Delusion in Death (In Death #35)(48)

Baxter met her on her way back in. “They’re loading up the last of the survivors. We have fourteen from inside.”

“I counted sixteen.”

“Two didn’t make it. I peeled off to talk to a couple of them who were lucid enough. It’s running like the bar, Dallas. Having lunch, serving it or cooking it, headache, hallucinations, most with feelings of anger or fear along with the headache.”

“We’ve got one who got out, left with the headache.”

“Good.” He glanced toward the café, the blood on the sidewalk. “She’s lucky.”

He rooted in the pocket of his snazzy top coat—always the smart dresser, that Baxter. And came up with a PowerBar. “Want half?”

“No. Maybe. What kind is it?”

“Yogurt Crunch.”

“That’s a no.”

With a shrug he unwrapped it, bit in. “I’ve had worse. McNab and two e-geeks have most of the electronics. We’ve got IDs on the survivors, and about half the DBs so far.”

“Take Trueheart and what you’ve got, go back and start running the names. I want lists of anyone with employment at any of the businesses involved in the first incident. There’s going to be some cross. Another crossing the connections.”

It was going to come down to relationships and geography, she concluded. Who he knew and where he knew them.

“This is his comfort zone, his place. People tend to eat and shop in the same area, especially when they’re on a schedule. Look for businesses between the two crime scenes. Use a two-block radius on both ends, list who lives in that sector who’s connected to any survivor, any vic, or who we pin leaving either scene before the hit.”

Baxter took another bite of the bar, chewed thoughtfully. “It won’t be fast.”

“Get started. Briefing rescheduled for eighteen hundred.”

“LT.” Jenkinson hustled up. “Lydia’ll go in for exam, but I had to tell her Reineke and I would take her.”

“Get it done. Start interviewing survivors while you’re there. Briefing’s now at eighteen hundred. Don’t waste time.”

Taking her own advice, she moved fast, walked back into the building, and spotted Morris kneeling beside one of the dead.

“You didn’t have to come in,” she told him.

“You’ll want confirmation as quickly as possible you’re dealing with the same COD. There are tests I can run here.”

“And?”

“The same. I can give you solid confirmation within the hour, but it reads the same.”

She crouched down beside him. “We’re going to try to keep a lid on how and what. We won’t, not for long, but do what you can.”

“Depend on it.”

“I am.” Still crouched, she scanned the room. “Was it already planned? Both hits? Bang-bang. He went smaller. Impulse or planning? He’s not impulsive, so … Why this place?” She tracked the bodies. “Who in this place?”

As he understood she was thinking out loud, Morris remained silent.

“Is he a familiar face, a regular? I bet he is. Pleasant enough guy, knows how to interact, but it’s all surface. Probably speaks to the counter guy or the waitress whenever he comes in. Just a ‘How ya doing?’ kind of thing. He wants attention, to be noticed, remembered. But he’s just one of the many. Really just another customer here, and back at the bar. One of the many where he works? It’s not enough. Not nearly f**king enough, not for him, not with his brains, his potential. He’s not just one of the many. The suits and drones, the people who trudge through the workday. Goddamn it, he’s special. They’re beneath him, all of them. None of them matter, and still …”

She shook her head, continued to study the room. “Someone in here or something that happened in here mattered enough for this. Because it’s not random.

“He’s going to need to brag,” she decided. “You think the NYPSD worries me? Look what I can do, whenever I damn well please.” She pushed to her feet. “He’ll need us to know that.”

By the time she’d finished, rounded up Peabody, and gone back to Central, she had a new batch of photos for her board.

“Post these,” she told Peabody, “then check in with the lab.”

She moved straight into the bullpen, to Baxter’s desk.

“Still working on it,” he said before she could speak. “You were right. We’ve already found some vics who worked at the same places previous vics worked. Crossing survivors, too. There’s a decent percentage, so far, who live in the area you designated.”

“Any connections between the vics in the two locations? Personal connections.”

“Still working on it.”

“Bring in a couple of e-men Feeney picks to help you run it. And tell him I’m heading up to talk to Callendar.”

She went straight up. Easier to go to, she calculated, then to send for.

She pushed into the color and chaos of EDD, scanned the neons and patterns, the busy movements for Callendar. When she didn’t see her, Eve turned toward Feeney’s office.

One of the e-geeks jogged by her. “He’s in the lab.”

She veered out again, turned toward the e-lab. She saw Feeney hunkered at a station on one end of the big, glass-walled area, and Callendar standing, doing some sort of dance, in front of another.