BACK IN HIS CAR, he pulled out his cell phone and called Kyle Driscoll about their Crown Heights case. “Listen,” he told the young detective, “I’ve got something I need to take care of. Why don’t you check in with the M.E. and see if he’s got any kind of I.D. on our victim? And then, I guess, keep going with the neighborhood canvass, and I’ll meet up with you as soon as I can.”
He hung up, feeling a bit guilty after his big speech about priorities. He made another quick call, then dropped the phone into the cup holder next to him. As he drove away from the Kings County Morgue, he thought about the man who had become his hospital comrade. Outside the car, Brooklyn residents limped down Linden Avenue in the blistering heat, but Jack barely saw them. He was focused on another scene, in his mind’s eye.
The rehab gym had been like a strange dance hall; the patients sat with their wheelchairs in a row, waiting for the physical therapists to take them for a whirl. The long, sunny room was crowded, and everything was forcedly cheery, from the lite rock on the radio to the brightly colored exercise balls stored in nets over the mats. The more mobile patients gritted their teeth and did their best to walk the length of a set of parallel bars, to lift small weights, to keep their balance while standing on yellow DynaDiscs. Others were lucky if they could wiggle their fingers.
Jack and his roommate had begun working out together, sharing the aches and pains, giving each other encouragement. He remembered an afternoon when he had sat in a wheelchair, curling a small dumbbell. Next to him, Daniel breathed heavily between his own sets. He gave Jack a frank, open look. “Do you remember what it was like when you was shot?”
Jack rested the dumbbell in his lap. He couldn’t recall much about his own shooting—the shock had been overwhelming—but a physical memory came through. He touched his chest. “It was like a hammer. No—a chisel. Sharp.”
“For me, it was like the bite of a bee.”
“The sting.”
“Steeng, yes.” The Russian ran a hand across his broad face. “I never think that one little piece of metal can make life so changed.”
Jack looked at the Russian and knew exactly what the man meant. Before his shooting, he had been unaware of his belief in an invisible membrane that protected him from the world. He realized it only after that membrane had been brutally ripped apart. Normally, Jack would talk only to fellow cops about his on-the-job experiences; they understood him in a way that even his ex-wife never had. But getting shot was something cops didn’t really understand, even though they witnessed violence all the time. It wasn’t something doctors really understood, either, though gunshot patients were often rolled into their wards. Having a bullet slam into your flesh was not just a physical annoyance, as it seemed in the movies, where a cop might take a hit in the shoulder and then just jump up and run after the bad guys. No—it was a profound psychological disturbance, a violation, a deep emotional trauma. After the incident in Red Hook, Jack had crossed over into a different universe, the world of victims, and this stranger seemed to be the only person who could really appreciate how he felt.
MOST OF THE PEOPLE who traveled to Coney Island in search of a little summer fun had no idea what the neighborhood was like just a couple of blocks away from the amusement parks and the beach. Here, where the year-round residents lived, there was very little public fun—it was a gritty little working-class backwater, a reminder that the nearby resort had fallen on tough times. Mermaid Avenue, the main shopping strip, had a busy street scene, populated by hard-faced, hard-drinking skels in bleached denim, do-rags, tractor caps, unlaced sneakers. Next to the elevated subway tracks that traversed the neighborhood stood an abandoned little building with a fitting name: Terminal Hotel. (It was easy to imagine some boozer or junkie settling in there to die.)
As if matching the general tone, the sky was overcast today; the clouds looked like dirty mattress stuffing. Jack glanced up at a second-floor sign advertising the Salt and Sea Mission, a Bowery-like project for the redemption of those whom the street had not entirely claimed. As he drove, he kept picturing Daniel’s face, so animated in the rehab gym; in the morgue, a lifeless lump of clay. They hadn’t kept in touch for long after they left the hospital: a few trips to the Brighton boardwalk (to walk together for physical therapy), a few afternoons sharing a couple of beers. And then things had petered out. They didn’t really have enough in common, beyond their shootings. It was like being comrades with someone in the army; for a while you were intensely close, but after you got back to your old surroundings, you drifted apart.
A block north, on Neptune Avenue, the street carnival thinned out, and the smells of salt air and fried food gave way to that of spilled motor oil. Along this industrial stretch, Neptune was home to automotive shops, gas stations, and—just up the way—a big repair facility and storage yard for subway trains. Jack parked in front of a Chinese takeout place and stepped out into a cool morning. Across the street, in front of a block presided over by a body shop, an auto glass place, and an auto parts emporium, scraps of yellow crime scene tape fluttered in the breeze. The car Daniel had been driving when he was killed was already gone, hauled off to the NYPD’s vehicle facility for further inspection.
Jack got out and crossed the busy avenue to the far corner, where a broken umbrella lay sprawled across the curb and scraps of paper littered the sidewalk—and his Homicide colleague Linda Vargas stood waiting. She was a short, wry Puerto Rican. The first thing that men tended to notice about her was that she had soccer-ball-sized breasts. If they made a pass, though, or condescended to her in any way, she could swiftly make them feel as if they were staring up at her from the curb. Underestimating her was not a mistake that anyone—perps or fellow cops—was likely to make twice.
Vargas’s finely plucked eyebrows went up. “You trying to steal my case?”
Jack shook his head. “Nope. It’s just that I met the vic a few times. Back in the hospital, after I got shot.” (Having some familiarity with a victim wouldn’t automatically disqualify him from helping with a case, not unless there was some sort of major connection that might foul up later legal proceedings, but he didn’t want to seem unprofessional in his interest.) “Who caught the case for the Six-oh?”
Linda pulled out a cigarette and lit up. “His name’s Scott DeHaven.”
“How’s he doing?”
She blew a puff of smoke over her shoulder, in consideration of the fact that Jack had stopped smoking since the hospital. “He’s all right. He’s over at BCI.” The Bureau of Criminal Information.
Jack nodded. He had to wonder whether the precinct detective might find Daniel’s name in any records over there.
Vargas moved into brisk business mode. “So: the vehicle was found here in the right lane—evidently it drifted into the curb after the deceased was capped. The angle made it look like a shitty parking job, which is probably why nobody called it in right away.”
Jack frowned. “How long was the body sitting here?” It felt a little weird calling a friend the body, but he knew he’d have to keep his feelings out of this.
Vargas shrugged. “The M.E. says maybe a couple of hours.”
Given the steady flow of passing cars, it seemed incredible that no one would have noticed, but Jack knew that they were looking at a time of death of midnight or 1 A.M. The avenue would have looked a lot different at that hour. All of the security shutters in front of the auto shops would have been rolled down. And the Chinese takeout place and the pizza parlor? Closed. He glanced at the red and yellow awnings of the nearby businesses; their bright colors would have been muted in the night. In the dark, all cats are gray. In front of a big liquor store on the next block, three life-size statues of pirates stood sentinel. Jack wished that they could talk.
“What’cha thinkin’?” said Linda Vargas.
Jack scratched his cheek. “The guy was shot at very close range, so where would the shooter have been?” He answered his own question. “In the car next to Lelo, or right outside his window. Did Crime Scene find powder on the seat next to him?”
Vargas shook her head. “Not much. It looks like the shooter was outside.”
Jack nodded. “I guess he couldn’t have just driven up next to the vic, because he would have been on the left side of the other car. Unless there were two of them … Or maybe he was on foot and walked up from across the street when the car was stopped at a red light? Maybe an attempted robbery?”
Vargas nodded. “Sounds good, only we found his wallet still in his pocket, and his cell phone on the seat next to him. I mean, it could’ve been a robbery gone bad, and the perp freaked out and took off before he grabbed the dough, but that doesn’t seem likely. …”
“Have you gotten the cell phone records yet?”
“They’re on the way.”
Jack stared into the empty space where the car would have been stopped. “Hold on,” he said. “Maybe there’s another option. Instead of being on foot or in a car, what if the shooter came up right beside him on a motorcycle or a bike?”
Vargas nodded. “I can see that.”
“Any bullet casings?”
“Nope. He cleaned up after himself.”
“Witnesses?”
She shook her head. “He picked a nice spot for a quiet killing.” She pointed up the avenue. “The only open business within sight would have been that gas station down there, and it’s a bit too far for a real I.D., even if someone had been standing out front. And there are only a couple of residences within the sight lines.” She pointed across the street, at a couple of little apartments above the Chinese takeout place and the pizza parlor. “We’ve got an old guy says he heard a pop in the middle of the night, but he didn’t get up or even look at a clock. That’s it. No other drivers, no foot traffic, no calls to nine-one-one.”
Jack frowned. What did they have? No leads, as yet. Not a robbery. A random shooting, perhaps, but the odds of that were highly unlikely, especially considering the fact that Daniel had already been caught in one such incident. No, this had the earmarks of a premeditated, execution-style murder.
Oh, Daniel, he thought, shaking his head. Who did you get yourself tangled up with?
He looked at his watch, thinking that he really ought to return to Crown Heights, but then—picturing some silky, feathered blond hair, picturing a sexy scar—he couldn’t help making one more personal stop.