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Authors: James Patterson
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always, the place is packed with the Hispanic carpenters, gardeners, and day workers who keep the Hamptons buff. Despite the stack of newspapers with Dante’s picture plastered all over them, no one here could care less about the latest Hampton drama. In this disconnected Spanish-speaking pocket of town, I’m invisible, and it feels pretty good.
I eat the pork-and-assorted-veggies sandwich at my desk, where despite my best efforts, I think about Dante scared in his cell and about his tired old public-defender lawyer. The only good thing I come up with is that big as Dante is, no one will mess with him.
As of yesterday, Michael Walker still hadn’t turned himself in, and I call Lenny at the AP offices to find out what, if anything, he’s heard. We’re talking the talk when something is thrown through the window in the office. What the hell? Shattered glass covers my desk. Then I see a burning bag on the floor.
“Call you back, Lenny! Somebody just broke my damn window.”
I douse the flames with the extinguisher hanging in the hall, but the room is already full of acrid yellow smoke and a horrendous stench, which Wingo and I soon discover is the smell of a plastic bag of burning shit.
I think I get the point—somebody is mad at me. And guess what? I’m a wee bit angry at them too.
Chapter 36
Detective Connie P. Raiborne
I GIVE DETECTIVE Yates the address for today’s first reported homicide—838 MacDonough—and he swerves out of the traffic and barrels down the middle of Fulton, his screaming siren and flashing lights barely denting the usual cacophony of a lovely Bed-Stuy afternoon.
Our banged-up Crown Vic barely gets a glance from the sleepy-eyed schoolkids hanging out in front of PriceWise. In this neighborhood police sirens are part of the soundtrack, like the strings and horns in a Nelson Riddle chart.
“Joe, take it easy. I got it on good authority our man will sit tight till we get there.”
Joe Yates has three of the more annoying qualities you’ll ever find in a colleague or friend—tireless good humor, a full head of hair, and a beautiful girlfriend. Maybe the three are related, but that doesn’t make them any less annoying.
Yates doesn’t reply to my request, but apparently he listens. The car slows to double the speed limit, and there’s less screeching around the corners. When we finally pull up in front of a redbrick six-floor walk-up and park behind the two double-parked squad cars, half my iced coffee is still in my cup.
“Smooth enough for you, gramps?”
When we reach the fourth floor, everyone is already here—Heekin from Forensics, Nicolo and Hart from Homicide, and the street cop who broke down the door after a neighbor alerted the super to the funky smell inside.
But except for the guys in white gloves dusting the doorknobs, faucets, light switches, and window, everyone’s been waiting for me to get here and see the scene as it was found.
No one’s touched the teenage brother half lying, half sitting on the bed. Judging by the smell and the pallor and the chunk a rat gnawed off his big toe, I’d say the kid’s been dead about a week.
“TV on when you got here?” I ask.
“Yup,” says Hart, the younger of the two homicide detectives and a bit of a kiss-ass. “Same volume. Same channel. No one touched a thing, Connie.”
Blaring away on the tube is one of those stand-up comedian shows. Right now some skinny black female comic is riffing about large black women, and Heekin seems to think it’s hysterical.
“We catch you at a bad time, Jimmyboy? Because if we did, we can reschedule.”
“That’s okay, Chief.”
“You sure? Girlfriend’s pretty damn funny. I mean, she’s killing our friend over here.”
I get one of the guys from Forensics to dust the TV remote for prints so we can turn the set off and I can ask the question of the hour.
“So who is this poor, unfortunate deceased individual?”
Chapter 37
Raiborne
THERE ARE THREE characteristics I
I eat the pork-and-assorted-veggies sandwich at my desk, where despite my best efforts, I think about Dante scared in his cell and about his tired old public-defender lawyer. The only good thing I come up with is that big as Dante is, no one will mess with him.
As of yesterday, Michael Walker still hadn’t turned himself in, and I call Lenny at the AP offices to find out what, if anything, he’s heard. We’re talking the talk when something is thrown through the window in the office. What the hell? Shattered glass covers my desk. Then I see a burning bag on the floor.
“Call you back, Lenny! Somebody just broke my damn window.”
I douse the flames with the extinguisher hanging in the hall, but the room is already full of acrid yellow smoke and a horrendous stench, which Wingo and I soon discover is the smell of a plastic bag of burning shit.
I think I get the point—somebody is mad at me. And guess what? I’m a wee bit angry at them too.
Chapter 36
Detective Connie P. Raiborne
I GIVE DETECTIVE Yates the address for today’s first reported homicide—838 MacDonough—and he swerves out of the traffic and barrels down the middle of Fulton, his screaming siren and flashing lights barely denting the usual cacophony of a lovely Bed-Stuy afternoon.
Our banged-up Crown Vic barely gets a glance from the sleepy-eyed schoolkids hanging out in front of PriceWise. In this neighborhood police sirens are part of the soundtrack, like the strings and horns in a Nelson Riddle chart.
“Joe, take it easy. I got it on good authority our man will sit tight till we get there.”
Joe Yates has three of the more annoying qualities you’ll ever find in a colleague or friend—tireless good humor, a full head of hair, and a beautiful girlfriend. Maybe the three are related, but that doesn’t make them any less annoying.
Yates doesn’t reply to my request, but apparently he listens. The car slows to double the speed limit, and there’s less screeching around the corners. When we finally pull up in front of a redbrick six-floor walk-up and park behind the two double-parked squad cars, half my iced coffee is still in my cup.
“Smooth enough for you, gramps?”
When we reach the fourth floor, everyone is already here—Heekin from Forensics, Nicolo and Hart from Homicide, and the street cop who broke down the door after a neighbor alerted the super to the funky smell inside.
But except for the guys in white gloves dusting the doorknobs, faucets, light switches, and window, everyone’s been waiting for me to get here and see the scene as it was found.
No one’s touched the teenage brother half lying, half sitting on the bed. Judging by the smell and the pallor and the chunk a rat gnawed off his big toe, I’d say the kid’s been dead about a week.
“TV on when you got here?” I ask.
“Yup,” says Hart, the younger of the two homicide detectives and a bit of a kiss-ass. “Same volume. Same channel. No one touched a thing, Connie.”
Blaring away on the tube is one of those stand-up comedian shows. Right now some skinny black female comic is riffing about large black women, and Heekin seems to think it’s hysterical.
“We catch you at a bad time, Jimmyboy? Because if we did, we can reschedule.”
“That’s okay, Chief.”
“You sure? Girlfriend’s pretty damn funny. I mean, she’s killing our friend over here.”
I get one of the guys from Forensics to dust the TV remote for prints so we can turn the set off and I can ask the question of the hour.
“So who is this poor, unfortunate deceased individual?”
Chapter 37
Raiborne
THERE ARE THREE characteristics I
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