A Textbook Case

troubled. Sachs, too, stopped her analysis of a sheet of paper, walked behind him and massaged his shoulders, which were tense as stone.
    It felt nice…
    But didn’t take away the frustration.
    Rhyme gazed at the largely useless evidence, trying desperately to think of a different approach. It was clear that the classic textbook procedure for running a case forensically wasn’t going to work.
    What else could he—?
    Textbook.
    “Sachs!”
    “What?” She stopped the massage and walked around in front of him.
    “Textbook. Think about what I’ve been saying for the past couple of days. My textbook.”
    The evidence chart reads like the table of contents in my goddamn book….
    Sachs was nodding. “It’s like everything he knows about evidence and crime scenes, he learned from your book.”
    He pointed to the chart. “There’s a separate chapter for each of those categories of evidence collection and analysis. And I wrote sections about contamination, having too much evidence, and arson as a means to obliterate it. Somebody who bought or borrowed my text is the perp.”
    “How many copies did you sell?” Cooper asked. He knew the book well; he was one of the dedicatees.
    “About twenty thousand.”
    “Not very helpful then.”
    Rhyme considered this. “I’m not so sure. People aren’t going to curl up with it on cold winter nights like they would with Harry Potter or one of those vampire books now, are they? The vast bulk of sales would be to law enforcement. But let’s put them aside for the time being—it’s too obvious, too traceable. Somebody with a forensic specialty’d be the first people we’d look at.”
    “We’ll drop everything and get in touch with publishers and retailers.”
    “How do we factor out law enforcement sales?” Cooper asked.
    “Anybody with the government got a discount, so let’s get a list of any customer who paid full price.”
    Sachs pointed out, “But like you just said, it could have been borrowed. It could’ve been bought with cash in a store, could’ve been stolen.”
    “Maybe, but not many retail outlets carried it. Most sales were online. As for borrowing it, just because something is unlikely is no reason not to pursue it. I don’t think we have much choice, anyway.”
    “Time frame for the sales?” Cooper wondered.
    “I’d go back a year. The sales spiked after that documentary I did on A&E; a lot of people saw it, Googled me and bought the book.” Rhyme’s head was forward and he felt exhilarated. He was on the hunt and he knew his heart was pounding hard—felt the sensation in his neck and head, of course, not in his numb chest.
    “Besides, I’d think emotionally you don’t buy a book to help you plan a killing and then wait two years. This perp’s moving fast.”
    “You’re sounding quite psychological, Rhyme,” Sachs said, laughing. “That almost sounds like you’re profiling him.”
    A pseudoscience, he felt. But he replied with a shrug, “Who said forensic scientists can’t be
aware
of human nature? That’s all. Let’s get to work. Who coughed up a hundred and twenty dollars for my words of wisdom, plus shipping and handling?”
    In three hours they had a rough list from the publishers, online retailers and professional bookstores. Sixty-four people in the New York area had bought the textbook in the past year, paying full price.
    “Ouch,” Cooper muttered. “Sixty-four? That’s a brick wall.”
    “Not at all,” Rhyme whispered, looking over the list. “I’d say it’s merely a speed bump.”
    # # #
    Okay, he was a catch.
    Vicki Sellick probably wouldn’t’ve thought of him that way by herself. But Joan and Alaki from work had met them for a drink earlier that night and both gave her subtle raised-eyebrows approval ratings. Joanie had whispered, “Go, girl! You hooked a good one.”
    Oh, stop…
    But, yeah, Vicki now thought, she had.
    Her date was courteous, handsome, had a great job and on the two times that he’d stayed over their time together had been… well, fantastic. They made a solid couple, politically in tune (centrist Democrats), athletic, lovers of the out of doors. They’d both been through tough divorces. True, he worked long hours, but so did she, a Wall Street lawyer. And he was older—in his mid-fifties, but looked much younger. Besides, Vicki, thirty-seven, had stopped using age as a definitive criterion for potential partners some years ago, one of her better decisions in the crazy world