Nightwatcher (Nightwatcher #1)(77)

Is it just Jerry?

Or is that short for Jerome? Jeremiah?

For all Rocky knows, it’s spelled with a G—Gerry? Short for Gerald? Gerardo?

He hasn’t a clue.

Hoping to locate the guy on a prior, he just wasted an enormous amount of time searching arrest records back to 1997, the year the database was created, for every crime under the sun, petty to major.

No luck. The few perps whose first names and ages made them potential contenders were quickly ruled out when Rocky either looked at their mug shots—not even close to the description of the handyman—or discovered that they’re currently serving time, or dead.

But he could be looking in the wrong direction entirely.

Jerry might be innocent; there might be some other connection between the two victims.

Like Dale Reiss . . . who has yet to turn up, according to Brandewyne, who’s been trying to find the guy, along with Kristina Haines’s ex-boyfriend.

The first responders and people who worked in those towers aren’t the only New Yorkers who have gone missing. What about the tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands, whose lives here imploded in the aftermath?

Rocky keeps reminding himself that in the grand scheme of things, his own problems are minuscule, and yet . . .

I can’t catch a freaking break with this case.

His greatest fear is that the killer will strike again, and soon. In a case like this, the cooling-off period tends to get shorter and shorter with every murder.

Earlier, Rocky went to the press in an effort to get the word out to potential victims that a killer is on the loose in the city, and doors and windows should be securely locked at all times.

Ordinarily, the local tabloids and television reporters would be all over a sensational story like that; so far, he hasn’t seen a scrap of coverage. The city is in a state of emergency; every second of airtime and every square inch of newsprint is devoted to the crisis.

Ordinarily, at this stage in a double murder investigation, Rocky would have set up round-the-clock surveillance at the apartment buildings where both victims lived.

The perp often returns to the scene of the crime. Fifteen years ago, Rocky was working the famous Preppie Murder case in Central Park as the clean-cut killer, Robert Chambers, famously watched the investigation with a crowd of bystanders. Happens all the time. That’s why the NYPD closely monitors a crime scene in the hours and days that follow, snapping photographs of crowds who inevitably show up to gawk from behind the yellow tape and blue police barricades.

But in these chaotic New York days, ghoulish onlookers are drawn to a far more catastrophic scene, along with the beleaguered officers who keep tabs on them while keeping them at bay.

Whoever killed Kristina Haines could have pitched a pup tent on the stoop of her building and the squad might have missed it entirely.

Manpower is shorter than ever, and frankly, right now, most of the homicide guys have concerns a lot more pressing—and a lot closer to home—than the Nightwatcher case.

Marianne Apostolos’s neighbors proved much more accessible than Kristina Haines’s fellow tenants—but what good did that do in the end? Marianne had just moved into the building; hardly anyone Rocky and Brandewyne interviewed had ever seen or even heard of her, and no one could shed much light on her movements in the hours leading up to her murder.

All the neighbors knew Jerry the handyman, but not his last name, or where he lives.

A few of them mentioned that there had been a recent rash of petty burglaries in the building—stolen costume jewelry, women’s clothing, small change. Rocky attempted to touch base with the officers who had investigated those thefts and was told that one was down at the pile, and the other was among the missing.

Meanwhile, he keeps going back to the long hair in Marianne’s hand and the skin scrapings under her nails. DNA could lead him to the killer . . .

But—like the police force itself—the forensic lab is currently otherwise occupied. When Rocky tried to get them to put a rush on his results, his telephoned request was greeted with incredulous silence on the other end of the line.

Right. On the heels of mass murder, there are perhaps millions of people waiting for test results on remains coming up from ground zero. Who the hell is Rocky to request a rush job?

So it seems there’s nothing to do but wait—for the things that are out of his own hands, anyway. Which is just about everything.

Again, he thinks of the killer returning to the scene of the crime.

He’s exhausted, and the last thing he feels like doing is settling in on a stakeout with Brandewyne instead of Murph for company.

But then, he’s pretty sure the last thing his fellow cops felt like doing on Tuesday was running into a burning skyscraper.

Yeah. His own problems are minuscule.

So get moving.

Jaw set, Rocky pushes back his chair.

Where is Jamie?

Jerry doesn’t like being alone at night. It’s not something he’s had much experience with. He didn’t often find himself in this situation before Jamie came back into his life and Mama left.

She didn’t really go out much.

She didn’t have any friends that he knew of. She liked to keep to herself, because you can’t trust anyone in this world. That was what she always said, anyway.

She didn’t like Emily.

Well, she didn’t like anyone, but it really bothered Jerry that she didn’t like Emily, because Emily was never anything but kind to Mama.