She hit the ground hard, pushing her muscles as far as she could, and kept it going, thirty seconds, forty seconds, a minute… her heart rate soaring, her mind blank. It was working. She kept it up for another minute and then slowed her pace and settled into a rhythm, feeling the sweat start to form around her hairline and down her back.
Her therapist called it ‘acting out’. To escape the panic, she had to put herself in danger out there on the streets. Because the danger made sense, and the fear of the outside world didn’t seem as bad as the terror inside. The pain of burning muscles was nothing to the memories that left her choking on her own silence.
She knew the theory. As a psychologist herself, she had trained and taught at Columbia, then re-trained as a police therapist for the NYPD. She knew far too much about radical trauma and its manifestations. In medical terms, she knew what she was. In layman’s terms, she was a basket case, running away from fear, losing touch with everything and everyone.
She ran for an hour then arrived back exhausted but calmed. She stopped across the street and stared at a car outside her building. It wasn’t one she’d noticed before. She saw the window ajar and smoke twirling from inside and felt a stab of panic.
‘You’re being a freak, Denise. Stop it. It’s just a car.’ She tried to move but her limbs refused to obey. She looked around, feeling self-conscious as she stood paralyzed on the sidewalk, the sweat beginning to roll off her.
Two long minutes passed. Denise could make out two forms in the car. Two men, possibly. She twisted her fingers together as she looked at the door to her building. The car was parked illegally. She could see the two men looking around. They were waiting for somebody. She had to do something about this debilitating fear. After the abduction, Harper had given her the name of a specialist — a guy called Mac who he said could help her. She’d dismissed it at the time, but she’d always kept his number. Denise pulled out her cell phone and dialed. There was just an answerphone message giving the times of the classes and the address.
Denise had wanted to speak to a person. She needed help. She’d done so much herself and come a long way, but she needed to walk around without fear. She finally talked herself into crossing the street. She planned to keep her head straight, keep tight to the building and make her way inside immediately.
As soon as she started to walk past the car, the two doors opened. They must have been checking their mirrors. Denise jerked to a halt. She wanted to react well, to appear normal, but it sent a shiver right through her and her eyes shifted about for an escape route.
The two people were out of the car quickly, both medium height, purposeful, tidily dressed. Their quick eyes and languid movements told her that these were cops or gangsters, but most likely cops.
‘Miss Levene,’ said one of them.
Denise didn’t speak, she just nodded slightly.
The first cop held out his shield. He had obviously sensed her apprehension.
‘Sorry to jump out like that. Detective Munroe, Missing Persons.’
Denise looked at the second officer. She’d been wrong. It wasn’t a man, but a tall athletic woman with broad shoulders.
‘Detective Gauge,’ she said, smiling.
Denise was standing and sweating, aware that she looked like a car-crash victim.
‘What do you want?’ she said firmly.
‘You’re hard to get hold of, Miss Levene.’
‘Am I?’
Detective Sarah Gauge had warm brown eyes and a way of holding people’s attention. She stepped forward, her gestures open and non-aggressive. ‘I failed, if the truth be told, Miss Levene. I tried calling you, but you never pick up. I came round here three times, you never answer your buzzer.’
Denise Levene stared at them both. Still distrustful. ‘I wondered who was calling,’ she said. ‘Most people stopped trying a month back. I don’t socialize much.’
‘We need to talk to you,’ said Detective Munroe. ‘If that’s possible.’
‘About what? I’m not a missing person, I’m just not very good company.’
Detective Munroe opened his hands, showed both palms. ‘We just need your help. Can we come inside, Miss Levene? It’d be good to talk to you.’
‘It’s Dr Levene, for the record.’
‘We’re aware of your academic qualifications, Doctor. My apologies.’
‘You must be desperate to look me up. Someone at the NYPD send you?’
Munroe shook his head. ‘We can tell you more inside.’
Denise tried to imagine why they were there. ‘You’re both from Missing Persons?’
‘Right.’
Denise looked up. The city was concrete gray under a pale blue sky. The traffic was rushing by in a frenzied continuous strain. The sweat was turning cold on her skin. She turned back to Sarah Gauge. ‘So, who’s missing?’
Gauge glanced at Munroe then cleared her throat. ‘You heard of Abby Goldenberg? The missing schoolgirl, Abby?’
‘No,’ said Denise. ‘Should I have?’
‘It’s been on the news. She went missing a week ago.’
‘I don’t watch much TV.’ Denise hadn’t heard of Abby, but the name Goldenberg rang a bell somewhere in her memory.
‘Kind of cut yourself off,’ said Munroe. He pushed a finger in one ear and scratched. ‘It’s not a solution.’
‘You’d know this?’ said Denise. ‘Because you’re a psychiatrist, right? Forgive me, I didn’t realize.’
Munroe’s lips formed a half-smile. ‘No, lady, I’m no shrink. It’s common sense. No one learned to ride again by hiding from a horse.’
‘Yeah, well, what I do is up to me, right?’ said Denise.
‘Sure, but—’
She held up her hand, cutting him off. She walked past both detectives and opened the heavy glass door of her building. Munroe and Gauge followed her in. ‘I apologize for being so persistent,’ said Munroe, ‘but a girl’s life is at stake here. We need your help.’
‘I’m on the eighth floor. You can take the elevator. I’ll meet you there.’ Denise went towards the stairs.
‘You’re taking the stairs eight floors?’ said Gauge. ‘You on some fitness program?’
‘I don’t take elevators,’ said Denise. The door to the stairway closed behind her. She was sheeted in sweat. The brief conversation had not been easy for her. The two cops looked at each other and Munroe pressed for the elevator. ‘What’s with her?’ said Gauge.
‘The killer held her underground for two days,’ said Munroe. ‘Only way in or out of her prison was an elevator shaft.’
Chapter Five
He sat in the diner in East Harlem, five minutes from the murder scene, eating a bacon and egg bagel. He was alone on a table for four but the diner was only half full at that time of day. An old lady to his right sat staring ahead, her head slightly crooked on her shoulders, wearing a pompous and refined air as if she was better than the rest, but beneath the table, she had no shoes and her bare feet were cut and rancid.
There were two cops sitting in the corner booth. He stared at them as they ate and joked. Jimmy Headless and Johnny Neckless. Every day, he imagined that this was how they started their shift — sign in, drive two blocks up from the precinct, park up and take free coffee and bagels from Enrico.
He took out a cell phone. Prepaid, untraceable. He had used it to call David Capske the night before, just after midnight. He’d told David that he had photographs of him taking cocaine. Threatened the palpitating young man that he was going to embarrass the hell out of the Capske clan and lose David his job.
