The Devils Teardrop by Jeffery Deaver Page B

stopped himself. Maybe afraid that he’d scare him off.
    “Artie let me up,” Parker Kincaid said. The Bureau’s employee entrance night guard. “He still remembers me. After all these years.”
    This was a very different image of Kincaid, Lukas thought. He’d seemed frumpy at his house. It hadn’t helped that he’d been wearing some god-awful sweater and baggy slacks. The gray crew-neck sweater he wore now, over a black shirt, seemed much more him .
    “Mr. Kincaid,” Lukas said, nodding a greeting. “Don’t bother with what?”
    “Graphoanalysis. You can’t analyze personality from handwriting.”
    She was put off by his peremptory tone. “I thought a lot of people do it.”
    “People read tarot cards too and talk to their dear departed. It’s bogus.”
    “I’ve heard it can be helpful,” she persisted.
    “Waste of time,” he said matter-of-factly. “We’ll concentrate on other things.”
    “Well. All right.” Lukas pledged that she’d try not to dislike him too much.
    Cage said, “Hey, Parker, you know Tobe Geller? Doubling as our computer and communications man tonight. We tracked him down on his way to a ski trip in Vermont.”
    “It was New Hampshire,” the trim agent corrected, offering Kincaid one of his ready grins. “For holiday pay I’ll do anything. Even break a date. Hi, Parker. I heard about you.”
    They shook hands.
    Cage nodded to another desk. “This’s C. P. Ardell. He’s from the D.C. field office. Nobody knows what C. P. stands for but that’s what he goes by. I don’t think even he knows.”
    “Did a while ago,” C. P. said laconically.
    “And this is Len Hardy. He’s our District P.D. liaison.”
    “Nice to meet you, sir,” the detective said.
    Kincaid shook his hand. “Don’t really need the ‘sir.’”
    “Sure.”
    “You Forensic? Investigative?” Kincaid asked him.
    Hardy seemed embarrassed as he said, “Actually I’m Research and Statistical. Everybody else was out in the field so I got elected to liaise.”
    “Where’s the note?” he asked Lukas. “I mean, the original?”
    “In Identification. I wanted to see if we could raise a few more prints.”
    Kincaid frowned but before he could say anything Lukas added, “I told them to use the laser only. No ninhydrin.”
    His eyebrows lifted. “Good . . . you’ve worked in forensics?”
    She had a sense that, even though she was right about not using the chemical, he was challenging her. “I remember from the Academy,” she told him coolly and picked up the phone.
    “What’s that?” Hardy asked. “Nin . . .”
    As she punched in a number Lukas said, “Ninhydrin’s what you usually use to image fingerprints on paper.”
    “But,” Kincaid finished her thought, “it ruins indented writing. Never use it on suspect documents.”
    Lukas continued to make her phone call—to ID. The tech told her that there were no other prints on the document and that a runner would bring the note up to the Crisis Center stat. She relayed this to the team.
    Kincaid nodded.
    “Why’d you change your mind?” Cage asked him. “About coming here?”
    He was silent for a moment. “You know those children you mentioned? The ones injured in the subway? One of them died.”
    With a solemnity that matched his, Lukas said, “LaVelle Williams. I heard.”
    He turned to Cage. “I’m here on one condition. Nobody except the immediate task force knows I’m involved. If there’s a leak and my name gets out, whatever stage the investigation’s in, I walk. And I deny I even know you people.”
    Lukas said, “If that’s what you want, Mr. Kincaid, but—”
    “Parker.”
    Cage said, “You got it. Can we ask why?”
    “My children.”
    “If you’re worried about security we can have a car put on your house. As many agents as you—”
    “I’m worried about my ex-wife.”
    Lukas gave him a quizzical glance.
    Kincaid said, “I’ve had custody of my children since my wife and I got divorced four years