Ahead of her was Morningside Park, filled with people as the hour approached lunchtime. Children, nannies, businesspeople, Columbia students, musicians . . . hundreds of them, just hanging out, enjoying the beautiful day. People on the sidewalks too. But the number of targets was only part of what dismayed Sachs.
"Rhyme, the whole west side of the park, Morningside Drive?"
"What?"
"They're doing construction. Replacing water mains. They're big iron pipes. God, if he's rigged the line to them . . ."
Rhyme said, "Then the flash could hit anywhere on the street. Hell, it could even get inside any building, office, dorm, a store nearby . . . or maybe miles away."
"I've got to find where he connected it, Rhyme." She slipped her phone into its holster and jogged to the construction site.
Chapter 32
SAM VETTER HAD mixed feelings about being in New York.
The sixty-eight-year-old had never been here before. He'd always wanted to make the trip from Scottsdale, where he'd lived for 100 percent of those years, and Ruth had always wanted to see the place, but their vacations found them in California or Hawaii or on cruises to Alaska.
Now, ironically, his first business trip after her death had brought him to New York, all expenses paid.
Happy to be here.
Sad Ruth couldn't be.
He was having lunch, sitting in the elegant, muted Battery Park Hotel dining room, chatting with a few of the other men who were here for the construction finance meeting, sipping a beer.
Businessman talk. Wall Street, team sports. Some individual sports talk too, but only golf. Nobody ever talked about tennis, which was Vetter's game. Sure, Federer, Nadal . . . but tennis wasn't a war story sport. The topic of women didn't much enter into the discussion; these men were all of an age.
Vetter looked around him, through the panoramic windows, and worked on his impression of New York because his secretary and associates back home would want to know what he thought. So far: really busy, really rich, really loud, really gray--even though the sky was cloudless. Like the sun knew that New Yorkers didn't have much use for light.
Mixed feelings . . .
Part of which was a little guilt about enjoying himself. He was going to see Wicked, to see if it stacked up to the Phoenix version, and probably Billy Elliott, to see if it stacked up to the trailers of the movie. He was going to have dinner in Chinatown with two of the bankers he'd met that morning, one based here and one from Santa Fe.
Maybe there was a hint of infidelity about the whole enjoyment thing.
Of course, Ruth wouldn't've minded.
But still.
Vetter also had to admit he was feeling a little out of his element here. His company did general construction, specializing in the basics: foundations, driveways, platforms, walkways, nothing sexy, but necessary and oh-so-profitable. His outfit was good, prompt and ethical . . . in a business where those qualities were not always fully unfurled. But it was small; the other companies that were part of the joint venture were bigger players. They were more savvy about business and regulatory and legislative matters than he was.
The conversation at the lunch table kept slipping from the Diamondbacks and the Mets to collateral, interest rates and high-tech systems that left Vetter confused. He found himself looking out the windows again at a large construction site next to the hotel, some big office building or apartment going up.
As he watched, one worker in particular caught his eye. The man was in a different outfit--dark blue overalls and yellow hard hat--and was carrying a roll of wire or cable over his shoulder. He emerged from a manhole near the back of the job site and stood, looking around, blinking. He pulled out a mobile phone and placed a call. Then he snapped it closed and wandered through the site and, instead of leaving, walked toward the building next door to the construction. He looked at ease, walking with a bounce in his step. Obviously he was enjoying whatever he was doing.
It was all so normal. That guy in the blue could have been Vetter thirty years ago. He could have been any one of Vetter's employees now.
The businessman began to relax. The scene made him feel a lot more at home--watching the guy in the blue uniform and the others in their Carhartt jackets and overalls, carrying tools and supplies, joking with one another. He thought of his own company and the people he worked with, who were like family. The older white guys, quiet and skinny and sunburned all of them, looking like they'd been born mixing concrete, and the newer workers, Latino, who chatted up a storm and worked with more precision and pride.
It told Vetter that maybe New York and the people he was doing this deal with were in many ways similar to his world and those who inhabited it.
Relax.
Then his eyes followed the man in the blue overalls and yellow hard hat as he disappeared into a building across from the construction site. It was a school. Sam Vetter noted some signs in the window.
POGO STICK MARATHON FUNDRAISER.
MAY 1.