The Lost Key (A Brit in the FBI 2)

2

Mike’s black Crown Vic waited for them in the garage. She jangled the car keys at Nicholas, then drew them back. “Maybe I should drive, even though you need the practice. Wall Street’s pretty crazy.”

“Contrary to popular belief, I do know how to manage the streets of New York. I have American blood, too, you know.”

She laughed and got behind the wheel. Once they were out of the garage, she said, “Next time out, you’ll drive. It’s a requirement that you know all the streets. But not today. So tell me, did you really live up to Savich’s lofty standards at the Academy? And Sherlock’s?”

“I tried my pitiful best, Agent Caine.” He watched her come within an inch of a lane-cutting taxi without blinking an eye.

“What have you been doing here in New York for the last two weeks?”

He never looked away from the pedestrian zigzagging in front of the Crown Vic. “Oh, a bit of this and that, getting set up, that’s about it.” Not to mention I shopped for furniture until I nearly cut my own wrists, fought with Nigel on where all the bloody furniture should go, and was forced to have dinner with my ex at a French in-place big on presentation and light on food. In short, I haven’t used my brain for two bloody weeks—but he didn’t tell her any of that.

She sped through a yellow light. “I’ve missed having you around. Come on, now, tell me about your new place.”

Not in this lifetime. “Nothing much to tell, really. It’s a place to live, that’s all.” Nicholas’s grandfather, in a magnanimous show of support for his grandson’s decision to move to America, had purchased Nicholas a brownstone. No matter how hard Nicholas had protested, the baron, and his parents, he suspected, refused to allow Nicholas his wish, an anonymous apartment somewhere in Chelsea.

He was now saddled with a behemoth town house on East 69th Street, much to his butler Nigel’s delight. Five bedrooms, five floors. Oh, yes, this sort of opulence was just the ticket for fitting in with the rest of the agents in the New York Field Office.

Mike slowly turned onto a street packed with pedestrians. “I can’t wait to see it. Invite me over for a beer later, all right?”

And again he thought, Not in this lifetime. He said, “Where is our crime scene?”

“Just off Wall Street. Right there.”

Mike threaded through dozens of people across to Pine Street, not far from Federal Hall. He saw the yellow sawhorse barrier with NYPD on it, three blue-and-whites, lights revolving, reflecting off the stone buildings.

They badged the NYPD cop at the barrier, signed in to the scene, and were led to the small side street. It was going to be a beautiful day, he saw, already warming nicely. Considering the number of crime scenes he’d handled in the pouring rain in London, this certainly was preferable.

“What do we have here?” he asked the young NYPD officer standing inside the tape. His badge read F. WILSON, and he looked barely old enough to vote, much less be a cop. Even though Nicholas knew he couldn’t be more than five years older than the cop, he felt ancient, until Wilson spoke like the seasoned professional he was. “Stabbing,” Wilson said, “and aren’t you in luck, it’s right there on your land. Another five feet and it would be ours, but no, this guy decides to get himself dead and make it all yours. I hear it’s your first day on the job. Welcome to New York.”

“Thank you.”

Wilson grinned. “We’ve been canvassing, got a small group of people held aside who were nearby when it happened. Most say the suspect was a Caucasian male, brown hair, medium height, wearing jeans and a white hoodie.”

Nicholas looked over at the small knot of people standing on the street corner, gaping at the scene, some recording everything with their phones, others standing quietly, obviously shell-shocked. He said, “Rather a detailed description, that.”

“I know, right? Amazing, really, since most witnesses can rarely agree on the sex of the suspect. Talk about lucking out—from the statements so

far, there were two men arguing, then a struggle, then one guy turned away and the other man stabbed him from behind and took off running.”

Mike said, “Hold everyone here, Officer Wilson. We’ll want to speak to them as well. We need to get a look at the body, and we’ll be right back.”

Wilson saluted her and moved away from the tape to let them in.

Nicholas took his time walking toward the dead man, noticed Mike was taking in everything as well. Special Agent Louisa Barry, one of their crime scene techs, was snapping on nitrile gloves, ready to get to work. Nicholas smiled at her, then went down on his haunches beside a man who was seriously dead. He was in his late forties to early fifties, his brown eyes staring sightlessly into the sky, salt-and-pepper hair combed slightly to the side to cover the beginnings of a receding hairline, his suit rumpled and creased. From the angle of his body on the pavement, and the way his arms were flung out from his body, Nicholas thought he’d fallen to his knees, then onto his back and died. The blood pooled beneath him, dark and thick, but it was disturbed, like a child’s finger painting, swirls and whorls whipping across the sidewalk. What were you arguing about? Why’d he stab you in the back?

“See anything interesting?” Mike asked, studying the blood pool.

“It’s what I’m not seeing that’s interesting,” Nicholas said. “No murder weapon. The guy stabbed him, then pulled out the knife and took off. I wonder if any of the witnesses saw the killer do that.”

Mike said, “He still had his wallet, isn’t that right, Louisa?” She looked up at Louisa, holding the man’s belongings.

“Right here.”

Nicholas asked, “What’s his name?” He hated calling a once living, breathing man a corpse. He deserved more than that.

“Jonathan Charles Pearce. Lived on the Upper East Side. Money and cards left in the wallet. His cell’s a BlackBerry Touch, and here’s a nice old watch and a set of keys. Cell is password protected, I can’t access it without my tools.”