“I think so. Jazz mentioned one once. Some woman in England, I think. Sam could be a serial killer.”
“Watch it. That’s the mother of my illegitimate children you’re talking about.”
“Howie.”
“But really—what are the odds of a brother and sister serial-killing tag team?”
“Same parents. Same genetics. Same environment. I don’t know the odds, but it’s not impossible.”
“How do we find out? Do we just ask her?”
“Not a chance. There’s got to be some way to find out without confronting her directly.”
“I’ll ask Gramma,” Howie joked.
“Hell, what if she’s involved? I was thinking that before—what if she’s been faking all this Alzheimer’s crap, hiding in plain sight?”
“No way, Connie. Uh-uh. You haven’t been around her as much as I have. Trust me—the woman’s nuts. And not in the way you mean. Not in like an evil mastermind–slash–Hannibal Lecter kind of way. She’s completely off her rocker. Sometimes Jazz has to change her adult diaper, for God’s sake. You think she’s gonna go through that just to keep up a cover story?”
They sat in silent thought in the car, staring at each other until a horn honking from behind them brought them out of their reverie.
“Maybe I should stay here….” Connie said hesitantly, almost unwillingly.
“No. Go to New York. Figure out this bell thing. Get the other clue. This stuff is all connected. What’s happening in New York is connected to what’s happening here. You work the New York angle with Jazz and I’ll figure out what’s going on here.”
“Are you sure?” She was worried, that much was obvious. Howie didn’t blame her; he was worried, too. He sort of liked being alive. He also thought Sam was hot and it would really suck if she turned out to be crazy like her brother.
“Sure? No. But go.” He popped her lock and the horn from behind blared again. “You better get going. And for God’s sake, be careful! There’s crazy-bad juju going down.”
“Howie…”
“I’m serious, for once. Now go. It’ll be all right. I’m not as fragile as I look.”
“I know. That’s the problem—you’re more fragile.”
“This is true.” He leaned over impulsively and kissed her cheek. “Get out of here. You have a flight to catch.”
Once she was through security, Connie had to run for her plane, boarding right before the door closed. She apologized to her row mates and slid into her middle seat.
Was she doing the right thing? She had left Howie—Howie!—completely unprotected, with Gramma, who was crazy enough for any three people, and Samantha, who quite possibly could be crazy, too. Even though he’d encouraged her to go, was it the right thing to do?
She dug into her purse. Howie was right. Time to set aside pride (no matter how righteous) and anger (ditto) and call Jazz. See what he thought. Didn’t it make more sense for him to go to JFK, after all? Sure, it would be a distraction from the Hat-Dog Killer, but Howie was right—these cases were interconnected. It was all interconnected, as cables stretched from the past to the present, from Lobo’s Nod to New York, entangling and binding all of them: Jazz, Billy, Sam, Howie, the Hat-Dog Killer, the Impressionist, Connie herself, the victims…. She couldn’t untangle the knots just yet and see where they’d come from, but she knew they were all connected.
“Miss, no electronic devices,” a flight attendant said just as Connie hit the Call button under Jazz’s name.
“But—”
“Off, please. Now.” Said with a grim little smile that seemed to broadcast Try me, sister.
Connie ended the call before the first ring, then made a show of shutting down her phone. Now she had the entire flight to think about how she might have sent Howie to his death.
And how she might be voluntarily winging her way to her own.
By five that evening, Jazz’s hotel room looked like an evidence locker had exploded inside a math classroom.
But he had the answer. It all worked out.
He stared at the new app on his phone, then shifted over to the sheet of paper covered with his most recent scribbles. Yeah. Yeah, it all made sense.
Crazy sense. But sense nonetheless. Somehow, it was fitting that Billy and G. William had said the things that made it all click for him.
Hughes had warned him away from the precinct, but this was too big.
He gathered up a few critical pieces of paper, double-checked his phone, then grabbed Belsamo’s disposable cell before heading out the door.
CHAPTER 44
The 76th Precinct was still mobbed by press. Jazz gnawed on his bottom lip, watching from half a block away. He had no choice but to plunge right in.
For a disguise, he turned up the collar of his coat and pulled his hat down low over his forehead, then slipped on his cheap sunglasses. He pushed into the throng, eyes down, jostling reporters out of the way. Two NYPD uniforms stood at the front door, keeping it clear for civilians, and they ushered him into the precinct without realizing who he was.
Morales stood just inside the front door, leaning against the wall as she swapped a high-heeled shoe for a sturdier sneaker. She recognized Jazz as he whipped off the hat and glasses. “Feeling better?” she asked, only slightly surprised to see him.
“What? Oh, yeah. Much better.” He scanned the entryway. “Got a minute?”
“Headed out,” she said, putting on the other sneaker and dropping her heels into a bag. “Field office wants a report in person, and you don’t keep the field office waiting. First rule of the FBI.”
“But—”
“First rule,” she said again, and breezed out the door.
Jazz ground his teeth together. Should he follow her? She was the one he should convince now, because there was no way Hughes would listen—
“Dent!”
Speaking of Hughes…
Jazz grinned apologetically in Hughes’s direction as the detective bulled through the lobby toward him. “Sorry! I was just leaving.” Yeah, he’d go after Morales and—
“You’re not going anywhere.” To prove it, Hughes clamped a powerful grip on Jazz’s wrist. Jazz tamped down his first reaction, to break the grip in the most painful way possible. Crippling an NYPD detective wouldn’t solve this case any sooner.
“I can go,” Jazz whispered. “Let me—”
“I told you to stay away from here.” Hughes dragged Jazz unwillingly into a smallish office. “Everyone thinks you have food poisoning. And I still haven’t figured out what to do about you after last night.”
Jazz calculated the odds of being able to persuade Hughes that he’d figured out the Hat-Dog Killer before the pissed-off cop tossed him out of the precinct. Hit him with something he won’t expect.
“Belsamo’s on Atlantic,” Jazz said, and Hughes released him immediately. He was in control right now, whether Hughes liked it or not. “There’s an Atlantic Avenue around here, right?”
If Hughes’s reaction weren’t so predictable, it would have been fascinating to watch as he visibly deflated, his face realigning from righteous anger to incredulous shock. “How do you do that?” It was as close to a whine as Jazz could imagine coming from the detective. “He’s been walking up and down Atlantic Avenue all day. Not doing anything illegal. Just walking from the river to over by Flatbush, over and over. Like he’s casing the whole avenue.”
“Not the whole avenue,” Jazz said. “He’s looking for his next dump site.”
It was raw, bloody meat to a starving wolf, and Hughes could do nothing but bite into it. “So it’s him? He’s definitely the Hat-Dog Killer?”
Jazz considered taking mercy on Hughes and just spilling it all at once. But… nah. Where was the fun in that?
“He’s not the Hat-Dog Killer,” Jazz said with authority, and watched the shock return to Hughes’s face, along with a soul-crushing distress.
Jazz gave it a couple of seconds to sink in, then said, “He’s the Dog Killer.”