joe to Kendra.

‘Unh-unh,’ she said. ‘Perp’s not going to leave them behind – my guess is they’re his special toys.’

TWO

There were six doors off the hallway in Lowry’s apartment: into two bedrooms and a bathroom on the left; into the kitchen, living room and office on the right. The kitchen was painted citrus lemon with green glossy cabinets and cream worktops – all tidy and undisturbed. The living room had a deep red sofa, wide-screen TV and a pile of children’s toys in one corner. In the other was a yoga mat and two pink dumbbells.

‘I’m not sure any good graphic designer would have been involved in this interior,’ said Joe.

‘Maybe he was a bad graphic designer,’ said Danny. ‘Why do you always make victims nicer or more talented than you actually have any proof they are?’

‘No, I don’t.’

‘When they’re in a nice house, you do.’

‘Yeah, well they’re hardly ever in a nice house, so that’s bullshit,’ said Joe. ‘They’re decomposing on the bare springs of a bed in some skanky crack den or some place that hasn’t seen a bottle of bleach …’

They walked into Ethan Lowry’s office.

‘This is more like it,’ said Joe. ‘See what I mean? Clean lines.’

‘People love crime shows. People love interior shows. You mix the two, Joe, you got a job for life. Extreme Make-over: Home Invasion Edition. CSI: Brownstone.’

Joe smiled. It encouraged Danny. ‘Detective Joe Lucchesi: investigating your death and your taste. What were your last movements? And why did you choose those drapes with that carpet? Find out after the break. This season, green kitchens are all the rage. Speaking of rage, savage beatings are—’

‘All right, already,’ said Joe. ‘Let me think.’

Ethan Lowry’s office was tidy and minimalist. Across one white wall was a long gray desktop, mounted on steel legs. A twenty-inch flat-screen monitor sat at the center, running the screensaver – a slideshow of Lowry’s family photos. Joe hadn’t set his up on his laptop yet, because he couldn’t think of anything he wanted to be reminded of. He paused in front of this happy montage of a dead man’s life. From the photos and the food deliveries, it was clear that Ethan Lowry had worked hard to slim down. The new, lighter body he had fought for was sad and pointless, lying in a pool of blood by his front door. The camera, a professional digital SLR, was on a low table to the right, beside two tall stacks of clear plastic drawers. Joe pulled a few of them open: receipts, paperclips, rubber bands, stamps.

‘Look,’ he said to Danny, ‘he was a good designer.’ The bottom drawer was filled with design awards that were gathering dust. ‘And,’ said Joe, ‘he was obviously modest enough not to display them. Which would lead me to believe he might have been quite a nice guy.’

Danny rolled his eyes.

Underneath the desk, the cables that ran from the computer, the printer, the disk drive and the lamp were grouped together neatly with cable ties and ended in plugs with icons. On the floor beside a well-made single bed in the corner was a pair of navy track pants, with a white T-shirt and a pair of white jersey boxer shorts thrown on top. A bunch of letters addressed to Ethan Lowry in girlie script and tied with rubber bands lay beside them. A seventeen-inch PowerBook was on top of the bed, its tiny white light pulsing. Beside it was a remote control vibrator and a short, stiff leather whip. Joe lifted up the screen of the laptop, which quickly flashed up a series of images from soft-porn DVD covers; oiled, topless men in jeans bearing down on tiny, lost blondes. Huge-breasted lesbian liplocks, cheerleaders, repairmen, soldier girls, soldier boys, police officers.

‘We’re a few shy of the Village People,’ said Danny, moving up beside him.

‘Tame,’ said Joe.

‘He’s no Marv.’ Marvin was one of the first dead bodies they had to guard as rookies, a morbidly obese victim of his own eating habits. All he had in his apartment when they found him was a tower of Krispy Kreme boxes, a mountain of crispy Kleenex and the sickest collection of amateur porn that Joe or Danny had ever admitted to seeing.

They moved into the master bedroom. Another tidy space, with a queen-sized bed and a pale green satin throw folded over the bottom half.

‘I wish Gina would let me have a bed this easy to climb into,’ said Danny. ‘Instead of taking a hundred fucking pillows out of the way first. Does that make sense to you ever, why women do that?’

‘No.’

There were books and bottles of water on each nightstand, some headache pills and a bracelet on the wife’s side, a wallet and a watch on the husband’s side. There was a chair in the corner with a pair of jeans and a gray sweatshirt on it. Up a step on the left-hand side of the room was a raised dressing area that appeared to be Mrs Lowry’s domain and the most disturbed by the attack. There was makeup, shoes, belts and bags everywhere. In a corner, two linen baskets were stuffed and spilling over with clothes, a suitcase lay half unpacked, the dressing table was covered with hair products and more makeup. A small stool was upturned on the floor. Joe studied the room for several minutes before deciding the perp hadn’t made it in here. It looked more like a case of opposites attract.

Joe took notes of where he needed photographs to be taken and checked with Kendra when he got back to the hallway. He drew a sketch of the apartment, marking in the smallest of details.

After three hours, everyone was winding down and heading back to the twentieth precinct.

‘What do you think?’ said Danny as they got into the car.

‘Well, it’s not a burglary,’ said Joe.

‘Yeah, with the wallet just lying around—’

‘Two wallets,’ said Joe.

‘What?’

‘Yeah. In the hallway, the little table was knocked over. There’s a kind of bashed-up wallet there. And a new one.’

‘Both the vic’s?’ said Danny.

‘Both have his cards in it. And money.’

‘Yeah and then the expensive watch on the nightstand and shit …’ said Danny.

‘With the computer and the sex toys and the naked body, it could be something sexual.’

Danny nodded. ‘Do you think maybe he had something going on on the side? Blazkow said the wife was in Jersey with her ma for the night.’

Joe nodded. ‘I’d say yeah.’

He took out his cell phone. He had eight missed calls. Six were from Anna: one voicemail, four hang-ups and a final voicemail:

‘Asshole.’

With her accent, Joe liked when Anna said asshole. He didn’t like the volume, though, and the crash of the phone as she slammed it down. He looked at his watch. He hadn’t made Shaun’s meeting. And he hadn’t called.

‘Shit,’ he said. ‘Shit. I forgot to call Anna.’

‘You’re a dead man,’ said Danny, reversing out of the space. ‘Speaking of dead men, did you hear why Rufo lost all that weight?’

‘No.’

‘His brother died, forty-nine years old, heart attack. Bam. No warning.’

‘Yeah, I remember that.’

‘No, but there’s more. Apparently, at the funeral, Rufo had a few too many and one of the guys heard him tell some old aunt that he didn’t want to go down the same road as his brother because – wait for it – he’d never been in love. Specifically, he’d never found true love.’

‘Rufo?’

‘Yes.’

‘I’m seeing him in a whole new way now.’

‘Yeah,’ said Danny, ‘in soft focus, running through a cornfield.’

‘How long ago was that?’

‘Three years ago.’

‘And we haven’t seen him with a woman yet.’

‘It’s sad. For all of us. He could have kept his fuller figure and we could have been spared the salad, quinoa, couscous talk.’

‘You go ahead in,’ said Joe when they got to the twentieth precinct. He walked past the entrance and called Anna. ‘Hey, honey, I’m sorry. I’m not gonna make—’

‘I know,’ said Anna. ‘Because I’ve already been to the school and now I’m back home.’

‘I caught a homicide. I’ve been tied up, honey. How did it go?’

‘Oh, well the principal was there and she started off by—’

Joe saw Cullen and Blazkow walk from their car into the building. ‘Honey? I’m sorry. I can’t get into the details right now. But did it go OK?’

‘That depends,’ she said stiffly.

‘I gotta go, look, I’m sorry. I’ll call you when I get back to the office, OK? It’ll probably be late. I love you.’

‘I love you too,’ she said, her voice tired.

Joe made his way up to the second-floor office. Everyone was standing around drinking coffee.

‘So what have we got?’ he said.

‘Closed homicide, no witnesses? A bag of shit,’ said Blazkow.

‘Any video?’ said Joe.

‘Not so far,’ said Martinez.

‘Not even from across the street?’ said Joe.

‘Nope.’

‘Not everyone was home in the building,’ said Blazkow. ‘So we’ll see what comes up, but neighbors on either side heard nothing and the doorman didn’t see shit.’

‘What about the wife?’

‘She’s at her ma’s with their kid,’ said Martinez. ‘She was a mess, tried to hold it together for the daughter, but … fuck. I got what I could from her, which was not a lot. She has no idea why this happened. They don’t socialize a lot, they hang out together most of the time.’

‘OK – Rencher, can you pull Lowry’s phone records?’ said Joe. ‘Cullen, could you run the plates of all the cars on the street? Tomorrow, we’ve got the autopsy. When we’ve got an idea of the time of death, we can work out about canvassing the building again.’ He turned to Blazkow. ‘You get anything from BCI or Triple I?’

Anyone who was arrested in New York got a NYSID number – New York State Identification. The Bureau of Criminal Investigations had the records. If Lowry had a criminal record, a phone call to the BCI would have details and a photo. A Triple I check would show if Lowry had an out-of-state record.

‘Nada,’ said Blazkow.

‘OK,’ said Joe.

‘Grab a desk,’ said Blazkow. ‘You want coffee?’

‘Thanks, yeah,’ said Joe. He took off his jacket and sat down. When he looked up, Denis Cullen was standing over him.

‘Uh – Joe? Can I put myself forward for going through the financial records, maybe the phone records?’

Joe laughed. ‘That’s the first time in my life I’ve ever been asked that.’

‘Yeah, well … I guess I’ve kind of got an eye for it.’

By 1 a.m., Joe was slumped in his chair, his fingers stiff from typing. He had crossed the coffee threshold. It was now sending him to sleep. He never realized he was ODing until it was too late.

‘I’m outta here,’ he said, standing up, suddenly.

‘You OK?’ said Danny.

‘I’m tired. I’m going back to the office. You coming?’

‘Sure. You not going home?’

‘Not tonight. Not with the autopsy first thing.’

The dorm in Manhattan North was off the locker room and had four metal beds with thin mattresses and covers that nobody risked sleeping under. Working the ‘four and two chart’ meant four days on, two days off. The first two tours were 4 p.m. to 1 a.m., the last two were 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. The turnaround tour ended at 1 a.m. and was followed by an 8 a.m. start. Most detectives stayed in the dorm on those nights or at least told their wives they did. Anna didn’t like being alone at night any more, so Joe had been coming home; because they lived in Bay Ridge, he didn’t have far to go. But the first few nights on a major case, she wouldn’t expect to see him. He called her anyway.

‘Sweetheart, it’s me again. I’m staying at the office tonight.’

‘I know,’ said Anna.

‘Well, it’s just I hadn’t said, so I thought—’

‘It’s fine. Don’t worry.’

‘Will you be OK? Is Shaun home?’

‘No. But he’ll be back.’

‘What happened at the school?’

‘Well, the principal was very nice. I think she likes Shaun, but understands he’s … changed. She said he’s been rude and uncooperative.’

‘That’s the French blood.’

Anna laughed. ‘Yes. His falling grades they’ve put down to the American.’

Joe laughed. ‘They said the same thing about his charm and his looks.’

‘And low self-esteem …’

‘What was the bottom line?’ said Joe.

‘Just that they will give him a chance to improve. They think he’s tired in class, staying out too late and—’

‘Did they give us a hard time?’

‘They didn’t have to say a word.’

‘Look, are you sure you’re going to be OK tonight? Would you like me to get Pam to come over and stay?’

Pam was his father Giulio’s second wife.

‘Pam?’ said Anna. She laughed. ‘Yeah, babysitting by a woman the same age as me … who is my mother-in-law.’

‘Step.’

‘Whatever.’

‘It wouldn’t be babysitting. You could ask her over for a glass of wine and a movie. I’m just trying to help.’

‘Just to remind you – it’s after one in the morning. And I’m OK. Sleep well whenever you get there.’

‘Thanks. I’ll see you—’

‘In a few days. I know.’

‘I love you.’

‘Me too.’

‘Honey?’

‘Yeah?’

‘I love laughing with you.’

‘Me too,’ she said. ‘And Joe?’

‘Yeah?’

‘At least I know you sleep in the dorm.’

‘I wouldn’t want it any other way.’

Anna was right. He did sleep in the dorm. But Gina Markey thought the same thing about Danny.

THREE

Stanley Frayte had an hour to kill before he showed up for work. He drove down Holt Avenue in his white Ford Econoline van stamped with the chunky blue lettering of Frayte Electrical Services. He pulled into the parking lot at the south end of Astoria Park. At 8.30 a.m., it was quieter than it would have been an hour before when the dawn walkers, runners and swimmers were making their way back home to take a shower before work.

He got out of the van and let the cool breeze from the East River raise goosebumps on his bare arms. Where he stood – by the park, under the Triborough Bridge – was Astoria as it had always been to him. On the Shore Boulevard side, the luxury condos that looked over the tennis courts on one side and Manhattan on the other represented change. Like Brooklyn, Astoria had lured people out of the city and was going through the makeover to prove it. Stan liked it all. He was just happy to be anywhere he could feel the sun, look out over beautiful water, walk through the trees, sit on a bench. When it hit 8.50 a.m., he went back to his van.

He drove down 19th Street and pulled into the small parking lot of the apartment building he had been working on for the previous two weeks. He unloaded his equipment and walked up the flagstone path. He stopped halfway and bent down, laying his gear beside him and pulling a penknife from his utility belt. He flipped it open and sliced at a weed that was pushing up through a gap in the cement. June, the receptionist, waved to him from behind the front desk as he walked towards her. He pushed through the front door into the lobby. The smell was lemon disinfectant, rising from the shiny floor tiles. June’s desk was on the left-hand side, a crescent moon that curved towards the door. The walls were pale gold with a cream dado rail that traced around the corner to the elevator bank. Behind the desk, free-standing plastic barriers closed off the corridor to everyone except the construction workers who were renovating that section of the building all the way up to the fourth floor.

‘Hey, Flat Stanley,’ said June, smiling up from her desk. Flat Stanley was a character from a children’s book who in a tragic accident got flattened to 2-D. The Stanley standing in front of June was not flat; he was Stanley with a belly inflated to bursting point. Stan grunted, shifting the utility belt that only ever came to rest under his gut, no matter how high he tried to move it.

‘Anything I need to know?’ he said.

‘Just that Mary Burig on the second floor is going to plant that little strip of flower-bed you’ve been kind enough to lend her.’

‘Mary?’ His face lit up. ‘Today?’

June nodded. ‘Yup.’ She smiled. ‘I think someone has you wrapped around her little finger.’

He frowned. ‘She likes flowers.’

Mary Burig checked her smartphone. It held everything she needed to remember: phone numbers, addresses, bank account details, appointments, shopping lists, birthdays, anniversaries, maps and guides. She spent fifteen minutes tidying her living room, starting by the front door and working clockwise through each corner. She moved into the kitchen and wiped down the surfaces. She was about to unload the dishwasher when the doorbell rang. She jogged back to the front door and opened it.

‘Hi, Magda,’ she said. ‘Come in. I’m working hard here. Tea?’

‘Coffee,’ said Magda, hugging her. ‘Thank you. I can make it.’

Magda Oleszak was in her early fifties, with a healthy glow from eating good food and walking everywhere. She came to New York from Poland with her two teenage children ten years earlier, learned perfect English, but never lost her accent.

‘The place looks great,’ said Magda, walking around as she took off her light vinyl jacket. Upside down and open beside Mary’s bed was Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier.

‘Are you reading Rebecca again?’ said Magda.

‘I know,’ said Mary. ‘It’s cheating because I know it inside out.’

‘It’s not cheating,’ said Magda, turning to her, holding her hands passionately. ‘Don’t ever let me hear you say that again, Mary. It’s beautiful what you and Rebecca have. You are friends for life. She’ll always be with you, won’t she? Or whatever that girl’s name is. Does she have a name? I don’t think she does, does she? I get confused myself, see? I get confused. You don’t. It’s wonderful, Mary. You hang on to that feeling. You remember what Rebecca brought you when you were lying on your bed as a young girl.’

Mary smiled.

‘Now, because we are talking about books,’ said Magda, ‘I have some good news for you. Stan Frayte, you know Stan, is going to do your make-over on the library.

Mary clapped. ‘Cool.’ Then she frowned. ‘So do you think it’ll wind up looking more like a library than a store window?’

‘Nothing is happening with the glass if that’s what you mean. We want to make sure no-one’s making trouble in there.’

‘No-one makes trouble in libraries.’

‘They do, going right to the dirty bits in all those romance novels. Hot throbbing whatever.’

‘Magda!’

Magda laughed.

‘I wish they’d do something about the other windows,’ said Mary. ‘They’re too high up. You can’t see out if you sit down. You’re just staring at a blank wall.’

‘You know what?’ said Magda. ‘I like to think that the reader uses it as a blank screen and they project onto it the world of whatever book they’re reading at that time.’

Mary thought about it. ‘I’ll go with that,’ she said. ‘I like it.’

‘Oh, you want to know how they got the money to do the library? Stan himself. He said he got a discount on some light fixtures for the hallway. I’m not so sure.’

‘That’s so kind,’ said Mary. She paused. ‘There’s something sad about Stan.’

Magda went into the kitchen. ‘You’re out of coffee, Mary.’

‘Oh. I’m sorry.’ She hit Tasks on her phone menu and added coffee to her grocery list.

‘So,’ said Mary, ‘what’s going on?’

‘David’s coming this morning, isn’t he?’

‘Yes,’ said Mary. ‘There’s cake in there. I’m not hungry, but you can help yourself.’

Magda opened the bread bin and pulled out a cake wrapped in aluminum foil. It was covered in mould. She flipped the lid of the bin and threw it inside.

‘Thanks,’ she said, ‘but I’ve eaten.’ She came back into the living room and sat down on the sofa. ‘Will I stay until David comes?’

‘That would be great,’ said Mary. ‘Today is ironing day, so I’m going to start now, if you don’t mind.’

‘Go ahead,’ said Magda.

David Burig was thirty-four years old, looked younger, and spent most of his time dressed in a suit so his staff would take him seriously. He ran a successful catering business he bought after offloading an overvalued software firm nine years earlier.

‘Hello there,’ he said, hugging Mary and kissing her on the cheek.

‘David,’ she said. ‘Yaaay!’

‘If only everyone had that response when they saw me.’

‘Yaaay!’ said Magda.

He laughed. ‘Why thank you, both. I feel very special. So,’ he said to Mary. ‘I believe it’s time for bed.’

Mary frowned. She looked at the clock. ‘But it’s only 10 a.m.!’

He smiled. ‘Flower-beds.’

She shook her head. ‘Is that supposed to be funny?’

‘Yes.’

‘Just because you say so, I’m still not sure that means it is.’

He held his hands up. ‘It actually wasn’t funny at all.’

‘It was dumb,’ said Magda.

‘Worth a try, though,’ said David. ‘Let me go change. And can I ask? What are you wearing?’

‘Do I look nuts?’ said Mary.

‘You look … creative.’

Mary smiled because David did. ‘I thought it was kind of cool.’ She was wearing a pair of orange baggy cotton pants that tapered at the ankle, a green vest and white sneakers.

David laughed and disappeared into the bedroom with his sports bag.

‘OK,’ said Magda. ‘Have you got what you need for gardening?’

Mary pointed to the tools lined up on the table: ‘Two trowels, mat to kneel on, watering can, fork thing … is that everything?’

‘Yes,’ said Magda. ‘There’s a faucet at the back of the building.’

David appeared in a battered pair of jeans, a blue long-sleeved T-shirt and green retro Pumas. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘I am ready to garden. I am proud – no, I’m shocked – to be assisting in such a noble endeavor. Come on, lady in scary pants, let’s go down and bring that dirty brown soil to life.’

‘I’ll take the elevator with you,’ said Magda.

Mary laid down the mat in front of the flower-bed that ran along the edge of the property, fifty feet away from the back of the apartment block. A row of pots filled with chrysanthemums in bright shades of yellow, orange and magenta was lined up against the wall.

‘They’re so beautiful,’ said Mary.

‘They are,’ said David. ‘Stan always sticks with the same color theme, doesn’t he? Just changes the flowers in fall.’

She nodded.

David turned to the bare flower-bed and laughed. ‘Look – he’s marked out where we can plant: the shadiest, quietest corner—’

Mary smiled. ‘In case we do it wrong?’

‘I’d say so.’

‘But I’ve helped him before, he knows I’m good.’

‘You. But not me.’

‘OK,’ said Mary. ‘We need to take the flowers out of the pots, break up the roots gently and plant them here in a pattern.’ She handed him a piece of paper with a rough diagram.

‘That should be easy,’ said David.

Mary knelt down on the mat and started to dig a hole. David tended to the pots, pushing a small trowel into the first one, working it around the roots, pulling the plant free and shaking off the excess soil.

‘Everyone I know is at the office right now,’ he said. ‘Do you know how good that makes me feel?’

Mary smiled. ‘Thanks for helping me.’

‘Helping you? I’m helping myself, here,’ he said. ‘This is therapy. This is what life’s all about. Outdoors, fresh air, office avoidance.’

He spotted a weed, growing by the grass at the edge of the flower-bed. He pulled it out and held it up. ‘Isn’t it funny?’ he said. ‘How easy it is for beauty to attract such ugly, clinging things.’

‘Like the garden in Manderley,’ said Mary.

‘Yes!’ said David. ‘Exactly.’

They worked on, talking and laughing for over an hour. David stopped and watched his little sister, her concentration unwavering, stooped over the bright petals, holding them gently in her tiny hand, pouring her heart into the job.

‘How are you doing?’ he said.

She looked up at him. ‘I guess I’m OK.’

He squeezed her hand. ‘That’s good. That’s good, Mare.’

She smiled. They continued in silence until David stopped again. He looked at her and started a quote from Rebecca: ‘We all of us have our particular devil who rides us and torments us.’

Mary smiled sadly and continued. ‘And we must give battle in the end. We have conquered ours . . .’

David let out a breath. ‘Or so we believe.’

FOUR

The body of Ethan Lowry was laid out on the perforated surface of a stainless steel table in the basement of the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner. A body block lay under his back, forcing out his trunk that had been emptied of its organs. A handwritten, bloodstained list with their weights lay by the scales.

Joe and Danny were dressed in scrubs, gowns and gloves, with face masks hanging around their necks. Joe’s digital camera and notebook were on the counter beside him. He had taken photos and notes and asked questions through every step of the three-hour autopsy.

Dr Malcolm Hyland was young for an ME. Cops liked him because he didn’t expect them to be doctors, but he didn’t expect them to be stupid either. He was soft-spoken until he had to use the microphone – then he turned stilted and loud.

‘OK, doc,’ said Joe. He grabbed the notebook and flipped it open again.

‘OK,’ said Hyland. ‘Estimated time of death somewhere between 11 p.m. and 3 a.m. Cause of death was a point-blank GSW to the head – you saw the small entry hole by his eye socket and the bruised and battered twenty-two caliber bullet taken from the skull cavity. The bullet’s trajectory was left to right, lodged in the temporal lobe. You remember the grazing around the wound margins as the bullet was spinning in. Because it was directly over bone, you got the radiating splits in the skin and the stellate effect – that star shape. Mechanism of death was an intracerebral bleed.

‘But before we even get to the gunshot, we had evidence of compressive asphyxia which is what I was saying about the diaphragm not being able to expand. I’d say the killer sat on the guy’s chest or pressed a knee down on it and the vic got the full force of his body bearing down on him. Subdued like that, the killer was able to assault him with what was probably a medium-sized hammer. With regard the facial injuries – you already saw that – extensive bruising and swelling, several irregular lacerations. The upper and lower lips showed external and internal lacerations … this is very common in homosexual killings.’

‘He was alive for all the facial injuries,’ said Danny.

Hyland nodded. ‘He’d inhaled blood and teeth fragments.’

‘And what you’re saying is this guy was already dying when he was shot, he wasn’t able to breathe properly,’ said Danny.

‘Yeah,’ said Hyland. ‘I guess I could understand if the killer bashed his head in, then asphyxiated him. But on top of that, he shoots him? It’s cruel stuff. You can imagine, the man’s fighting for his every breath, putting all his strength into that, then he’s slammed in the face with the hammer. He’s focused on that agonizing pain, then back to fighting for breath, then pain again, everything mounting right ’til the end. Then a gunshot wound. And that’s it. He’s gone.’

‘These wackos always got their own screwed-up reasons,’ said Danny. ‘Some of it is looking familiar to me, I gotta say. You remember William Aneto?’

Joe shook his head.

‘Oh yeah. You weren’t here. It was me and Martinez. This gay guy on the Upper West Side. It just … there’s something about it rings a bell.’

‘If we’re done here …’ said Hyland. He pointed to Joe’s notebook. ‘I’m sure you got it all there.’

‘Yeah, until I get back and I find one word I can’t make out and nothing else makes sense without it.’

‘Well, if you need anything else, call me.’

Joe nodded. ‘Thanks.’

‘Good luck,’ said Hyland. ‘You know, I wish when I dissected a brain I could find a little reel, like a victim’s-eye movie, so we could just sit back and watch a replay of what happened. It’d be foolproof in court for you guys, wouldn’t it? Slam dunk. Wouldn’t that be great? Or if I could find, like, a mental black box that would log the minute-to-minute psychological impact of what the victim’s been through. Although I’d say with this guy, it was all so horrific, a circuit somewhere would have blown.’

Anna Lucchesi lay on the sofa in her pyjamas with a light fleece blanket over her. She was watching the fourth episode in a row of Grand Designs. A couple had renovated a country estate somewhere in England and she was now watching the car wreck that was their 80s taste in interiors. When she first started watching the show in Ireland, it was from a different vantage point in a house that fit. She was a rising star at Vogue Living and had overseen the renovation of a lighthouse and the keeper’s home beside it outside a small village in Waterford. She was doing the job she loved in a beautiful location with her husband and son cheering her on. Watching Grand Designs now, she felt like a disconnected outsider, sitting in a grim two-storey brick frame house in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn – not Brooklyn Heights, not Williamsburg, not even DUMBO. It was older, it felt safe, the neighbors were nice, but it held no spark for Anna.

She stared towards the window, missing the sea view and waves that could get so loud, you had to close the window to hear people talk. The house had been peaceful and comfortable, with simple furniture and neutral tones. Then everything it represented was gone, shattered by Duke Rawlins. He wanted to destroy Joe. But he had underestimated his resilience. And when Anna thought of it now, she didn’t admire Joe for it, she resented him. Joe killed Donald Riggs and she paid the price. He was uninjured, back on the job. She was in her pyjamas in the afternoon.

For two months after Ireland, she stayed with her parents in Paris. Joe and Shaun came for the first three weeks, but the tiny house started to close in on them. She felt like Joe was trying to rush her recovery and make things go back to a kind of normal she knew they never would. She eventually persuaded him to take Shaun back to New York.

When she followed them over, she spent time adjusting to the new house in the new area she had been too depressed to take an interest in choosing. She would wake in the morning, wondering why she was there, but never able to figure out where she would really like to be. But she knew she wanted to avoid the outside world. And that meant embracing the four walls.

Her boss, Chloe da Silva, had allowed her to work from home, but had made it clear that it was only a temporary arrangement – Anna was too good an interior designer to lose on the big jobs. That was fine at the start, but as the months went by, Anna felt a rising insecurity that any day she would be fired and the only thing keeping her sane would be taken away. She liked styling shoots from home, choosing products from catalogs or jpegs or from the packages that were sent nearly every day to the house. It was unorthodox, but it worked. She hoped.

She dragged herself up off the sofa and was about to go into her makeshift office when the phone rang. She heard the harsh clatter of being punched off speaker phone in Chloe’s office.

‘It’s me again.’

Anna held her breath.

‘I’m sorry to land this on you, but, Anna, I really am under serious pressure here. There’s a major shoot at W Union Square tomorrow morning and Leah has let me down big time. Anyway, the shoot is bedrooms – models in hotels slash extravagant homes, sleeping off all that hard work they do – walking and um, staring. A lot of our major advertisers are involved and, here’s what I’m hoping you’ll go for: the photographer is Marc Lunel. You can work with someone who doesn’t pronounce Moët wrong. Come on. Please. Please. Please.’

Anna paused, watching the couple on television directing two men into the house with a red leather sofa. ‘Only if I get the main credit,’ she said finally.

‘You’ll do it?’ said Chloe.

Anna’s heart was beating rapidly, but not out of excitement. ‘Yes.’

‘God, if I’d known it was going to be that easy, I would have called Marc months ago.’ Her laugh was shrill. Anna was silent.

Chloe jumped in. ‘Oh, listen to me being so insensitive. Of course you needed all that time—’

‘Please,’ said Anna. ‘Email me the details.’

‘Of course. Done. Darling, thank you. Thank you so much.’

Joe leaned into the mirror in the men’s room, snipping away the nasal hair that had spent three hours soaking up the smell of death. He never figured out if it was a practical or a psychological routine or both. He didn’t like seeing his face up close, seeing the new lines around his eyes, the extra gray hairs at the side of his head; more things that were out of his control. He went to his locker and grabbed a bottle of tea-tree shower gel that Anna had given him. He got undressed and threw his suit into a plastic bag.

‘The smell of that crap,’ said Danny walking in. ‘I think I’ll go back to the autopsy.’

‘Screw you,’ said Joe. ‘I’d rather smell—’

‘Like weird-ass tea—’

‘Like – clean, than how you go out with your cheap foaming shit that doesn’t cover up nothing.’

‘If a woman can’t handle the smell of death from a man—’

‘She can’t go out with a deadbeat.’

‘Shit,’ said Danny, closing his locker door. ‘I’m all out of shower gel. Give me some of that crap.’

Joe went back to his desk and checked his email. Danny walked over a few minutes later, smelling the back of his hand and frowning.

‘Get over the fucking shower gel,’ said Joe.

‘Let me pull that file,’ said Danny. ‘The one I told you about – Aneto.’

Joe made space on his desk, laying a stack of files on the floor beside him. Danny came back and opened William Aneto’s file in front of him. Aneto was thirty-one, slightly built, handsome, with collar-length black hair. Joe looked at his head shot and saw a TV actor’s face; the four-line max guy, two or three steps back from the main action. His role in a Spanish language soap opera was the friend of the brother of the leading man. He was killed almost a year earlier, his body discovered in his Upper West Side apartment by a female friend. The case had quickly gone cold. As a victim, William fell into the high-risk category, promiscuous on the gay scene, known for disappearing at the end of a night with a stranger. Danny and Martinez had interviewed hundreds of Aneto’s friends, acquaintances and lovers and had gotten nowhere. His murder was down as a hook-up gone bad.

Joe pulled out the next photos and laid them in rows on the table in front of him. Danny stood beside him. Like Ethan Lowry, the body was found in the hallway. But behind William Aneto, hair smears of blood curved across the gray tiled floor like tracks through red paint from a dried brush.

‘Yeah. It’s all coming back to me,’ said Danny. ‘Most of the action happened in the kitchen. He was killed there and then dragged to the front door to be finished off. Wait ’til you see the kitchen. Hand prints, footprints, all over the floor, up the wall – kindergarten art class. You know – if all the paint was red. And the children were Damian.’

Joe studied the photos of the kitchen. He pointed to the bloodied corner of a granite counter top. ‘So I’m the perp, standing here behind the vic, bashing his face off this.’ Blood was spattered onto the wall, the counter, the floor, misted across the granite.

Danny nodded. ‘Yup.’

They looked at a wide shot of the hallway – the crumpled corpse, the spatter of a gunshot wound, the pooled blood under his head.

William Aneto’s face was more damaged than Ethan Lowry’s, destroyed by injuries that left the entire surface pulped and bloodied. His right eye socket was completely impacted from one of the blows, obliterating the entry wound from the bullet that, based on the autopsy results, followed a similar trajectory to Lowry’s.

‘Yeah. It’s a no-brainer,’ said Danny.

‘The caliber was too low,’ said Joe.

‘Funny guy. Shit, the phone – look,’ said Danny, pointing to the tiny silver cell phone beside Aneto’s body. ‘I forgot about that.’

Like Ethan Lowry, it looked like William Aneto could have made a call just before he died. Joe flipped through the file to a statement from a Mrs Aneto.

‘Yeah,’ said Danny. ‘His mother said the call was just to say goodnight.’

‘Maybe you should talk to Mrs Aneto again.’

‘She no likey me,’ said Danny, making a face. ‘Maybe Martinez could warm her up again.’

‘Yeah, that’s one I won’t be tagging along for.’

‘Why’s that?’

‘Maybe you should ask Martinez,’ said Joe.

‘What the hell’s that supposed to mean?’

‘See how he looks at me? I’m a homewrecker. He had eleven good months with you, I show up, you take me back, the guy’s life is over.’

Danny shook his head.

‘He gets that glint in his eye when you’re around,’ said Joe.

‘Screw you. What you are seeing is professional admiration.’

‘Come on. Let’s go talk to Rufo.’

‘Gentlemen,’ said Rufo when they walked in.

‘We got a link,’ said Joe. ‘Between Ethan Lowry and William Aneto.’

Rufo frowned. ‘The guy I’ve been getting all these calls about this week?’

Danny nodded. ‘Yeah. The year-anniversary-still-no-answers thing.’

‘Interesting timing,’ said Rufo. ‘Tell me more.’

‘Both happened at home, no sign of forced entry, similar facial injuries, similar twenty-two caliber gunshot wound, phone found beside both of them, bodies left in the hallway behind the door.’

Rufo nodded. ‘That’s good enough for me.’

Shaun Lucchesi lay on his bed staring at the ceiling. The stereo blasted the same lyrics over and over: left behind/left behind/left behind. It had been almost a year since his girlfriend, Katie Lawson, was murdered. They had met on the first day in school when he arrived in Ireland and they had been inseparable until she died. What made things worse was that Shaun had started out as the prime suspect, convicted by most of the small village until they learned the truth.

For months after Katie’s death, Shaun had woken up with a void inside him that had ached like nothing else he had ever known. On the good days, he was lifted by memories. On the bad ones, he was trapped in a loop of images that started from the time he picked her up that night and ended at the last moment he saw her. Everything now seemed unimportant. He came back to New York and met his old friends and went to the old hang-outs, but it was such a different life to the one he had with Katie, it was surreal. His life with her was stripped down to how they felt about each other, how they made each other laugh, how they lay on his bed wrapped around each other for hours, just talking or watching movies. It wasn’t about who your friends were, where you went, what you owned, who you were sleeping with, who had the latest cell phone, who had the fastest car. Sometimes he was so overwhelmed at the thought of never being that happy again, he almost couldn’t breathe. He turned off the stereo and went to his closet. From the top shelf, he pulled out a small, chunky round tin. A thin layer of wax coated the bottom of it and a short black wick twisted from the center. It was Katie’s favorite candle – Fresh Linen. He took a lighter from his drawer and lit it. He could only burn it for a few minutes at a time, it was so low. He couldn’t bear the thought it would ever burn out completely.

Everyone else would remember the anniversary of Katie’s funeral three weeks from now. But this night, one year ago, was the night he nearly had sex with her for the first time. But then they had fought. And then she had run away from him. And then she was killed. He lay down on his bed, closed his eyes and, for half an hour, let the tears run down his face onto the pillow. Then he sat up and grabbed his cell phone and scrolled through his photos. Katie at school. Katie on the beach. Katie in his room. Delete. Delete. Delete.

FIVE

Joe sat at his desk, pressing his fingers against his forehead, pretending to read a report that had started to blur a few minutes earlier. His phone rang. It was Reuben Maller from the FBI, Eastern District – the office that covered the whole east coast. They got on well since their first case together. The last one they worked was Donald Riggs.

‘Can you talk?’ said Maller.

‘Go ahead,’ said Joe.

‘How are you all doing?’

‘Who?’ said Joe. ‘You mean here? Manhattan North?’

‘You, Anna … Shaun. How are you holding up?’

Joe paused. ‘We’re good … why? What’s going on?’

Maller let out a breath. ‘OK,’ he said, lowering his voice. ‘Off the record, I got some news from the Bureau in Texas. On Duke Rawlins.’

Joe stopped breathing.

‘Before you say anything, Joe, it’s sketchy, I don’t have a lot of details. And you do not know this.’

Joe fought the nausea rising in his stomach. ‘Tell me,’ he managed.

‘Duke Rawlins’ home town, Stinger’s Creek? Geoff Riggs – Donald Riggs’ father – said he had a visit last week from Rawlins. Geoff Riggs is in really bad shape, Joe. No-one knows the last time he was sober. He walks through town, railing about things, not making a lot of sense. Last week, he said to some young kid in the liquor store that Rawlins was out at his cabin the week before. The kid was freaked out and called the cops. They went to speak with Riggs. I have it written here verbatim. Geoff Riggs said, real calm: “Sure, I had a visit from Dukey. He was wanting to say Hi, catch up. Been years. Wanted to take a look around Donnie’s bedroom. I said, ‘Knock yourself out, buddy’. Not a lot in there since y’all turned it upsideways last year. So Dukey comes out, then he go on out to the shed out back where I keep my tools and I say, ‘Sure you can, Dukey. You’re a good boy.’ He seemed kinda aggritated. Had some sort of bug in his bonnet. Anyways, last I saw of little Dukey.”’

‘That’s it?’ said Joe.

‘Yep.’

‘Geoff Riggs didn’t call the cops, nothing?’

‘No – this guy’s brain is so fried. That statement I just read to you took two hours to extract from him. My guess is Rawlins is taking advantage of the relaxed surveillance.’

‘The no surveillance,’ said Joe.

‘Yeah,’ said Maller. ‘It’s been a year – he hadn’t shown anywhere anyone expected him to. And his visit to Geoff Riggs is only part one of the story. The second part is that a few days later, the custodian of the Stinger’s Creek cemetery was doing his rounds and when he got to Donald Riggs’ grave … well, there was another one opened up right beside it.’

Joe paused. ‘Someone was dug up?’

‘No. Someone had just dug a grave. It was empty. It was thoroughly searched and there was nothing or no-one in it.’

‘Jesus Christ,’ said Joe.

‘What we have got to remember is everyone out there knows what Rawlins and Riggs did. And on the one hand, you’ve got people baying for blood. On the other, some of the officers from the sheriff’s department who went to investigate this, spoke to a group of stoners who were all, “Man, Duke Rawlins is, like, sick.” In a good way. So it could have been an angry relative of a victim, it could have been a teenage prank.’

‘Maller, why don’t we cut the crap, here? You know what this is. Alcoholic witness or not. It’s not a coincidence – we hear Rawlins shows up, pays a visit to a tool shed and within days a grave is opened up next to his old buddy. Come on.’

‘Yeah,’ said Maller. ‘It’s just I know what this man has done to you. I mean, that’s why I called you on this … yeah, I don’t think this one’s a false alarm.’

‘Jesus Christ.’

‘I have to ask,’ said Maller, ‘has he tried to get in touch with you?’

Joe did not hesitate. ‘No.’

Anna Lucchesi sat at her dressing table in her bathrobe, her hair pulled back with a black jersey headband, her face pale, her eyes shadowed. She opened a packet of cleansing wipes and started wiping down her makeup products, getting rid of dust and dried-in foundation and caked powder. She grouped them together and lined them up, ready for the following morning. A photo beside the bed showed her as she used to be, her hair dark and glossy, her cheeks healthy, her eyes alive.

The notice board at Manhattan North was covered with badges from police departments all over the country and around the world. Joe stood in front of it, thinking about Duke Rawlins. Every evil thing Rawlins had done had settled close to the surface and deep down inside. He didn’t know what would end it, but every day a new scenario took him away from where he was supposed to be.

‘Joe? That’s your freakin’ phone,’ yelled Martinez.

Joe grabbed the receiver.

‘Joe? It’s Bobby Nicotero. From the 1st.’ Bobby’s father was Victor Nicotero – Old Nic – a retired cop and close friend of Joe’s.

‘Jesus, Bobby. What’s up?’

‘Not a lot.’

‘How’s Old Nic?’

‘You tell me.’

Joe paused.

Bobby’s laugh was off. ‘I was going to ask you the same thing. How is my father?’

‘Well … last time I saw him was at that barbecue, couple weeks back. You had to be somewhere with the kids, I think. He was good, taking it easy, enjoying writing.’

‘Writing what?’

‘Oh,’ said Joe. ‘He’s working on a book.’

‘Yeah, well, I’ve been busy …’

‘Yeah – your old man’s writing his memoirs.’

Bobby shot out a laugh. ‘I got a few chapters of my own I might like to add to that.’

‘Really?’ said Joe. ‘What can I—’

‘Actually I’m calling because I think I’ve got something you might be interested in. The Upper West Side homicide you got? Your vic – Ethan Lowry. Was there a phone by him when they found him?’

‘Yeah. There was. Why?’

Bobby sucked in a breath. ‘Sounds a lot like this case I caught in SoHo back in December. Guy’s name was Gary Ortis, badly beaten about the face, gunshot to the head, phone in the hallway beside him. We never got the guy.’

‘Jesus. And it looks like we’re already linking this one to a case a year back. Was your guy gay?’

‘He was single and he dated women,’ said Bobby, ‘but who knows? Yours?’

‘Ethan Lowry was married with a kid,’ said Joe. ‘William Aneto was gay.’

‘Hmm.’

‘I know where you’re coming from,’ said Joe, ‘it has that feel about it. That was some hardcore facial damage and I don’t know about you, but last few times I saw shit like that, it was two guys, lovers’ spat. No-one died, but …’

‘Yeah, I know,’ said Bobby.

‘Look, why don’t you call in to the Two-Oh, bring what you got.’

Joe put down the phone and reached into the inside pocket of his jacket hanging on the back of his chair. He pulled out two pills and took them with a can of Red Bull.

‘Guys,’ he said. ‘That was Bobby Nicotero from the 1st. Looks like he got a third vic, happened back in December. He’s on his way over.’

‘Holy shit,’ said Danny.

‘On Lowry’s records? said Blazkow. ‘The last call at 10.58? Was to a woman – Clare Oberly. Lives on 48th Street between 8th and Broadway.’

‘OK,’ said Joe. ‘Danny and I’ll go check her out this evening.’

Half an hour later Bobby Nicotero walked into the twentieth precinct with his partner. Bobby was thirty-nine years old with a thick neck, broad shoulders, short legs and suits too cheap to flatter any of them. He had close-cut black hair, a heavy brow and a range of facial expressions that stretched to pissed off.

‘Hey,’ said Joe. ‘Good to see you.’

‘You too,’ said Bobby, shaking his hand. ‘This is my partner, Roger Pace.’

Pace was shockingly gaunt with eyes set deep into dark sockets.

‘Nice to meet you,’ said Joe, shaking his hand. ‘Thanks for coming in.’

‘No problem,’ said Pace, slipping back behind Bobby.

‘OK,’ said Joe, walking over to the others. ‘Bobby, you know Danny Markey. And this is Aldos Martinez and Fred Rencher from Manhattan North. Tom Blazkow and Denis Cullen from here at the Two-Oh. Everyone, Bobby Nicotero and Roger Pace from the 1st.’

Everyone nodded.

‘Do you want to tell us what you got?’ said Joe.

‘Sure,’ said Bobby. ‘I read the paper and I just saw our friend, the “source close to the investigation” saying that the vic was found naked and his face was severely beaten. I figured there could be something to it, could be nothing.’ He opened the file.

‘Our vic’s name was Gary Ortis, DOB 07/10/69, cause of death – GSW to the head from a twenty-two. There were signs of oxygen deprivation, you know, petechial hemorrhages. He was found naked in his apartment on Prince Street in SoHo.’

‘Body behind the door,’ said Joe.

‘Yup.’

Everyone nodded. ‘That sounds like our guy,’ said Joe. ‘Any leads?’

Bobby shook his head. ‘Nothing. We thought it was a gay thing, but the guy had lots of girlfriends—’ He shrugged. ‘Not that that means anything.’

‘Yeah,’ said Martinez looking at Danny.

Danny rolled his eyes.

‘Looks sexual to me,’ said Blazkow. ‘They’re all found naked like that, beaten so bad.’

‘We got the ME talking about a homosexual motive,’ said Joe.

‘Makes sense when you look at the physical damage,’ said Rencher. ‘When I was in the 17th, I caught this case – a high school junior, one of those small, pretty boy types, hooked up with this forty-year-old guy, they had a thing going on for a while. Then we’re called out, the boyfriend has beaten the crap out of the poor kid, totally smashed up his face and, I mean, like our vics, he was unrecognizable. The boyfriend was out of his mind with grief, crying and saying he just wished the kid hadn’t spent so much time talking to that cute barman, that he would have been still alive if he had. Unbelievable.’

‘And remember that guy in Jersey who shot his boss?’ said Cullen. ‘He’d been arrested for beating the crap out of his boyfriend with a hammer a few years before that.’

‘But then, there’s no damage to the genitals with our vics,’ said Joe. He shrugged. ‘That usually goes along with it.’

‘Also – on the sex thing,’ said Rencher. ‘According to Lowry’s wife, the DVDs and whip and shit were just theirs, they liked to watch porn together, no big deal. She figures he was just going to watch some that night while she was gone.’

‘OK. But what else was left lying around the other scenes? What was in the bedrooms?’

‘There was a sexual element at the Aneto and Lowry scenes,’ said Blazkow.

‘Yeah, same for Ortis,’ said Bobby. ‘Toys, DVDs. Some of them were a little dusty, I remember, but they were out there on his bed. But there was also work papers, diaries, photos.’

‘Yeah, we got photos at Aneto’s too,’ said Danny.

‘There were love letters from Lowry’s ex-girlfriend by his bed.’

‘Oh, there were boxes of wax strips at Aneto’s,’ said Martinez.

‘And Preparation H at Ortis’s place,’ said Bobby.

‘It’s kind of like they were all looking for something,’ said Blazkow. ‘Pulling out drawers, looking through closets. Do you think maybe the perp was after something?’

‘Maybe,’ said Bobby. ‘Maybe they could have all ripped him off.’

‘Let’s take a look at what they’ve got in common,’ said Danny. ‘We got a Wall Street guy, an actor, a graphic designer …’

‘Faggoty jobs?’ said Martinez.

‘Yeah, I see that sensitivity training worked out well for you,’ said Danny.

‘It’s cool, I’m dating the guy who gave the talk,’ said Martinez.

‘You’re such a dickhead,’ said Danny.

‘What about success?’ said Blazkow, ignoring the interruption. They all nodded. He continued, ‘Perp could have a chip on his shoulder. All these guys were successful … at least, on the surface, like if you saw them on the street.’

‘The Wall Street guys are all about surface,’ said Danny. ‘Why else do they freak out so much when they’re caught with their pants around their ankles burying it in some ten-dollar whore? My neighbors, my clients, my wife …’

‘Yeah,’ said Bobby. ‘And then the pricks tell us they’re paying our salary, like that’s going to help their situation. How to win cops and influence whatever.’

‘OK – phone calls,’ said Joe. ‘All the vics made calls the night they died. Looks like while the perp was in their home. William Aneto calls his mother – she says it was just to say goodnight.’

‘Gary Ortis calls his former business partner just to say hi, he says, see how he was doing,’ said Bobby.

‘Hmm,’ said Joe. ‘Maybe not. We need to go talk to these people again. And how is he choosing the vics? Is he following them home? If so, from where? If not, how is he meeting them – online, at work, in a bar, at the gym …’

‘Why, though? Why is he killing them?’ said Blazkow.

‘It’s going to be a long night,’ said Danny.

‘What’s Denis Cullen’s story?’ said Joe later, when he was alone with Danny.

‘That’s Denis Cullen who the 10–13 benefit’s for next month. Well – it’s for his daughter. She’s got cancer, she’s only thirteen years old.’

‘Shit,’ said Joe. ‘I didn’t know that. I thought he’d just been through a divorce or something.’

‘Nah, they’re a real close family. He’s a good guy. When he’s not here, he’s at the hospital with his wife and daughter the whole time.’

‘When’s the benefit?’

‘A couple weeks at the Bay Ridge Manor. There’s a poster up on the board. It’s black tie.’

‘Black tie? What’s up with that?’

Danny shrugged. ‘It’s terrible – it’s because they’re not sure, you know, if she’s going to pull through and you know, make her prom, her wedding … so it’s kind of a fancy affair for that.’

‘Jesus Christ, you think you have problems …’

‘I know.’

Anna Lucchesi lay in bed as wide awake as she had been when she got in. She wanted so badly to sleep, but one part of her was listening out for Joe to come home, the other for Shaun. Over the past few months, she had been kept awake by a strange humming sound somewhere off in the distance, maybe out across the water. Tonight, at least it was quieter, just the sound of cars going by below on the Belt Parkway, a soothing sound that usually lulled her to sleep. She pulled the sheet tightly around her, up over her shoulder and high under her chin. Just as she settled, she heard the screech of a car pulling up outside the house. A door opened, then closed, then silence. No footsteps. Nothing. She leaned up on her elbow and listened. She looked at the clock. It was 4 a.m. After a minute, she heard faint electronic beeps from outside. Then a short five-note melody. Then more beeps. Shaun’s cell phone. She got up and walked over to the window when she pulled back the blinds, she saw a body lying on the street outside the gate. Her heart leaped. She looked closer and recognized Shaun’s sneakers. Her legs went weak. She grabbed her cell phone off the nightstand and dialled Joe’s number as she ran down the stairs.

‘Joe, Joe, get home now,’ she screamed. ‘Something’s happened to Shaun. He’s lying outside the house on the street.’ She hung up. Shaun was on his back with his eyes closed, his arms stretched out by his side.

‘Shaun,’ said Anna. ‘Shaun.’

She crouched down beside him and put an ear to his chest. He was taking in deep guttural breaths and breathing out a rancid mix of garlic, cigarettes and alcohol.

‘Shaun,’ she hissed. ‘Wake up.’

He frowned and rolled his head from side to side. Anna looked around to see if anyone was watching her in her pyjama bottoms and cami kneeling beside her drunk teenage son. Shaun’s eyes flickered open and he slowly turned to her, his head loose on his neck, his eyes wildly trying to focus, first on her, then randomly on either side of her.

‘Mom?’ he said finally.

‘Yes,’ she snapped.

‘Dad?’ he said.

She reached down and grabbed his arm. ‘Get up. Into this house.’

He wrenched his arm away. ‘Get off of me.’

‘Just get inside,’ said Anna. ‘It’s four o’clock in the morning.’

He laughed.

‘It’s not funny.’

‘It is,’ he said. ‘C’mon, it is funny getting the time whenever you come home. Every kid gets the time when they come home. Like we care. Like it matters.’ He lifted his head off the concrete. ‘Am I on the sidewalk? Jesus Christ.’ He laughed again. ‘How the hell did I get here?’

‘Oh my God – how did you get here? You don’t know how you got here?’

‘Jesus Christ,’ he said, rolling onto his side, then dragging himself up onto his elbow. ‘I have no idea.’

‘OK. I’m going inside and you can follow me in. Now.’

‘Ugh.’

‘And your father is on his way.’

‘What? I thought he had a—’

‘Yes he does,’ said Anna. She reached the front door. ‘So God help you.’

Shaun stayed where he was, then dragged himself to the top step of the house. Eventually Anna opened the door and came out.

‘Get up now, Shaun.’ She walked back into the hall. ‘I’m closing the door.’

‘I never asked you to open it.’

She slammed the door and turned on the porch light.

‘Aw man,’ he said. ‘Come. On.’ He leaned a hand back on the step and pushed himself up, knocking against a plant pot. ‘Turn off the goddamn searchlight. I’m right here.’ He banged on the door. Anna opened it. He walked in and sat on the first chair he found.

‘Don’t get comfortable there,’ said Anna.

She heard the beeps again, outside the house. She pulled open the door and grabbed his cell phone.

‘Give me that,’ he said.

She held it up. ‘When you go up and get into bed. Where were you tonight?’

‘Out.’

‘Tell me where you were. Or I will not give this back.’

Shaun laughed. ‘What? Give me my phone.’ He glared at her.

‘Don’t try anything with me,’ said Anna. ‘No more. I’m tired of this.’

‘I’m the one who’s tired of all this,’ said Shaun, standing up, ‘this fucking house. It’s so depressing. I hate being here. I can’t bear it. You go to anyone else’s house and you have fun. You come here and it’s all, like, ugh.’

Anna reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a bottle of beer. She shook her head slowly. ‘What are you?’ she said. ‘A wino now? Walking around the streets with bottles of alcohol?’

‘I didn’t want it to go to waste,’ said Shaun.

‘It’s disgusting,’ said Anna. ‘When did you turn into this … this person?’

‘What person?’ said Shaun.

‘Stop it,’ she shouted. ‘Stop being so aggressive with me.’ Tears came out of nowhere. Shaun swayed in front of her, blinking slowly. She turned quickly and walked into the kitchen, wiping her eyes. She sat down at the table and took some deep breaths. She remembered the advice she once heard that it was never too late to start your day over. She looked at the hands of the clock at 4.20 a.m. and wondered which day she would be re-starting. In the hallway, Shaun’s cell phone beeped again. Anna boiled the kettle and made a mug of Sleepytime tea. Within minutes, she could feel its effects and wanted to stay exactly that way – alone, warm and calm in the soothing steam.

Beep. Beep-beep. Beep-beep. Beep. Beep.

She put down her mug gently. And made an angry burst for the hallway.

‘Turn that phone off,’ she roared.

Shaun jumped. They both turned towards the door when they heard the keys.

‘Oh no,’ muttered Shaun.

‘Hey, what’s going on here?’ said Joe.

‘What do you think?’ said Anna. ‘He arrived home drunk – again. This time, he was lying on the pavement. Someone had pushed him out of a car and left him there.’

‘What?’ said Joe and Shaun.

‘Yes,’ she said, turning to Shaun. ‘You don’t even remember that part. What nice friends you have.’

Joe knew by looking at Anna that she hadn’t slept yet.

‘Go to bed, honey,’ he said. ‘You need sleep. I’ll take care of this.’

‘What do you mean you’ll take care of this?’ she said. ‘You haven’t done anything—’

Joe turned to Shaun. ‘You, stay where you are. Anna, can I talk to you upstairs?’

Anna shrugged. They walked up the stairs and stood on the landing, leaving Shaun muttering after them.

‘If he sees us fighting, we’re going to get nowhere.’ Joe struggled to keep his voice low.

Anna stared at him, her eyes wide. ‘Really?’ she said. ‘But if he doesn’t see you at all, that’s better?’

‘What the hell is that supposed to mean?’

‘You know what that means,’ said Anna. ‘I’m trying to discipline him alone. And I’m not able to.’

‘Yes you are.’

Anna laughed. ‘Obviously.’

Joe stared at the ceiling.

‘Do you know he hasn’t done anything about his college applications?’ said Anna.

‘Yeah, well, he’s doing that to piss us off. Because we didn’t go see them with him.’

‘What? He knows we couldn’t. I was just back from Paris, you were—’

‘Yeah, yeah, working, I get it.’

‘But you were!’

‘Of course I was! Where else is the money going to come from?’

Anna stepped back. Joe stared at her. ‘It’s true,’ he said.

Her eyes were black with anger. ‘I can not believe you. After what you put me through—’

‘What I put you through?’ His voice cracked. They looked at each other. ‘Jesus Christ, Anna. Is that how you feel?’

‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘I’m tired. I’m going to bed. You blame me for him, I blame you for me, you blame yourself for nothing. Goodnight.’

‘Wait – you have to answer me. You’ve never said that—’

‘I said I don’t know what I feel. Now let me go to bed.’

‘What has happened to us?’ said Joe. But she was gone.

Joe leaned against the banister, his breath shaky. He slowly made his way down the stairs.

‘Shaun,’ he said, crouching down in front of him. Over the past year, the brightness had gone from Shaun’s eyes and his skin was starting to look pale and waxy.

‘What?’ said Shaun, drowsy and irritated.

‘Where were you tonight?’

‘Not again,’ said Shaun. ‘I was out, OK? Just let me go to bed.’

‘What’s going on with you?’ said Joe.

‘Nothing,’ Shaun snapped. ‘Nothing, OK? Nothing.’

‘Your Mom and me are worried.’

‘Yeah, well, get over it.’

‘This isn’t you talking,’ said Joe. ‘You’re my boy, you’re a good kid. I don’t know where this nasty piece of—’

‘Leave me alone,’ said Shaun. ‘I want to go to bed.’

‘Your mother was up at the school today, I know you haven’t done anything about college—’

‘Why are you talking to me about this shit now?’ said Shaun. ‘What is wrong with you? It’s, like, late. Or early, whatever.’

Joe moved back and let Shaun struggle up from the chair.

‘Shaun – this is the last time you’re going to do this, come home like this, OK?’

Shaun snorted. ‘Whatever.’

‘Don’t,’ said Joe. ‘EVER say that word to me like that, OK?’

‘Whatcha gonna do?’ said Shaun, taking a step towards him, staring him down.

‘Don’t make this any worse for yourself,’ said Joe.

‘Worse than living in this house? With Mom moping around all day?’

Joe grabbed his arm. ‘Listen carefully, Shaun. I married your mother. That was a choice I made. I love your mother. And I never have and never will listen to anyone disrespect her, least of all her own son. Now, get the hell out of my sight.’

SIX

Danny and Joe pulled up across the street from Clare Oberly’s apartment building and parked outside a dry cleaners. The elderly owner stood against the plate glass window, smoking a cigarette and staring at them.

‘That Pace guy looks kinda funny, doesn’t he?’ said Danny.

Joe smiled.

‘Kind of like parts of his face are trying to make a run for it,’ said Danny. ‘His eyes are busting out, his Adam’s apple … it’s like he’s so thin, there’s no nourishment there for them. They’re out of there. Know what I’m saying?’

Joe shook his head. ‘You’re a cruel son of a bitch.’

‘Just saying what everyone else is thinking.’

‘You are so full of shit.’

They walked over to the building, past a huge moving van and into a brightly lit foyer with floors streaked with black marks. A couple walked by them in shorts and T-shirts, carrying a chest of drawers, the man sweating heavily and trailing foul air behind him.

‘Jesus Christ,’ said Danny to Joe. ‘Deodorant.’

One of the elevators was held open by the couple moving. Joe and Danny took the free one to the tenth floor, found apartment 10B and rang the bell.

‘Hello,’ said Joe. ‘Clare Oberly?’

‘Yeah. Hi.’ She was an attractive blonde in her mid-thirties, dressed in a lime green chiffon top, white jeans and red and green platform shoes. Strings of expensive multi-colored beads hung around her neck.

‘My name is Detective Joe Lucchesi. My partner and I are investigating a homicide. You received a phone call round about 11 p.m. last night?’

She paused. ‘Yeah. Why?’

‘Who was the call from?’ said Joe.

‘Ethan Lowry.’ She looked at both of them. ‘Why?’

‘What’s your relationship with Mr Lowry?’ said Joe.

‘Oh, we dated in college. Is he OK?’ she said.

‘Can we come in?’ said Joe.

‘I’m sorry. Yes. I’m so rude. Come in.’ She brought them into a neat, open plan apartment with a huge Miró on one wall. She sat down and gestured to the sofa opposite.

‘I’m afraid Mr Lowry’s been the victim of a homicide,’ said Joe.

‘Oh my God,’ she said. ‘Ethan?’ She shook her head. ‘Oh my God. He’s so … what happened? He’s just so not the type … if that makes any sense.’

‘He was murdered in his apartment. We think he may have called you right before it happened. And we need to find out why.’

‘God. I don’t know. I mean, I don’t think it would be anything to do with why he was murdered. We don’t even know each other that well any more. Like, I’m not a person he would call if he was in trouble. We’re just not close.’

‘When was the last time you spoke with him?’

‘A year and a half ago. At my brother’s funeral. It was really sweet of him to come. Ethan was very kind like that.’ She bowed her head. ‘I can’t believe this.’

‘What did he say to you when he called?’

‘Not a lot. He just called to say hi.’ She shrugged.

‘How long were you two dating?’

‘Six years.’

‘What happened?’

‘Nothing major, the usual, we were too young, I was too ambitious, he wanted quiet nights in, I wanted to party. We drifted. It got boring, I guess.’

‘And you both moved on.’

‘I did more than he did, I guess. But then he met his wife and he got married shortly after.’

‘So why do you think he called you the night he died?’

‘I have no idea.’

‘You have no idea,’ said Joe. ‘Really?’

She smiled sadly. ‘I’m such a bad liar. The worst. I guess I’m worried … his wife’s just lost her husband …’ She sighed. ‘OK. What I tell you? Does his wife get to hear it?’

‘Not necessarily, no,’ said Joe.

‘I don’t want to make things worse for her. Even though I haven’t done anything … just, the only weird thing that night was Ethan told me … that he loved me.’

Joe frowned. ‘What? And you hadn’t seen him in how long? A year and a half?’

‘Yeah. He said he was just calling to say he loved me.’

‘What did you say to him?’

‘I was shocked. I mean, he sounded pretty normal except for what he was actually saying to me. That was it. I didn’t know what to say back. I mean, he’s married, I heard he has a lovely wife and daughter and … I don’t know. I mean, I don’t love him. Didn’t. I said that to him. I said about his wife and that I’d moved on.’ She shrugged. ‘Now I feel terrible. For him. For his wife. I’m guessing she has no idea. Do you think … I mean, he didn’t kill himself or anything?’

‘No,’ said Joe. ‘Had he hinted about his feelings when you met at your brother’s funeral?’

‘No,’ said Clare. ‘He was really sweet to me. But that’s Ethan, he just is. There was no major interaction between us, no plans to meet up, I didn’t encourage him, nothing.’

‘Is there anyone you could think of that had a problem with Ethan? Was he ever in trouble?’

‘It was eight years ago when we broke up. But before then, Ethan was, like, normal, just a nice guy. I never saw him even have an argument with anyone. He was low-profile, you know what I mean? He’d be the last person I would think would end up murdered.’

Rufo was sitting at his desk pressing keys on his cell phone when Danny and Joe walked in. He held up his left hand to silence them. They looked at each other. Joe shrugged. Rufo spent another few minutes focused on the tiny handset. He was smiling to himself. He hit one last key and put the phone down.

‘Texting,’ he said. ‘What a great way to communicate. You should check it out.’

‘I lived in Ireland, remember?’ said Joe. ‘It’s nearly taken over from drinking.’

‘Who were you texting?’ said Danny.

Rufo looked up at him. ‘None of your business, Markey. Now, to what do I owe the pleasure?’

Joe spoke. ‘I’m thinking of setting up a meeting with Reuben Maller in the Eastern District, get some sort of profile worked out on this perp …’

‘Sure. Go ahead,’ said Rufo. ‘As long as we’re all clear it’s his friendly assistance you’re after.’

Joe nodded. ‘I’ll see what comes out of the profile. If there’s anything we think he should stick around for, anyone he’d like to interview, we’ll see, but you know Maller, he’s a good guy, he does his thing, then disappears back—’

‘Under his rock,’ said Danny.

Joe rolled his eyes. ‘Do you ever think it might be you?’

‘What the hell’s that supposed to mean?’ said Danny.

‘You know? The whole world’s an asshole or a dickhead. Did you ever think it might be you?’

‘Ladies, take it outside,’ said Rufo.

Anna stood outside Bay Ridge subway station, searching through her huge navy bag. She found her white headphones, but as she pulled them out, she realized there was no iPod attached.

‘Merde.’ She remembered seeing it in the speaker dock in the kitchen. ‘Merde.’

She checked her watch and thought about running back home for it, but instead, she forced herself to walk into the heat of the station and down the steps. Raised voices echoed up and when she reached them, she saw a tall well-dressed woman push a scruffy teenage boy by the shoulders, slamming him against the ticket machine. He spat in her face. She threw money at him and walked away. Anna had no interest in working out what had happened, she kept her head down and moved as far away from him as she could. It annoyed her that her heart rate shot up. It happened too easily, any confrontation, any sudden movements, any loud noises. When she had her iPod on, Mozart made her feel that she could drift everywhere untouched by her surroundings, a gentle soundtrack for a different place, a different set of scenes.

She swiped her Metrocard and waited on the platform, glancing over at the woman in the suit, keeping her where she could see her. The woman was tweaking – coming down off crystal meth, radiating crazy. Anna could hear the young guy behind her shouting – ‘Crazy bitch! She took my money, the crazy bitch!’ Then, ‘No! I got it here! Crazy bitch threw it back at me!’

Nervous energy ran through the crowd. The woman walked away swinging her briefcase, her head held high, her own special tune playing in her head. The R train pulled in and everyone moved on. It was rush-hour cramped and Anna, small and slight, got pushed into a tight spot against a huge student who smiled an apology down at her. She smiled back.

For the first part of the journey, everyone was focused on their books and newspapers or talking to their friends. Anna stared through the window at nothing. Then the subway doors slid open at Cortlandt Street and stayed open. Panic struck up in her again. Announcements boomed from the speakers on the platform. No-one could hear them. People started to look up, then around at everyone else.

Anna felt a sickening urge to push her way through and burst onto the platform, but was held back by the attention that would attract, everyone staring at this women who was alarmed because a train stopped for two minutes longer than it was supposed to. She could feel the sweat soaking into the fabric at her back, the heat of the platform, of the people around her, of their breath. The doors slid closed and the train started up again. She breathed out and talked to herself all the way to her stop, telling herself she was stupid, then brave, then irrational, then strong, then stupid. She almost ran up the steps into Union Square, relieved to hit air that wasn’t suffocating her. She peeled her top away from her skin and let the light breeze cool her. ‘I can’t do this,’ she said to herself. ‘There is no way I can do this.’

She straightened up and looked across at Barnes & Noble and felt the pull of a morning spent drinking coffee and flicking through design books of faraway houses on stilts in the ocean or on beaches or cliffsides. A shiver ran up her spine. She took a deep breath and walked towards the W Hotel. She stood at the window and saw everyone gathered in the early morning darkness of the bar. She recognized the back of Marc Lunel’s head, his long, black shiny hair, the red tab on his Prada shoes. She saw four models, two makeup artists, two hair stylists, the intern from Vogue Living … everyone waiting for her guidance. She saw her reflection in the glass, her tired eyes, her downturned mouth, the sheen of sweat on her forehead. She turned away. She started walking. And she hailed the first cab that passed by.

When Joe got back to his desk, a white envelope lay there, stamped and addressed to him. Most of the mail he got was yellow-envelope inter-departmental. He picked it up. It was light but bulky; cheap paper with no return address. He grabbed a ruler from his drawer and sliced through it. The thin white pages were folded in half and sprang open, both sides covered in scrawled writing and short sentences: Dear Detective Lucchesi, The noise this morning was almost unbearable. I could try to create it in letters and words. I got out of bed. I wouldn’t know how. Two directions. And it’s agony. I get anxious sometimes if I do. And actually what I need is peace to find my way through everything. There was no point in just laying there. One forward, one back. I made coffee and fixed myself scrambled eggs. I still know how to do that. I’m not sure which is harder. But it was loud. Not everyone else does. I don’t think I can figure it all out without quiet. Bass and drums. There are times when I’m nearly there …

Joe paused, rubbing his temples. He flipped the page over and kept reading. On it went, a random series of thoughts and the vague sense that there was a story inside, one that only the writer knew. It was a complexity of simple facts, observations, theories and descriptions. What Joe read on the sixth page made it relevant to him. Vertically, in the right-hand margin was written: Lying, badly beaten. Lowry is the result. I don’t know if I could have done anything differently.

Something cold shot up the back of Joe’s neck. He scanned quickly through the pages that followed, through writings about rooms and stories and calculators and theaters. It ended after sixteen pages, signed off namelessly: More will come. Captured at the right time.

‘Jesus,’ said Joe. ‘What the fuck was that?’ He called the others over.

‘Guys, I just got a letter about Ethan Lowry.’

‘A letter?’ said Danny. ‘From who?’

‘A randomer,’ said Joe.

‘Who’s Arrandoma?’ said Rencher.

‘Randomer. A random person. Person unknown. It’s something I picked up from one of Shaun’s friends in Ireland.’

‘OK, what’s this randomer saying?’ said Rencher.

‘A little and a lot,’ said Joe.

‘Don’t be fooled by the rocks that I got,’ said Danny.

Joe ignored him and looked down at the letter. ‘OK, so we got a lot of information on exactly where the salt is in the kitchen for when the guy is microwaving his eggs in the morning, a bunch of other stuff about what he likes to do – major detail there …

‘Did he sign it?’ said Rencher.

‘Yeah, sure he did,’ said Danny, ‘with his address too, that’s why we’re all sitting around here, trying to figure out who could have sent it.’

‘Yeah, I meant with anything—’

‘What? Like, From the killer …?’ said Danny.

‘Shut the fuck up,’ said Rencher.

‘Shut the fuck up all of you,’ said Joe. ‘Let me read this out to you.’ He read through the letter and waited in the silence that followed.

‘Are we taking this seriously?’ said Rencher.

‘I think we should be,’ said Joe.

‘But “lying badly beaten” – you could get that from a media report, that’s no insider information there,’ said Rencher.

Joe looked down again at the letter and shrugged. ‘I think there’s something in this. Let’s just take it that there is.’

‘“More will come, captured at the right time”,’ said Danny. ‘More victims?’

Joe shrugged. ‘Or more letters?’

‘Maybe,’ said Danny.

‘I mean, what is the point of this letter?’ said Martinez.

‘Someone is reaching out,’ said Rencher.

‘But are they trying to help?’ said Cullen. ‘Are they giving us any information?’

Joe glanced down at the pages. ‘I think somewhere in here there’s information. I think they’re trying.’

‘Seriously, could it be from the perp?’ said Rencher.

‘Doesn’t sound like a psycho, but then, “Lowry is the result. I don’t know if I could have done anything differently”.’

‘Yeah,’ said Joe. ‘That could be talking about anything. I don’t know. Look, I’ll go ahead, copy this a few times, if anyone has any ideas, get back to me.’

‘Will Question Documents be able to tell us more?’ said Rencher.

‘Probably not a whole lot,’ said Joe, ‘Looking at this, the paper, the envelope, the pen don’t look like anything special. If we get another letter in, they can tell us if it’s from the same guy. And if there’s any problem when we track him down, they can use samples of his writing to match it up. That’s about it. First thing is to get it to Forensics, see if we can get some prints.’ He pointed to his notebook. ‘I mean doesn’t whoever wrote it get that it’s pretty fucking easy to trace? I’ve got the time and place where it was mailed right here from the stamp. I’m going to get in touch with the post office, see if we can get any video. Bobby, can you pass me the Ortis file?’

‘Sure,’ said Bobby, handing it to him.

The others were talking among themselves as Joe slowly started to flip through the pages.

‘You got the VICAP form?’ said Joe. He looked up at Bobby.

‘For Ortis?’

‘Yeah,’ said Joe.

Bobby shrugged. ‘I guess I didn’t fill one out.’

‘You didn’t fill out the VICAP form, Bobby?’ Joe’s voice rang loud in the room.

‘Yeah, like, you fill them out every time?’ Bobby glanced around at everyone. ‘Come on, a hundred bullshit questions that are no use when, like, the whole fucking country isn’t filling them out too? Everyone knows that. Spending hours answering questions when I could be out on the street getting somewhere?’

‘So you don’t see how making a link here might have helped Ethan Lowry?’

Bobby snorted.

‘And to answer your question, yeah, I did always fill out the form,’ said Joe. ‘And I still do …’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ said Bobby.

‘Nothing,’ said Joe. ‘If I’m working with a squad detective and they haven’t filled one out, I have to do it for them.’ Joe was looking down, his tone neutral.

Danny got up. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘On that VICAP bombshell—’

Nervous laughter broke out, but died away just as quickly.

William Aneto’s mother Carmen lived above the grocery store she owned on 116th Street in East Harlem. Martinez had rung the bell, but there was no answer. The door was freshly painted bright green with a gold knocker he slammed against the wood.

‘Nice smell,’ said Danny, glancing into the store. He reached out to ring the doorbell again.

Martinez slapped his hand away and did it himself. ‘This is my show.’

Mrs Aneto opened the door and gave them a weary look. She was a small woman in her early fifties, dressed in a navy blue suit and low heels. Her hair was held neatly in a bun at the base of her neck. She wore no makeup. Martinez greeted her in Spanish, introducing himself and Danny.

She stared at Martinez. ‘You must be the token guy,’ she said.

He frowned.

‘Match the skin of the detective to the skin of the victim,’ she said.

Martinez turned back to her and spoke again in Spanish. She gave a defeated smile and led them in, up a narrow flight of stairs into a small apartment.

The living room was well worn and looked like the centre of entertainment for Mrs Aneto. There were women’s magazines on the sofa, two books balanced on the arm, a tray with a teapot and one cup on it. A bowl at the center of the coffee table was filled with candy. The TV was widescreen and behind it, there were tall shelves of DVD cases and at the bottom, rows and rows of cassettes with white stickers and handwritten titles.

Mrs Aneto sat down in a high-backed armchair and put the footstool in front of it to one side. Danny and Martinez sat side by side on the sofa. Martinez leaned forward, resting his forearm on his left knee. He spoke in Spanish. ‘The night your son died, you said when he called you it was to say goodnight. Did he say anything else?’

‘Let’s not be rude to our white guest,’ she said and switched to English. ‘Why are you asking me this now?’

‘Because there have been some new developments in the investigation and—’

‘What kind of new developments?’

‘We believe there may be another victim.’

Her eyes were wide. ‘Was the victim white?’

‘Yes,’ said Martinez. ‘In fact, there may be two of them.’

‘Both white.’

‘Yes,’ said Martinez. ‘We’ve spoken with another victim’s family member who got a phone call the night their loved one died – well, a different kind of call than the one you got. We’re wondering if there’s a connection …’

Mrs Aneto closed her eyes. Her lips moved in silent prayer. Then she took a deep breath. ‘My son begins his introduction to detectives as a Latino victim. Strike one. William is gay. Strike two. Strike three would have been what I told you about the phone call. You people did nothing to find William’s killer. Nothing. You did not give a damn. And you’re only back around now because some white boys have gone the same way. I’m telling you now what I didn’t tell you before, because it might be connected. And you will work harder now for three victims than you ever would for William, a lone victim with the wrong-colored skin—’

‘Mrs Aneto—’ said Danny.

She held up a finger. ‘There is nothing you can say to me that will change my truth.’

‘Your truth, Mrs Aneto,’ said Danny.

She stared him down. ‘I have spent a year having my anger and bitterness grow inside me. And this is my break. I won’t cry for those white boys, because maybe they’ll help me lay my William to rest. This is a tragic spotlight to have shined on my son, but I’ll take the light where I can get it.

‘I have two dead sons,’ she said. ‘Pepe, my youngest, was killed three years ago in drive-by crossfire, some gangs in Alphabet City. I was told he was scoring drugs. I never believed that. Something never seemed right about that to me. His killers have never been found.

‘On the night William died, as you know, he called me. But no, it wasn’t just to say goodnight.’ She paused. ‘I could barely hear him. He sounded drunk, he was sobbing, breathing so badly. He said to me, “Mama? I killed Pepe.” I said, “William. Is everything OK? What is the matter?” He said everything was fine. Then he told me what happened. He told me that he had sent Pepe to pick up drugs for him. And that was why Pepe was there. And that’s why he was shot. William apologized. Over and over. I was so angry with him, but I was so scared for him, he sounded so hopeless. When the police came the next morning to tell me he had been found, I thought it was suicide.’

‘So William was a drug user.’

‘I didn’t know he was. But he must have been at one stage. I knew William was clean when he died – his toxicology proved that – but if I told you what he said in this phone call he made, you wouldn’t get by the fact he had been involved with drugs.’

‘Mrs Aneto, every victim is important to us,’ said Danny. ‘Every single one. No-one gets treated any differently because of the color of their skin, the lifestyle they have, the choices they make, nothing. We want to find your son’s killer. And we just want all the information we can to do that. We’re not judging that information, running it through any filter. They’re just facts to us – black and white – things that may or may not lead us to a killer.’

Mrs Aneto reached for a photo of William from the sideboard, framed in shiny black wood. She stared down at it. ‘I’m only talking to you today, detectives, because I have hope. I am still bitter, I am still angry, but I have hope. I’m not sorry I didn’t tell you this a year ago. I stand by that decision. Because I hate to think how bad your efforts would have been if you had known he had been into drugs.’

Joe grabbed his suit jacket from the back of his chair. He looked around the office.

‘I haven’t eaten yet. I’m going to get breakfast. Anyone need anything?’

He took three food and drink orders and as he was getting out of the elevator, his cell phone rang. It was a number he hadn’t seen in over two years and had never deleted from his contacts: Anna (W).

He frowned. ‘Anna?’

‘Do you know where she is?’ It was Chloe. Her tone had none of its usual confidence.

Joe could not speak. Anna cannot be anywhere other than the W Hotel in Union Square. The number he had programmed into his phone that morning. Just in case.

‘What?’ he said. His hunger had gone, the void in his stomach now filled with something else.

‘I’m sorry. It’s Chloe here. Anna didn’t show up at the shoot this morning. I’ve been trying her cell, the home phone – nothing. I dragged your number out of some next-of-kin thing we had for her. I’m sorry to bother you—’

‘Whoa,’ said Joe. ‘What’s going on? I left her this morning and she was taking the subway to Union Square and everything was fine—’

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