Tracking Time

Iriarte jumped out of the car and slammed the door. 'Woo, what the mother-fucking hell do you think you're doing?' he screamed.

The sudden loss of face like the bang of a popped balloon in front of her former bosses made April's head swim. Neither Captain Higgins, who didn't like girl cops, nor Lieutenant Joyce, who didn't like her, had ever spoken to her quite like that.

Joyce, a big swearer herself, looked pretty surprised by the attack. She got out of the car moving one plump leg at a time, a frown gathering on her pugnacious face. Higgins was out of the car. Baum jumped out. Captain Reginald, CO of the Central Park Precinct, was out of his Jeep, running toward them, too. April prayed for bloody turf war.

'Good morning, sir. Lieutenant Joyce, congratulations on your promotion. Good morning, Captain Higgins, Captain Reginald.' April gave them all a second, covered all the bases except for Baum, who had seemed a little too happy with the opportunity to run her down.

'Yeah, and congratulations on yours. I always knew you'd make good.' Lieutenant Joyce glanced at Iriarte and gave April a real smile. 'And congratulations on your upcoming nuptials, too,' she added.

'My nuptials?' April blushed some more.

'Yeah, I heard you and Mike are getting married. I like it when my best people get together. Mazeltov.' This was for all the captains' benefit. A few courtesies before the ax fell.

Higgins guffawed at the Yiddish.

'We're just friends, Lieutenant-' April said. She was freaked by all the brass and saw her career careening toward a desk job in Housing for sure.

''Enough of the chitchat,' Iriarte interrupted her peevishly. 'I've had complaints about you, Woo.' He eyed Captain Reginald.

Thousands of years of prescribed correct Chinese behavior for people of lower rank, including and especially females, had coded April's genes to make her bow to the ground, to smack her forehead on the earth, and beg for forgiveness for her lack of wisdom and any involuntary foolishness that she might wrongfully have committed. Correct Chinese behavior warned that the tongue was dangerous to the throat. In other words, shut up.

Being in a new country and new century altogether, however, a reasonable modification of forehead knocking might be to wither to half-self, cast her eyes down, and attempt to disappear. This self-effacement tactic to appease an irritated boss, though, was at odds with her more recent training from Lieutenant Joyce and Mike Sanchez, who were big stand-up-for-yourself people. For a second she was almost conflicted about which way to go.

'I'm with Lieutenant Sanchez,' she said officiously. 'He's working Special Case on the Atkins case. Last night he requested a second dog tracker, I suggested John Zumech. I worked with Zumech when I was in the Two-O. Do you know him, sir?' she asked Iriarte.

'He's worked in here before.' Captain Reginald affirmed Zumech's credibility, then waited for the shit to hit.

'What does Zumech have to do with it?' With the comment from the CP CO, Iriarte's mood darkened further. His tongue worked its way around his mouth unhappily.

'It was his dog that found Pee Wee James.' April glanced at Lieutenant Joyce. She nodded. Way to go, April.

'Is that the victim?' Baum blurted out.

April nodded at Captain Reginald. Now was not the time to mend fences with him. She turned to Iriarte again. 'What happened, sir? I had the vic in an interview room yesterday morning. When I returned last night at 2100, I found out he'd been released at noon. Now he's dead. Unfortunate.' Now she was stepping way out of line.

Iriarte didn't like it one bit. His tongue punched out the side of his cheek. Clearly whatever report he'd received on the homicide hadn't revealed the victim's identity. He didn't like hearing it from April.

'It's James?' he said unhappily.

'Yes, sir,' she told him. Pee Wee was zipped up in the bag. The finger was packaged separately.

Iriarte watched the removal of the remains with the distress of someone about to lose a promotion.

'Hey, this was your investigation, April. As far as I'm concerned, you can take the homicide,' Joyce said with a smile. 'You'll solve it one, two, three, right, Captain?'

'Yeah, good plan,' Higgins agreed. He didn't want the case in the Two-O. They hadn't caught it in the first place. Why take on a big problem?

The Central Park Precinct wasn't set up for homicide investigations. That meant that the closest precinct was Midtown North, just what Iriarte didn't want. No one wanted Special Case in it, either. Made them all look bad.

'April was the best detective I ever had, right, Captain?' Joyce said.

'No question,' Higgins agreed.

Now April could see why the three of them had come together. They all wanted April to take the heat for the homicide. The dog barked, easing the tension. Looked like the search was over. Mike strolled toward them with Zumech. Peachy was at his side, heeling nicely. The two men were in serious conversation. No sign of Maslow.

'Fine, April is the primary. She set up the search, she gets the homicide.' Iriarte gave her an evil smile.

'Thank you, sir, I need Woody here for a few hours, mind if I take him?' The little bastard.

As far as Iriarte was concerned the conversation was at an end. The homicide fuckup was on April's plate; that was all that mattered to him. He'd lose her when it was over.

'Yeah, he'll take us back and then you're welcome to him. He's a terrible driver.'

Forty-six

Around noon Jerry Atkins appeared in Grace's doorway for a minute. He wiggled his finger at her, then walked away. Grace glanced at Craig. He was eating a calzone at his desk and drinking one of those huge containers of Coke, careful not to drip on his work. He didn't notice her leave.

Grace and Jerry had a method for meeting during the day. He would go downstairs to the newspaper stand in the building, and she would meet him there. He always said if anyone saw them together it would look like a coincidence. She thought it was pretty silly, so what if people saw them together? They'd worked in the same office for almost twenty-three years, longer than anyone else.

In the beginning of the relationship he used to call her into his office several times a day. They spent hours discussing all her problems, her life plan and options, and of course his distress about his empty marriage. She'd sit on his sofa, and they'd talk as if there was nothing else in the world to do. He was a wealthy man. He took her out to lunch and to dinner and promised to help her in her career. No one had ever paid that much attention to her in her entire life. At twenty-one she'd enjoyed his pleasure in her prettiness and never for a moment thought forty-four was old. Now, because he was paranoid about the telephone, he would E-mail her to meet him at the newspaper stand, and the only time she saw him socially was at the firm Christmas party.

She got downstairs first and was busy reading tabloid scandals in the private lives of the rich and famous, and predictions of the end of the world before 2002, when Jerry turned up. He motioned toward the door, and they went outside. It was a gorgeous day, but neither was in the mood to notice. Jerry turned south on Third Avenue. It was lunch hour and the sidewalk was jammed.

'Any word from Dylan?' he asked.

'No. Have you spoken to the police?'

'Yes, I had a telephone call from the Mayor. I also had a call from the Police Commissioner's office, too. Everybody's working on this.'

'The Police Commissioner called you?'

'His office called.' Jerry spoke with obvious pride. 'A deputy commissioner assured me they were doing everything they could to find my son. He sounded like a very nice man. I also spoke to some detectives. They didn't seem very competent. I hate to break this to you, but there's been a murder in the park. Not Maslow. I was right that this has nothing to do with Dylan.'

'A murder?' Grace was horrified. 'Who was murdered?'

'Just a homeless man. A mental patient.'