Tick Tock

Chapter 66

BEYOND ENTHUSED FOR THE FIRST TIME since the case began, I sped with Emily back to the squad room. When we turned the corner, the elevator door at the end of the hallway opened.

A wiry male uniform from the HQ security detail downstairs exited with a tall, white woman and a squat Hispanic woman in tow. Both women looked tired and lost, completely grim-faced. I didn't have to read their visitor badges to know they were Mrs. Cavuto and Mrs. Morales.

Emily ushered them into one of the interview rooms as I ran and poked my head into my boss's office.

"Computer Crimes just pulled a lead off a serial killer site that's making John Jay look even better," I called to her. "Some freak let it be known that some other rich freak who liked to collect sick, bloody crime-related shit was working there at some point but got fired. No name yet, but we're about to sit down with the mothers of the two victims to see if they can fill us in."

"What are you waiting for?" Miriam said, lifting her phone. "Get into that interview room and start pumping. I'll tell Brown to start scouring the staff rolls for people who got canned."

I turned off my phone as I entered the interview room, where Emily sat with the distraught mothers. Attractive, stylish, blond Mrs. Cavuto looked like she was taking the loss of her four-year-old daughter fairly well until you picked up on her extremely glassy eyes and sloppily applied makeup. Stocky, in a striped MTA uniform shirt, Mrs. Morales just looked like she wanted to hit someone.

As I sat, I could see from Emily's face that something very good was up.

"Mrs. Morales, please tell my partner what you just told me," Emily said.

"Alicia and I actually know each other," Mrs. Morales said, patting Mrs. Cavuto on the elbow. "Back in the nineties, we took a night class together at John Jay."

I shot Emily a look, squashing the urge to give her a high five. They'd been in the same class! This really was the connection we'd been gunning for! We'd struck absolute gold!

"Not only that, but our teacher was a sick, slimy weirdo. His name was Berger. Professor Berger."

"Berger," I said. "Are you sure?"

"Positive," Mrs. Morales said, nodding.

"It's true," Mrs. Cavuto said, quietly looking up at me with her empty blue eyes.

I thought of something then.

"His name wasn't Lawrence, was it? Lawrence Berger?" I asked.

"Yes," Mrs. Morales said, nodding vehemently. "That was it. Lawrence Berger."

"Excuse me one second," I said, popping out the door and poking my head back into Miriam's office.

"The lid just ripped off this thing. We got our Lawrence! Tell Brown to look for Berger. Lawrence Berger. He was a professor at John Jay."

I rushed back into the interview room. "I can't tell you how important the info you just gave to us is," I said. "Do you have any idea why Berger would do something like this? Hurt your families?"

"It's because we got the twisted son of a bitch fired. He got canned 'cause we objected that he was getting his rocks off," Mrs. Morales yelled, standing up.

"Come again?" Emily said.

"He set up a secret video camera in the ladies' room next to the class," Mrs. Cavuto said. She took a tissue out of the box on the table and began shredding it.

"Exactly," Mrs. Morales said. "There were strange noises from time to time in the ladies' room, and finally one day in the cafeteria between classes, Alicia and I and a woman named Stephanie put our heads together and realized we had all heard it. We took it to the administration. A week later, Berger was investigated, found out, and ultimately fired."

"Wait. What about Stephanie? Stephanie Brill, I think it was. Where is she?" Mrs. Cavuto said. "Did he go after Stephanie's family? She signed the complaint as well."

"Stephanie Brill died in the recent bombing at Grand Central," Emily said.

"He comes up to my neighborhood and stabs my daughter?" Mrs. Morales said, staring at us in disgust. "He didn't even have the cojones to come after me?"

"What was the name of this class?" I said.

"Abnormal Psychology," Mrs. Cavuto said, meticulously tearing her tissue.

There was a knock, and my boss threw open the door and gestured for me to come with her.

"This is it, Mike," Miriam said, handing me a printout. "We've got an address on Lawrence Berger. You're heading uptown, the Upper East Side. The son of a bitch lives on Fifth Avenue."