Vanishing Girls (5 page)

We walked up to Court Street—the main commercial strip that ran from what I thought of as Deep Carroll Gardens, one of the last parts of the linked neighborhoods to be gentrified—to Brooklyn Heights, where we could catch the express train. Along the way, Billy filled me in.

“They were both shot once in the face from close range.”

“Find the weapon?”

“Not yet.” He shook his head. “Lot of rage there—someone didn’t like them very much.”

“Reed’s face . . .” I wished I could stop seeing it: obliterated. “You don’t think it was some random whacko who somehow got in?”

“No sign of breaking and entering.”

“So they opened the door to their killer.”

“Or he was already inside. Hopefully Abby can tell us.”

“You don’t think
she
—” But I couldn’t think that; there was
no way
that little girl in sheep pajamas was a killer.

“It doesn’t matter what I think, Karin. I’m just doing my job.”

“Are you running a GSR on her?” Though by now any gunshot residue would have been washed off her skin at the hospital.

“Her clothes are at the lab.”

We turned onto Joralemon Street and headed into the yawning stairwell that led into the subway. Partway down, I turned to Billy.

“Do you think this could be connected to the woman last night? Abby was found so close to the latest victim of—”

He didn’t let me finish. “That’s a serious stretch, Karin. The Dekkers’ house is right around the corner from Nevins Street . . . something happened in that house, and that’s where Abby ran because it was close. The Working Girl Killer kills hookers, and hookers work Nevins, that’s a well-known fact. It’s the city; you walk one block and you’re in a different universe. I wouldn’t look for connections that probably don’t exist.”

“But what are the odds of all that happening in such close proximity in one day and night?”

“It was a bad day in Brooklyn.”

“Maybe whoever was driving the car that hit Abby saw something.”

“Maybe, maybe not. Along with GSR, the lab’s looking for paint and metal trace from a car. It’s a long shot, but if it goes that way—if we luck out and find the car, and we find the driver—what are the odds that he killed the Dekkers, abducted Abby, she got away and he mowed her down with his car before pulling over to butcher another prostitute?”

“That’s ridiculous, Billy.”

“Exactly.”

“But if he or she saw something—”

“That would be great.” A sarcastic snort. He’d been a detective a long time; you learned not to hang hopes on what you might find, but to look at what was right in front of you.

“I hear you. But I have a feeling—”

“No feelings, Karin. Facts. Keep the feelings somewhere else. What I really need is to talk to Abby, or if she doesn’t wake up, find another witness who saw . . .”

His sentence drifted off, so I finished for him. “Anything at all.”

Billy flashed his badge to the ticket booth attendant, who buzzed open the gate for him. I swiped my MetroCard and went through the turnstile. We headed down another flight of steps and waited on the platform for a train. The subway had that familiar rotten egg smell, but it was warmer down here. The track started to rumble and soon the front of a train appeared with a green-encircled number five. We stopped talking and crowded in. For the next half hour we rode in silence. When we went back up to the street, we were on Lexington Avenue in Manhattan, the sun was fading, and the sky was turning gray.

It was a ten-minute walk to the river and the Sixtyeighth Street entrance of New York–Presbyterian Hospital, where Abby had been admitted to the Komansky Children’s Center. As soon as we crossed York Avenue and entered the lead-in to the hospital’s circular driveway, we started seeing media vans with their tall antennas. There were five in all. Reporters hung around the bank of revolving doors, waiting for some action.

They surrounded Billy as soon as they saw him.

“No comment,” he said firmly, twice.

We pushed into the main entrance, a hive of activity beneath a vaulted ceiling, and were directed to the pediatric critical care unit. We knew we had reached the correct elevator when we encountered a few more reporters.

“Any thoughts about all those murders happening so close together,” a woman in a big fur hat asked, “and the kid getting hit by a car, pretty much all at the same time?”

Billy briefly turned a cold glare on her, before stepping into the elevator and riding with me to the fifth floor.

We stood in the hall outside Abby’s private room; we had been told to wait for someone who would fill us in and give us the ground rules of dealing with a coma patient, specifically
this
coma patient. I hated hospitals with their high-gloss floors and eerie quiet punctured by bursts of noise; their awful antiseptic chaos. The only nontraumatic thing that happened in a hospital was the birth of a baby, and sometimes even that was traumatic. I briefly thought of last October (of Julie or Marisa or Zoe) and almost succumbed to the sticky emotional turmoil that reached for me at times like this, but pushed it away before it latched on. I felt a cascade of triumph, then despair. Sometimes I wished for my Prozac back, but it hadn’t worked for me, at least not the way it was supposed to. I looked at Billy, wondering if antidepressants would help him. He was leaning against the wall with his eye closed. His breathing was so shallow I couldn’t see it.

Finally a woman approached with her hand outstretched. Billy opened his eyes and stepped forward.

“I’m Sasha Mendelssohn. Sorry it took so long.” She was small, with short red hair and freckled skin, and wore a white coat with a name tag that didn’t say MD, so she wasn’t a doctor. “I don’t know if anyone at the desk explained, but I’m Abby’s care coordinator. That means if you have any questions or concerns, or want to speak with the doctor, you ask me, and I, well, coordinate.”

“Detective Staples, Brooklyn Eight-four.” Billy shook her hand. “This is Karin Schaeffer; she’s consulting on the case; we were both there last night and we’re following up. Can we see her?”

“We understand that you’ll want to question her,” Sasha said, “and eventually we’ll be able to bring her out of the coma, but right now that’s just impossible. She’s in very delicate condition.”

“Any idea how long it’ll be?”

“I wish we knew. Her gaze settled on Billy’s eye patch. “How did you lose the eye?”

“How do you know I lost it?” His tone was hard, but she’d asked a pitiless question.

“The patch.”

“Maybe I was born blind in that eye. Maybe I have an infection.”

“No one wears an eye patch for an infection or blindness, at least not in my experience.”

“I don’t like to talk about it.”

“I’m sorry I brought it up—truly. Not my business.”

“How long before we can talk to Abby?”

“Honestly, it could be days, it could be weeks.”

“She may be the only witness. We understand she’s a child, and that she’s injured, but it’s important.”

“Let me explain,” Sasha said, looking alternately between us. “The idea behind putting her in a medically induced coma is to protect her from potential brain damage. The coma helps to prevent swelling that would reduce blood flow to the brain, which could result in a secondary injury worse than the initial injury. It’s preventative. But that’s not all. She has a broken leg, which is in a cast, and she also has four broken ribs and a broken collarbone, which we tape; for those to heal, the main thing is keeping still. The coma keeps her body at rest and her brain quiet. For her sake, it’s the best recourse at the moment.”

“All right.” Billy’s attempt at acquiescence didn’t match his agitated tone. “But can’t you be more specific than a few days or a few weeks?”

“Billy,” I said to him. “They have to do what’s best for Abby now.”

Sasha hesitated, and then offered, “I can let you see her for a minute.”

“That would be great,” I said.

“Just a moment.” She quietly opened Abby’s door and peeked in, then beckoned us to follow.

Last night, framed in the menacing context of the dual crime scenes, it had taken a moment to realize Abby was a child; here, it was the first thing you saw. She was small and narrow in the big white hospital bed, not taking up much space, a little girl encased in a web of casts, bandages, and tubes. Her broken leg, the left one, lay above the covers. It was set in a cast from hip to foot, with just her multicolored toenails sticking out. Her hands lay still at her sides, with her blue fingernails again evoking a strange feeling in me. I couldn’t see her ribs under the hospital gown, but her bruised and battered left collarbone was visible beneath strips of translucent medical tape. She had either been hit by the car on her left side, or had fallen, hard, to the left. Her head appeared to have been shaved; the soft, wheat-colored hair was gone. A white gauze turban hid her head injuries, but you could see that the bruising on her face below the turban was worse on the left side. Tubes protruding from a nostril and her mouth were attached to a pair of larger tubes connected over her chest and extending right and left to the machinery that surrounded and sustained her.

Sasha glanced at me. I held my poker face, summoning the old cop-me who could handle anything (or thought she could). I understood why she had invited us in: seeing Abby like this would have convinced anyone of the fragility of her medical condition. Poor girl; motherless child. I wanted to hug her, but didn’t dare. I felt bereft on her behalf, knowing what she would have to learn about her parents’ loss when she awoke.

Unless she already knew.

What
did
she know?

That was the big question.

Chapter 5

A
screeching noise filled the YMCA gym, and the short, gray-haired man standing under the basketball hoop pulled the microphone away from his mouth and winced. Howie Marcus was the president of the Eighty-fourth Precinct Community Council; I didn’t know what he did for his day job, but clearly he was not used to talking into microphones. All three cops standing behind him held still, not responding to the awful sound, but in the middle row of folding chairs a man with muttonchop sideburns pressed his hands against his ears until the sound system was adjusted and the feedback died down. Ladasha was farther down from us in the front row, sitting with two young boys I guessed were her sons. I wasn’t surprised that she had come out on her own time to show support for Billy when he received his award from the council; for all her toughness, she was a good lady deep down.

“That’s better,” Howie said. “Back to business. As I was saying, or trying to say”—he paused for a spate of laughter—“before I turn the microphone over to Detective Gates, I want to remind our local children not to smoke, and I want to remind the parents of our children that you are their role models. So don’t smoke, either. Detective Gates?”

A man in a dark suit and pink shirt, with a gun holstered on his belt, replaced Howie beneath the hoop. It was a funny place to stand, I thought, given the enormity of the gym. But someone had set up two banks of folding chairs facing the basketball hoop, forcing the speaker into that spot.

“First, let me say thanks to everyone who came out tonight. Like Howie mentioned, we do these meetings every month and they’re an important part of our precinct’s outreach to the local community. It’s our chance to meet each other and your chance to ask us questions. First though I wanted to talk a little about identity theft.”

I turned to glance around the room. It had grown more crowded since we’d first sat down, mostly, I noticed, with older people, though there were a few clusters of the neighborhood’s signature hipsters, a sign of the changing demographic. Someday those hipsters would be the oldsters, and a new generation would move in to replace them, just about the time their not-so-coolanymore tattoos faded and sagged beyond recognition.

Detective Gates reached into his pocket and pulled out a small black plastic device about half the size of a man’s wallet. He held it up.

“This is what they call a skimmer—it’s a magnetic strip reader. See this slit down the middle? You go into a restaurant, the waiter takes your check and your credit card and goes away for a minute. By the time he gets back, he’s run your card through this reader and he’s got enough information to reproduce your credit card. You sign the chit, now he’s got a carbon of your signature, and he’s all set. By tomorrow he’s got a dummy card on your account, he knows how you sign your name, and he goes on a shopping spree—on your dime.”

A murmur passed through the room.

“Another thing the guy might do is put a skimmer right over the card slot on your local ATM, so when you dip in your card to take out some cash, you just gave all your information away. The guy standing on line behind you is his partner: He watches you enter your PIN. He memorizes your PIN. As soon as you walk away, he writes it down. Now these sweethearts can duplicate your ATM card and get into your bank account.”

A hand shot up in the front row. Detective Gates pointed at the woman.

“But how can someone put one of those things on a bank machine without everyone noticing?”

“Good question. They wait until no one’s around, then the accomplice stands outside the bank window holding a big umbrella, blocking the view, while the guy affixes the skimmer to the card reader.”

“How could someone tell it’s not a real card reader?” a man called out from behind me.

“Wiggle it. If it doesn’t feel right, don’t use it. Go tell someone in the bank if it’s during banking hours. If you can, pull the thing off and report it.”

“I never heard of that before,” someone else mumbled.

“That’s why I’m here to talk about it. I’ve been on the precinct’s Computer Crimes Unit a year now and the stuff I’ve seen would curl your hair.”

“I have a question.” The woman’s voice was strong and clear. I turned around and saw a young mother holding a baby over her shoulder, patting him with a hand wearing a large diamond ring. “But it’s not about identity theft.”

“Go ahead. Probably one of us can answer it.”

“My husband and I are thinking of buying a house in the area.”

“Good place to raise a family.” Gates smiled.

“That’s what I hear. But all the news today about those murders and that little girl getting hit by a car—it freaked me out. And now I don’t know if this is such a great place to live after all.”

The room erupted, and more hands shot up. A knot formed in my stomach. Billy’s jaw muscles moved visibly beneath his skin; he pointedly did
not
turn around to show his face, though he’d have to eventually. Because he was wearing a baseball cap, the strap of his eye patch wasn’t visible from behind; I braced myself for the moment he turned around and people made the connection between the cop being honored tonight and the latest face of the serial killer hunt.

Detective Gates raised a hand to calm the crowd. “We’ll address that to the best of our ability. But first, I want to remind everyone here that out of seventy-six precincts citywide, we’re number sixty-nine in terms of crime, so this is a pretty safe neighborhood.”

The clamor heightened. One man loudly said, “Three people murdered in twenty-four hours doesn’t feel safe.” Passionate agreement rippled through the room.

Ladasha stood up, faced the room with an irritated expression, but glanced at her children and sat back down.

The cops and detectives present had obviously decided not to throw Billy and Ladasha to the wolves. The only reason they were here tonight was because Billy was about to be honored. It wouldn’t be much of a celebration if a throng of outraged citizens vented at him moments before he was handed the plaque we could all see lying on the table behind Howie Marcus, Detective Gates, and the three uniformed officers.

“This is an investigation in progress,” Gates said, “but I can tell you that from what I understand, one of those cases, the couple on Bergen, was not a situation of breaking and entering. I don’t think it’s even been classified a homicide yet. And the other one is a separate case totally.”

“It was the Working Girl Killer,” a woman said in such a soft, quavering voice the room quieted suddenly to hear her. “That’s what I’ve heard. That the killer they’ve been looking for is right here in our neighborhood now.”

The young mother got up and walked out; she had just changed her mind and wouldn’t be buying in Brownstone Brooklyn, after all.

“That case has a task force working practically around the clock,” Gates began, but was cut off by the man with the muttonchop sideburns. He was now holding a pad of paper and a pen: a reporter.

“I thought both cases were being worked by the same detectives. Why is that?”

“Could be. I don’t know.” Gates glanced at Ladasha, and then back to the reporter. Ladasha gathered her kids and left the gym. Billy’s gaze trailed her, as if he wished he, too, could escape this; but he was on the meeting’s agenda and had to stick it out. “If you’re a journalist, why don’t you see us after the meeting when we can talk?”

“Why can’t you talk now?” a woman called out.

“That’s right! We all want to know.”

“I hear you.” The detective’s smile was stiff now. “Believe me, cases like these are an anomaly for our area. We just don’t see murders like that very often, and definitely not so close together geographically, or the same day. Not around here. But sometimes crazy stuff happens. We’ll get to the bottom of it, that’s a promise.”

“It isn’t as safe here as you say,” an elderly man directly behind us mumbled, but it was loud enough for Gates to hear as well.

“This is still one of the safest neighborhoods in the city, people. Trust me. These were not random killings. We will catch both assailants. In the meantime, do what you always do and use your judgment about where you go and what time you go there. Don’t open your doors if you’re not expecting someone. Don’t walk alone on dark streets if you have a choice.”

“Don’t smoke,” a young man at the back of the room called out, inciting a ripple of sarcastic laughter.

A few people in the back got up, grumbling, and left the room. Howie Marcus came forward and took back the microphone. Gates stood behind him with the three cops.

“Thank you very much, Detective Gates, for informing us about identity theft.” He waited for the obligatory applause, which seemed skimpier than before. “Now that we’re done with all the official community business, I’d like to turn your attention to a special member of our local police force.”

Billy had known for weeks about the award he was going to receive from the precinct’s community council. I turned to wink at him, thinking I might earn a smile, but he looked horrified by the attention that was about to befall him. He still seemed raw from last night’s hallucinatory migration into the past. I regretted that Mac couldn’t be here to cheer him on; he might have relaxed Billy better than I seemed able to. Or maybe it was delusional to think that Mac’s close friendship had some special power over Billy; maybe he was slipping beyond anyone’s reach.

“Detective William Staples, will you please stand up?”

Billy dutifully stood, his hands clasped together in front of him, and turned to face the crowd. A round of tepid applause was broken by gasps of recognition.

“Isn’t
that
the detective?”

“He’s been sitting here all along!”

“Why didn’t he say something?”

“What’s going on with all those murders?”

“Are we safe or not?”

Billy lifted a hand in a gesture of calm and peace. His voice sounded more assured than I knew he felt: “I promise you, as soon as we know something, we’ll tell you. But I can say you’re as safe today as you were yesterday. As Detective Gates said, none of the events here over the weekend were random. We’re working hard on closing both cases, I promise you.”

“
And now
,” Howie practically shouted, gesturing for Billy to join him at the podium, “let’s get back to the real reason we brought Detective Staples here tonight.” Reading from a prepared statement, Howie continued: “Detective Staples has been with the precinct for sixteen years, and he has been an upstanding member of our local law enforcement team. But that isn’t why he’s receiving the Distinguished Officer Award tonight. The reason we’re honoring Detective Staples is because any man who puts his life on the line in the course of duty, as Detective Staples does every single day, deserves our recognition and our gratitude. But what Detective Staples did one day a year and a half ago went far beyond the call of duty. He put his life on the line, he took a bullet for our community, and lucky for us, he is not only still here to tell the story but he’s still on the job. Now that’s courage!”

When the room burst into applause, Billy finally cracked a smile.

“On behalf of the precinct and the entire community, please accept this Distinguished Officer Award for Bravery in the Line of Duty.”

Howie handed Billy the plaque. Billy held it by his side without looking at it. He leaned toward the microphone in Howie’s hand, said, “Thank you,” and returned to his seat.

“Well, I guess that’s it,” Howie said. “Thanks for coming, folks. See you in a month, second Tuesday of January.”

Billy and I waited in our seats until the room had mostly emptied before getting up to leave.

“Thank God that’s over,” Billy muttered as we made our way down a flight of stairs and outside to Atlantic Avenue. We stood together in the cold and the dark, cars whizzing past on the busy two-way thoroughfare. Billy leaned forward to kiss my cheek. “Thanks for coming, Karin. Appreciate it.”

“Billy—wait.” I opened my purse, pulled out the slip of paper with the contact information for POPPA, and gave it to him.

“What is this?”

“Police Organization Providing Peer Assistance. It’s the support group I started telling you about before.”

“Jesus, Karin.” He tried to hand back the paper, but I refused to take it.

“You need to talk to people who understand what you’re going through. PTSD, Billy; you’ve got to stop denying it. It’s only going to get worse if you don’t—”

“Forget it.”

“Let me finish.”

“No.”

I stood there and watched him walk off toward Boerum Place. He lived in Park Slope, twenty minutes away on foot. He obviously wanted to be alone, so I didn’t try to catch up with him. I still had one more stop to make before my day was over: I had picked up a prescription for my mother yesterday and promised to have it to her by today. As I turned to walk in the opposite direction, I noticed Billy stuffing the slip of paper into his pants pocket instead of throwing it away. It was reassuring, even if it didn’t guarantee that he would follow through.

C
ourt Street was bedecked with holiday lights as far down as I could see; the illuminated stars and snowflakes, slung above the traffic, appeared every November and stayed until January. The decorations always cheered me up, and by the time I’d walked a couple of blocks I was feeling susceptible to the sweet pine smell wafting from the trees being sold in front of the corner drugstore. Another local tradition seemed to be that a small group of French Canadians camped out for a month with their truckload of trees, doing a brisk business right up until Christmas Eve. We were going to spend the holidays at my brother’s in Los Angeles this year, and had decided not to get our own tree. But Mac loved Christmas trees, and on impulse, thinking it would cheer him up, I changed the plan.

I pointed to a six-foot Fraser fir, full with silver-green needles and emanating a strong, comforting scent. “How much?”

“Seventy dollars,” the young man in a red-and-black checked flannel shirt and brown scarf answered in a strong French accent.

“I’ll give you fifty.”