Desperate Measures

59

They got into Dino’s car and headed downtown on Lexington Avenue. Stone looked at his watch. “You want some leftovers for dinner at my house?”

“Sure,” Dino replied.

“It’s weird, but I have a strange feeling of letdown.”

“Yeah, I get that sometimes,” Dino replied, “when a case is cleared.”

“Are you having any luck from your surveillance of Mike Adams?”

Dino shrugged. “Well, we were a little slow off the mark on that one,” he said. “But now that we’ve got Donald Trask off our hands, we can make some manpower available.”

“What’s going to happen to Calabrese?”

“That’s up to the DA, but if he’s charged with murder, he’ll probably get off.”

“You think?”

“The union will weigh in and get him a hotshot attorney. He’ll claim he was making an arrest of an armed suspect, who drew a weapon. Which is true, except that Muldoon and I saw how he handled it.”

“I, as well.”

“You don’t count.”

“Thanks a lot.”

“Calabrese will be off the force soon, though. You can count on that. Muldoon found an envelope in his partner’s pocket with Trask’s old Greenwich address on it, containing eighteen hundred dollars and change. He’s been tipping Trask along the way. That’s why Donald-boy was so hard to nail.”

“So Calabrese nailed him for you.”

“As a way of covering his ass. Should I be grateful?”

“Well, you cleared a case, and you’ll have a bad cop off the force. That’s not a bad day.”

“I guess not,” Dino said, brightening.

Suddenly Stone said, “Driver, pull over!”

“What for?” Dino asked.

“We just passed the hotel,” Stone said, “and there was a light on at the back of the lobby. Why don’t we check it out?”

“Oh, what the hell,” Dino said. “Back it up, Tim.”

Tim reversed and set them down in front of the hotel.

“No work light in the lobby,” Dino said, peering through a door.

“Looks like it’s coming from the manager’s office,” Stone said.

Dino started trying doors and found one unlocked. He opened it and stood back. “After you,” he said, drawing his weapon.

Stone drew his own. “With your permission, Commissioner.”

“Granted,” Dino said.

They moved quietly into the lobby and toward the rear, from which chamber music was coming. They stopped on either side of the manager’s office door, and Dino pointed to himself.

Stone nodded and made an ushering motion with his free hand.

Dino peered around the doorjamb, then looked back at Stone and grinned.

Stone made the ushering motion again.

Dino stepped inside the office, weapon pointed, and said, “Freeze!”

Stone stepped inside behind Dino and peered over his shoulder at the figure behind the desk: black coveralls and a hood with holes for the eyes.

“How nice to see you,” Stone said to the figure.

“In fact,” Dino said, “let’s see some more of you. Take off the hood.”

The figure didn’t move.

“Stone,” Dino said, “you do the honors while I cover you.”

“I’d be delighted,” Stone said.

“I hope he twitches,” Dino said, “because I’d rather shoot him than arrest him.”

“I know the feeling,” Stone replied. He walked clear of Dino and stayed near the wall, out of reach of the black figure, until he was behind the man. Stone frisked him thoroughly and found a small 9mm pistol tucked into a holster at the small of his back. He also found a flat, plastic box in the man’s right hip pocket and he laid it on the desk, then stuck his gun in a pocket. He took hold of a wrist and brought it up between the man’s shoulder blades and bent him over the desk. Finally, he reached up and placed a palm on top of the hooded head, grabbed a handful of fabric, and yanked.

“Well,” Dino said, “look who we have here.” He handed Stone his handcuffs and Stone applied them, the first time in years he had cuffed somebody. He stood the man up and looked at his face. “Good evening, Mike,” he said.

Mike remained quiet.

Stone opened the plastic box he had removed and found a syringe and a vial of clear fluid inside, set into a foam rubber bed. “What’s this, Mike?”

Mike still said nothing.

“Dino,” Stone said, “I think the perp is choosing to remain silent, as is his constitutional right.”

Dino read him his rights anyway, then he made the call for a patrol car.

Stone had a look around the office and opened the closet door. Behind a few hanging garments he could see an exposed corner of a sheet of drywall. He gave it a tug, and it came free. “Dino,” he said, “closet behind a closet. That’s where the costume was.”

“Oh, good,” Dino said.

A siren could be heard approaching, and a minute later a voice from the lobby yelled, “Commissioner?”

“Back here,” Dino yelled back, and two uniforms appeared in the doorway. “Take him in and book him on one count of first-degree murder.”

“Only one count?” Stone asked.

“We’ll let the DA sort that out.”

The cops escorted Mike out of the office and the building.

“Well,” Stone said, “I think that somewhere in this building is probably a forgotten room that Mike has equipped for his purposes.”

“So, we’ll charge him with bad interior decorating?”

“It’s better than finding a corpse in a garbage bag on Lexington Avenue,” Stone said.

“I’ll grant you that,” Dino said, taking out his phone. “We’d better get a search started.” He started issuing orders.

A few minutes later they were back in Dino’s car. “I’ll drop you at home,” Dino said, “but I won’t stay for the leftovers. I’m tired.”

Stone realized that he was tired, too.