Chapter 17

SHE FOUND MORRIS, WITH SOME SORT OF bass-heavy rock bumping out of his speakers, working on the seriously bludgeoned Jake Ingersol. Parzarri, chest still wide open, lay on a second slab.

“Two slabs,” Morris said as he poked around in Ingersol’s chest. “No waiting.”

“I bet they’d have been happy to.”

“No doubt. Your accountant had a standard mix of painkillers and relaxants in his system. He would’ve been quite happy before having his air supply so rudely cut off. Manually, and with a large hand.”

“Any chance of prints?”

“Sorry, no. We can give you a reasonable reproduction of the size and shape of his right thumb and forefinger from the bruising, and estimate the size of his hand. I believe you’ll be able to say with confidence, it’s the same hand that bruised the first victim’s face.”

“That couldn’t hurt.”

“This second vic’s hands and feet were restrained during the attack, and despite the drugs, the victim had a strong survival instinct. He struggled hard as you can see from the bruising on his wrists and ankles. As for the third victim, he never had a chance to struggle at all.”

Morris, his hair in a long, sleek tail today, offered Eve microgoggles. “Your observation at the crime scene was correct. You can see the discoloration from a stun stream, mid-body. A full charge from the look of it. He never felt what came after.”

“I want to hear Mira’s take, but I don’t think he stunned him unconscious to spare him pain. He was dealing with a man this time, and not one hurt, doped up, or restrained. So he put him out.”

“Taking no chances? Careful then, and you could say cowardly.”

“I do.”

“A careful coward with this much rage? A dangerous combination.”

“Maybe. Rage, sure, but fun, too. Knees, groin—that one’s personal—chest, face, head, hands.”

“My analysis is the hands were crushed rather than broken.”

“Crushed. More stomped on than hammered?”

“I believe so.”

“He really didn’t like this guy. He took Parzarri’s travel case and Ingersol’s briefcase and ’link and appointment book. And he left four hundred in cash on Ingersol, and a fistful of credit cards, a six-figure wrist unit. He didn’t care about making this one look like a robbery. What’s the point? And still, leaving the cash, the wrist unit... it tells me the hacker was most likely the one to take the cash out of the safe at Brewer’s, and he either wasn’t inside when this happened, or he’s a little too delicate to root around in the blood and gore for profit.”

She tucked her thumbs in her front pockets. “This is about money, more of it, greed for more. These two died for it, but money’s not the killer’s god.”

“These two will have some explaining to do if and when they meet theirs.”

“Yeah. It’s tough to buy your way past those gates. I wonder how they, it, he, she, whatever keeps track.”

“The higher power? Of the dead?”

“Yeah. I mean, think of the number of dead just you and I deal with. And we’re just two people and one city. Then expand that pretty much by infinity. It’s a lot. It makes you wonder if there’s a bunch of people up there with ledgers, checking people off. Okay, John Smith from Albuquerque, too bad about that shuttle crash. Follow the green line to Orientation. And what if two John Smiths from Albuquerque happened to be in the same crash? It could happen. Plenty of room for clerical error there.”

And over death, Morris smiled at her. “Entirely too much room. Let’s hope the system’s a bit more sophisticated.”

“Yeah, but it makes you wonder.”

She put existential musing aside and headed into Central.

She heard rolls of laughter as she approached Homicide, noted a small clutch of uniforms—that weren’t hers—crowding the doorway of the bullpen.

“Has crime taken the day off, Officers?”

They scattered quickly, making a hole for her to go in.

She saw the reason for the party atmosphere in the person of Marlo Durn—vid star, celebrity darling, and the actress playing Eve in The Icove Agenda.

She’d let her hair grow and had gone blonde again, a vague relief to Eve as they no longer resembled each other closely. She sat on the edge of Baxter’s desk, obviously in full flirt mode as she entertained the detectives and uniforms currently not doing any work.

Baxter looked like he’d been hit with a heart-shaped stunner.

Peabody spotted her first, dropped the cowboy boots she’d propped on her desk to the ground. “Hey, Dallas. Ah, look who’s here.”

“Dallas!” Wreathed in smiles, Marlo jumped off the desk and rushed to catch Eve in a hard, bouncing hug. “It’s so good to see you. Matthew and I got into New York late last night, and I took a chance I’d be able to see you. We’re all so excited about the premiere tomorrow.”

“Yeah. It should be something.”

“You’d rather be out looking for a killer than walking the red carpet, but it will be fun. Peabody said you’re in the middle of a multimurder investigation now.”

Peabody hunched her shoulders as Eve slid her a stony stare. “You’ll have this in Homicide. In fact, I’d wager every cop in this room has a case that needs attending to on his or her desk. Right now.”

Immediately cops shifted, shuffled, opened files, picked up ’links.

“And you’re busy. You wouldn’t have just a few minutes?”

“I’ve got a few. Peabody, Dickhead?”

“On it. Bitchily, but on it.”

With a nod, Eve gestured Marlo toward her office.

“I’ve missed it,” Marlo began. “All this. I know it was just a set, but I miss the feel of the place. And—” She paused as she saw the murder board. “You are in the middle. I think about K.T., and all that happened. Matthew and I don’t talk about it much, but it’s there. Hovering, I guess. I’ve talked with Julian a few times. He’s in rehab, taking a couple of days out now for the premiere, but plans to go back, finish the full program.”

She turned away from the board. “I know it seems we’re in and out of rehab like a boutique in our world, but I really think he’s better. What happened with K.T., nearly dying himself, it pushed him to evaluate. It’s terrible to say, but all that horror was probably the best thing that could’ve happened to him. You’ll see for yourself tomorrow.”

“I’m glad to hear it. Do you want coffee?”

“No, but thanks. The trial, the scandal, Joel—a major producer, a Hollywood icon like Joel Steinburger a murderer? It’s dominating the media back on the Coast, and of course, by association Marlo Durn, Matthew Zank, Mason, Connie, and the rest of us. It’s a relief to be away, though I expect we’ll deal with some of that here, too.”

“It’ll pass,” Eve said as Marlo wandered her office.

“Yes, it will. It’s actually, in a terrible way, bumping up promotion for the vid, even for the studio. It’s depressing, and I refuse to be depressed because—I wanted to tell you—Matthew and I are going to get married.”

“Congratulations.” Eve thought of the charming actor who’d played geeky McNab.

“I know it’s fast, and that’s another perception. Actors, always falling in and out of love, especially with other actors. But I do love him, so much. We’re only telling a few people. We don’t want a splash or the media hype. We went away for a while after the vid wrapped, after everything. It was good for us, good to be away, be together, have time to talk it all through. We love what we do, and despite all the shine, we live and work in a hard, stressful world. You understand hard, stressful worlds, and making a life, a real life inside one.”

“I guess I do. As well as anybody can.”

“I wanted to tell you because being you, so to speak, helped me understand and evaluate and decide on priorities. On what’s really important. Good work, yes, in whatever you do. But when you find someone, the one, it changes everything. It changes you, and you’re better for it. I have friends I can say that to, and they’d understand, but not the way you can. Because of that, I wanted to ask you a favor.”

“Okay.”

“Matthew and I are going to have a small, private wedding at Mason’s and Connie’s here in New York, the day after tomorrow. Will you stand up for me?”

“What?”

“Will you come—you and Roarke—and will you stand up for me? If you can. If you’re not working.”

“Marlo, you have to have people, friends you’re tight with, someone—”

“I do, and I thought about it.” Reaching out a hand to take Eve’s, Marlo flashed her megawatt smile. “I want you, if you will, if you can. When I make promises to Matthew, I want someone beside me who really understands how important those promises are. We want to keep it simple, private. Later we’ll have some big, crazy party back home, but this part—the promises—we want to keep the rest out of it.”

Eve remembered when she’d understood, really understood that’s what marriage meant. Promises, making them and keeping them.

“All right. Sure, if—”

“I know the ifs.” Marlo looked back at the board. “And if one comes up, that’s okay. Thank you, so much.” She gave Eve’s hand a grateful squeeze. “I was nervous to ask you. I feel much better now. Any time you need a favor, just ask.”

“I could use two VIP tickets for tomorrow. I had to bribe someone.”

“I’ll take care of it. Just let me—and hello.” The flirt went back on as Roarke stepped into the doorway. Then Marlo laughed, moved to him for a friendly kiss. “I didn’t expect to be able to see both of you when I came in. This is an extra treat.”

“How are you, Marlo?”

“I’m just about perfect. Dallas will fill you in as I’ve interrupted her work long enough. We’re all looking forward to the after-party tomorrow. Plenty of time to catch up there.”

“I’m sorry to interrupt. Marlo! How nice to see you.”

When Mira came in, Eve thought: Whatnext? A brass band?

Now she had to wait for all the how are yous, you look wonderfuls, and blah, blah, blah with people crowded into her office sucking up her oxygen.

Roarke sent Eve an amused look over Mira’s head. “Marlo,” he began, “I was about to go up to EDD. Would you like to come along, have a little look around?”

“I’d love to, and then I can fill you in myself. I’ll see both of you tomorrow. And thank you, Dallas. Again. I’ll take care of those tickets.”

“Thanks.”

When Roarke led Marlo out, quietly closed the door, Eve let out a huge breath. “God! Why are there so many people?”

“She looks happy,” Mira commented. “You look impatient.”

“She is. I am. I was coming to you as soon as I updated my book and board.”

“I read the reports, studied the recording Peabody sent me, and I wanted to speak with you right away. He’s evolving, Eve.”

“I got that much.”

Mira shook her head. “Update your board. Put this morning’s victims and crime scenes up.”

“Okay.” She went to her unit to load the recorder, make the prints.

“I’m programming coffee,” Mira told her.

“I’ve got some of that tea stuff you like stocked in there.”

“I want coffee.” While Eve worked, Mira programmed two cups.

“You see the first victim,” Mira began. “A clean, quick kill, and the attempt to disguise murder as mugging.”

“It was a job. He didn’t know her. Business.”

“I agree, as we discussed before. The second murder is unnecessarily cruel, would have caused suffering, and was done face-to-face.”

“More personal. I get it,” Eve repeated. “He knew the guy, and he’s got a little taste for it.”

“Face-to-face,” Mira said again, “but a victim in a drugged state, and the restraints. You believe the killer is a big man, a strong man, yet he restrained the smaller, weaker man.”

“He’s a coward at the bottom of it.”

“Yes, he is. The third victim, all but on the heels of the second, fast work, and in the last case, extremely violent. You believe the victim was stunned prior to the bludgeoning.”

“Confirmed by Morris, yes.”

“And that he lay in wait, lured the victim in, incapacitated him, then beat him violently. It’s a very quick escalation, an experimentation in methods, perhaps, but more it’s an embrace of that violence, one that, to escalate so quickly, has always been there. A big, strong man, capable of snapping a woman’s neck, both physically and mentally. And yet a coward, and the cowardice, even more than the strength and violence, makes him very dangerous.”

“Because he’ll ambush, come from behind.”

“It’s more than that. Despite the relative ease of the first killing, he failed. It wasn’t judged a mugging, and it turned the spotlight on his employer. The reaction to that?”

“Try for me and Peabody.”

“Yes. Impulsively, and without any consideration for people who might have been hurt. And his cowardice is clearly shown—and has been touted all over the media—by using a child as a shield and weapon. Again, he failed, and this time he’s been called a coward, a monster, while you’re cheered as a hero.”

“I caught the kid,” Eve began. “It wasn’t heroic, it was a good catch.”

“I disagree, and so does the very vocal public. But the point is, he’s termed a coward. You’re termed a hero.”

“All right. That’d be a pisser for him.”

“Do you believe his employer ordered, or expected him, to carry out these two killings today with increasing violence? With no attempt at all to mask them?”

Eve shook her head. “Probably not. I expect the order was just, Take care of this. I don’t think Alexander thinks things through any more than his muscle.”

“No. Impulse, carelessness, cowardice, violence unleashed. He may not, very well may not, wait to be ordered before killing again. He’ll see his last two murders as successes. He committed them his way, released that violence. Enjoyed it. He’ll want that feeling again, that accomplishment, that release. And his first kill was a failure due to you, and Peabody. His second attack, on you and Peabody a failure.”

“So he’ll want to correct that mistake.” Considering, Eve sat on the corner of her desk. “Okay.”

“Need to correct it. He lost considerable face, considerable pride when those vids of you snatching that baby out of the air hit the media, the Internet. He was able to offset that by these kills, rack up success, feel accomplished, and enjoy the act. Increasingly. Whether or not his employer directs him, circling back to you will be imperative.

“And now you’re calculating how you can use that threat to your advantage.”

She wasn’t the department’s top shrink for nothing, Eve mused.

“If I can’t, if I can’t figure out a way to outsmart and stop this moron, I should be in another line of work. I figured if he got ambitious, he’d kill the hacker next.”

“And he may. But he’s feeling good about himself at the moment. The only fly in that ointment is you. You exposed him as a coward. He has to end you to prove he’s not.”

“So I draw him out. He won’t want to wait long. Alexander may figure, incorrectly, that he’s covered now. No loose ends, which would mean no fresh kills for his boy. If he kills the hacker, he’d have to explain why. But if he can get me, it’s just cleaning up old business. I can work with this.”

“He won’t be controlled. He won’t be logical. He will be vicious and violent, and he won’t care who else may be harmed in his attack on you.”

“So, I pick the time and place and circumstances. I can’t just walk around the city hoping he’ll make a move. I have to draw him a map. I think I have one. If I need it. We may be able to ID him today, then this is moot.”

“Don’t underestimate him, Eve. His impulse and unpredictability could work in his favor.”

Maybe, Eve thought when Mira left her. But she believed cunning, experience, and a little manipulation would work in hers.

She contacted Nadine Furst.

“Ready for tomorrow night?” Nadine asked her.

“That’s why I tagged you.”

Nadine’s cat-green eyes narrowed. “Don’t pull the ‘I’m too busy working a murder’ card.”

“I am busy working a murder. Make that murders.”

Nadine shifted to reporter mode without mussing a hair on her streaky blonde head. “They’re connected. The two this morning? And to Judge Yung’s sister-in-law.”

“The dots line up. How come I haven’t done an interview on my excitement and anticipation of tomorrow’s premiere?”

“Is that a trick question?” Those eyes narrowed again. “What have you got in mind?”

“I’m thinking about inviting one more person to the premiere.”

“And that would be?”

“The killer. Get over here with a camera, and we’ll issue the invitation.”

Eve clicked off, sat back. It could work. Risky, sure, but workable. She started to reach for the comm to call Peabody in, then Roarke stepped up to the now open door.

“Alone again.”

“Not anymore. Thanks for taking Marlo out.”

“Easy enough as I wanted to speak with Feeney and McNab in any case. She’s blissfully happy, and very grateful you agreed to stand up for her at the wedding.”

“I couldn’t find the wiggle room out.”

“Didn’t have the heart to wiggle hard.” He tapped her chin, then set a go-cup from Vending on her desk.

“What’s that?”

“Soup, as I wager you’ve had nothing since breakfast.”

“I’ve been a little busy.”

“As I’ve heard.” He stepped over to her board. “Not cold and controlled any longer, but mean and bloody. Is the dog off the leash?”

“Maybe. Mira thinks so, in a lot of ways. She thinks killing opened up his taste for violence, and for killing. I’m with her on that. She sees him as a coward. Right there with her. Escalating, enjoying his work. Yeah. She also thinks that combination makes him more dangerous. She could have a point.”

“A frightened animal’s bite is as deadly as an emboldened one, but less predictable.”

“Okay, that’s her summary, or close enough. She figures I’m the fly in his lotion.”

“Ointment.”

“Same thing. He screwed up with me, so he needs to fix that so he feels good about himself. Plus the endlessly rolling vid of the flying baby damaged his internal rep.”

“He’d hope to lure you into a trap or ambush.” Roarke wasn’t the department’s top shrink, but he knew his wife. “And now you’re planning one for him with yourself as bait.”

“I wouldn’t call myself bait in this case. More... an incentive. If we ID him before, we’ll go scoop him up. If not, I’ve got an idea, and following Mira’s profile, I can’t see him resisting it.”

He took a disc from his pocket. “I think you’ll find everything on here to arrest and charge Sterling Alexander with multiple cases of fraud, embezzlement, and misappropriation of funds, with a side of tax evasion.”

“You nailed it down?”

“Easily enough, once the dominoes started to fall. It’s also easy enough to connect him to several other companies, some merely shells, and to individuals in those companies who would also be guilty of fraud.”

“Does anything in there tie him to three murders, and attempted murder of a police officer?”

“It’s easy, again, to draw the lines from his company, the other companies, to the recently dead accountant and the equally if more messily dead money manager. Were they alive, they’d have a lot of questions to answer.”

“So we could say Alexander had them killed so they couldn’t answer any questions. But without the trigger, we can’t prove it. We get him on fraud, and push him for conspiracy to murder, he can claim he didn’t have anything to do with it, had no idea.”

She held out her hand for the disc. “I’ll take it to the commander, and the prosecutor. And ask them to give me a couple days to cage him in on the murders. It’s good work, Roarke. Thanks.”

“How do you know? You haven’t looked at it.”

“Because it’s your work.”

He flipped a finger down her hair. “You’re trying to soften me up so I won’t make an issue of your... incentive to a murderer.”

“That doesn’t make it less true.”

He sat in her miserably uncomfortable visitor’s chair. “I suppose you’d best eat your soup and tell me what you have in mind.”

Eve took off the lid, sniffed. “What kind of soup is it?”

“It was billed as minestrone, but it’s your Vending.”

“It won’t be magic.” But she sampled it. “It’s not horrible. So, Nadine should be here before too long to do a quick interview with me about—woo-hoo—fun and excitement, glamour and glitter at the premiere tomorrow night. A premiere of the vid that’s based on the case I cracked like a rotten walnut. Though modesty will prevent me from playing my own fiddle—”

“Tooting your own horn.”

“What’s the difference? They both make noise.”

“I stand, if not corrected, forced to agree.” In a futile attempt to find comfort in the chair, Roarke stretched out his legs. “You want to manipulate a confrontation with a violent killer at a public event?”

“I’m going to manipulate a killer into the open at an event he won’t be able to resist because not only am I attending, I’m getting media play from it. It’s splashy, and it comes right on the heels of his own media humiliation in the form of flying baby.”

“And you see no downside to rubbing his face in it.”

“I see that as a side benefit. Listen,” she continued, knowing his reservations, “how’s he going to lure me into an ambush? Maybe he tries to hit me when I’ve driving home, or into Central, or when Peabody and I are in the field. We can take precautions on all that, but for how long? Or he goes at Peabody first when she’s walking to the subway, or in the market for a bag of chips.”

“All right, it’s too open, too unpredictable.”

“Exactly, and this narrows it down to a point. Tomorrow night, when I’m raking in the attention, he shows me—shows everyone, and more himself if Mira’s on it—he can do the job.”

He couldn’t argue with her logic, or her strategy to ambush the ambusher. “And there’ll be cops at the event, covering the event.”

“Lousy with cops,” she assured him. “And we should have a better description of him by then. It may be we’ll be able to get him prior, but if not, we’ll throw the net over him tomorrow.”

And he’d be beside her, start to finish, Roarke thought.

“And when you have him, you believe you’ll get him to turn on Alexander?”

“I will turn him, and they both go away.”

“Well then, it promises to be an interesting evening.”

“I need to clear it with Whitney, brief the men.”

“And you can put any fine points on it, adjust as need be, consider more angles while Trina’s dealing with your hair and makeup tomorrow evening.”

“What? What? Why?”

“Lieutenant, for someone so clever, you really should have known that was coming.”

“I know how to put the face gunk on.”

“You’ll have Mavis and Peabody for moral support. Not my doing,” he added, holding up his hands. “And really, darling, if you can so courageously face down a killer, you should be able to tough out an at-home salon treatment with friends.”

“Just another ambush,” she muttered. “What kind of friends ambush you?”

“Your kind. And think how much more irresistible you’ll be to your quarry when you’ve been glamorized.”

She opened her mouth, shut it. Hummed. “That doesn’t make up for it, but it’s a point.”

She glanced toward the door when she heard the sound of footsteps. “Prancing. McNab,” she said moments before he bounced to her doorway.

“Lieutenant. I think I’ve got your hacker.”

She forgot the misery of hair and face by Trina. “Who is he? Where is he?”

“His name’s Milo Easton aka Mole. Milo the Mole, he’s pretty famous in hacking circles. Have you heard of him?” McNab asked Roarke.

“As a matter of fact, yes. Young, isn’t he, not twenty-five, and responsible for hacking into the NSA mainframe—still a teenager then. Draining the bank account of an Internet magnate he considered a rival, manipulating the odds boards before the Kentucky Derby.”

“That’s Milo,” McNab confirmed. “He’s only been caught once, and that was early on. He was only about fourteen, so they went easy on him. Big mistake as he stopped doing it for fun, and started doing it for profit. He burrows,” he told Eve. “Himself—which is why he’s hard to pin—and his work. He lost a lot of his shine in the community when it got out he’d tapped into retirement accounts. Going after big money from big companies or people, that’s one thing. Sucking from regular joes? No frost on that. It’s his fingerprint on the first vic’s unit, and on the safe at the accounting firm. I’m sure of it.”

“Where do we find him?”

“He burrows,” McNab repeated. “You pop an ID on the guy, and you get one stream of data. Pop it again, you get another. All of them bogus. I’ll work on it, but I can’t pin his location yet.”

“I think I can help with that.” Roarke smiled at Eve. “It’s, again, knowing people who know people. Then there’s the money stream.” Roarke nodded toward the disc on Eve’s desk. “He’s been paid. However he might funnel the money, however he might route it, that route has a beginning and an end.”

Now he smiled at McNab. “Won’t it be fun to find it?”

“Find Milo the Mole?” Sheer delight blasted over McNab’s pretty face. “Fun doesn’t begin. If we do that I’m King of the Hackers. Emperor of EDD.”

“Let’s go and get you that crown.” Roarke rose, stepped over to kiss Eve’s head. “I’ll be playing with my friends.”

And she’d better play with hers, so to speak. She contacted Whitney’s office to ask for a meeting.

By the time she arrived she had a basic outline of her operation. She’d refine it, she thought as she stepped inside the commander’s office. Nail down any loose ends, refine the layout.

“Lieutenant.”

“Sir. I wanted to update you. Detective Yancy is working with the witness who sold the UNSUB the hammer used to murder Jake Ingersol. EDD, with McNab heading, has identified the man we believe served as the hacker on Dickenson’s office unit, building security, and the hospital communications.”

“Who?”

“He goes by Milo the Mole. Apparently if you’re a geek, that name means something. They’re working now to find his hole. We’ll run Yancy’s sketch for face recognition. If we can locate and bring in either or both of these individuals, we’ll push them to roll on Alexander.”

“I’ll be attending Marta Dickenson’s memorial later today. Judge Yung will have questions.”

Stickier, she thought, and fortunately not her call to make.

“I don’t know how much you feel appropriate to tell her, sir, but Roarke’s compiled enough evidence through the copies of Dickenson’s files re Alexander and Pope to bring them in on multiple counts of fraud and misappropriation of funds, tax evasion. There’s money laundering in there, too.”

“You’ve got him?”

“I haven’t yet personally reviewed the data, but—”

“If Roarke verifies, it’s so,” Whitney finished.

“I will submit copies to you and the forensic accountant, but yes, sir, Roarke was confident. With time we should be able to follow that data and if payments to the killer and the hacker were drawn from any of the accounts therein, expand the charges to conspiracy to commit murder, murder for hire. As there will be issues of tax fraud and tax evasion, I expect federal agencies will take a strong interest in the actions of Sterling Alexander and in his company.”

Whitney leaned back. “And you’d like to delay informing those federal agencies in these matters.”

“Three people are dead. In addition an attempt was made on the lives of two NYPSD officers. I’d prefer he answer for that before the money matters.”

“How long?”

“Thirty-six hours, at the outside. If we can ID and locate, we can bring in the killer and the e-man. If, however, we’re unable to ID or unable to locate expediently, I have a contingency plan.”

Leaning back, Whitney linked his fingers. “Go ahead.”

“The New York premiere of The Icove Agenda has generated a lot of media interest and attention. It’s well reported that Peabody and I will be attending. I believe, Commander, following the pattern, Doctor Mira’s updated profile, and a ninety-six-point-six probability ratio the UNSUB will also attend in some fashion in order to complete the objective he failed to complete yesterday.”

“You believe he’ll try to get to you and/or Peabody at the premiere? With the crowds attending or watching the attendees arrive, the cameras, the security?”

“I do, not despite that but because of it. He failed, and was humiliated, on screen, with the replay of the baby catch.”

“That was impressive,” he agreed.

“Thank you, sir. The increase in the violence of his kills today—in his more personal involvement in those kills—indicates a growing taste for murder, and a passion that lacked with Dickenson. He’s a coward, Commander, who needs to prove his ability, his strength. Every kill has been an ambush. This time, we’ll turn that around.”

“And ambush him?”

“Sir. With an interview with Nadine Furst, I can sweeten the trap, play up my attending, and more, my excitement about it.”

Something close to a smirk played around Whitney’s mouth. “Are you that good an actress, Dallas?”

“I can pull it off. He’ll see the shine, not the trap. Moreover, if we don’t close this down prior, Alexander will also be in attendance. He’ll finish this job, in public, and in front of his employer. Commander, I strongly believe if we don’t wrap this up before, he will make that attempt. I want to be ready for him. He killed two people in under an hour today. He’s pumped, and so far he’s only missed once. He needs to rectify that.”

“There are easier ways to kill a cop.”

“But none as expedient, or that fits his pattern of impulse. None that brings those cops down at the moment it seems they’re most vulnerable. All dressed up, peacocking around. And all those people who saw his cowardice and humiliation on screen now get to watch his triumph. If we don’t have him in a cage, Commander, he’ll make his move tomorrow night.”

“I tend to agree. All right, Lieutenant, what’s your plan?”