Crosshairs, page 12
Trilling said, “I’m just thinking about the groupings we saw on the plywood behind her mom’s house. Robinson knows what she’s doing with a rifle. I don’t like being in this gray area where we don’t know how strong a suspect she is.”
“You’ll get used to it in Homicide. It feels like everyone’s a suspect sometimes. Let’s run by this address in the Bronx and see what we can find out.”
“I’ll tell you the truth, I hope she’s not the killer. I know what it’s like readjusting to civilian life. She might just be having a few problems. She seems like she’s trying to straighten her life out.”
“By lying to us and ignoring her mother?”
Trilling didn’t respond. If I’d never met him, I would’ve said he was brooding.
We found the address Walter had given us and sat in my Chevy down the block from the building. I casually said, “Where do you think she keeps the rifle she used up at her mom’s?”
Trilling thought about it. “If I were her, I’d have a place to keep it up in Putnam County. It’s too hard to move it around in the city without people noticing.”
We’d been sitting on the apartment building for only about five minutes. I was trying to think ahead and wondering if we needed assistance. When a cop does a surveillance like this, they never know when it will end. I’ve been on surveillances that lasted more than twenty-four hours.
My thought processes were shut down when Trilling tapped my shoulder and I looked up from my phone. Wendy Robinson was walking out of the apartment building, carrying an oversized gym bag.
I said, “Could you hide a rifle in a bag like that?”
“If the rifle broke down, you could. The oversized bag is good camouflage.” Trilling started to shift in his seat and reach for the door handle.
I said, “Hang on just a minute. Let’s follow her and see where she’s headed. Maybe we’ll learn something. If we start to lose her, we’ll end the surveillance and interview her on the spot.”
We waited until Robinson was almost at the end of the block, then Trilling and I hopped out of the car. He jogged up the block when we saw her turn at the end of the street. I remained behind her while Trilling crossed the street to follow her from another angle.
We followed the former Army sergeant six blocks. It only took a minute for me to realize she was headed to her boxing gym. I sent a quick text to Trilling so he could get ahead of her.
I started to catch up to her when she reached the block where her gym was located. I noticed the homeless man with the pet rat, Nigel, sitting across the street, keeping an eye on the entire neighborhood.
I saw Trilling a block ahead of me. Then I hesitated. Wendy Robinson walked right past the entrance to the gym. Trilling picked up on it and stayed out of sight as he casually walked on the other side of the street.
He met up with me as she turned on the far side of the gym.
Trilling said, “What’s the plan?”
“We stay on her. Now I need to know what she’s up to.”
We hustled around the building in time to see our suspect speak to a tall man wearing sweats, then follow him through a door at the rear of the building.
Trilling and I walked up to the door. He gave me a questioning look, so I shrugged and tried the handle. We both walked through the door with confidence and were surprised to find ourselves in a warehouse crammed with dozens of people. No one paid us any attention. I worked my way through the crowd and saw that a square area on the floor was being lined with heavy mats.
When I looked across the open area, I saw Wendy Robinson taking off her sweatshirt and flexing her arms and shoulders. The tall man she’d walked inside with stepped onto the mat across from her.
Trilling inched up next to me. “What the hell is going on?”
I was about to say I wasn’t sure. Then I heard the ding of a bell and Robinson rushed out onto the mat to meet the man in the sweatsuit. There was no introduction or announcement. She just started swinging.
CHAPTER 49
WHEN WENDY ROBINSON stopped her wild swings and squared off against her opponent, I took a closer look at the man she was bare-knuckle fighting. He was well over six feet tall. He had some bulk to him as well. I figured him to be around thirty-five years old. He had a long, droopy mustache that reminded me of Harry Grissom’s impressive facial hair.
Trilling started to step past me, his instinct to stop something like this too strong to ignore. I put my hand out and caught him by the chest. I leaned over and said into his ear, “This isn’t her first rodeo. Give it a minute before we do anything stupid.”
“We can’t let this keep going.”
“We can’t fight the forty people in here either.”
Trilling nodded but didn’t look happy about my decision. We both turned and watched the fight. Robinson knew how to move. The tall man landed one glancing blow off her shoulder. Then she stepped to one side, cocked her right arm back, and caught the man on the side of the chin with her bare fist.
I could tell by the way his head snapped that the fight was over, even before I saw his eyes roll back in his head. Then he dropped to his knees and fell face forward to a round of cheers from the entire crowd.
Wendy Robinson had hardly broken a sweat. She checked to make sure her opponent was okay. Several men from the crowd had him sitting up and were checking his eyes. The man gave her a thumbs-up and she turned to walk away.
Trilling and I intercepted her as she was headed into the crowd to watch the next fight. As soon as Robinson noticed us, she turned on the ball of her foot and tried to cut through the crowd to the rear door.
Trilling raced ahead and was waiting at the door.
Once I reached the door, we all stepped outside into the relatively quiet alley behind the gym-warehouse. The place was a perfect camouflage for these illegal fights. Even from inside the gym you couldn’t tell there was a rear warehouse section of the building.
We stood on either side of Wendy Robinson as I said, “You haven’t been enrolled at City College for almost two years. You lied to us.”
She smiled. “I lie to everyone. I have to just to stay sane. My mom wants to know my every move. The VA wants to make sure I stay on my meds. And cops asking questions just makes things worse. I didn’t want to tell you I was involved with these guys. You’d shut them down.”
I said, “So it’s like the movie. First rule is not to talk about it.”
“What movie?”
“Fight Club.”
She just gave me a vacant look. “Our first rule is to make sure no one gets hurt. It just adds a level of realism to our training, and the owner of the gym makes a little extra from people coming to watch the fights. The VA would never sanction this sort of therapy for PTSD. I swear to God it’s the only way to deal with living here.”
I said, “Now that I know your alibi is bullshit, I need to know where you were the night Adam Glossner was shot on his balcony.” That was the date we knew she had lied about.
She made a sour face and said, “C’mon, guys. You can’t figure it out? I was right here. I’m here two or three nights a week. Your detective abilities don’t seem that sharp to me.”
I looked at Trilling and he nodded as he went back inside to verify her story. He’d find the manager easily enough.
I looked back at Robinson. “We visited your mom. She seems very nice.”
“She’s the best. Except she expects everyone to live their lives the same way she has. I don’t want to end up in a little town with a house full of kids running around.”
“Where’s the rifle you used at her house?”
Another smile slid across her face. “So you’re saying I shouldn’t confide any criminal activities to my mother. She showed you my little range, didn’t she?”
“To be fair, she didn’t know why we wanted to talk to you.”
“The rifle belongs to one of my buddies who lives near my mom. I just wanted to feel a rifle against my shoulder for an hour or so. It’s too expensive to shoot anymore. Ammo costs a fortune. I liked it a lot better when the government provided me with bullets.” She gave me a sly smile. She wasn’t worried about a homicide charge.
After a while, Trilling came back out. “Robinson’s story checks out. The manager even showed me some video. He says she’s a regular and never causes any trouble.”
Robinson did a little curtsy. “That’s me, just a good little girl.” She pointed at the building. “I guess you could say this whole thing is my anti-anxiety drug. Please don’t shut us down.”
“Answer your phone if I call you again and we won’t bother this place. Ignore me and I’ll make a call that shuts this place down for good. Do we have an understanding?”
She held out her right hand and shook mine. “You have my word.” She turned to Trilling and stuck her hand out again. When he reached to shake it, she pulled him close and planted a kiss right on his lips. “That’s just to show I’m serious about my work.”
Watching Trilling blush never got old.
CHAPTER 50
I’M USED TO calls in the middle of the night. Every homicide detective is. The only thing that surprised me about this one was the caller. Instead of Harry Grissom calling to give me an assignment, it was my sometime partner, Terri Hernandez, directly from a scene in the Bronx. Usually Terri handled the homicides up that way. Then she dropped the bombshell: it looked like the sniper had struck again.
Mary Catherine was just conscious enough for me to give her a kiss on the forehead as I slipped out of the bedroom and then the apartment. Traffic was light at this hour. I was on the scene in the Highbridge area, half a dozen blocks north of Yankee Stadium, in about ten minutes.
Terri met me in front of a nice apartment building. She gave me a quick hug and asked about the kids. It doesn’t matter the situation; you still know who your closest friends are.
Similarly, before I even asked about the specifics of the homicide, I asked after her sisters, Christy and Sylvia.
Terri smiled and said, “My dad is getting used to the idea of their goofy white boyfriends. Sylvia’s boyfriend loves heavy metal music and has a dog named Ace, after one of the members of Kiss.”
Thinking of how that would go over with Terry’s Cuban-born father made me smile. Then I got serious. I said, “What’s the story here?”
“Someone used a rifle to shoot a community activist named Gus Querva. The doorman found him about an hour ago. My rough estimate is that he was shot around eleven o’clock from somewhere to the north of the building. It looks like Querva was walking in the front door when the killer took the shot.”
I considered that for a moment, then asked, “Is this the same Gus Querva who some people claim is part of a gang that terrorizes the Bronx?”
Terri gave me a sideways glance and said, “Whoever told you that wasn’t from any of the precincts around here. We got a very specific memo saying we weren’t supposed to talk to anyone about him. We weren’t sure if it was because of all of his efforts building youth centers or if the feds were working some kind of big case on him.”
Terri had already covered the bases on this homicide. She had people out canvassing the area, talking to doormen, and looking for video surveillance. She asked, “Where’s your new partner?”
I was more than a little annoyed to notice that Trilling hadn’t shown up yet. I had texted him after I got the call from Terri but had gotten no answer. I looked at Terri and shrugged.
She said, “What’s with these guys with no sense of duty?”
“That’s not Rob Trilling. He’s all about duty and responsibility. But I don’t know where he is right now.”
A couple of local TV news trucks came down the street and stopped just outside the police perimeter. I figured one of the doormen had made the call. They’d learned there were some perks to tipping off the media to things like this.
A green Toyota Camry rattled to a stop behind one of the news trucks. I couldn’t help but smile when I saw Lois Frang pop out of the beat-up car and start marching toward the perimeter. When she waved at me, I felt obliged to walk over and talk to her.
I said, “Tell me who tipped you guys off. I’m just curious.”
Lois let out a quick laugh. “No one ever gives me tips. I work for the Brooklyn Democrat. What could I give them in return? I rely on a good old-fashioned police scanner. It catches your general traffic, and I could tell something was going on.”
“You were up listening to a police scanner at this hour?”
“Insomnia. It’s either a gift or a curse.” She looked past my shoulder and said, “I thought it might be the sniper again. Seeing you confirms it. Can you tell me anything?”
“Not much.” In the silence that followed we both heard the TV reporter next to us practicing his introduction.
“We’re at the scene of a murder, possibly committed by the sniper who has been terrorizing the city. The victim is Gus Querva, the man responsible for bringing countless youth centers and community advancements to the Bronx.”
Lois snorted.
“What’s funny?”
“These journalism-school grads who believe anything that’s fed to them. Everyone with half a brain knows Gus Querva was able to live in a building like this by running a protection and extortion racket. There’s hardly a bodega in this part of the Bronx that doesn’t pay one of Gus’s crew a cut every week just to be left alone.”
I nodded and made an excuse as I headed back to find Terri Hernandez. I checked my watch and called Rob Trilling. I told him to call me as soon as he got my message.
I thought about how upset Trilling had been when he saw Querva talking to the media. He’d said the same things about Querva that Lois Frang just had. I felt a sharp sting of anxiety in my stomach as I thought about my partner’s comments regarding our latest victim.
CHAPTER 51
ROB TRILLING SHOWED up at the crime scene in the Bronx at almost exactly seven in the morning. All his new partner said when he arrived was “You need to live next to your phone when you’re working in Homicide.” Trilling nodded, knowing more would be coming later. He’d had his ass chewed by professionals in the Army. So far, no one in the NYPD scared him too much.
Trilling tried to make sense of the scene and what each of the team members was doing. Uniformed police officers kept the media and gawkers behind the police line. Crime-scene techs took photos near the front door where the body had fallen. Detectives were searching for potential witnesses. And Trilling took it all in. He wanted to understand how a smart guy like Mike Bennett could figure out the details that led to an arrest. He knew that was always the key to any mission: details.
Trilling stepped over to Bennett and asked, “When did the M.E. take Querva’s body?”
Bennett stopped what he was doing, turned to face Trilling, and said, “How did you know the victim was Gus Querva?”
“It’s on the news. I heard it on my way over here.” Trilling didn’t like the look Bennett gave him. He stayed put while Bennett started to march through the crime scene, checking on each person doing a specific task.
Trilling wanted to be close to Bennett so he could learn how this shit was done properly. He caught up to Bennett and started to follow him around as he talked to a couple of potential witnesses, including Querva’s girlfriend. The former Miss Colombia had been asleep in their apartment. Apparently the doorman had an excused absence for a couple of hours, then came through the rear door, so he didn’t notice the dead man by the front door. As soon as he’d found the body, he called 911.
After the initial round of tasks was completed, Bennett turned to Trilling and said, “Let’s go sit in my car for a few minutes. It’s quiet and I need to think.” His Chevy was parked almost in front of the building. Its close proximity to the crime scene discouraged anyone from walking up and talking to him when he was sitting inside. Trilling could understand why he needed to get away from everyone’s questions for just a few minutes.
Once they were settled in the car’s front seats, Bennett turned to him and said, “We have something we didn’t have before.”
“What’s that?”
“The canvass turned up a coffee shop employee who saw someone walking by with what they thought was a musical instrument case. At least we have a description now. White male, about six feet tall, with short, dark hair. The description that fits maybe five hundred thousand people in the greater New York area.”
“I even fit that description.” Trilling noticed Bennett didn’t say anything.
“You going to be okay working on the homicide of a guy like Gus Querva?” Bennett asked. “You told me you thought he’d ruined the neighborhood and was just putting on a show for the media.”
Suddenly Trilling felt like someone was tightening a vise on his chest. He’d never had anyone question his integrity before. In the service, if you completed your mission, no one harassed you.
“It almost sounds like you’re trying to accuse me of something. Go ahead and ask me anything you want.”
“I just did. Can you work the case?”
Trilling nodded.
“Where were you that you didn’t answer your phone?”
Trilling was silent. He stared at Bennett for a moment, then said, “Do I need an alibi? Sure you want to ride around town with me?”
“Making smart-ass cracks right now doesn’t help anything. I texted and called you and got no answer. Where were you?”
Trilling didn’t need someone looking at him the way Bennett was right now, grilling him over a missed phone call. All he could say was “I was at home, sound asleep. No fancy excuses. I screwed up and I know it.”
Bennett sat silently, looking out the windshield. “For a guy who got to sleep last night you look like shit.”
Trilling nodded. He knew he had bags under his bloodshot eyes. He could tell Bennett was exhausted. Maybe too tired to pick up on some details of the crime and the shooter.
Trilling said, “I’m here now. Let me take some of the burden off you. What do you need done right now?”
