“Jesus Christ.”
“The bedroom looks like a slaughterhouse.”
Powell looked more closely at the small screen. The DOA could have been anyone. “Is it Michael Roman?”
Fontova shook his head, held up an evidence bag. In it was an oversized leather wallet, connected to a chain. “His name was Nikolai Udenko.”
“Did you run him?”
Fontova nodded. “Small timer. Did a stretch at Rikers for assault. No wants or warrants.”
“Then why is he dead in this pretty house?”
Fontova had no answer.
“Ma’am?”
Powell glanced over at the paramedic. She hated being called ma’am, but this kid looked twenty-four, and Powell figured it was the right term. “Yeah?”
“I should really take a look at those ribs.”
T
EN MINUTES LATER
, while an EMT team wrapped her damaged – probably broken – ribs, Powell tried to put it all together.
Since she’d gotten the assignment, she was certain she had the starting point of this case. She believed it was the point where all homicide investigations began, that being with the murder itself. Elementary this, no?
No. Not always.
“We got a call from the 105,” Fontova said, sitting at the dining-room table, looking the other way while Desiree Powell – wearing just her bra on top – got swaddled in Ace bandages. “It seems that a uniformed officer talked to a man up there at one of the pay-and-play motels along Hampstead. They’d gotten a call of two men fighting in the parking lot.”
“What about it?” All three words hurt. Powell winced. The paramedic helped her slip her blouse back on.
“The officer said the guy did not have any ID on him, but identified himself as a Queens prosecutor.”
“A prosecutor?”
Fontova nodded. “The guy said his name was Michael Roman.”
“O
kay
.”
“They checked him out, let him slide. But the officer said they pulled around the back of the motel and watched the guy drive away. He was driving a 1999 Ford Contour.”
“He run the plate?”
Fontova looked at his notes. “Yeah. It comes back to a company called Brooklyn Stars.”
“What the hell is that, a Roller Derby Team?”
“Small car dealership in Greenpoint. Probably a chop shop. I checked it out. Guess who owns the place?”
Powell would have thrown up her hands if it wouldn’t have sent her into paroxysms of agony. “I am in a world of hurt. Don’t make me guess.”
“Nikolai Udenko.”
“Our friendly neighborhood DOA?”
“The same.”
Powell glanced out the window. Her chest was aflame. But that didn’t stop the wheels from turning.
“So let me get this straight. We’ve got a torture homicide up in the 114, the victim a shady lawyer tied to ADA Michael Roman – a man who I might add was spotted this afternoon on Hampstead Avenue, driving a car that belonged to a man we just found sliced and diced in the aforementioned Mr Roman’s lovely suburban house.”
“Yep.”
“A house inside which I talked to his rabbit-eyed wife before taking three –”
“Four.”
“Four slugs to the vest.” Powell shifted her weight in the chair. For some reason, learning about the fourth shot made her ribs even worse. “And now the wife and daughters are gone.”
“In the wind.”
Powell thought it might take a calculator to add all this up. “Some fuckery this.”
“That’s exactly what I was gonna say, but I gave that word in all its forms up for Lent.”
Fontova held up a second evidence bag, this one containing what looked to Powell like a .25 semi-auto.
“That was my ticket to heaven?” Powell asked.
“Yep.”
“That bitty thing? I’m almost embarrassed.” The truth was, a .25 could drop you just like a .38, depending on the load. Powell thanked the Lord it was only a twenty-five. At the range at which she had been shot, the vest might not have saved her if it had been anything bigger.
“I called in the serial number,” Fontova said. “And it turns out this here belly gun is registered to none other than one Abigail Reed Roman, RN, thirty-one, of Eden Falls, New York.”
Powell just looked at her partner. “Now, you’re just a handbook of police procedure aren’t you?”
“Tell the world,
chica
.”
“Well I may not know much, but I’m sure of one thing,” Powell said, struggling to her feet.
“What’s that?”
“I know
she
didn’t pull the trigger.”
A
S THE SHOOTING TEAM
headed up to Eden Falls, Powell got on her cellphone to Lieutenant John Testa, the commanding officer of the Queens Homicide Squad. Testa was a supple sixty, with a full head of silver hair and burnished little gray eyes that could make you confess to something you never did. He had an unrequited thing for Desiree, and therefore she could usually wrap him around her finger. After assuring her supervisor that she was fine (she was not), and pleading with him to not pull her in (she hated begging), she told him the facts as they knew them. Except in detail about how her chest felt like she had been kicked for a forty-nine-yard field gold and it hurt to even hold the cellphone. Testa caved, let her stay on the street.
As promised, five minutes later, he issued an arrest warrant for Michael Roman.
FORTY-FIVE
M
ichael drove two miles under the speed limit, coming to a full stop at stop signs and red lights. He was usually a careful driver, especially with the girls in the car, but today there were more reasons to be cautious. He did not know if there were wants and warrants on him yet. He had to be where he was going, but he had to get there.
The horror of what he had found inside his house roiled within him. The place where his children played, where he had thought his family was protected, was shrouded in blood. Right now a madman had his wife and one of his children. And that madman could be anywhere in the city.
He had gotten on Henry Hudson Parkway heading south, frantically scanning both the side and rear-view mirrors, trying to see if Aleks was following him. For the first few miles, he concentrated on looking for Abby’s car. He saw no champagne-colored Acuras. Then it occurred to him that Aleks might have had his own car, a car unknown to Michael. He had not been able to see the length of the driveway.
He called Abby’s brother Wallace, first at his office, then at his house in Westchester. Wallace said he had not spoken to Abby since the birthday party, and Michael did not sense that Wallace was under any kind of duress. Wallace Reed could negotiate multimillion dollar contracts with foreign investors, but when it came to confrontations he was not the coolest egg in the dozen. Michael doubted he would have even been able to talk if a psychopath was holding him hostage.
Michael then called Abby’s parents house in Pound Ridge. He got Charles Reed’s answering service and, after identifying himself to the satisfaction of the efficient young woman on the phone, was told that the Reeds were currently on a plane between Alexandria, Egypt and Madrid. They were not expected back for another ten days.
The security around the gated community in which Abby’s parents lived was tighter than Quantico, and Michael doubted that Abby and her captor would have been able to bluff their way past.
Still, Michael did not know what kind of network this madman had in place, how many bolt-holes he might have around the city, the county, the country.
Michael knew that Desiree Powell was one of the best detectives in Queens Homicide and, for her to have had probable cause to enter the house, given all the surrounding circumstances of the case as it sat – combined with the facts that no one would be able to contact Michael and Abby Roman, not at the office, not at the clinic – it would not be long before they put two and two together.
There was only one reason Powell had showed up in Eden Falls, and that was because she had made the connection between Michael and Viktor Harkov.
They stopped at the red light on Northern Boulevard at 82nd Street. The sun was warm, the sky was gemstone blue, and people walked with a spring in their step. It was all too surreal. It had never been darker in Michael’s heart.
Since leaving Eden Falls Charlotte had not said a word. She was sitting in the passenger seat, her hands folded in her lap, looking out the window. Michael had no idea what had happened in his house, had no idea what Charlotte had seen. It appeared that she had not been crying. That was the only positive thing.
As they waited for the light to turn green, Charlotte turned slightly in her seat, scanned the messy back seat. She looked at Michael.
“Whose car is this, Daddy?”
Her tiny voice roused Michael from his black reverie. “Uh, it belongs to a friend of mine.”
“Which one?”
“You’ve never met him, honey. It’s somebody I work with.”
Charlotte wrinkled her nose.
“What’s wrong?” Michael asked.
“It smells funny.”
She was right. Michael had smelled it the moment he had dumped Omar in the park. The man had soiled himself.
“Where are we going?”
“We’re going to see another a friend of mine. A friend of
ours
.”
Charlotte didn’t ask who the friend was this time. Emily would have, but not Charlotte. Once Charlotte sensed a pattern developing, she tried to find a way around it. “Are Mommy and Em going to be there?”
Michael looked over at his daughter. The open window had blown her hair into her eyes. He reached over, smoothed his daughter’s hair. “No, baby. We’re going to meet up with them later.”
Michael went silent for a few moments, organizing his thoughts. He knew he had to ask. The possibilities were eating him from the inside. “That man back at the house,” he began, not knowing how he was going to broach the subject. “The tall man. Was he nice?”
Charlotte just shrugged.
“He didn’t . . . hurt you or Emily or Mommy did he?”
Charlotte hesitated for a moment, and Michael’s heart began to sink. Then, “No.”
There were a million more questions, but there was no way to ask them without scaring Charlotte even further. He would have to get the answers on his own.
As they drove down 94th Street Michael rehearsed what he would say to Dennis McCaffrey, his boss. He had placed a call to the office and found, as expected, that McCaffrey was still there. Michael visualized pulling into the back lot, leading Charlotte down the sidewalk. She had never been to his office. What a first visit this would be.
When they turned onto Roosevelt Avenue, they pulled directly behind a NYPD sector car, lights flashing. The entire street was blocked.
Michael looked past the police car. Ahead was a fender bender, probably a little worse. Two cars sat at right angles to each other. A second police car sat in front of the scene. A patrol officer was directing cars around it.
As they approached the officer who was diverting traffic, Michael pulled his cap down low, put on a pair of gradient lens sunglasses that were sitting on the back seat. The shades were a woman’s style, and looked far too feminine, but this was New York. Michael chanced a glance, peering over the top of the frames. The police officer on the street was only ten feet away now, looking straight at him. Was he made? Would the cop draw his weapon, command Michael to get out of the car and lay down on the pavement?
Michael had spent so much time on the other side of things, garnering so little sympathy for the criminals and their mindset, that –
The cop held up his hand. Stepping in front of the car, nearly at the hood. Michael glanced in the rear-view mirror. There was no one behind him. If he slipped the transmission into reverse, floored it, he could back up the twenty or so feet needed to get away. They could get a few blocks, get out, and take the subway.
The cop was just a few feet away now.
Michael eased the gearshift into reverse, trying not to make it obvious. The cop still had his hand up. Michael was just about to put his foot on the gas when a vehicle turned the corner and drove up behind him, a dark SUV. He was blocked in.
The cop eased up to Michael’s window, twirling his finger in a circular motion, indicating to Michael that he should roll down his window. Michael thought of the illegal handgun under the seat, the blood in the trunk of the car. He heard the next few seconds unfold in his mind.
Can I see your license and registration, please?
I’m sorry. I don’t have them with me.
You have no identification with you?
No, sir.
Is this your car, sir?
No.
Please step out.
“Good afternoon,” the officer said. He was in his late forties, a veteran patrol officer. Michael knew a lot of men who were on the job more than twenty-five years, men who never took the test, men who were not consumed by advancement. They were savvier in many ways then half the detectives out there.
“Good afternoon.”
The cop looked at Michael, at Charlotte, at the back seat. Cops of this experience could take in an entire scene in seconds. “You know your front license plate is about to fall off. It’s hanging on by one screw.”
Michael felt a cool wave pass over him. “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”
“That plate falls off, someone picks it up, they could use it for all manner of nefarious purposes.”
“I understand.”
The officer held him in his cop stare for a few more seconds – direct, street-hardened, unconvinced. This was his nature. He then looked over at Charlotte. “What’s your name, little darling?”
Charlotte beamed. “Charlotte Johanna Roman.”
The cop smiled, winked at Michael. Michael took a breath, held it. He knew if this cop decided to run the plate, it would not come back registered to anyone named Roman.