Apprentice in Death (In Death #43)(43)

“And we know how to get around that.”

“Reineke, Jenkinson, Santiago, Carmichael, you’re on takedown. Baxter, Trueheart, you’re on data and interviews. Trueheart will soften the mother up,” Eve added before Baxter could object. “We’re going to need her cooperation. Baxter, you’re going to sit hard on Patroni, put the fear of God into him, if necessary. Fuck his loyalty, if any, to Reginald Mackie. I want three officers, soft clothes, to check out the minor suspect’s school.”

“School would be over for the day, Lieutenant,” Peabody told her.

“There may be staff still there, after-school shit going on. We may be able to determine if she has any particular hangout. If we can take her outside the apartment, we take her. We’re not just taking down serial killers, we’re taking down a veteran police officer and his teenage daughter. We need it clean.

“We need a warrant to search the mother’s residence, get into the kid’s room there.”

“Consider it done,” Whitney told her.

“Peabody and I will handle that search before or after the takedown, depending on timing. The mother’s residence is on First. Anyone not on takedown, get started now.”

“One moment.” Tibble rose, tall and lean and, under the control, Eve noted, furious. “I’d like to add to Lieutenant Dallas’s statement. Reginald Mackie served the city and its people for twenty years. But he has broken his oath, his faith, his duty. He is responsible for the death of another police officer and six other citizens, one a minor. He has done this for his own purposes, and has disgraced himself, has made his own child an accessory at best, a killer at worst. Knock him down, take him out, bring him in. I would prefer he still be breathing at the end of this operation, but I want no other good cops killed today. Serve and protect, not just the citizenry, but each other. Lieutenant Dallas, good work. Commander, we have work of our own to do to support those who are going out into harm’s way.”

Eve let out a breath when Tibble walked out with Whitney. “He is pissed.”

“So am I.” Lowenbaum pushed to his feet. “I never saw it. You asked me, dead on, who I knew who could make these strikes. Mackie never blipped on my screen.”

“Let me ask you now: Could he have executed these strikes?”

“Possibly. He wouldn’t have been high on my list, but possibly. The thing is, he’s been off my screen for close to a year. I never pushed to see how he was doing. If I had, I might have had a better sense where his head was at.”

“You said you tagged him.”

“I didn’t push.”

“Were you pals?”

“No, not really. But we were comrades. I was his supervising officer when he broke.”

“And you did what you could for him. Don’t go there, Lowenbaum. If you have to go there, save it for later. Get me a SWAT team, one that knows how to take a suspect of this caliber alive, and can keep a lid on it.”

On a brisk nod, he left the room.

“Feeney.”

“Just hold it, your man’s working on something.”

“I’ve got something,” Roarke corrected, “again that might be useful. Can I use the screen there?” Without waiting, he rose, walked over, and interfaced his PPC with the room comp.

“Your suspect’s building,” he began, when the image came on. “We’ll draw in on his apartment. It’s apartment 612, according to my data.”

“Okay.”

“And my building, just diagonal from the target. We have an unoccupied apartment—actually three altogether, but this one on the seventh floor provides a good location to set up. We could do a heat sensor search from there, and potentially set up ears at least, depending on the target’s shielding.”

“Do that,” Eve said.

“How about we add this?” Feeney scratched his chin. “People move in, move out. We use a small moving van. We get McNab here, maybe another boy to cart in some boxes, or furniture, and our equipment moves in without sending up any flags.”

“How soon can you have it set up?”

“Fifteen, maybe twenty.”

“Roll it. Baxter, Trueheart, start compiling data, and check with Uniform Carmichael. Start the interview process as soon as we’ve got some of these people in the house. See if you can get the name of the lawyer Mackie talked to. We need to bring him in. He may be a target.”

“Protecting a lawyer.” Baxter shook his head. “What the hell. Come on, partner, let’s get this started.”

With only her takedown team in the room, Eve turned to the screen. “Okay, here’s how I see it going.”

Within thirty minutes, as data continued to stream in, Eve had her team in a police van, outfitted not only with body armor, but helmets. Which meant she had to do the same. While the coat took care of the body armor, the helmet bugged the crap out of her.

But a head shot would do worse.

Inside the van, on screen, she watched the feed Feeney sent her. She watched McNab and Callendar, looking every bit like a happy couple moving into a new place, haul boxes into Roarke’s building.

“No heat source in suspect’s apartment,” Feeney told her. “We’re running that from the van for now. They’re not in there.”