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Her phone sounded.
“Rhyme,” she answered.
“Sachs, where are you?”
“Hospital. Near the crane. Should be able to get some samples pretty soon. Pictures too.”
“Let the techs run the scene. I’ve got a lead. Have to move fast.”
“Tell me.”
“The samples you and Lyle took? In the garages? We had apositive hit. One of the developers we targeted left HF trace on the ground under the passenger door of his limo.”
“Which car?” She wondered if it was the Bentley.
“It’s a Mercedes that Lyle sampled. It’s owned by one of the biggest developers in the area. Willis Tamblyn.”
The one she tried to find after the Bentley but hadn’t been able to.
“No record, but Lon checked city logs. He’s been in the Structures and Engineering building a dozen times in the last year.”
So his theory was making sense: this developer hired the Watchmaker to devalue property so he could pick it up cheap.
“We’ve had it on the LPR wire and they had a hit on the Merc five minutes ago. About three blocks from you.”
“So he’s here, looking over Hale’s handiwork. And he’s probably pissed we stopped the collapse. Where’s the Merc?”
He gave her the address. “I’m sending you Tamblyn’s DMV picture.”
She glanced at her phone. In his fifties, thinning hair, stern face, like smiling would be painful. He looked like … a real estate developer.
“I’m on my way.”
They disconnected. She ripped off the cumbersome white Tyvek overalls and pulled on her black sport jacket once more. A lead had come up, she told the three evidence collection techs; they should continue with the scene. She’d be back soon.
A jog wasn’t a pleasing proposition, given her battered lungs and windpipe.
But Dr. A. Gomez had declared her fine, so jog she did.
Thinking of an old expression of her father’s, one that she lived her life by:
When you move, they can’t getcha …
•••
Patrolwoman Evelyn Maple, a ten-year vet on the NYPD, was keeping selfie takers out of the scene.
Yes, the crane was stabilized and dismantled.
Yes, the crews looked like they knew what they were doing.
But she, a mother of two, was keepingherdamn distance. Because you never knew what could happen. Why wasn’t everybody else doing the same?
“You, you can’t be on that side of the rope.”
“It’s tape, technically, Officer.” Snotty little blond cheerleader sort.
The officer was not tall, about five-four, and petite, so she lacked the intimidation factor she wished she had.
