The Cold Moon

hiscredit card companies showed that he hadn’t rented one recently using his plastic.
    “When did you drop the money?” Sellitto asked.
    He explained that he’d left work about seven thirty the previous night. He’d had some drinks with friends, then left about nine and walked to the subway. He remembered pulling a subway pass out of his pocket when he was walking along Cedar, which was probably when he lost the clip. He continued on to the station and returned home, the Upper East Side, about 9:45. His wife was on a business trip so he went to a bar near his apartment for dinner by himself. He got home about eleven.
    Sellitto made some calls to check out his story. The night guard at his office confirmed he’d left at seven thirty, a credit card receipt showed he was at a bar down on Water Street around nine, and the doorman in his building and a neighbor confirmed that he had returned to his apartment at the time that he said. It seemed impossible for him to have abducted two victims, killed one at the pier and then arranged the death of Theodore Adams in the alley, all between nine fifteen and eleven.
    Sellitto said, “We’re investigating a very serious crime here. It happened near where you were last night. Did you notice anything that could help us?”
    “No, nothing at all. I swear I’d help if I could.”
    “The killer could be going to strike again, you know.”
    “I’m sorry about that,” he said, not sounding very sorry at all. “But I panicked. That’s not a crime.”
    Sellitto glanced at his guards. “Take him outside for a minute.”
    After he was gone, Baker muttered, “Waste of time.”
    Sachs shook her head. “He knows something. I’ve got a hunch.”
    Rhyme deferred to Sachs when it came to what he called—with some condescension—the “people” side of being a cop: witnesses, psychology and, God forbid, hunches.
    “Okay,” he said. “But what do we do with your hunch?”
    It wasn’t Sachs who responded, though, but Lon Sellitto. He said, “Got an idea.” He opened his jacket, revealing an impossibly wrinkled shirt, and fished out his cell phone.

Chapter 6
    Vincent Reynolds was walking down the chilly streets of SoHo, in the blue light of this deserted part of the neighborhood, east of Broadway, some blocks from the area’s chic restaurants and boutiques. He was fifty feet behind his flower girl—Joanne, the woman who would soon be his.
    His eyes were on her, and he felt a hunger, keen and electric, as intense as the one he’d felt the night he met Gerald Duncan for the first time, which had proved to be a very important moment for Vincent Reynolds.
    After the Sally Anne incident—when Vincent got arrested because he lost control—he told himself that he’d have to be smarter. He’d wear a ski mask, he’d take the women from behind so they couldn’t see him, he’d use a condom (which helped him slow down, anyway), he’d never hunt close to home, he’d vary the techniques and the neighborhoods of the attacks. He’d plan the rapes carefully and be prepared to walk away if there was a risk he’d get caught.
    Well, that was his theory. But in the past year it’d been getting harder and harder to control the hunger. Impulse would take over and he’d see a woman by herself on the street and think, I have to have her. Now! I don’t care if anybody sees me.
    The hunger does that to you.
    Two weeks earlier he’d been having a piece of chocolate cake and a Coke at a diner up the street from the office where he regularly temped. He glanced at the waitress, a new one. She had a round face and a slim figure,curls of golden hair. He noticed her tight blue blouse that was two buttons open and, in his soul, the hunger erupted.
    She smiled at him as she brought his check and he decided he had to have her. Right away.
    He heard her say to her boss she was going into the alley for a cigarette. Vincent paid and stepped outside. He walked to the alley and then glanced into it. There she was, in her coat, leaning against the wall, looking away from him. It was late—he preferred the 3 to 11 P.M. shift—and though there were some passersby on the sidewalk, the alley was completely empty. The air was cold, the cobblestones would be colder, but he didn’t care; her body would keep him warm.
    It was then that he heard a voice whisper in his ear, “Wait five minutes.”
    Vincent jumped and swiveled around to look at a man with a round face and lean body, in his fifties,