Page 42 of Crosshairs
I’M USED TO calls in the middle of the night. Every homicide detective is. The only thing that surprised me about this one was the caller. Instead of Harry Grissom calling to give me an assignment, it was my sometime partner, Terri Hernandez, directly from a scene in the Bronx. Usually Terri handled the homicides up that way. Then she dropped the bombshell: it looked like the sniper had struck again.
Mary Catherine was just conscious enough for me to give her a kiss on the forehead as I slipped out of the bedroom and then the apartment. Traffic was light at this hour. I was on the scene in the Highbridge area, half a dozen blocks north of Yankee Stadium, in about ten minutes.
Terri met me in front of a nice apartment building. She gave me a quick hug and asked about the kids. It doesn’t matter the situation; you still know who your closest friends are.
Similarly, before I even asked about the specifics of the homicide, I asked after her sisters, Christy and Sylvia.
Terri smiled and said, “My dad is getting used to the idea of their goofy white boyfriends. Sylvia’s boyfriend loves heavy metal music and has a dog named Ace, after one of the members of Kiss.”
Thinking of how that would go over with Terry’s Cuban-born father made me smile. Then I got serious. I said, “What’s the story here?”
“Someone used a rifle to shoot a community activist named Gus Querva. The doorman found him about an hour ago. My rough estimate is that he was shot around eleven o’clock from somewhere to the north of the building. It looks like Querva was walking in the front door when the killer took the shot.”
I considered that for a moment, then asked, “Is this the same Gus Querva who some people claim is part of a gang that terrorizes the Bronx?”
Terri gave me a sideways glance and said, “Whoever told you that wasn’t from any of the precincts around here. We got a very specific memo saying we weren’t supposed to talk to anyone about him. We weren’t sure if it was because of all of his efforts building youth centers or if the feds were working some kind of big case on him.”
Terri had already covered the bases on this homicide. She had people out canvassing the area, talking to doormen, and looking for video surveillance. She asked, “Where’s your new partner?”
I was more than a little annoyed to notice that Trilling hadn’t shown up yet. I had texted him after I got the call from Terri but had gotten no answer. I looked at Terri and shrugged.
She said, “What’s with these guys with no sense of duty?”
“That’s not Rob Trilling. He’s all about duty and responsibility. But I don’t know where he is right now.”
A couple of local TV news trucks came down the street and stopped just outside the police perimeter. I figured one of the doormen had made the call. They’d learned there were some perks to tipping off the media to things like this.
A green Toyota Camry rattled to a stop behind one of the news trucks. I couldn’t help but smile when I saw Lois Frang pop out of the beat-up car and start marching toward the perimeter. When she waved at me, I felt obliged to walk over and talk to her.
I said, “Tell me who tipped you guys off. I’m just curious.”
Lois let out a quick laugh. “No one ever givesmetips. I work for theBrooklyn Democrat.What could I give them in return? I rely on a good old-fashioned police scanner. It catches your general traffic, and I could tell something was going on.”
“You were up listening to a police scanner at this hour?”
“Insomnia. It’s either a gift or a curse.” She looked past my shoulder and said, “I thought it might be the sniper again. Seeing you confirms it. Can you tell me anything?”
“Not much.” In the silence that followed we both heard the TV reporter next to us practicing his introduction.
“We’re at the scene of a murder, possibly committed by the sniper who has been terrorizing the city. The victim is Gus Querva, the man responsible for bringing countless youth centers and community advancements to the Bronx.”
Lois snorted.
“What’s funny?”
“These journalism-school grads who believe anything that’s fed to them. Everyone with half a brain knows Gus Querva was able to live in a building like this by running a protection andextortion racket. There’s hardly a bodega in this part of the Bronx that doesn’t pay one of Gus’s crew a cut every week just to be left alone.”
I nodded and made an excuse as I headed back to find Terri Hernandez. I checked my watch and called Rob Trilling. I told him to call me as soon as he got my message.
I thought about how upset Trilling had been when he saw Querva talking to the media. He’d said the same things about Querva that Lois Frang just had. I felt a sharp sting of anxiety in my stomach as I thought about my partner’s comments regarding our latest victim.
CHAPTER 51
ROB TRILLING SHOWED up at the crime scene in the Bronx at almost exactly seven in the morning. All his new partner said when he arrived was “You need to live next to your phone when you’re working in Homicide.” Trilling nodded, knowing more would be coming later. He’d had his ass chewed by professionals in the Army. So far, no one in the NYPD scared him too much.
Trilling tried to make sense of the scene and what each of the team members was doing. Uniformed police officers kept the media and gawkers behind the police line. Crime-scene techs took photos near the front door where the body had fallen. Detectives were searching for potential witnesses. And Trilling took it all in. He wanted to understand how a smart guy like Mike Bennett could figure out the details that led to an arrest. He knew that was always the key to any mission: details.
Trilling stepped over to Bennett and asked, “When did the M.E. take Querva’s body?”