"And yet as nice as you were, you and Horton are still not on a first-name basis."
She shrugged. "Okay, I may have pushed his b.u.t.tons a little too hard, but you have to admit he knows something."
"He knows a lot more than something," I said. "Did you see all that equipment-boxes of phones, cords, cable, wiring, installer tools? Maybe he really is sentimental about all that old c.r.a.p, but there was more in those boxes than phone nostalgia."
"Like what?"
"Like when I dug my hand into that one box and pulled out the Princess phone, I saw a piece of equipment that didn"t come from Ma Bell or any phone company he ever worked for," I said. "It was made by Shenzhen Adika, and they don"t make cute little pink telephones for teenagers. They"re in China, cranking out high-tech audio and video surveillance systems you can buy at any one of those spy shop websites."
"Son of a b.i.t.c.h," Kylie said. "He was bugging Catt"s apartment?"
"Think about it. He"s positive that Catt murdered his wife. How hard would it be for a guy like LaFleur who installed phones all his life to wire Catt"s apartment, hoping he could pick up something that would connect Catt to Hattie"s murder?"
"If you"re right, we should search Catt"s apartment," Kylie said. "We wouldn"t even need a warrant. It"s still sealed. It"s part of the ongoing investigation."
"We can get in there easy enough," I said, "but we won"t find anything. Whatever LaFleur put in there, he disa.s.sembled as soon as Catt disappeared. It"s gone, and even if we did find a bug in that apartment, we can"t prove LaFleur installed it, and we certainly can"t get him to talk."
"Do you think he knows the guy-or the guys-who killed Catt?" Kylie said.
"No, but he probably could help us find out who did," I said.
"But he won"t," Kylie said. "As far as he"s concerned, the Hazmat Killer is every bit as heroic as Bernie Goetz."
"He"s not alone," I said. "A lot of people in this city are rooting for Hazmat. He-they-who knows how many there are? All people know is that he"s killing sc.u.mbags who got away with murder. h.e.l.l...they"ve even given him a fan page on Facebook. They love him."
"Then they sure as h.e.l.l are going to hate us," Kylie said. "Because we"re the ones who are going to bring him down."
That"s the thing about Kylie. Nothing rattles her confidence. Certainly not a crusty old codger like Horton LaFleur.
Chapter 34.
"Where to next?" I said, getting behind the wheel of the Interceptor.
"The two choices are at opposite ends of Manhattan," Kylie said. "Victim number one was Alex Kang-Chinatown. Or number three, Antoine Tinsdale-Harlem. Your call."
"Wherever we wind up, we"re going to be closing in on lunch, and as much as I love Marcus Samuelsson"s Red Rooster up in Harlem, I haven"t had good dim sum since the Year of the Monkey."
"Done deal," Kylie said, giving me a thumbs-up.
"Whoever said police work was difficult?" I said, heading toward the FDR Drive.
"Speaking of monkeys, Chinatown is Donovan and Boyle"s regular beat," Kylie said. "They"ve been working out of the Five for years. You would think that as sloppy as their reports were, their file on Kang would be the one they"d get right. But according to their notes, they only talked to one guy."
"I saw that. They probably talked to more, but they only named one in their report. Those two coppers are not big on paperwork."
"That would just mean they"re lazy," Kylie said. "But did you see the name of the person they interviewed?"
I laughed. "Yeah, I did."
"It"s not funny, Zach. They obviously didn"t give a s.h.i.t, and they probably never thought someone else would be taking over the case."
"I"ll take the drive down to the Brooklyn Bridge exit," I said. "Give me the exact address in Chinatown."
"I can give you what they wrote in their report," she said. "Who knows if those n.u.m.b.n.u.t.s got it right? All they wrote down was "CP Emperors gang HQ-Fifty-Eight Mulberry.""
"And remind me again," I said, busting her chops. "What"s the name of the guy they interviewed?"
She opened one of the files and pretended to look through it. "Let"s see," she said, playing along and milking the situation for all it was worth. "Oh, here it is. According to their flawless record keeping, Detectives Donovan and Boyle interviewed a g.a.n.g.b.a.n.ger named John Doe."
Chapter 35.
The CP Emperors headquarters was on the ground floor of a squat redbrick building in the heart of the Chinese community. It looked relatively innocuous, but clearly it was a fortress. The windows were barred, a rolled-up metal security gate spanned the front, and the entry door was solid steel. The only thing missing was a moat.
Kylie pounded on the front door. "NYPD," she yelled. Then she turned to me. "I think we should identify ourselves, just in case they can"t figure out who the white couple pulling up to their building in an unmarked cop car is."
The door opened, and a sallow-faced Chinese g.a.n.g.b.a.n.ger blocked our path. He was dressed in black, which is normally a slimming color, but it did nothing to hide his three hundred pounds. He filled the doorway.
"NYPD," I repeated. "Who"s in charge?"
"You got a warrant?"
"Why would we need a warrant? We"re just here to talk."
"We got nothing to talk about. Now get the f.u.c.k out of here."
And then we heard it coming from the other side of the door. Loud, clear, and unmistakable. Click. Clack. The distinct sound of someone racking the slide of a gun, most likely a semiautomatic.
Kylie didn"t hesitate. She reached behind her right hip and drew her Glock. "Down on the floor!" she yelled. She didn"t wait for a response.
She jerked her right foot straight between Fat Boy"s legs and hit paydirt. He grabbed his b.a.l.l.s, doubled over, and dropped like a canary in a coal mine.
I had no idea how many CP Emperors were in there, and I had no interest in finding out. I drew my gun and yelled from behind the door, "NYPD! Weapons down. Weapons down-now!"
I braced for the first shot to be fired and hoped the door was thick enough.
"Bulls.h.i.t," said a voice from the other side. "You got no right to pull guns on us."
"Don"t tell us what we can"t do," Kylie yelled back. "As soon as that a.s.shole racked the slide on that semi, we stopped needing a warrant. Exigent circ.u.mstances. Toss them. Now."
"All right, all right." I heard the gun slide across the floor. Then another. "I"m coming to the door. Move your fat a.s.s, Rupert."
Still holding his crotch, the big guy slid out of the way, and a tall, long-haired Asian kid opened the door wide. He was about twenty-two, with a wispy mustache and a permanent scowl on his face.
"You in charge?" I asked.
"Most of the time," he said. "Except right now it looks like you"re in charge."
"What"s your name?" I said.
"John Doe," he said without disturbing the scowl.
"We already have plenty of guys named John Doe in the morgue waiting to be identified," I said. "How about your real name."
"John Dho," he repeated. "D-h-o. You"re in Chinatown, dude."
So it turned out that Donovan and Boyle actually did know who they talked to. They just couldn"t spell.
"This is a house of mourning. What do you want?"
"We understand, and we"re sorry for your loss, but we still need to talk. Here or at the precinct?" I said.
"You can come in," Dho said. "The b.i.t.c.h stays outside."
"The b.i.t.c.h either comes in," Kylie said, "or she marches you out the door and parades you down Mulberry, screaming at you the whole way until we get to our car, which we parked two blocks from here."
"Bulls.h.i.t. You"re parked across the street."
"Then I"d have to march you back. I don"t give a s.h.i.t about your "No girls allowed in the clubhouse" rules. I yelled "NYPD," and somebody in here locked and loaded a semi-which I"m sure you have a license for."
He stepped aside and let us in. "What do you want here?"
"We"re looking for the person who killed Alex Kang," I said.
Dho was smoking a hand-rolled cigarette that smelled like the inside of a stable. He blew a lungful of smoke our way. "So are we," he said, "but we can do it without your help."
"Let"s talk about it," I said.
The room was dimly lit and spa.r.s.ely furnished. Two tumbledown sofas, a smattering of Formica-topped tables, and a mismatched a.s.sortment of folding chairs. One corner at the far end was a makeshift kitchen.
"Nice digs," Kylie said. "Clearly fit for an emperor."
"Tell us about the day Alex went missing," I said.
"He was hanging here till about eleven in the morning. He left to go visit his grandmother-she was in Beekman Downtown Hospital. When he didn"t come back by two, we started calling him. No answer. I went to the hospital. His mother was there. She said he never came. We checked his apartment, all his usual hangouts-nothing. Six days later, he shows up in a Hazmat suit on a bench in the Ca.n.a.l Street subway station. I already told all this to those two doughnut commandos."
"Who are we talking about?" I said.
"Defective Donovan and Defective Boyle. They ha.s.sle the s.h.i.t out of us all the time. Even when we"re the victims."
"So you knew Donovan and Boyle before Alex was killed."
"Yeah, we all know them. They work this area. "Youth Patrol.""
"Did they have a beef with Alex?" Kylie asked.
Dho looked at her as though she were clueless. "They"re racists. They hate all the CPEs-only they s.h.i.t on Alex even more because he was in charge. Do you really think those two cops are looking for the person who killed Alex?"
"I don"t know about them, but I can promise you that these two cops really are looking for the killer. So as long as we"re all on the same side, how"s your investigation going?"
"It"s none of the other gangs," Dho said.
"Are you sure?" Kylie said, asking the same question that got her in trouble with LaFleur.
Dho put his palms together and bowed his head. "Most sure, Honorable Detective. Our investigation very thorough," he said, purposely omitting the verb-a dead-on imitation of Charlie Chan, the cla.s.sic Asian stereotype churned out by the Hollywood studios in the thirties and forties.
He stood up and dropped the act. "You cops are all full of s.h.i.t," he said, the scowl firmly back in place. "When this Hazmat a.s.shole killed Alex, you send in Detectives Dumb and Dumber. But now that he whacked some rich white lady, you"re all over it like-how you round eyes say?-"white on rice." You want to know who killed my best friend, Alex Kang? There"s some freaky guy out there who thinks he"s some kind of f.u.c.king savior, and he"s doing his part to make this city a safer place to live. Here, you can read all about it in today"s paper."
There was a newspaper on the table. He picked it up and shoved it toward me.
It was all in Chinese. The only thing I could understand was the picture of Evelyn Parker-Steele on the front page.
Chapter 36.
"I had cause to draw my weapon," Kylie said as soon as we were back outside. "As soon as I heard that semi-"
"Hey, no arguments from me," I said. "I was right behind you. I didn"t agree with the way you handled Damon Parker this morning, but kicking Odd Job in the b.a.l.l.s was spot-on. Nice work, partner."
She looked surprised. "Thanks."
"You really are a b.i.t.c.h," I said. "And I mean that in the nicest possible way."
We stood outside the building, absorbing the unique sights, smells, and sounds of Chinatown-this little enclave that is home to some and a tourist destination for many.
"I don"t get it," Kylie said. "Alex Kang walks out of here at eleven o"clock in the morning. How does he just disappear? It"s a little after eleven now, and look-there are people all over the street, cars are going in and out of the garage next door, somebody had to see something."