The Bone Collector

taking.”
    Dellray looked from the SAC to the other agents and continued, “At this moment we have field agents hitting every major terrorist cell in the city and pursuing whatever leads we can find that’ll get us to the unsub’s residence. All CIs, all undercover agents. It’ll mean compromising some existing operations but we’ve decided it’s worth the risk.
    “Our job here is to be rapid response. You’ll break out into groups of six agents each and be ready to move on any lead. You’ll have complete hostage-rescue and barricade-entry support.”
    “Sir,” Sachs said.
    Perkins looked up, frowning. Apparently one didn’t interrupt briefings until the approved Q&A break. “Yes, what is it, officer?”
    “Well, I’m just wondering, sir. What about the victim?”
    “Who, that German girl? You think we should interview her again?”
    “No, sir. I meant the next victim.”
    Perkins responded, “Oh, we’ll certainly stay cognizant of the fact that there may be other targets.”
    Sachs continued, “He’s got one now.”
    “He does?” The SAC glanced at Dellray, who shrugged. Perkins asked Sachs, “How do you know?”
    “Well, I don’t exactly know, sir. But he left clues at the last scene and he wouldn’t’ve done that if he didn’t have another vic. Or was just about to snatch one.”
    “Noted, officer,” the SAC continued. “We’re going to mobilize as fast as we can to make sure nothing happens to them.”
    Dellray said to her, “We think it’s best to focus on the beast himself.”
    “Detective Sachs—” Perkins began.
    “I’m not a detective, sir. I’m assigned to Patrol.”
    “Yes, well,” the SAC continued, looking at the stacks of files. “If you could just give us some of your bullet points, that would be helpful.”
    Thirty agents watching her. Two women among them.
    “Just tell us whatcha saw,” Dellray said, gripping an unlit cigarette between prominent teeth.
    She gave them a synopsis of her searches of the crime scenes and the conclusions Rhyme and Terry Dobyns had come to. Most of the agents were troubled by the unsub’s curious MO.
    “Like a goddamn game,” an agent muttered.
    One asked if the clues had any political messages they could decipher.
    “Well, sir, we really don’t think he’s a terrorist,” Sachs persisted.
    Perkins turned his high-powered attention toward her. “Let me ask you, officer, you concede he’s smart, this unsub?”
    “Very smart.”
    “Couldn’t he be double-bluffing?”
    “How do you mean?”
    “You . . . I should say the NYPD’s thinking is that he’s just a nutcase. I mean, a criminal personality. But isn’t it possible he’s smart enough to make you think that. When something else’s going on.”
    “Like what?”
    “Take those clues he left. Couldn’t they be diversions?”
    “No, sir, they’re directions,” Sachs said. “Leading us to the vics.”
    “I understand that,” quick Thomas Perkins said. “But by doing that he’s also leading us away from other targets, right?”
    She hadn’t considered that. “I suppose it’s possible.”
    “And Chief Wilson’s been pulling men off UN security detail right and left to work the kidnapping. This unsub might be keeping everyone distracted, which leaves him free for his real mission.”
    Sachs remembered that she’d had a similar thought herself earlier in the day, watching all the searchers along Pearl Street. “And that’d be the UN?”
    “We think so,” Dellray said. “The perps behind the UNESCO bombing attempt in London might want to try again.”
    Meaning Rhyme was going off in the completely wrong direction. It eased the weight of her guilt somewhat.
    “Now, officer, could you itemize the evidence for us?” Perkins asked.
    Dellray gave her an inventory sheet of everything she’d found and she went through it item by item. As she spoke Sachs was aware of bustling activity around her—some agents taking calls, some standing and whispering to other agents, some taking notes. But when,glancing down at the sheet, she added, “Then I picked up this fingerprint of his at the last scene,” she realized that the room had fallen utterly silent. She looked up. Every face in the office was staring at her in what could pass for shock—if federal agents were capable of that.
    She glanced helplessly at Dellray, who cocked his head, “You saying you gotchaself a print?”
    “Well, yes. His glove fell off in a struggle with the last vic and when