Donnie. We might as well have a look.”
Fiermonte hesitated,
thought about that for a moment, then nodded and said, “Okay. I’ll head south,
toward Canal.”
“I’ll take a walk
up to Houston.”
“If you find
something, give me a call. Otherwise, let’s meet back here in fifteen.”
“You got it.”
Chapter Five
North on Attorney, east on
Rivington for two blocks, then north again on Pitt, and Cat was facing Hamilton
Fish Park.
Fiermonte was
right — if Jeremy’s motorcycle had been parked there, its rider would have
easily lost any pursuer on foot between here and the crash site. And for the
rider to have passed the Delancey Bar and Grille, he would have had to enter
Delancey either by Clinton Street or one of the streets farther east, and the
distance between here and Clinton was even greater than the distance between
here and Delancey.
Cat stood on
the park’s perimeter for a few moments, looking around but seeing nothing. Just
as she had been in her dream, she was alone now. The few bars she had passed on
the way here were all closed up, but finding another set of witnesses wasn’t
really ever a hope.
Finally, she
began to backtrack, but instead of turning onto Attorney, she continued west on
Rivington, then a block later turned on Clinton. She was just north of Delancey,
and halfway down the block, when she saw something in the gutter on the east
side of the empty street.
She crossed and
approached it, but it wasn’t till she was a few feet away that she recognized
what the item was.
The clear
plastic visor from a motorcycle helmet.
And it wasn’t
till she was standing over it that she saw what appeared to be a small smudge
of dried blood on one of its edges. The edge was chipped, the visor itself
cracked.
She looked around
the immediate area but saw no sign of the helmet. Could this have been why the
shooter backtracked? Had he run up Clinton — as opposed to fleeing in any of
the other directions available to him — to retrieve the helmet to which this
visor belonged?
If so, why
would he have done that?
Standing by the
visor as if guarding it, Cat scanned the surrounding buildings, looking not at
the doors of each one but rather just above them. She didn’t have to look for too
long before she spotted exactly what she had been hoping to see all along.
A security
camera. One of the many — thousands probably, these days — scattered
throughout the city.
This particular
camera was mounted above the door of a preschool and aimed toward the sidewalk in
a way that gave Cat hope that where she was standing would be included in its
field of vision.
Cat was waiting in her Mustang
as Fiermonte and Morris, standing once again by the crashed motorcycle, spoke. A
wrecker arrived to tow the motorcycle to the impound lot, so they moved their
conversation to the sidewalk as the driver worked. Cat glanced at her watch. It
was almost half-past five, the sky along the eastern horizon rimmed with a steely
gray.
It took another
ten minutes before Fiermonte finally broke away from Morris and headed toward
Cat’s Mustang. He climbed into the passenger seat and pulled the door closed. The
windows were closed, had been as she waited, but with him in the seat beside
her now she suddenly felt just a little crowded. A little shut in. A trace
amount of panic rushed through her, and she craved a drink.
“He’s going to
contact the owner of the preschool and get a look at their surveillance tape,”
Fiermonte said. “I’ll let you know what it shows, if it shows anything.”
“And the
visor?”
“It’ll take a
few days to get the DNA from the blood.”
“You’ll need
something of Jeremy’s to match it to.”
“Morris will
get a warrant to search the apartment. I’m assuming there’ll be a brush with
some of Jeremy’s hair on it, or a used razor or something along those lines.”
“I could take
care of that,” she offered. “It’d be good for me to do something to help.”
“It’s
Fiermonte hesitated,
thought about that for a moment, then nodded and said, “Okay. I’ll head south,
toward Canal.”
“I’ll take a walk
up to Houston.”
“If you find
something, give me a call. Otherwise, let’s meet back here in fifteen.”
“You got it.”
Chapter Five
North on Attorney, east on
Rivington for two blocks, then north again on Pitt, and Cat was facing Hamilton
Fish Park.
Fiermonte was
right — if Jeremy’s motorcycle had been parked there, its rider would have
easily lost any pursuer on foot between here and the crash site. And for the
rider to have passed the Delancey Bar and Grille, he would have had to enter
Delancey either by Clinton Street or one of the streets farther east, and the
distance between here and Clinton was even greater than the distance between
here and Delancey.
Cat stood on
the park’s perimeter for a few moments, looking around but seeing nothing. Just
as she had been in her dream, she was alone now. The few bars she had passed on
the way here were all closed up, but finding another set of witnesses wasn’t
really ever a hope.
Finally, she
began to backtrack, but instead of turning onto Attorney, she continued west on
Rivington, then a block later turned on Clinton. She was just north of Delancey,
and halfway down the block, when she saw something in the gutter on the east
side of the empty street.
She crossed and
approached it, but it wasn’t till she was a few feet away that she recognized
what the item was.
The clear
plastic visor from a motorcycle helmet.
And it wasn’t
till she was standing over it that she saw what appeared to be a small smudge
of dried blood on one of its edges. The edge was chipped, the visor itself
cracked.
She looked around
the immediate area but saw no sign of the helmet. Could this have been why the
shooter backtracked? Had he run up Clinton — as opposed to fleeing in any of
the other directions available to him — to retrieve the helmet to which this
visor belonged?
If so, why
would he have done that?
Standing by the
visor as if guarding it, Cat scanned the surrounding buildings, looking not at
the doors of each one but rather just above them. She didn’t have to look for too
long before she spotted exactly what she had been hoping to see all along.
A security
camera. One of the many — thousands probably, these days — scattered
throughout the city.
This particular
camera was mounted above the door of a preschool and aimed toward the sidewalk in
a way that gave Cat hope that where she was standing would be included in its
field of vision.
Cat was waiting in her Mustang
as Fiermonte and Morris, standing once again by the crashed motorcycle, spoke. A
wrecker arrived to tow the motorcycle to the impound lot, so they moved their
conversation to the sidewalk as the driver worked. Cat glanced at her watch. It
was almost half-past five, the sky along the eastern horizon rimmed with a steely
gray.
It took another
ten minutes before Fiermonte finally broke away from Morris and headed toward
Cat’s Mustang. He climbed into the passenger seat and pulled the door closed. The
windows were closed, had been as she waited, but with him in the seat beside
her now she suddenly felt just a little crowded. A little shut in. A trace
amount of panic rushed through her, and she craved a drink.
“He’s going to
contact the owner of the preschool and get a look at their surveillance tape,”
Fiermonte said. “I’ll let you know what it shows, if it shows anything.”
“And the
visor?”
“It’ll take a
few days to get the DNA from the blood.”
“You’ll need
something of Jeremy’s to match it to.”
“Morris will
get a warrant to search the apartment. I’m assuming there’ll be a brush with
some of Jeremy’s hair on it, or a used razor or something along those lines.”
“I could take
care of that,” she offered. “It’d be good for me to do something to help.”
“It’s
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