Urge to Kill

“Oh, he even struck the detectives taking the complaint as a prick. I’m sure he’s a real bully. That’s what everyone’s saying now, including Berty Wrenner.” Renz took another bite of knish. Half of it broke off and fell into his waiting palm, and he flicked it away. Some of it got on the pants cuff of a man in a suit walking past, and he glared at Renz.

Quinn waited until Renz had chewed and swallowed, so as not to be sprayed by knish. “Who’s Berty Wrenner?”

“The guy that shot the complainant,” Renz said.

Quinn looked at him. “The guy who came into the precinct house with the package and gun got shot?”

“Once, in the middle of the forehead,” Renz said. “It did the job, even though it was a twenty-two-caliber slug.”

“Who’s—who was the guy that got shot?”

“Name of Alec Farr. He was Wrenner’s boss, and apparently rode the hell out of him, drove him nutty enough to kill. The other salespeople at the agency confirmed this. They didn’t disguise the fact they were glad Farr was dead, said Wrenner was his favorite whipping boy.”

“So you have Wrenner in custody.”

“Yep. He was found sitting next to the body, sobbing.”

“He’s not our serial killer,” Quinn said.

“Not a chance. Our problem, though. The mayor himself was on the phone this morning telling me these murders are out of control.”

“He’s just catching on to that?”

“He’s had other things on his mind. But now we’re on his mind.”

“Why didn’t Farr get out of town, if he took the threat seriously enough to go to the police?”

“Said he couldn’t. He had a job, work to do here. He’d get fired if he left town just because some asshole threatened him. Besides, he was the stubborn sort.”

Quinn thought that should be engraved on the tombstones of a lot of people he’d known: He was the stubborn sort. Maybe on his own tombstone.

“I’m getting pressure from on high you wouldn’t believe,” Renz said.

“Am I supposed to be feeling pressure here?” Quinn asked.

“That’s the purpose of this conversation. Mayor told me to light a fire under you.”

“Isn’t that arson?”

“Unless you’re protesting something. Like lack of progress. I know there’s already a fire under you, Quinn, but that’s because I know you, and the mayor doesn’t. I’m simply delivering the message.”

Quinn said nothing while Renz finished his knish, then produced a white handkerchief from a pocket and fastidiously wiped his hands finger by finger.

After stuffing the handkerchief back in his pants pocket, Renz reached into an inside pocket of his suit coat and brought out a folded City Beat and held it out to Quinn. “Sellers has got the exclusive on this; that’s why it wasn’t in the big papers this morning. It’s on their Web sites, though, and radio and TV news is on the story heavy. Sellers painted Wrenner as a victim, said he shot Farr for the same reason women kill their abusive husbands. Wrenner was too dependent on Farr and his job to go out and get another job, just like wifey’s too dependent to get another hubby and goes for the knife or gun instead.”

Accepting the newspaper, Quinn said, “There’s enough truth in it that in some quarters it might wash.”

“That’s what worries me, Quinn. The rest of the media’s already spouting the same nonsense. They’re making it look like murder’s okay in certain circumstances. There are too many damned people in this city who think they’re in those circumstances.”

“Copycats with guns,” Quinn said.

“Only nobody’s got nine lives.”

Quinn looked at a display of miniature digital cameras behind Renz. With all the electronic crap taking over the world, for all they knew they were being video streamed right now. Not that they had anything to hide, but neither one would want…say, the mayor, to see or hear their conversation.

Tucking the City Beat beneath his arm, Quinn said, “What would you have me do about all this, Harley?”

“Catch the bastard,” Renz said, as if the answer was obvious and Quinn had somehow missed it.

“Uh-huh. Gonna have another knish?”

“One’s enough. Moderation in all things. What I’m gonna have next is a cigar.”

“Tell the mayor I’m on fire,” Quinn said.

Renz smiled and motioned to his driver.

“Mission accomplished,” he said, and got into the limo.

“Catch the bastard,” Renz said again, and pulled the door shut so that all Quinn saw in the limo’s tinted window was a bent-nosed, tough-looking guy with a thatch of unruly straight hair. Quinn.

58

Pearl told herself it was too early for Dr. Eichmann to call about her biopsy report, but she was nonetheless impatient. Quinn was off somewhere in a meeting with Renz, and Fedderman was trading briefings with Vitali and Mishkin so the left hand would know all about the right hand.