TEN
Ten minutes later I was sitting between Mike and the sergeant on the porch of the Loeb Boathouse, overlooking the Lake. It had been closed off to tourists, and Lieutenant Peterson was using it as a mini command center because of its unspoiled vista of the Bow Bridge and the area surrounding the place where the body was found.
“I’m not the only Coop in the world, you know. That might not be referring to me.”
“You’ve made more than your share of enemies,” Mike said.
“Just following in your footsteps, I think.” He’d yet to be alone with me this morning, so there had been no mention of Judge Pell.
“The Alexandra Cooper Wing at Dannemora. Everybody doing twenty-five to life, sitting around in their therapy sessions making voodoo dolls of Coop and her team at SVU.”
The sergeant put his finger to his lips to quiet our bickering. He was on the phone with an analyst at One PP, in the tech information hub known as the Real Time Crime Center. The Center was a rabbit warren of computer screens and technicians-a modern effort to centralize all the information gathered by the NYPD.
Every arrest report and detectives’ steno pad contained valuable nuggets of detail. One database recorded descriptions of birthmarks and scars; another was the source for dental irregularities-missing teeth, grids, gold or silver caps; and yet one more listed unusual gaits-limps, if suspects had them, as well as how pronounced or severe they were.
The tattoo database had become one of the most regularly used. Frequently, based on things victims had told me about their attackers, I called to request a search of a particular body part-like the left shoulder blade or the back of a man’s neck-for a certain word or symbol. With a few keystrokes by a good detective analyst, a single phone call could lead to a suspect with a criminal history, and a subsequent arrest.
“Kevin? It’s Manny Chirico. I’m up in Central Park and I need a check of your tattoo base.”
He waited while his contact got ready to take the information.
“Can you enter the word ‘kill’?” Manny asked.
Chirico put his hand over the receiver. “He says ‘kill’ is really common in gang art. The search will pull up lots of kills.”
“Great. All Coop needs is an angry banger.”
I was trying to think of guys I had put away recently who had been gang members.
Chirico whistled. “Okay, 276 hits with the word ‘kill.’ Now try ‘kill cops.’”
The answer came within a minute. “Twenty-three. I guess we’re not too popular, are we? Now search for ‘kill Coop.’”
It took two or three minutes for a response because the officer must have tried entering the words several times.
“No luck, eh? Thanks for trying.” Chirico looked at me and said, “Got a blank on that one.”
“I’m sure you’re overreacting,” I said.
“A guy jerking off in the Park? He’s one of your boys, Coop,” Mike said. “Either he got the ink after he did his time and that’s why he isn’t in the database, or he hasn’t gone to trial yet. But he’s definitely part of the SVU posse.”
“Let me call Laura.”
I dialed my secretary. “Good morning, Laura. I trust you got the voice mail that I’d be spending most of the day in the Park.”
“I did. That’s what I told Rose when she called looking for you.”
“Battaglia wants to see me?” I said, wincing as I looked from Mike to Manny. “Tell him it will have to hold till tomorrow.”
“That’s what I said. No blowback so far. Need anything?”
“We do. I’d like you to go back through all the unit indictments for the last five years. Pull out screening sheets on convictions of any male, black, twenty-five to thirty-five, that I had anything to do with. Review the pending cases, too. And see if you can match our list against parole-make sure we know all our offenders who’ve been released within the last year. Double-check anything that took place in a park-Central or any other city park. Will that keep you busy for a few hours?”
“It’s a slow day, Alex. I don’t mind at all.”
“Thanks. Call me if you need anything. We’ll be working with the parks commissioner most of the afternoon.”
I hung up and asked the sergeant what to do next.
“That Reservoir rapist that you and Mercer put away,” Chirico asked. “What kind of time did he get?”
“Four victims, so he’s doing the better part of two hundred years.”
“Yeah,” Mike said, “but did he run with a gang? Maybe he’s got somebody on the outside who has it in for you.”
“That’s a lot of ‘maybes’ to check when you’re a prosecutor who specializes in violent felons. Why don’t you see how many convicted offenders named Cooper are in jail?”
“We can do that, too,” the sergeant said. “We’ve got an hour till we get our briefing from the parks commissioner. That’s a good time to let everyone know about the Austin sisters’ perv. In the meantime, while we’ve got some privacy, would you two like to tell me anything I should know for my dealings with Judge Pell?”
I stepped out onto the patio of the boathouse restaurant and leaned against the railing. “I seem to be the last to know, guys, so feel free to fill me in.”
Mike was running his fingers through his hair, which he always did when he was nervous. “I really don’t want to do this right now, Sarge. I’ve sort of sandbagged Coop on this.”
“I’d say we’ve all been sandbagged. You don’t have time to waste,” Chirico said. “You ever appear before this woman?”
“I don’t know. Maybe I testified in a hearing once or twice. I fucked up, Sarge, is all I can say. The lieutenant had me on the detail ’cause Pell claimed she was getting threats.”
“Claimed?”
“I never heard the threats. There were some notes-typed-that came in the mail to her office. One with white powder.”
“Like anthrax?” the sergeant asked.
“Like talcum pretending to be anthrax.”
“Who from?”
“Supposedly it all involved a Wall Street trader gone too greedy. She presided over the case and sent him up the river for ten years. A piker compared to Coop.”
“And the threats?” Chirico asked.
“The guy hired a hit man. The letters started coming to Pell in December, and the chief administrative judge called in Battaglia and the chief of detectives immediately. They put security on her 24/7.”
“I know we only let them have you two nights a week,” the sergeant said. “Who else?”
“They pulled a female detective from Major Case, and two guys from the DA’s squad did most of the work. Between Christmas and the end of February, there were no more threats and nothing unusual happened. Scully ended the detail.”
“Then what?” I asked.
“Then I got really stupid. Is that what you’re waiting for me to say?”
“I guess so.”
“Pell was smart, tough, funny. Kind of quirky.”
“All the things you find resistible in me.”
“And sexy.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah, she wasn’t always mooning about some guy who was out of reach.”
“So you got in bed with her,” Chirico said.
“But it was after my assignment was over.” Mike put his hands in the pocket of his chinos. “On my own time.”
“And it ended because…?” the sergeant said.
“Don’t make it more dramatic than it has to be. The thrill was gone, Manny. It was just a fling. She gives off a lot of ‘crazy’ the minute you get close. I wanted out.”
“And how did I become your exit valve?” I asked.
Mike picked up a stone from the patio and skipped it across the smooth surface of the Lake below us. “It was that last week of April. Things were wild with Luc here and that murder case. I was working it with all my free time since I couldn’t do it officially because of my friendship with Luc and you.”