‘Afraid so.’

‘The American Eagles,’ she said. ‘Old machines, not as reliable as the new ones. One of the first portables.’

‘That’s what TT said.’

Thomson nodded. ‘He’s a good guy. You’re lucky he’s helping you. And I think I can help you too. Nobody’s ever bought a machine here but about a week ago a man came in and bought some needles for an American Eagle.’ She leaned forward, resting her hands on the counter. The shiny black ring on her right index finger turned out to be ink.

‘I didn’t pay much attention. Late twenties, thirties. White. Had a cap on, dark, and a scarf around his neck. It came up high, almost covering his chin. Sunglasses too. Which he didn’t need because the weather was as bad as now. That, the glasses, seemed hipster and uncool. But we get imagistas in here a lot. It’s a fine line between posing with ink and being real with ink.’

Imagistas . Clever.

Sellitto showed her the Identi Kit pic.

Thomson shrugged. ‘Could be. Again, not paying much attention. Oh, but one thing I remember. He wasn’t inked that I could see. Wasn’t pierced either. Most skin artists’re pretty modded.’

‘He has one on his arm. Maybe a dragon, some creature. In red. Does that mean anything?’

The snake and bird woman shook her head. ‘No – after that book, that thriller, a lot of people wanted dragons. Copycats. No significance that I know.’

He then asked, ‘You know anything significant about a tattoo of the words “the second”? Or “fort”Y? They mean anything in the skin art world?’

‘No, not that I’ve ever heard.’

He displayed pictures of the tattoos.

‘Well,’ she said. ‘Old English font. That’s hard to do. And the lesions, the raised part? That was because of the poison?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Well, whatever else, he’s good. Real good.’

‘And he worked fast. Probably did that in ten, fifteen minutes.’

‘Really?’ She seemed astonished. ‘And the scarification too? The scalloped border?’

‘All in ten or fifteen. Does that, or the style, give you any idea who this guy might be?’

‘Not really … But I don’t see the outlines.’

‘No, TT said he used a bloodline. Freehand.’

‘Then nobody I know could do a work like that in fifteen minutes. And I know all the talented people in town. That’s one hell of an artist you’re dealing with.’

‘TT said he was from out of town but didn’t know where.’

‘Well, you don’t see that font much in the area. But I couldn’t tell you what’s hot now in Albany – or Norwalk or Trenton. My clientele’s pretty much downtown Manhattan.’

‘He paid cash for the needles, right?’

Why bother to ask?

‘Right.’

‘Any chance you’d still have the money? For prints.’

‘No. But it wouldn’t matter. He wore gloves.’

Natch …

‘I thought that was a little weird too. But not suspicious weird, you know?’

Imagistas.

‘Did he say anything?’

‘To me? No. Other than to ask for the needles.’

Sellitto, paying attention to that first sentence. ‘But?’

‘When he was leaving he got a call on his mobile. After I’d rung him up I stepped into the back room. When he was walking out the door he said, “Yeah, the Belvedere.” And then I think he said “address”. Anyway, that’s what I thought. But it might’ve been “bella dear” or something else.’

Sellitto wrote this down. Asked the standard: ‘Anything else you can think of?’

‘No, I’m afraid not.’

It was usually afraid not or no or don’t think so. But at least Thomson had thought about the question and was being honest.

He thanked her and, with a last glance at Quetzawhatever on her chest, headed back into the sleet, speed dialing Rhyme to tell him don’t get your fucking hopes up but he might  have a lead.

A good workout.

As he walked from his health club back to his apartment on East 52nd Street to collect his car, Braden Alexander was counting the crunches he’d done. He’d given up after a hundred.

Counting them, that is. The crunches themselves? Plenty. He’d forgotten how many.

Alexander had a sedentary job – writing code for one of the big investment firms (one that actually had not  been the subject of an investigation) – and the thirty seven year old was determined to stay in good shape, despite the eight hour days at his workstation – and the one hour reverse commute to Jersey, where his company’s IT headquarters building was located.

And the curls? With the thirty pound bells? Maybe two hundred. Damn, he sure felt it. He decided he’d take it a bit easier tomorrow. No need to push too  far. It was more important to be consistent, Alexander knew. Every day he made the trek from his apartment west to the health club on Sixth Avenue. Every day, the stationary bike and curls and squats and, yeah, crunches, crunches, crunches … What do we think, 150?

Probably.

He glanced at himself in a window and thought: The weight’s okay. His skin seemed a little pale. Not so good, that. He and his family would get to an island soon. Maybe after Thanksgiving. Anyway, who wouldn’t look sickly on a day like this? The sleet had let up but the light was gray and anemic. He was actually looking forward to getting into his cubicle. He found it cozy, a word he wouldn’t use with anybody but his wife.

Today there was something else to look forward to. He’d be picking up a bicycle at his brother’s house in Paramus. Joey’d gotten a new mountain bike and was giving his old one to Alexander’s son. The boy was ecstatic and had texted twice from school, just to see how ‘everything was going?’

The impatience of youth.

He looked south and caught sight of the new Trade Tower, or whatever it was going to be called. He’d been working at his first job, crunching code for a bank, when the attack had happened, 2001. The new structure was impressive, architecturally more interesting than the simple rectangles of its predecessors. Still, nothing could ever match their grandeur, their style.

What a time that was. His first son had been born the day after the attack. Alexander and his wife had abandoned plans to name him after her father and had picked instead Emery, after the architectural firm Emery Roth & Sons, which along with Minoru Yamasaki had designed the original Trade Towers.

Alexander continued east back toward his apartment, where he’d collect his car and head to work. As he paused for a red light he happened to look back and caught a glimpse of someone behind him, head down. Some guy, young, in dark clothes and stocking cap. A bag or backpack on his shoulder. Was he the same one who’d been sitting in a coffee shop across the street from the health club?

He following me?

Alexander had lived in the city for fifteen years. He considered New York the safest urban area on earth. But he wasn’t a fool, either. He made his living because of bad guys. When he’d started as a programmer some years ago most of his work had been to hack together code that made the servers run more smoothly, expanded web traffic and allowed the various operating systems to talk to each other without stuttering. Over the years, though, he’d developed the specialty of security. Commercial hackers, terrorists and punks with too much time on their hands and too many cells in their brains now preyed on banking institutions like his employer with increasingly bold and brilliant attacks.

That had become Alexander’s specialty, throwing nails in the path of some pretty smart and pretty nasty hackers.

He’d heard of some computer security pros who’d been physically attacked. He sometimes wondered if he was at personal risk. He had no specific knowledge that any hackers knew his name but he also was aware that it was impossible to keep all information about yourself hidden from someone with enough drive to track you down.

Near his apartment building Alexander paused and, on the pretext of making a phone call, glanced back once more. The man in the cap and coat continued following, head down. He didn’t seem to be paying any attention to Alexander. Then without a pause the supposed hit hacker walked into a building across the street, an old one, now a commercial space, with a For Rent  sign pasted across a dirty window. Maybe he was a Realtor or new tenant. Or a janitor examining a temperamental boiler – it was supposed to be another bone chilling evening.