The Broken Window

books, magazines, Kleenex, some empty Vitamin Water bottles, a Starbucks napkin, running shoes shedding rubber, a Seventeen magazine in the backseat and a textbook on poetry . . . And who owns this superb contribution to the world of Japanese technology? The registration tells me it’s Pamela Willoughby.
    I’ll get a little more information on her from innerCircle then I’ll pay her a visit. Wonder what she looks like? I’ll check DMV to make sure she’s worth the trouble.
    The car starts up just fine. Ease out carefully, no upsetting other drivers. Don’t want to make a scene.
    A half block, into the alley.
    What does Miss Pam like to listen to? Rock, rock, alternative, hip-hop, talk and NPR. Presets are extremely informative.
    I’m already forming a game plan to arrange a transaction with the girl: getting to know her. We’ll meet at Amelia 7303’s memorial service (no body, no funeral). I’ll offer sympathy. I met her during the case she was working on. I really liked her. Oh, don’t cry, honey. It’s okay. Tell you what. Let’s get together. I can tell you all about the stories Amelia shared with me. Her father. And the interesting story of her grandfather’scoming to this country. (After I learned she was snooping around, I checked out her dossier. What an interesting history.) We got to be good friends. I’m really devastated. . . . How about coffee? You like Starbucks? I always go there after my run in Central Park every evening. No! You too?
    We sure seem to have something in common.
    Oh, there’s that feeling again, thinking about Pam. How ugly can she be?
    It might be a wait to get her into my trunk. . . . I have to take care of Thom Reston first—and a few other things. But at least I have Amelia 7303 for tonight.
    I drive into the garage and ditch the car—it’ll rest here until I swap plates and it goes to the bottom of the Croton reservoir. But I can’t think about that now. I’m pretty consumed, planning out the transaction with my red-haired friend, waiting back home in my Closet, like a wife for her husband after a really tough day at the office.
    •   •   •
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    Despite drawing from the world’s largest database, despite the state-of-the-art software examining every detail of Amelia Sachs’s life at the speed of light, the program struck out.
    “I’m sorry,” Mark Whitcomb said, dabbing his nose. The high-def system on the video-conferencing system displayed the nasal injury quite prominently. It looked bad; Ron Pulaski had really slammed him.
    The young man continued, sniffing, “There just aren’t enough details. What you get out is only as goodas what you put in. It works best with a pattern of behaviors. All it tells us is that she’s going someplace she’s never been before, at least not on that route.”
    Right to the killer’s house, Rhyme reflected in frustration.
    Where the hell was she?
    “Hold on a minute. The system’s updating. . . .”
    The screen flickered and changed. Whitcomb blurted, “I’ve got her! Some RFID hits twenty minutes ago.”
    “Where?” Rhyme whispered.
    Whitcomb put them on the screen. They were in a quiet block on the Upper East Side. “Two hits at stores. The duration of the first RFID scan was two seconds. The next was slightly longer, eight seconds. Maybe she was pausing to check an address.”
    “Call Bo Haumann now!” Rhyme shouted.
    Pulaski hit speed dial and a moment later the head of Emergency Service came on the phone.
    “Bo, I’ve got a lead on Amelia. She went after Five Twenty-Two and she’s disappeared. We’ve got a computer monitoring her whereabouts. About twenty minutes ago she was near six forty-two East Eighty-eighth.”
    “We can be there in ten minutes, Linc. Hostage situation?”
    “That’s what I’d say. Call me when you know something.”
    They disconnected.
    Rhyme thought back to her message on voice mail. It seemed so fragile, that tiny bundle of digital data.
    In his mind he could hear her voice perfectly: “I have a lead, a good one, Rhyme. Call me.”
    He couldn’t help wondering if it would be their last communication.
    •   •   •
    Bo Haumann’s Emergency Service Unit A Team was standing near a doorway of a large town house on the Upper East Side: four officers in full body armor, holding MP-5s, compact, black machine guns. They were carefully staying clear of