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Swann had decided that now he could use a cover crime for the murder: In addition to prosecuting patriotic Americans for taking out vile traitors, Laurel had sent plenty of rapists to jail. He'd looked up her conviction record--extremely impressive--and learned that among those she'd put away were dozens of serial rapists and molesters. One of these suspects could easily decide to get his revenge following his release. Or a relative of a prisoner might do just that.
Her own past would come back to get her.
Yes, he'd gotten word from headquarters that the investigation into Moreno's death was over. But that didn't mean it might not surface again. Laurel was the sort who might leave government service and start writing letters or articles in the papers or online about what had happened, about NIOS, about the STO assassination program.
Better if she just went away. And anyway, Swann had set off a bomb in Little Italy and stabbed an interpreter and limo driver to death. If nothing else, Laurel might be called on to help in the investigation of those crimes. He needed her dead and all her files destroyed.
He fantasized. Not about the sex but about faking the attack, which he was looking at like a recipe. Planning, preparation, execution. He'd break into her apartment, stun her with a blow to the head (not the throat; there couldn't be a connection to Ms. Lydia Foster, of course), rip her clothes off, make sure her breasts and groin displayed severe striking hematoma (no biting, though he was tempted; that bothersome DNA). Then he'd beat her to death and penetrate her with a foreign object.
He didn't have time to go to an adult bookstore with video booths or a porn theater and scoop up a bit of somebody's DNA to swab on her. But he had stolen some stained and torn underwear, teenager's size, from the trash behind a tenement not far away. Fibers from this garment he'd work under her fingernails and hope the teen had been masturbating at some point in the past few days. Likely.
This would be enough evidence.
He dipped his tongue into the coffee. Enjoyed the intense sensation throughout his mouth; it's a myth that different tastes are experienced in different parts of the tongue: salt, sour, sweet, bitter. Another sip. Swann cooked with coffee sometimes--he'd made a Mexican mole-type sauce for pork with 80 percent cacao and espresso. He'd been tempted to submit it for a contest then decided it wasn't a good idea for him to be too public.
He was running through the plan for Nance Laurel again when he spotted her.
Across the street the ADA had appeared from around the corner. She was in a navy-blue suit and white blouse. In her small pudgy hands were an old-fashioned attache case, brown and battered, and a large litigation bag. He wondered if either was a present from her father or mother, both of whom were attorneys too, Swann had learned. They were in the low-rent district of the profession. Her mother, public defender. Her father, poverty law.
Doin' good deeds, helping society, Swann reflected. Just like their stocky little girl.
Laurel was walking with eyes cast downward and laboring under the weight of the litigation bag. Though her face was a cryptic mask, she now gave off a slight hint of depression, the way Italian parsley in soup suggests but doesn't state. Unlike bold cilantro.
The source of the somber mood was no doubt the foundering Moreno case. Swann nearly felt bad for her. The prosecution would have been the jewel in her crown but now she was back to a life of sending Jose, Shariq, Billy and Roy into the system for crack and rapes and guns.
Wasn't me. No way. I don't know, man, I don't know where it came from, really...
Except, of course, she wouldn't be handling any such cases.
Wouldn't be doing anything at all after tonight. Would be cold and still as a slab of loin.
Nance Laurel found her keys and unlocked the front door, stepped inside.
Swann would give it ten, fifteen minutes. Time for her to let her guard down.
He lifted the small, thick cup to his nose, inhaled and slipped his tongue into the warm liquid once more.
CHAPTER 73
WHAT DO WE KNOW ABOUT the last of our ten little Indians?" Lincoln Rhyme asked absently.
The setback about Moreno's citizenship had defeated Nance Laurel but it had only stoked his hunt lust. "I don't care what Albany wants, Sachs, I want our unsub. Five Sixteen's too dangerous to stay free. What do we know?" He looked over the evidence whiteboards. "All right, we know Five Sixteen was in the Bahamas around the time of the shooting. We know that he killed the student-prostitute Annette Bodel. We know that he set the bomb to eliminate leads to the whistleblower. We know he killed Lydia Foster. We know he was following our Sachs around town. What can we make of that?...Sachs!"
"What?"
"The other driver, the one that Moreno usually used? Did you ever get in touch with him?"
"No. Never called back."
This happened frequently when the police phoned, asking for a return call.
Usually this was out of reluctance to get involved.
Sometimes there were other reasons.
She tried the driver once more and shook her head. She placed another call--to Elite Limos, Rhyme deduced. She asked if they had heard from their employee. A brief conversation and she hung up.
"Never called in after he went to see a sick relative."
