No before or after…

As he passed the cemetery the pack of dogs glanced up at the Ford then returned to scuffling through the brush, looking for rats and nosing madly for water in the unbearable heat.

No then or now…

He took the ski mask and gloves from his pocket, set them on the seat beside him as he sped out of the old neighborhood. The bone collector was going hunting.

SOMETHING HAD CHANGED ABOUT THE ROOM but she couldn’t quite decide what.

Lincoln Rhyme saw it in her eyes.

“We missed you, Amelia,” he said coyly. “Errands?”

She looked away from him. “Apparently nobody’d told my new commander I wouldn’t be showing up for work today. I thought somebody ought to.”

“Ah, yes.”

She was gazing at the wall, slowly figuring it out. In addition to the basic instruments that Mel Cooper had brought with him, there was now a scanning electron microscope fitted with the X-ray unit, notation and hot-stage ’scope setups for testing glass, a comparison microscope, a density-gradient tube for soil testing and a hundred beakers, jars and bottles of chemicals.

And in the middle of the room, Cooper’s pride – the computerized gas Chromatograph and mass spectrometer. Along with another computer, on-line with Cooper’s own terminal at the IRD lab.

Sachs stepped over the thick cables snaking downstairs – house current worked, yes, but the amperage was too taxed for the bedroom outlets alone. And in that slight sidestep, an elegant, practiced maneuver, Rhyme observed how truly beautiful she was. Certainly the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen in the police department ranks.

For a brief instant he found her immeasurably appealing. People said that sex was all in the mind and Rhyme knew that this was true. Cutting the cord didn’t stop the urge. He remembered, still with a faint crunch of horror, a night six months after the accident. He and Blaine had tried. Just to see what happened, they’d disclaimed, trying to be casual. No big deal.

But it had been a big deal. Sex is a messy business to start with and when you add catheters and bags to the equation you need a lot of stamina and humor and a better foundation than they’d had. Mostly, though, what killed the moment, and killed it fast, was her face. He saw in Elaine Chapman Rhyme’s tough, game smile that she was doing it from pity and that stabbed him in the heart. He filed for divorce two weeks later. Elaine had protested but she signed the papers on the first go-round.

Sellitto and Banks had returned and were organizing the evidence Sachs had collected. She looked on, mildly interested.

Rhyme said to her, “The Latents Unit only found eight other recent partials and they belong to the two maintenance men in the building.”

“Oh.”

He nodded broadly. “Only eight!”

“He’s complimenting you,” Thom explained. “Enjoy it. That’s the most you’ll ever get out of him.”

“No translations needed, please and thank you, Thom.”

She responded, “I’m happy I could help.” Pleasant as could be.

Well, what was this? Rhyme had fully expected her to storm into his room and fling the evidence bags onto his bed. Maybe the saw itself or even the plastic bag containing the vic’s severed hands. He’d been looking forward to a real knock-down, drag-out; people rarely take the gloves off when they fight with a crip. He’d been thinking of that look in her eyes when she’d met him, perhaps evidence of some ambiguous kinship between them.

But no, he saw now he was wrong. Amelia Sachs was like everybody else – patting him on the head and looking for the nearest exit.

With a snap, his heart turned to ice. When he spoke it was to a cobweb high on the far wall. “We’ve been talking about the deadline for the next victim, officer. There doesn’t seem to be specific time.”

“What we think,” Sellitto continued, “whatever this prick’s got planned for the next one is something ongoing. He doesn’t know exactly when the time of death will be. Lincoln thought maybe he’s buried some poor SOB someplace where there’s not much air.”

Sachs’s eye narrowed slightly at this. Rhyme noticed it. Burial alive. If you’ve got to have a phobia, that’s as good as any.

They were interrupted by two men in gray suits who climbed the stairs and walked into the bedroom as if they lived here.

“We knocked,” one of them said.

“We rang the bell,” said the other.

“No answer.”

They were in their forties, one taller than the other but both with the same sandy-colored hair. They bore identical smiles and before the Brooklyn drawl destroyed the image Rhyme had thought: Hayseed farm boys. One had an honest-to-God dusting of freckles along the bridge of his pale nose.

“Gentlemen.”

Sellitto introduced the Hardy Boys: Detectives Bedding and Saul, the spadework team. Their skill was canvassing – interviewing people who live near a crime scene for wits and leads. It was a fine art but one that Rhyme had never learned, had no desire to. He was content to unearth hard facts and hand them off to officers like these, who, armed with the data, became living lie detectors who could shred perps’ best cover stories. Neither of them seemed to think it was the least bit weird to be reporting to a bedridden civilian.

Saul, the taller of them, the frecklee, said, “We’ve found thirty-six -”

“- eight, if you count a couple of crack-heads. Which he doesn’t. I do.”

“- subjects. Interviewed all of them. Haven’t had much luck.”

“Most of ’em blind, deaf, amnesiacs. You know, the usual.”

“No sign of the taxi. Combed the West Side. Zero. Zip.”

Bedding: “But tell them the good news.”

“We found a wit.”

“A witness?” Banks asked eagerly. “Fan-tastic.”

Rhyme, considerably less enthusiastic, said, “Go on.”

“ 'Round the TOD this morning at the train tracks.”

“He saw a man walk down Eleventh Avenue, turn -”

“ 'Suddenly,' he said,” added no-freckle Bedding.

“- and go through an alley that led to the train underpass. He just stood there for a while -”

“Looking down.”

Rhyme was troubled by this. “That doesn’t sound like our boy. He’s too smart to risk being seen like that.”

“But -” Saul continued, raising a finger and glancing at his partner.

“There was only one window in the whole ’hood you could see the place from.”

“Which is where our wit happened to be standing.”

“Up early, bless his heart.”

Before he remembered he was angry with her Rhyme asked, “Well, Amelia, how’s it feel?”

“I’m sorry?” Her attention returned from the window.

“To be right,” Rhyme said. “You pegged Eleventh Avenue. Not Thirty-seventh.”

She didn’t know how to respond but Rhyme turned immediately back to the twins. “Description?”

“Our wit couldn’t say much.”

“Was on the sauce. Already.”

“He said it was a smallish guy. No hair color. Race -”

“Probably white.”

“Wearing?” Rhyme asked.

“Something dark. Best he could say.”

“And doing what?” Sellitto asked.

“I quote. ‘He just like stood there, looking down. I thought he gonna jump. You know, in front of a train. Looked at his watch a couple times.’ ”

“And then finally left. Said he kept looking around. Like he didn’t want to be seen.”

What had he been doing? Rhyme wondered. Watching the victim die? Or was this before he planted the body, checking to see if the roadbed was deserted?

Sellitto asked, “Walked or drove?”

“Walked. We checked every parking lot -”

“And garage.”

“- in the neighborhood. But that’s near the convention center so you got parking coming out your ears. There’re so many lots the attendants stand in the street with orange flags and wave cars in.”

“And 'causa the expo half of them were full by seven. We got a list of about nine hundred tags.”