Apprentice in Death (In Death 43)

“Sorry?” Distracted, he glanced over and saw her eyebrows drawn together. “What?”

“Especially Peabody. No one can ever know my name’s on some big-deal ice cream joint.”

“I see we’ll be canceling our plans for the Lieutenant Dallas Frosted, but as you like.”

“You— That’s a joke. Ha-ha. Why is my name on— No, later. I’m losing my focus.”

“Then tell me: How does Divine play into this?”

“They go there—the Mackies. It’s their celebration place. They went there after each strike.”

The amusement, the slight curve of his lips faded away. “Kill people, enjoy a banana split?”

“Something like that.”

“You’ve dealt with some monsters in our time together, but these . . . They’re a separate breed. Father and daughter, celebrating death over ice cream while families mourn.”

“He rewards her. He trained her, helped make her, so he rewards her for a job well done. I’m looking for their hole. If they went to Divine—having stowed the weapons first—I lean toward them holing up in a place within reasonable walking distance of the ice cream joint. According to my information, Divine has been their place since she was a kid.”

Others began to file in as she spoke. “I’m going to ask you to take a deep dive into Mackie’s finances, but even considering pension, death benefits from the wife, he’s paying rent on two places. He’s had to acquire all the weapons, the false IDs. That’s got to stretch his income. So the hole’s likely low rent, maybe a month-to-month. It’s doubtful he’s had it more than six months.”

“Dallas, Uniform Carmichael and Officer Shelby are on their way in,” Peabody told her. “They won’t be here for at least fifteen.”

“Loop them in remotely. They don’t need to come in.”

“Loop Chief Tibble,” Whitney ordered as he stepped in.

“I’ve got them.” Feeney moved to the comp.

“Everybody else, give your attention to screen one. Note the buildings highlighted. These are potential nests for today’s attack on Times Square. Note your sectors,” Eve added.

“In the first strike, the suspects used a hotel room, a conventional check-in. They may have done the same here. You’ll search your sectors—hotels, flops, office buildings, studios. The program used to determine these probabilities also, as you see, lists probable angle and direction of strike. You have the most likely floors and angles.

“Hit all, hit thoroughly. Talk to clerks, supers, beat cops, LCs, merchants, dog walkers, residents, cleaning crews. They didn’t pick the nest at random, so at least one of them cased it previously. Find it.”

She turned to the other screen.

“Divine,” she began.

“Best Rocky Road in the city,” Jenkinson commented, then shrugged. “Just saying.”

“Your endorsement’s so noted. Apparently the suspects agree—although she prefers the caramel sundae. We’ve learned the suspects indulged themselves after both strikes.”

“Fucking cold,” Feeney muttered. “And I ain’t talking ice cream.”

“Zoe Younger, Willow Mackie’s mother, states Mackie has taken his daughter to Divine regularly, as a reward. That pattern remains here. The Wollman strike took place at fifteen-fifteen. Times Square at thirteen-twenty-one. The Mackies were caught on Divine security feed today at fourteen-twenty-five. And witnesses state they came in at approximately fifteen-forty-five after the Wollman attack. In both cases, Mackie carried nothing, and the daughter only had a backpack.”

“So they left the nest, went to wherever they’re holed up, stowed the weapons. Then went out for dessert,” Baxter concluded.

“And consider the timing. On the afternoon of the Central Park attack. They packed up the weapons, left the East Side hotel, and were ordering ice cream about thirty minutes after the first TOD. Today, the time between the attack and the wits’ statement of their arrival at Divine is more than an hour. It’s a full thirty minutes longer for them to travel from where we project they used a downtown nest for the strike on Times Square, to the East Side location of Divine for their celebration.”

“Takes longer to get there from downtown,” Santiago began, “that’s a factor. But both times they ditched the weapons, the bags. Could they have their own transportation?”

“He didn’t,” Lowenbaum said. “Never knew Mackie to have his own vehicle.”

“East Side Hotel has garage parking for guests,” Eve added. “The Mackies didn’t check a vehicle there.”

“And unless he’s bought one that’s as secure as our Tactical units,” Lowenbaum added, “there’s no way he’d leave weapons inside a vehicle, garaged or on the street. If he has transpo, he’d still stow his weapons in a secured location.”