The Steel Kiss

She explained that there would probably be a plea deal. “He admitted we got him dead to rights. He doesn’t want to fight it.” A smile. “He asked if I thought they’d let him make furniture in prison.”

Rhyme wondered if that was a possibility. It seemed that felons incarcerated for murder might not be allowed access to saws and knives and ball-peen hammers. The man might have to settle for making license plates.

Then he was gazing at the evidence boards, reflecting how the two cases that had seemed so different were in fact as genetically linked as twins. Frommer v. Midwest Conveyance and The People of the State of New York v. Griffith and, now, v. Alicia Morgan.

Sachs “deweaponed” herself (the verb had been in an NYPD memo on firearm safety that she’d shared with Rhyme; they’d had a good laugh). She poured coffee from a service Thom had set up in the corner. She sat. Just as she took her first sip her phone sang out. She read the text and gave a laugh. “CSU in Queens found the missing napkins. The White Castle napkins.”

“I’d forgotten about those,” Archer said.

Rhyme: “I hadn’t, though I had given up on them. And?”

Sachs read: “ ‘Negative for friction ridges, negative for DNA. Positive for confectionary beverage in proportions that suggest source was White Castle restaurant chain.’ ”

“But didn’t the—” Archer began.

“—napkins have White Castle printed on them? Yep, they did.”

Rhyme said, “Nature of our profession—yours now too, Archer. Every day we deal with missing evidence, evidence never properly identified, evidence contaminated. Deductions botched completely. And deductions made that don’t need to be. Missed clues. Happens in epidemiology, I would imagine.”

“Oh, yes. Myopic children, remember?” She told Amelia Sachs the story of the study that incorrectly asserted causation between children’s sleeping with lights on and vision problem.

Nodding, Sachs said, “Heard this story on the radio—people used to believe that maggots spontaneously generated from meat. Don’t remember the details.”

Archer said, “Sure, famous story. Francesco Redi, seventeenth-century scientist, was the one who disproved that. It was because fly eggs were too small to be seen. Father of experimental biology.”

Sachs glanced at the evidence boards, apparently at the section about the civil suit. She asked, “Your case, the original one, Mrs. Frommer’s? Can she recover anything?”

“Very doubtful.” Rhyme explained that the only cause of action would be against Alicia and Griffith for the wrongful death of Greg Frommer. Whitmore was looking into their finances, but neither of them seemed very wealthy.

Archer’s phone rang. She commanded, “Answer.”

“Hey, Jule. Me.”

“Randy. You’re on with Lincoln and Amelia.”

Her brother.

Greetings shot back and forth.

“Be there in ten.”

She said, “We closed the case.”

“Seriously? Well, I’m impressed. Billy’ll love to hear all about it. Between you and me, he loves the idea of Cop Mom. He’s doing a graphic novel. You’re the heroine. But you didn’t hear me say that. It’s going to be a surprise. Okay. I’m in traffic without a hands-free. Don’t tell the police. Ha!”

They disconnected.

Archer was looking not at Rhyme but toward Sachs. “When I signed up for Lincoln’s course, I knew about you, of course, Amelia. Anybody who follows New York crime knows about you. You’re epic, as my son would say. I’d go with ‘famous’ but, well, ‘epic’ seems to fit better. And I knew you worked with Lincoln and that you were his partner but I didn’t know you were that kind of partner too. Seeing you the past few days, I found out.”

“We’ve been together for a long time. Both ways,” Sachs said with a smile.

“I wasn’t sure what to expect. But you’re just like any other couple. Happy, sad, irritated.”

Rhyme chuckled. “We fight, sure. We’ve been having one for the past few weeks.”

Sachs wasn’t smiling when she said, “I’m mad he resigned.”

“And I’m mad she’s mad that I resigned.”

She added, “And mad he stole my lab tech.”

“You got him back in the end,” Rhyme groused.

Archer said, “When I was diagnosed I decided that I’d live alone. Oh, with Billy part of the time, under the custody agreement, and with a caregiver, of course—somebody like Thom. Though I don’t know if I can find somebody like him. He’s a gem.”

Rhyme glanced at the doorway. “None better. But that goes no farther than this room.”