The Kill Room (Lincoln Rhyme 10)

"I'll keep it in mind. What do you have?" Her eyes were on the empty parlor, in which dust motes ambled through a shaft of morning sun like hot-air balloons seen from miles away. Again, she was painfully aware of Rhyme's absence.

"I've got the location where he sent the email from. I won't bore you with nodes and networks but suffice it to say that your whistleblower sent the email and the STO attachment from Java Hut near Mott and Hester. Think about it: A Portland, Oregon, coffee chain setting up shop in the heart of Little Italy. What would the Godfather say?"

She glanced at the header on the copy of the whistleblower's messages taped to the board. "Is the date on the email accurate? Could he have faked it?"

"No, that's when it was sent. He could write whatever date he wanted in the email itself but routers don't lie."

So their man was in the coffee shop at 1:02 p.m., May 11.

The cybercrimes detective continued, "I've checked. You can log onto Wi-Fi there without any identifying information. All you have to do is agree to the three-page terms of service. Which everybody does and not a single soul in the history of the world has ever read."

Sachs thanked the tech cop and disconnected. She called the coffee shop and got the manager, explaining that she was trying to identify someone who had sent important documents via the Wi-Fi on May 11 and she wanted to come in and talk to him about that. She added, "You have a security camera?"

"We do, yeah. They're in all the Java franchises. In case we get stuck up, you know."

Without expecting much, she asked, "How often does the video loop?" She was sure new footage would overwrite the old every few hours.

"Oh, we've got a five-terabyte drive. It's got about three weeks of video on it. The quality's pretty crappy and it's black and white. But you can make out a face if you need to."

A ping of excitement. "I'll be there in a half hour."

Sachs pulled on a black linen jacket and rubber-banded her hair back in a ponytail. She took her holstered Glock from the cabinet, checked it as she always did, a matter of routine, and clipped it to her jeans belt. The double-mag holster went on her left hip. She was slinging her large purse over her shoulder when her mobile buzzed. She wondered if the caller was Rhyme. She knew he'd landed safely in the Bahamas but she was concerned that the trip might have taken a toll on his health.

But, no, the caller was Lon Sellitto.

"Hey."

"Amelia. The Special Services canvass team is about halfway through the building where Moreno and the driver picked up Lydia. Nothing yet. They're running into a lot of Lydias--who'da thought?--but none of 'em are the one. You know, how hard is it to name your kid Tiara or Estanzia? They'd be a fuck of a lot easier to track down."

She told him about the lead to the coffee shop and that she was on her way there now.

"Good. A security cam, excellent. Hey, Linc's really down in the Caribbean?"

"Yep, landed safe. I don't know how he's going to be treated. Interloper, you know."

"Bet he can handle it."

There was silence.

Something's up. Lon Sellitto brooded some but it was usually noisy brooding.

"What?" she asked.

"Okay, you didn't hear this."

"Go on."

The senior detective said, "Bill came by my office."

"Bill Myers, the captain?"

So how does it feel to be repurposed into a granular-level player...

"Yeah."

"And?"

Sellitto said, "He asked about you. Wanted to know if you were okay. Physically."