Chapter 103

Conklin looked over the top of his computer and asked, “What was that all about?”

“Roll your chair over.”

He pulled his chair around to my desk so that he could see my monitor.

I said, “Hotline thinks we might have a witness to the jazz center shootings. And…the witness sent pictures.”

“Let’s see.”

I opened the email, daring to hope.

The first photo was a glamour shot of the jazz center, the corner view of the building’s expanse of glass windows sparkling in morning sunlight. The street was quiet. There was some traffic at the intersection, but this shot had clearly been taken before three people, a semi-well-known guitarist and his two bodyguards, were picked off one shot at a time.

Fogel had said she’d taken a picture of the car.

In the lower right corner of the photo, on the opposite side of the street from the jazz center, was a black Ford Taurus.

I said, “The witness said that the gunman fired from inside a car. Maybe this one. I can read, uh, four numbers on the tag.”

“Not a bad line of sight from the car to the entrance of the building.”

There were a couple of other cars parked in front of the Taurus, all of which would have to be checked out.

I jotted down the tag numbers as Conklin said, “I’m ready for the next one.”

I clicked on the next picture. It had been shot only a few seconds after the first. It showed a man in the driver’s seat of the Taurus, his gloved hand on the window frame, pulling the door closed.

“Uh-oh,” I said. “So much for his prints.”

My partner adjusted the monitor so it faced him square on. “Am I hallucinating? Or is that Barkley without the beard?”

I enlarged the man’s face so that it took up most of the screen, but the more enlarged I made it, the more his features went out of focus. I had seen photos of Barkley with and without the beard. But I couldn’t be sure that this was him.

I said, “I’ll find Stempien. You run the plates.”

I called Stempien, but he didn’t pick up. It was twenty after twelve. Lunch hour. When I ate out close to the Hall, my cheap eatery of choice was MacBain’s. Was it Stempien’s go-to joint, too?

Conklin looked up from his computer and said, “The Taurus was reported stolen thirty-six hours ago.”

“Could be Barkley stole it before the shooting and still has it,” I said, trying out a theory. “Or, Richie. He could’ve left the car after the shooting and walked off the scene. The car could be right where it was yesterday. The street was closed all day for CSI and until late last night.”

“I’ll go take a look,” he said. “You find Stempien.”

I transferred the two pictures to a flash drive and went across the street to MacBain’s.

The place was crowded. It always was at lunchtime. True detective that I am, I spotted Stempien at a table by himself, a plate of steak fries, a burger, and an iPad Pro in front of him. I navigated a path through the congested bar and grill, and when our FBI computer guru looked up, I smiled and said, “May I join you?”

He said, “Absolutely,” but his look told me that he was checking out my face.

“Fistfight,” I said.

“Whoa. You okay?”

“Never better,” I said.

Syd came to the table and I ordered what Stempien was having. Once she’d departed, I held up the thumb drive and said, “Mike. You feeling heroic today?”

“Love to be a hero. How can I help?”

“I brought you a snapshot. Can you look and tell me if it’s Barkley? If you’re not sure, you have to run it through your DeepFace recognition program. ASAP.”

“What you call ASAP is what I call normal. As if I’ve heard anyone in the past five years say, ‘Mike. Take your time.’ And I’ve been waiting.”

I laughed. Stempien pushed his plate aside and plugged my thumb drive into his tablet. He stared at his device. He finger-swiped and pressed buttons, but he didn’t speak.

I don’t think I breathed as I watched him work.