Maggie got up and left the interview room. Two uniformed officers who’d been waiting outside came in to escort Ziegler down to the Manhattan Detention Center, aka the Tombs.
“Good job,” said McCabe as an exhausted Maggie returned to the conference room.
“Thanks, but what I really wanted to do was smack that smug bastard across the face.”
“You did a whole lot better than that,” Astarita told her. “You got him to confess to three murders.”
Maggie walked to a large coffee urn that had somehow appeared at the far end of the room and helped herself to a large dose of caffeine. She collapsed in a chair next to Diane Capriati, who was tapping away at her laptop.
“Here it is,” Capriati announced “Hadley and Bradshaw, 144 Wall Street. Big firm. Two hundred and twenty-seven lawyers. Six hundred and forty employees.” She pressed a few more keys. “No Tyler Bradshaw listed among the attorneys.”
“Then who’s the Bradshaw in the Hadley and . . . ?” asked McCabe.
“The boss. One Nicholas Bradshaw, who’s apparently one of the founding partners,” said Capriati.
“Could be Tyler’s dad. Or maybe his uncle,” said Maggie.
“Or possibly no relation,” said Astarita.
“Guess we’d better find out,” said McCabe, glancing at his watch. Five a.m. Zoe had been missing for more than thirty hours and the chances of finding her alive were diminishing with every passing hour. Exhausted or not, the team had to keep going. “Okay,” said McCabe, “since founding partner Nicholas Bradshaw is unlikely gonna be in his office this early, who do you guys call to get a number for his personal cell phone?”
“I’ll get right on it,” said Morales. “May take a little time but I’ll try to move fast.” He left the room and went back to his desk to start making calls.
McCabe next tapped in the number of Tom Delgado, the IT guy who was working his way through hundreds if not thousands of New York State driver’s licenses that had been issued to men with the first name of Tyler. Trying to find the ones who looked even a little like the guy in the sketches and/or the video.
“Hey, McCabe,” said Delgado. “We’re making good progress here. So far DMV’s provided facsimiles of 1,489 valid New York licenses issued to guys with the first name Tyler. When we limit it to guys between the ages of twenty and forty we’re down to 569.”
“I’m gonna make things a whole lot easier for you,” said McCabe.
“Oh yeah?”
“What happens if you add the last name Bradshaw?”
“Tyler Bradshaw? If that’s the guy’s whole name, we’re done. Give me five minutes and I’ll get back to you.”
With nothing to do other than wait for Delgado’s call and for Morales to find Nicholas Bradshaw’s cell number, McCabe went back to the desk Astarita had assigned to him, slumped down in the chair, and stared blankly across the nearly empty room, silently mouthing a prayer that Bradshaw was their guy and that Zoe was still alive.
Delgado called back in three minutes.
“Okay, I’ve got three Tyler Bradshaws for you,” said Tom Delgado. “One’s fifty-nine years old and lives in Spencerport, which is a suburb of Rochester. Number two’s twenty-nine but lives in Oneanta and looks nothing like the guy we’re looking for. Number three’s got to be the one. Tyler Bradshaw. Date of birth 7/14/87 which makes him twenty-nine years old. Address is listed as 1084 Park Avenue in Manhattan.”
McCabe did a quick calculation; 1084 Park would put Bradshaw’s apartment between 88th and 89th Street. Two blocks from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. A very fancy neighborhood. Not one he would have thought of as a likely home turf for a murderer and kidnapper. Still, you never knew.
“And this Bradshaw looks like our guy?” asked McCabe. “Both sketch and street photo?”
“Spit image. I’ll text you an image of the license.”
Seconds later the image appeared, and McCabe found himself looking at a photo of a guy he was certain was the same one he’d watched walking Zoe home on two frames of the surveillance video. He showed it to Astarita.
“You think we’ll need a warrant to search the apartment?” McCabe asked.
“Not if there’s a chance he’s holding Zoe there,” said Art. “Her life’s obviously in danger. But I’ll get Renee Walker on it right away. Just for insurance.”
“Take long?”
“Nah. We’ve got a judge standing by for just such a call. It’ll take less than an hour. Then I’ll have Walker and Fenton check the place out.”
“All right,” Ramon Morales called out from his desk on the other side of the room. “I’ve got Nicholas Bradshaw’s cell number. Since Zoe’s your niece,” he said, looking over at McCabe, “maybe you want to do the honors?”
McCabe reached for the landline phone on his desk. He wanted Nicholas Bradshaw’s caller ID to signal a call from the New York Police Department and not from some random number in Portland, Maine. Before punching in the number, he asked Astarita to sit down and listen in.
The phone rang five times and then went to message. McCabe broke the connection and punched the number in again. This time a sleepy male voice answered. His first words were, “Do you have any idea what time it is?”
“Yessir. Five-twenty-two a.m. This is Sergeant Michael McCabe and this is a police emergency.”
Nicholas Bradshaw suddenly sounded alert. “What happened? What sort of police emergency?”
“Do you have a son named Tyler Bradshaw?”
McCabe could hear a long angry sigh. “Oh, for God’s sake, what’s that maniac gone and done this time? Beaten somebody up again?”
“Tyler Bradshaw is your son?”
“No. He’s my nephew. My late brother’s son. Both his parents are dead. What’s he done? Started another fight? Beaten somebody up?”
“No sir. We have reason to believe he may have important information about the murder of a woman that took place Sunday night . . .”
“A murder?”
“Yes, a murder. And that he may know about another woman, who if she hasn’t been killed already, is certainly in grave danger.”
“Are you saying you believe Tyler is responsible for these crimes?”
“Right now we’re calling him a person of interest but it’s important that we talk to him.”
“Spare me the legalistic fine points, Sergeant. Do you think Tyler committed these crimes?”
“We have evidence that points that way. Do you have any idea where he might be? Where he might go to hold a young woman captive, to abuse her sexually until he was ready to murder her as well?”
There was silence on the other end of the line. When Bradshaw spoke again, he had somehow been transformed from an angry uncle stirred from his sleep to a hard-ass lawyer prepared for battle. “Before I give you that kind of information, I’d like to see what kind of evidence you have. Any evidence at all that Tyler was possibly involved in this murder and kidnapping.”
“We have a combination of witness testimony and CCTV footage.”
“Since you’re suggesting my nephew may have murdered someone, I’m afraid I’m going to have to see this evidence for myself before I tell you where I think he might be.”
As McCabe listened to these words, he felt a rage welling up in him. He had a strong desire to go up to Bradshaw’s apartment and pull Mr. Hot-Shit Attorney out of his bed by the short hairs and make him tell them where Bradshaw might be hiding right now. This was exactly the kind of reaction Astarita had warned him against. Rather than risk losing his temper and the possible cooperation of the only man they had in their sights who might know where Zoe was, McCabe signaled Astarita and asked Art to take over the conversation.
“Excuse me, Mr. Bradshaw, I’m going to turn this call over to my superior Lieutenant Art Astarita. He’ll be able to tell you more.”
Art got on the phone. “Mr. Bradshaw. Lieutenant Art Astarita. I’m heading up the NYPD task force investigating the current spate of serial killings. We’ll be happy to discuss the reasons why we need to talk to your nephew. But we need to do that as soon as possible. A woman’s life is at stake.”
“I understand that. But I’m not giving you the address until I see the evidence.”
Astarita sighed loudly. “Can you come down to the Seventh Precinct on Pitt Street?”
“When?”
“As soon as possible.”
“Fine. I just need to get dressed. I’ll be there in an hour. Six-thirty on the dot.”