“And Weber wasn’t only working on the Cinderella Strangler case. There was no reason for her to call Queens. I thought that was odd, because none of the victims were killed in Queens. She had called for a copy of Theissen’s autopsy report.” She pushed aside papers until she found the file. “We need to look at it again.”
Sean said, “Maybe she knew something we don’t.”
“I’m getting a headache,” Suzanne mumbled.
“No, seriously-if she pulled Theissen’s report, she may have thought there was something more to his death than an accident. If she knew something personal, or maybe it was the timing, or something we wouldn’t think to look at.”
“We can’t read her mind. We just need to do it all again. Talk to her assistant again. The professor. Rob Banker.” Suzanne started taking notes.
Sean understood why Suzanne was getting a headache. If they were dealing with different crimes, different cases, different suspects, until they knew what was connected and how, they’d be building scenarios that would get them nowhere.
But he had one idea that might help.
He called Lucy.
“How are you?” he asked.
“We couldn’t stop to see Hans,” she said. “Not that it would have helped. He’s still unconscious.”
“I’m really sorry.”
“I’m hiding in my room because I don’t want to face anyone yet. No one knows the truth. Everyone thinks it’s an accident, and I have to hold up that myth.”
“I’m planning on flying back tonight, though it might be late. I have a theory I need to run by you. What if Weber was an anomaly? What if her murder was because she was digging into Dominic Theissen’s accident?”
“Okay, I can see that, but where do Tony and Hans fit in?”
“I don’t know yet.”
“If connected, there’s two people involved.”
“I thought the same thing. But what if Weber was just a quasi-innocent bystander? We just found out that she was looking into Theissen’s accident. Patrick interviewed one of the gangbangers who pled to involuntary manslaughter and he can’t identify everyone involved in the brawl.”
“You’re thinking someone started it.”
“And if that’s the case, he was targeted. Is there any way to find out if Hans, Tony, Theissen, and Stokes worked any other cases together?”
“I don’t know. I’d have to ask Noah if there’s a way to search the data with agent parameters.”
“And more complex, I’d like a matrix of cases where any three of the four were involved, and any two of the four.”
“What might be simpler is to look at Weber’s articles and see what cases she wrote about, then compare that with the agent lists. If there is any-you’re talking about four cops who can’t talk anymore.”
“But that’s presupposing that she is a specific target, and I’m thinking she is a target because of something she learned. She was killed the same day she pulled all Theissen’s files. I think that’s the connection.”
“I’ll find out and call you tonight.”
“Thanks. And I’ll talk to Suzanne about it as well. Be careful, Lucy.”
“You, too.”
Sean hung up and frowned.
“What’s going on?” Suzanne asked.
“Lucy is worried about Hans,” he said. Then he ran his theory by Suzanne. “Can you think of a way to run it?”
“No, but our analysts might. Except I still have them working on the notes Tony and I found in Rosemary’s attic.”
“Maybe that’s exactly where we should start-find out what stories she wrote that quoted Theissen, then dig up those cases and find out who else was involved.”
“We’re looking for a needle in a haystack.”
“But we have one more thing coming our way-a suspect.”
“Rewind. Why do we have a suspect?”
“The unidentified guy in the subway tape. Patrick will be here in”-he looked at his watch-“twenty-five minutes. With the original security disk. And maybe we can round up that Bartz guy again. Because we know that Rosemary was writing a book about the Cinderella Strangler, but she was also looking into her friend Theissen’s death. She could have been killed for either reason.”
“Or something completely different,” Suzanne said.
“Watch the guy in the gray jacket and dark baseball cap,” Patrick told Sean, Suzanne and DeLucca thirty minutes later.
Patrick had come through with the original digital security disk from Theissen’s accident. “He’s already there when Theissen comes down the stairs. There he is,” Patrick said, pointing to a clean-cut man wearing slacks, a dark polo shirt, and baseball cap. He could be twenty or forty, the quality was poor and the images in black-and-white. The perspective was distorted because of the wide-angle camera.
The suspect was watching Theissen as he came down the stairs. A group of seven teenage boys walked behind him, a bit rowdy. This was the main station near Citi Field. According to the report, Theissen used the subway every day to commute to and from work, even though he left at different times. This was the end of his day.
“I watched the earlier footage,” Patrick said, “and Mr. Ball Cap was there for twelve minutes, coming in on one train and just standing. But during that time, several trains, local and express, went through the station. He didn’t get on any of them.”
As they watched, a group of four-two girls, two boys-got off one train and crossed the platform. The two groups eyed each other. It was crowded, the end of rush hour. Ball Cap moved between the two groups and said something to one of them, then bumped him. The kid responded by pushing him, but as Sean watched he realized that though Ball Cap had been pushed, the reaction was aimed at the kid on the other side of him.
What had Ball Cap said? Had he passed the blame for the verbal assault off on another person?
Theissen turned and kept his eye on the groups, and Ball Cap moved around the outside. There were two distinct situations-one was the pending brawl and the people drawn into it; everyone else moved to the perimeter, not wanting to get in the middle. Theissen stayed on the periphery, watching as a cop might to determine if the situation was getting out of control.
Ball Cap pushed Bascomb, the guy in prison for involuntary manslaughter, directly into Theissen. Theissen stumbled back. On the surface, Ball Cap appeared to be trying to get away from the fray.
“Did you see that?” Patrick said.
Everyone had missed it, so Patrick went back.
“Watch his foot,” Patrick said.
As the scene replayed, Sean kept his eyes on Ball Cap’s feet. After he pushed Bascomb into Theissen, Ball Cap moved to get away and in the process tripped Theissen as Theissen staggered back and tried to catch himself. The retired agent stumbled and Ball Cap used the crowd as a shield to slip away as Theissen fell onto the tracks.
“He kicked him,” DeLucca said. “When Theissen stumbled, Ball Cap tripped him, then kicked him using the crowd’s movement to hide his attack.”
“Exactly. The fight was a diversion he caused. At first glance, he looks like he was defending himself, but when you see the whole thing and focus on his individual actions, it’s deliberate,” Patrick said. “Now here’s the interesting thing-I talked to the transit cops and they said there was another incident very similar two days before. They don’t keep the tapes this long unless there’s an open investigation, but one of the officers said he remembered it because when he was called to the brawl he thought, Not again. Theissen was at the first brawl as well, and gave a witness report. What if Ball Cap attempted it once and failed, or he instigated the scuffle and figured out how to use the reactions to his advantage?”
“We can’t use this to ID the guy. He looks like half the white guys in New York,” Suzanne said.
“He’s very aware of the camera location,” Sean said.
“So we reopen the Theissen accident as a homicide,” DeLucca said. “I’ll talk to my chief.”
“I’ll talk to my boss as well,” Suzanne said. “If he was attacked because of his status as a retired federal agent, or because of a case he worked, we have jurisdiction. He’s one of ours.”