Connections in Death (In Death #48)(76)

“Oh.” Reo batted her pretty eyes. “Oh dear, I’m afraid there’s been some miscommunication. Immunity isn’t on the table. Lieutenant, I’m at Central coordinating an assault charge. I can’t take time away from that to deal in fantasies, If Mr. Cohen gains a grip on reality, let me know.”

“Just wait!”

Reo smiled again. “Mr. Cohen, I realize you’re in a precarious situation, but there are only so many hours in a day. I simply can’t waste any of mine.”

“Wait!”

He snapped it out. The same tone, Eve thought, he’d used when telling Eldena Vinn to be quiet.

It wouldn’t work here, either.

Reo glanced at her wrist unit, back at Cohen with the bitter cold of January. “Sixty seconds, starting now.”

Eve decided he’d felt the first bite of the fangs when his tone turned wheedling.

“I can help you break the back of the Banger gang. You’d be able to confiscate thousands of dollars’ worth of illegals, and weapons, and equipment. I can’t go to prison. I might be killed! I want Witness Protection.”

“Mr. Cohen, Witness Security is a federal program. I’m an assistant prosecutor for New York.”

“You can work it,” he insisted. “You can get the deal. The feds are going to confiscate the real estate and the funds anyway. Why care if I go to prison? Why care if I can give them bigger, a lot bigger, than me? I’m a legal consultant, that’s all.”

Reo’s eyes widened as she picked up her coffee. “Like a consigliere?”

“Yes. No.” He swiped the back of his hand over his mouth. “I consult, advise, that’s all.”

“And you claim, in that capacity, to have valuable knowledge that will lead to arrests and convictions?”

“Absolutely.”

“Example?”

“I need a deal.”

“Oops, ticktock.” Another glance at her wrist unit. “I need an example. Demonstrate your knowledge, and we can talk deal. Otherwise . . .”

“There’s an electronics shop on Broome—or was. When they refused to pay an increased protection fee, Jones ordered the place hit. A couple Molotov cocktails right before closing. The owner was still inside. He got out with minor injuries, but he lost everything.”

“And how did you come by this knowledge?”

“After the fact.” Earnestly now, Cohen patted his hands at the air. “Of course I’d have advised against destroying property, endangering lives. After the fact, one of the gang—Rufus Miller—was arrested. There was a witness who claimed they saw him light the place up. I was called in as his representative.”

“When did this take place?”

“Last November.”

Reo took out her PPC, keyed into it, scrolled. “Hmm. I see the witness recanted.” Reo spent another minute scrolling. “I also see an Amber Alert on the witness’s eight-year-old daughter who was abducted on her way home from school—on the very day of Miller’s arrest. She was returned, unharmed and unable to give any information on her abductor.”

Another hint of fang showed now as Reo smiled. “Coincidence?”

Looking away, Cohen tugged at the neck of his jumpsuit. “I only know the witness recanted.”

All three women remained silent, beat after beat.

“Okay, okay. Jones ordered it. He ordered the kid wasn’t to be hurt, just scared. It was only a few hours. That’s an example. I need a deal, in writing, before I give you more. Bigger.”

“Bigger than firebombing, kidnapping, witness intimidation? My, my.”

Reo took a tablet out of her briefcase. “Let the record show I’m bringing in Special Agent Teasdale of the FBI. Let’s see what we can do, Mr. Cohen.”

Eve figured she deserved some acting props for pretending annoyance and disgust. She’d personally requested Teasdale for this part of the game plan. They’d worked together before, and she knew the woman shot straight.

Reo cued up the tablet, brought Teasdale’s image on-screen.

“APA Reo.”

“Special Agent Teasdale, good afternoon. As previously discussed we have Mr. Cohen in interview, He’s given a verified example of his inside knowledge of the Banger organization and their alleged activities that break state and federal laws.”

“As discussed, the FBI currently has agents reviewing and logging Mr. Cohen’s records. These records document his activities which break state and federal laws.”

“Understood. However . . .”

Reo laid it out; Teasdale pushed back. Cohen whined, promised names, dates, locations. As negotiations crept along, Eve lobbed objections.

Why not just give him an all-expenses-paid lifetime vacation in fucking Tahiti?

Peabody tossed in a derisive remark about Club Fed.

At one point, Eve stormed out. When she hit the bullpen, she started barking orders. “Everybody in the conference room in thirty for a two-pronged op briefing.”

“What’s up, Loo?” Baxter asked.

“We’re taking on the Bangers and the Dragons. If you’re on a hot, I need to hear about it. Otherwise, you’re on this until it’s done. Detective Strong, my office.”

She hit the AC for coffee, gestured Strong to do the same.