The Skin Collector Read online

  He'd sketched Lovely Girl a thousand times.

  The pencil now drooped in his hand and he left a sketch of a branch half-finished, tossing the pad aside.

  Lovely Girl ...

  He couldn't think of her without hearing his uncle's somber voice, the deep baritone: 'Billy. There's something I have to tell you.' His uncle had gripped him by the shoulders and looked down into his eyes. 'Something's happened.'

  And, with those simple, horrific words, he'd learned she was gone.

  Billy's parents too were gone - though their deaths had been years ago and he'd come to some terms with the loss.

  Lovely Girl's? No, never.

  She was going to be his companion forever. She was going to be his wife, the mother of his children. She was going to be the one to save him from the past, from all the bad, from the Oleander Room.

  Gone, just like that.

  But today he wasn't thinking so much of the terrible news, wasn't thinking of the unfairness of what had happened, though what had happened was unfair.

  And he wasn't thinking of the cruelty, though what had happened was cruel.

  No, at the moment, having just finished inking Chloe, Billy was thinking that he was on the road to the end of pain.

  The Modification was under way.

  Billy sat at the rickety table in the kitchen area of the basement apartment and removed from his shirt pocket the pages of the book he'd found that morning.

  He'd found out about the volume weeks ago and knew he needed a copy to complete his planning for the Modification. It was out of print, though he'd found a few copies he could buy online through secondhand-book sellers. But he couldn't very well order one with a credit card and have it shipped to his home. So Billy had been searching through used-book shops and libraries. There were two copies in the New York Public Library but they weren't where they should have been in the stacks, in either the Mid-Manhattan branch or a satellite branch in Queens.

  But he'd tried once more, earlier today, returning on a whim to the library on Fifth Avenue.

  And there it was, reshelved and Dewey Decimaled into place. He'd pulled the book down from the shelf and stood in the shadows, skimming.

  Badly written, he'd noted from his brief read in the stacks. An absurdly sensational cover in black, white, red. Both the style and the graphics helped explain the out-of-print status. But what the book contained? Just what he needed, filling in portions of the plan the way flats or round shader needles filled in the space between the outlines of a tattoo.

  Billy had worried about getting the book out of the library - he couldn't check it out, of course. And there'd been security cameras near the photocopiers. In the end he'd decided to slice out the chapter he wanted with a razor blade. He'd cut deep and carefully before hiding the book away so no one else could find it. He knew that the book itself probably contained a chip in the spine that would have set off the alarm at the front doors if he'd tried to walk out with the entire thing. Still, he'd flipped through all the pages he'd stolen, one by one, to search for a second chip. There'd been none and he'd walked out of the library without a blare of alarms.

  Now he was eager to study the pages in depth, to help with the rest of the plans for the Modification. But as he spread them out before him, he frowned. What was this? The first page was damaged, the corner torn off. But he was sure that he'd extracted all of them intact from the spine without any tearing. Then he glanced at his shirt breast pocket and noted it too was torn. He remembered that Chloe'd ripped his coveralls when she'd fought back. That's what had happened. She'd torn both the clothing and the page.

  But the damage wasn't too bad though and only a small portion was missing. He now read carefully. Once, twice. The third time he took notes and tucked them into the Commandments.

  Helpful. Good. Real helpful.

  Setting the pages aside, he answered some texts, received some. Staying in touch with the outside world.

  Now it was cleaning time.

  No one appreciates germs, bacteria and viruses more than a skin artist. Billy wasn't the least concerned about infecting his victims - that was, really, the whole point of the Modification - but he was very concerned about infecting himself, with whatever tainted the blood of his clients and, in particular, with the wonderful substances he was using in place of ink.

  He walked to the sink and unzipped his backpack. Pulling on thick gloves, he took the American Eagle tattoo machine to the sink and dismantled it. He drained the tubes of liquid and washed them in two separate gallon buckets of water, rinsing them several times and drying them with a Conair. The water he poured into a hole he'd cut in the floor, letting it soak into the earth beneath the building. He didn't want to flush or pour the water down the drain. That little matter of evidence, once again.

  This bath was just the start, however. He cleaned each piece of the machine with alcohol (which sanitizes only; it doesn't sterilize). He placed the parts in an ultrasonic bath of disinfectants. After that he sealed them in bags and popped them into the autoclave - a sterilization oven. Normally needles are disposed of but these were very special ones and hard to come by. He autoclaved these too.

  Of course, only part of this was sanitizing to protect himself from poisons and infection. There was a second reason as well: What better way to sever any link between you and your victims than to burn it away at 130 degrees Celsius?

  Might even make hash of your 'dust' theory, don't you think, Monsieur Locard?

  CHAPTER 8

  Lincoln Rhyme was waiting impatiently.

  He asked Thom, 'And Amelia?'

  The aide hung up the landline. 'I can't get through.'

  'Goddamn it. What do you mean you can't get through? Which hospital?'

  'Manhattan General.'

  'Call them again.'

  'I just did. I can't get through to the main line. There're some problems.'

  'That's ridiculous. It's a hospital. Call nine one one.'

  'You can't call emergency to find out the status of a patient.'

  'I'll call.'

  But just then the front door buzzer sounded. Rhyme bluntly ordered Thom to 'answer the damn bell' and a moment later he heard footsteps in the front hall.

  Two crime scene officers, the ones who'd assisted Sachs at the Chez Nord boutique homicide, entered the parlor, carrying large milk crates, filled with evidence bags - both plastic and paper. Rhyme knew the woman, Detective Jean Eagleston, who nodded a greeting, which he acknowledged a nod. The other officer, a large body-build of a cop, said, 'Captain Rhyme, an honor to work with you.'

  'Decommissioned,' Rhyme muttered. He was noting that weather must have been worse - the officers' jackets were dusted with ice and snow. He noted that they'd wrapped the evidence cartons in cellophane. Good.

  'How is Amelia?' asked Eagleston.

  'We don't know anything yet,' Rhyme muttered.

  'Anything else we can do,' said her burly male partner, 'just give us a call. Where do you want them?' A nod at the crates.

  'Give them to Mel.'

  Rhyme was referring to the latest member of the team, who'd just arrived.

  Slim and with a retiring demeanor, NYPD Detective Mel Cooper was a renowned forensic lab man. Rhyme would bully anybody, all the way up to and including the mayor, to get Cooper assigned to him, especially for a case like this, in which toxin seemed to be the murder weapon of choice. With degrees in math, physics and organic chemistry, Cooper was perfect for the investigation.

  The CS tech cop nodded greetings to Eagleston and her partner, who like him were based in the massive NYPD crime scene oper-ation in Queens. Despite the ornery weather and a chill in the parlor, Cooper wore a short-sleeved white shirt along with baggy black slacks, giving him the appearance of a crusading Mormon elder or high school science professor. His shoes were Hush Puppies. People usually weren't surprised to learn that he lived with his mother; the astonishment came when they met his towering and beautiful Scandinavian girlfriend, a professo
r at Columbia. The two were champion ballroom dancers.

  Cooper, in a lab coat, latex gloves, goggles and mask, gestured to an empty evidence examination table. His colleagues set the cartons on it and nodded goodbye, then went out once more into the storm.

  'You too, rookie. Let's see what we've got.'

  Ron Pulaski pulled on similar protective gear and stepped up to the table to help.

  'Careful,' Rhyme said unnecessarily, since Pulaski had done this a hundred times and no one was more careful than he with evidence.

  But the criminalist was distracted; his thoughts returned to Amelia Sachs. Why wasn't she calling? He remembered seeing the powder pour into the video camera lens at the same time it hit her face. Remembered her choking.

  And then: a key in the door.

  A moment later. Wind. A cough. A throat clearing.

  'Well?' Rhyme called.

  Amelia Sachs turned the corner of the parlor, pulling her jacket off. A pause. More coughing.

  'Well?' he repeated. 'Are you all right?'

  Her response was to guzzle a bottle of water that Thom handed to her.

  'Thanks,' she said to the young man. Then to Rhyme: 'Fine,' her low sultry voice lower and sultrier than normal. 'More or less.'

  Rhyme had known that she hadn't been poisoned. He'd spoken to the EMT who specialized in toxins as she'd been shepherded to Manhattan General Medical Center. Her symptoms were atypical for poisoning, the med tech had reported, and by the time the ambulance got to Emergency, her only symptoms were a racking cough and teary eyes, which had been flushed several times with water. The unsub had created a less-than-lethal trap - but the irritant might have blinded her or played havoc with the lungs.

  'What was it, Sachs?'

  She now explained that swabs of mucous membranes and a lightning-fast blood workup had revealed that the 'poison' was dust composed mostly of ferric oxide.

  'Rust.'

  'That's what they said.'

  Pulling the duct tape off an old metal armature to which the unsub had attached the flashlight had dislodged a handful of the stuff, which had poured into Sachs's face.

  As a criminalist, Rhyme was familiar with Fe2O3, more commonly known as iron (III) oxide. Rust is a wonderful trace element since it has adhesive properties and transfers readily from perp to victim and vice versa quite readily. It can be toxic but only in massive quantities - more than 2500 mg/m^3. It's presence seemed to Rhyme didn't smell weaponized. He instructed Pulaski to call the city works department to find out if ferric oxide dust was common in the tunnels.

  'Yep,' the young officer reported after he'd hung up. 'The city's been installing pipes throughout Manhattan - because of the new water tunnel. Some of the fixtures they're cutting away are a hundred and fifty years old. End up with a lot of dust. All their workers're wearing face masks, it's so bad.'

  So the unsub had just happened to pick one of those fixtures to mount the flashlight to.

  Sachs coughed some more, drank another gulp or two of water. 'I'm pissed off I got careless.'

  'And, Sachs, we were waiting for a phone call.'

  'I tried. The lines were out. One of the EMS techs said it was an Internet problem that's also screwing up the phone switches. Been happening for the past couple of days. Some dispute between the hardwire cable companies and the new fiber-optic ones. Turf wars. Even talking sabotage.'

  Rhyme's look said, Who cares?

  With another faint, alto cough Sachs suited up for the lab and walked to the evidence cartons.

  'Let's get our charts going.' Rhyme nodded at the cluster of large whiteboards, standing about like herons on their stalky legs. They used these to list the evidence in a case. Only one was filled: the case of the recent mugging turned homicide near City Hall. The man who'd shaved so carefully for his date before stepping out into the street to be robbed and killed.

  Sachs moved that board to the corner and pulled a clean one front and center. She took an erasable marker and asked, 'What do we call him?'

  'November fifth's today's date. Let's stick with our tradition. Unknown Subject Eleven-Five.'

  Sachs coughed once, nodded, then wrote in her precise script:

  * * *

  237 Elizabeth Street

  Victim: Chloe Moore

  * * *

  Rhyme glanced at the white space. 'Now let's start filling it in.'

  CHAPTER 9

  Before they could get to the evidence, though, the doorbell hummed once more.

  With the familiar howl of wind and Gatling gun of falling ice, the door opened and closed. Lon Sellitto walked into the parlor, stomping his feet and missing the rug.

  'Getting worse. Man. What a mess.'

  Rhyme ignored the AccuWeather. 'The security videos?'

  Referring to any surveillance cameras on Elizabeth Street, near the manhole that the perp had used to gain access to the murder site. And where he had apparently been spying on Sachs.

  'Zip.'

  Rhyme grimaced.

  'But there was a witness.'

  Another sour look from Rhyme.

  'I don't blame you, Linc. But it's all we got. Guy coming home from his shift saw somebody beside the manhole about ten minutes before nine one one got the call.'

  'Home from his shift,' Rhyme said cynically. 'So your wit was tired.'

  'Yeah, and a fucking tired witness who sees the perp is better than a fresh one who doesn't.'

  'In which case he wouldn't be a witness,' Rhyme replied. A glance at the evidence board. Then: 'The manhole was open?'

  'Right. Orange cones and warning tape around it.'

  Rhyme said, 'Like I thought. So he pops the cover with a hook, sets up the cones, climbs down, kills the vic and leaves.' He turned to Sachs. 'Moisture at the bottom of the ladder, you said. So he kept it open the whole time. What happened to the cones and tape?'

  'None there,' Sachs said. 'Not when I came out.'

  'He's not going to be leaving them lying around nearby. Too smart for that. Lon, what'd your wit say about him, the perp?'

  'White male, stocking cap, thigh-length dark coat. Black or dark backpack. Didn't see a lot of the face. Pretty much the same descrip of the guy by the manhole when Amelia was running the scene underneath.'

  The one peering at Sachs. Who'd escaped into the crowds on Broadway.

  'What about the evidence on the street?'

  'In that storm?' Sachs replied.

  Weather was one of the classic contaminators of evidence and one of the most pernicious. And at the scene near the manhole, there'd been another problem: The emergency workers' footprints and gear would have destroyed any remaining evidence as they raced to get Sachs into the ambulance after the apparent poisoning from the trap that wasn't.

  'So we'll write off that portion of the scene and concentrate on underground. First, the basement of the boutique?'

  Jean Eagleston and her partner had photographed and searched the basement and the small utility room that opened onto it but they'd found very little. Mel Cooper examined the trace they'd collected. He reported, 'Matches the samples from the cellar. Nothing helpful there.'

  'All right. The big question: What's the tox screen result? COD?'

  They were starting with the assumption that the cause of death was poison but that wouldn't be known until the medical examiner completed the analysis. Sachs had called and harangued the chief examiner to send over a preliminary report ASAP. They needed both the toxin and whatever sedative, as seemed likely, the perp had injected into Chloe to subdue her. Sachs had sealed the urgency by pointing out that they believed this murder was the start of a serial killing spree. The ME, she reported, had sounded as burdened as doctors generally do, especially city employee doctors, but he'd promised to move the Chloe Moore case to the front of the queue.

  Again piqued by impatience, Rhyme said, 'Sachs, you swabbed the site of the tattoo?'

  'Sure.'

  'Run that, Mel, and let's see if we can get a head start on the poison.'
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  'Will do.' The tool Cooper used for this analysis was the gas chromatograph/mass spectrometer - two large, joined instruments sitting in the corner of the parlor. The gas chromatography portion of the equipment analyzes an unknown sample of trace by separating out each chemical it contains based on its volatility - that is, how long it takes to evaporate. The GC separates the component parts; the second device, the mass spectrometer, identifies the substances by comparing their unique structure with a database of known chemicals.

  Running the noisy, hot machine - the samples are, in effect, burned - Cooper soon got results.

  'Cicutoxin.'

  The NYPD had an extensive toxin database, which Rhyme had used occasionally when he'd been head of Investigation Resources - the old name for Crime Scene - though murder by poison was uncommon then and even more so now. Cooper scrolled through the entry for this substance. He paraphrased: 'Comes from the water hemlock plant. Attacks the central nervous system. She'd have experienced severe nausea, vomiting, we can see frothing too. Muscle twitching.' He looked up. 'It's one of the most deadly plants in North America.'

  He nodded at the machine. 'And it's been distilled. No instances of that level of concentration ever recorded. Usually takes some time to die after it's been administered. At these levels? She'd be dead in a half hour, little longer, maybe.'

  'What some famous Greek killed himself with, right?' Pulaski asked.

  Cooper said, 'Not quite. Different strain of hemlock. Both in the carrot family, though.'

  'Who cares about Socrates?' Rhyme snapped. 'Let's focus here. Does anyone else, aside from me, notice anything troubling about the source?'

  Sachs said, 'He could've found it in any field or swamp in the country.'

  'Exactly.'

  A commercial substance that was toxic, like those used in industrial processes and easily purchased on the open market, might be traced to a manufacturer and onward to a buyer. Some even had chemical tags that might lead investigators to receipts with the perp's name on them. But that wasn't going to happen if he dug his weapon out of the ground.

  Impossible to narrow down beyond regions of the country. And presumably, the month being November, he'd picked the plant long ago. Or might even have grown it in a hothouse in his basement.