Jason glared at Iriarte. "He doesn't have the profile of a killer."
"Then get him to come in here and prove it like a man." lriarte stabbed the air with a finger.
"I'm a physician. I'm no expert in police work, but I don't get the feeling you're regarding Liberty from the position of innocent until proven guilty, which is the position taken by the law of this land. So I could say the same of you—if he's guilty, you prove it."
"Don't get defensive now. I'm just asking for your assistance here, Dr. Frank. You're an expert in state of mind. You and your wife know Liberty as well as anybody, and we believe you know where he is."
Jason shook his head. "We don't know where he is."
Iriarte went on as if he hadn't spoken. "If you are his friend, you will convince him that his best interests will be served by coming in to see us as soon as possible."
"By turning himself in to people who believe he killed his wife?"
"By coming to talk with us. That's all we want to do."
"Is Liberty aware of your wish to speak with him?"
Iriarte flicked a hostile glance at April. She remained impassive. He took a deep breath. "We're in the middle of an investigation," he said. "We told him not to leave."
"I understand that." Jason directed his next question at April. "I gather you spoke with him at some length yesterday."
"Yes."
"What was the nature of your conversation?"
April raised a shoulder.
"Does that mean you led him to believe you think he murdered his wife?"
"He had opportunity. We believe he may have murdered his wife. We don't know if there's a connection with the murder in his car. But we will," Iriarte again.
More acid roiled around in Jason's stomach. He felt ill. Could Rick have killed Merrill, after all? Could his judgment of Rick be so wrong? What could be the motivation for it? Why would he kill her? He thought of the morning after the murder when Rick hadn't wanted medication. He'd wanted to be there, fully alert, because he thought the police had made a mistake and that Merrill was coming back. Rick was no actor, he'd been in genuine shock. But then again, he was a black man in a white firm, in a white world with a white wife. He had to be something of an actor to look so comfortable pulling that off. Jason realized he was holding his breath. He let it out before speaking.
"Do you have any evidence to suggest Liberty killed his wife?" Jason asked carefully.
"I'm not at liberty to tell you, no pun intended." Iriarte smirked at the pun nonetheless. "Have you been in touch with him?"
Jason thought of the funeral that had been so incomplete without Rick there. He thought of Rick's disappearing before the news of his absence at the funeral appeared on every TV and in every newspaper in the country, possibly to avoid arrest, and he thought of the E-mail message Rick had sent him, rambling and incoherent. Did E-mail count as being in touch? He decided it didn't.
"No," Jason said, they hadn't been in touch.
"Are you aware that if you help a criminal avoid arrest, you are a criminal yourself and can be prosecuted as such?"
"Do you have a warrant for Liberty's arrest?"
Iriarte sucked on his cheeks. "Not at this time."
Jason checked his watch. He had to go. "Well, I told you what I know about Liberty. I don't have anything else to add that will help you."
"Thanks for coming in." Iriarte jerked his chin at April. Take him away.
30
Hey, pretty one. What are you doing here again?"
Ducci hastily filed some slides in a box and stowed it away in his desk. Then he swiveled his chair around to Nanci, making nice all around. "Hey, Nance, you know April Woo."
Nanci looked April over, raking a hand through her good dye job. "How you doin', Woo. I hear you made sergeant."
"I'm in Midtown North now," April said wearily. She shook some raindrops off her coat and glanced at the two guest chairs in the room. They were occupied by files, a skull, and some labeled objects the two dust and fiber experts must be studying.
"Yeah, I heard, detective squad. That idiot Hagedorn still there?" Nanci pushed back her chair, stretching out a pair of faultless legs in black tights.
April nodded. "Still there. How're you doing, Nanci?"
"Oh, overworked and underpaid. And I have to sit next to an egomaniac. I guess it's raining out." Nanci reached into a desk drawer for her purse and a grungy-looking red sweater.
"Better than snow," April remarked.
"I guess."
"Oh, come on. You love every second you spend with me. I taught you everything you know," Ducci said, peeved.
"Oh, sure I do. I have boxes of stuff on this Central Park case, people breathing down my neck on it, and suddenly he's got this bee in his bonnet about Petersen's autopsy and T-shirt lint." Nanci rolled her eyes.
"Well, he doesn't get to see many autopsies these days," April said.
"And, he shouldn't." Nanci sniffed. "Wet stuff's not his area."
Ducci still had Tor Petersen's cashmere sweater on his desk with the severed fibers in the chest carefully cut out for his slides. A sleeve hung over the edge. Ducci played with the cuff like a cat with a tassel.
"I was doing blood before you were born. I know fuckups when I see them." Ducci turned to April. "Where's your boyfriend?"
What boyfriend? "If you're referring to Sanchez, who isn't my boyfriend, I haven't seen him since this morning. The car Liberty claimed was stolen turned up in Staten Island with a bloody interior."
"No kidding."
"Might be a drug buy gone wrong. I think Sanchez planned to look at it, then go out to New Jersey to talk to Petersen's driver."
"In this weather?"
"Yes. Mind if I put my coat here?"
"No, no, go ahead, sit down. You want some coffee or something?" Ducci grinned, playing the host.
"Uh-uh, yours is worse than ours." April slung her coat over the back of Ducci's guest chair and moved the skull over to the filing cabinet.
"Couldn't you get the guy to come into the station?"
"We talked to him once. He held back on us." She sat down and let out a sigh. "Now he's gone elusive on us and we've got two suspects we can't keep track of. Makes us look pretty careless, doesn't it?"
"We all have bad days."
"This is more than a bad day."
Ducci pointed to the plastic bag April had dropped at her feet. "You got something new for me?"
She glanced down, startled. "Oh, God, I'm so tired I don't know what I'm doing." She tossed the bag to Ducci. He caught it and looked inside.
"Nice sweater, a belated Christmas gift for me, pretty one?"
"Nah, it's another of Petersen's sweaters."
Ducci pulled the maroon cashmere out of the bag and grimaced at the heady aroma emanating from it. "Vanilla," he said decisively.
April looked surprised. "How can you guys identify smells like that? I could never have put a flavor to that stink."
Ducci laughed, creasing his round choirboy's cheeks. "I know most things," he murmured. "I know your perfume, know your boyfriend's."
"No kidding. What is it?" she asked about Mike's perfume.
Ducci didn't answer. He seemed stunned by the white T-shirt folded into the sweater. "What are you telling me with this?"
April smiled at Nanci. "You know most things, Duke. You figure it out for me."
"Okay, a T-shirt," Nanci said flatly. "So now we know Petersen wore T-shirts—sometimes. I'm going home."
"His widow told me he never went without one, and she was very upset that I asked," April said. "Apparently Petersen thought it was unhealthy to have cashmere next to his skin."
Preoccupied, Ducci pulled a Snickers bar out of his desk drawer. For once he was too absorbed to tear it open. He scratched the corner of his small mouth as he studied the sweater. "Too bad it's too big for me," he murmured.