The Steel Kiss

The breacher fired up the tool and sliced a two-by-four-foot hole in the door, kicked in the cut piece. Sachs pitched in the live grenade and, after the stunning explosion—disorienting but not lethal—Heller and Sachs, remaining outside still, went to their knees, pointing their weapons and flashlights inside.

Scanning.

The room was empty of humans.

But it was booby-trapped.

“Ah.” Heller was pointing to a piece of thin wire that was attached to the inside doorknob. If they’d bashed the door in, it would have slackened the wire and released a gallon milk jug, cut in half horizontally, filled with what seemed to be gasoline, spilling the contents onto a hot plate that sat smoking on a workbench by the window, sealed by the thick shutters.

The officers entered and dismantled the device. Then they cleared the room—the connected bathroom too.

Heller radioed Haumann. “Team A. Premises secure. No hostile. Team B, report.”

“Team B leader to Team A leader. No hostiles in back. We’ll sweep the other apartments. K.”

“Roger.”

“Sachs,” she heard through her earpiece. Surprised to hear Rhyme’s calm voice. She hadn’t known he was patched in to the tactical frequency.

“Rhyme. He’s gone. Rabbited. We should’ve thrown the Crafts For Everyone guy in protective detention to keep him from talking. That’s how Griffith got tipped off, I’m sure.”

“The nature of democracy, Sachs. You can’t tie up and gag everybody who ought to be tied up and gagged.”

“Well,” she said, “we’ve got a pristine scene. When he left he didn’t take much. We’ll find something here. We’ll get him.”

“Walk the grid, Sachs, and get back soon.”

CHAPTER 49

An hour later Sachs was on the doorstep of Vernon Griffith’s apartment, sweating in the Tyvek bodysuit.

Reading aloud from a notebook.

It’s society that’s the problem. They want to consume and consume and consume but they don’t have any idea what that means. Collecting objects, collecting things is what we focus on. In other words, dinner SHOULD BE about people, families getting together to commune at the end of a work day. It’s not about having the best oven, the best food processor, the best blender, the best coffee maker. We focus on those things, not on our friends!!! Not on our family.

“You still there, Rhyme?”

“Somewhat. It’s a rant. Like the others. The People’s Guardian.”

“It’s his full manifesto. The title’s The Steel Kiss.”

Poetic, she reflected.

She put the book back into an evidence bag. “Got lots of trace. Some paperwork. Lon’s running vitals. Sold his family house in Manhasset and no other residences show up positive at this point. Lon’ll have some people follow the public records.”

“Anybody else’s friction ridges?”

“One more than others. A woman’s, I’d guess. Or a small man’s. But probably a woman’s. I found long blond hairs. Seem to be dyed blond with traces of gray. And the alternative light source? He had a pretty active sex life. I mean, busy boy.”

The ALS imaged bodily fluids that would otherwise have been invisible.

“So, he has a girlfriend.”

“But no evidence that she lived here. No women’s clothing or cosmetics, toiletries.”

“He may be there now,” Rhyme muttered. “Wonder where the hell she is. Get the prints back here ASAP, Sachs, we’ll IAFIS them. I want to move.”

“I’ll be a half hour. I—”

Her phone rang. She recognized the number from NYPD Dispatch. “Detective Sachs.”

“Amelia, it’s Jen Cotter. Wanted you to know, there was a nine one one of an assault in Midtown West. Vic’s hurt but’ll live. Respondings say she’s ID’d her attacker. Vernon Griffith.”

Well. “Who’s the vic?”

“Alicia Morgan, forty-one. Don’t know the exact relationship with the perp but they knew each other.”

“She there, or the hospital?”

“Still there, far as I know. This just happened.”

“The perp?”

“Got away.”

“Give me the address.”

“Four Three Two West Three Nine Street.”

“Tell the respondings I’m on my way. I want to talk to the vic. If they take her to a hospital, let me know which one.”

“Will do.”

Sachs reported the developments to Rhyme and hurried to her car. Fifteen minutes later Sachs and Haumann’s tac teams were parked at the corner of Eighth Avenue and 39th, before a five-story apartment building.

It was unlikely Griffith was anywhere near here but he was obviously unstable, if not psychotic, and he might very well have stayed around after the assault. Hence the firepower.