•Lt. gray, silver, beige

Other

•Underground appeals to him

•Dual personalities

•Maybe priest, soc. worker, counselor

“Fuck this, Dellray,” Sellitto began, “you passed on the case.”

The agent swiveled his glossy black face around until he was looking down at the detective.

“Passed? Passed? I never got no ring-a-ling about it. D’jou call me?”

“No.”

“Then who dropped the dime?”

“Well…” Sellitto, surprised, glanced at Polling, who said, “You got an advisory. That’s all we’ve gotta send you.” On the defensive now too.

“An advisory. Yeah. And, hey, how ’xactly was that delivered? Would that have been by Pony Ex-press? Book-rate mail? Tell me, Jim, what’s the good of an overnight advisory when there’s an ongoing operation?”

Polling said, “We didn’t see the need.”

“We?” Dellray asked quickly. Like a surgeon spotting a microscopic tumor.

“I didn’t see the need,” Polling snapped. “I told the mayor to keep it a local operation. We’ve got it under control. Now fuck off, Dellray.”

“And you thought you could wrap it up in time for the eleven o’clock news.”

Rhyme was startled when Polling shouted, “What we thought was none of your goddamn business. It’s our fucking case.” He knew about the captain’s legendary temper but he’d never seen it in action.

“Ac-tu-ally, it’s ou-ur fuck-ing case now.” Dellray strolled past the table that held Cooper’s equipment.

Rhyme said, “Don’t do this, Fred. We’re getting a handle on this guy. Work with us but don’t take it away. This unsub isn’t like anything you’ve ever seen.”

Dellray smiled. “Let’s see, what’s the latest I hear about this ‘fuck-ing’ case? That you’ve got a civvy doin’ the ’rensics.” The agent forewent a glance at the Clinitron bed. “You got a portable doing crime scene. You got soldiers out buying groceries.”

“Evidence standards, Frederick,” Rhyme reminded stridently. “That’s SOP.”

Dellray looked disappointed. “But ESU, Lincoln? All those taxpayer dollars. Then there’s cutting up people like Texas Chainsaw…”

How had that news got out? Everyone was sworn to secrecy on the dismemberment issue.

“And whatsis I hear ’bout Haumann’s boys found the vic but dint go in and save her right away? Channel Five had a Big Ear mike on it. Got her screaming for a good five minutes ’fore you sent somebody in.” He glanced at Sellitto with a wry grin. “Lon, my man, would that’ve been the problem you were just talking about?”

They’d come so far, Rhyme was thinking. They were getting a feel for him, starting to learn the unsub’s language. Starting to see him. With a burst of surprise he understood that he was once again doing what he loved. After all these years. And now somebody was going to take it away from him. Anger rippled inside him.

“Take the case, Fred,” Rhyme grumbled. “But don’t cut us out. Don’t do it.”

“You lost two vics,” Dellray reminded.

“We lost one,” Sellitto corrected, looking uneasily at Polling, who was still fuming. “Nothing we coulda done about the first. He was a calling card.”

Dobyns, arms crossed, merely observed the argument. But Jerry Banks leapt in. “We’ve got his routine down now. We aren’t going to lose any more.”

“You are if ESU’s gonna sit around listenin’ to vics scream their heads off.”

Sellitto said, “It was my -”

“My decision,” Rhyme sang out. “Mine.”

“But you’re civvy, Lincoln. So it couldn’t have been your decision. It mighta been your suggestion. It mighta been your recommendation. But I don’t think it was your decision.”

Dellray’s attention had turned to Sachs again. His eyes on her, he said to Rhyme, “You told Peretti not to run the scene? That’s mighty curious, Lincoln. Why’d you go and do something like that?”

Rhyme said, “I’m better than he is.”

“Peretti’s not a happy boy scout. Nosir. He and I had a chin wag with Eckert.”

Eckert? The Dep Com? How was he involved?

And with one glance at Sachs, at the evasive blue eyes, framed by strands of mussed red hair, he knew how.

Rhyme nailed her with a look, which she promptly avoided, and he said to Dellray, “Let’s see… Peretti? Wasn’t he the one opened up traffic on the spot where the unsub’d stood to watch the first vic? Wasn’t he the one released the scene before we’d had a chance to pick up any serious trace? The scene my own Sachs here had the foresight to seal off. My Sachs had it right and Vince Peretti and everybody else had it wrong. Yes, she did.”

She was gazing at her thumb, a look that bespoke seeing a familiar sight, and slipped a Kleenex from her pocket, wrapped it around the bloody digit.

Dellray summarized, “You shoulda called us at the beginning.”

“Just get out,” Polling muttered. Something snapped in his eyes and his voice rose. “Get the hell out!” he screamed.

Even cool Dellray blinked and eased back as the spittle flew from the captain’s mouth.

Rhyme frowned at Polling. There was a chance they might salvage something of the case but not if Polling had a tantrum. “Jim…”

The captain ignored him. “Out!” he shouted again. “You are not taking over our case!” And startling everyone in the room, Polling leapt forward, grabbed the agent by his green lapels and shoved him against the wall. After a moment of stunned silence Dellray simply pushed the captain back with his fingertips and took out a cellular phone. He offered it to Polling.

“Call the mayor. Or Chief Wilson.”

Polling eased instinctively away from Dellray – a short man putting some distance between himself and a tall one. “You want the case, you fucking got it.” The captain strode to the stairs and then down them. The front door slammed.

“Jesus, Fred,” Sellitto said, “work with us. We can nail this scumbag.”

“We need the Bureau’s A-T,” said Dellray, now sounding like reason itself. “You’re not set up for the terrorist angle.”

“What terrorist angle?” Rhyme asked.

“The UN peace conference. Snitch o’ mine said word was up that something was gonna go down at the airport. Where he snatched the vics.”

“I wouldn’t profile him as a terrorist,” Dobyns said. “Whatever’s going on inside him’s psychologically motivated. It’s not ideological.”

“Well, fact is, Quantico and us’re pegging him one way. ’Preciate that you feel different. But this’s how we’re handling it.”

Rhyme gave up. Fatigue was spiriting him away. He wished Sellitto and his scar-faced assistant had never shown up this morning. He wished he’d never met Amelia Sachs. Wished he wasn’t wearing the ridiculous crisp white shirt, which felt stiff at his neck and felt like nothing below it.

He realized that Dellray was speaking to him.

“I’m sorry?” Rhyme cocked a muscular eyebrow.

Dellray asked, “I mean, couldn’t politics be a motive too?”

“Motive doesn’t interest me,” Rhyme said. “Evidence interests me.”

Dellray glanced again at Cooper’s table. “So. The case’s ours. We all together on that?”

“What’re our options?” Sellitto asked.

“You back us up with searchers. Or you can drop out altogether. That’s about all that’s left. We’ll take the PE now, you don’t mind.”

Banks hesitated.

“Give ’em it,” Sellitto ordered.

The young cop picked up the evidence bags from the most recent scene, slipped them into a large plastic bag. Dellray held his hands out. Banks glanced at the lean fingers and tossed the bag onto the table, walking back to the far side of the room – the cop side. Lincoln Rhyme was a demilitarized zone between them and Amelia Sachs stood riveted at the foot of Rhyme’s bed.

Dellray said to her, “Officer Sachs?”

After a pause, her eyes on Rhyme, she responded, “Yes?”

“Commissioner Eckert wants ya t’come with us for debriefing ’bout the crime scenes. He said something about starting your new assignment on Monday.”