The Cold Moon

guys’re . . . going out.”
    Amelia Sachs was a lantern that attracted many moths and Rhyme wasn’t surprised that the detective was checking out the availability of the flame. He laughed at the detective’s quaint term. Going out. He said, “You could put it that way.”
    “Must be tough.” Then Baker blinked. “Wait, I didn’t mean what you think.”
    Rhyme, though, had a pretty good idea what the detective was saying. He wasn’t referring to a relationship between a crip and somebody who was mobile—Baker seemed hardly to notice Rhyme’s condition. No, he was referring to a very different potential conflict. “Two cops, you meant.”
    The Other Case versus His Case.
    Baker nodded. “Dated an FBI agent once. She and I had jurisdictional issues.”
    Rhyme laughed. “That’s a good way to put it. Of course, my ex wasn’t a cop and we had a pretty rough time too. Blaine had a great fastball. I lost some nice lamps. And a Bausch & Lomb microscope. Probably shouldn’t’ve brought it home. . . . Well, having it at home was okay; I shouldn’t’ve had it on the nightstand in the bedroom.”
    “I’m not gonna make jokes about microscopes in the bedroom,” Sellitto called from across the room.
    “Sounds like you just did, if you ask me,” Rhyme replied.
    Deflecting Baker’s small talk, Rhyme wheeled over to Pulaski and Cooper, who were trying to lift prints from the spool from the florist shop, on Rhyme’s hope that the Watchmaker couldn’t undo the green metallic wire with gloves on and had used his bare hands. But they were having no success.
    Rhyme heard the door open and a moment later Sachs walked into the lab, pulled off her leather jacket and tossed it distractedly on a chair. She wasn’t smiling. She nodded a greeting to the team and then asked Rhyme, “Any breaks?”
    “Nothing yet, no. Some more strikes on the EVL but they didn’t play out. No ASTER information either.”
    Sachs stared at the chart. But it seemed to Rhyme that she was seeing none of the words. Turning to the rookie, she said, “Ron, the detective on the Sarkowski case told me he heard rumors about money going to our One One Eight friends at the St. James. He thinks there’s a Maryland connection. We find it, we find the money and probably the names of some people involved. I’m thinking it’s a Baltimore OC hook.”
    “Organized crime?”
    “Unless you went to a different academy than me, that’s what OC means.”
    “Sorry.”
    “Make some calls. Find out if anybody from a Baltimore crew’s been operating in New York. And find out if Creeley, Sarkowski or anybody from the One One Eight has a place there or does a lot of business in Maryland.”
    “I’ll stop by the precinct and—”
    “No, just call. Make it anonymous.”
    “Wouldn’t it be better to do it in person? I could—”
    “The better thing,” Sachs said harshly, “is to do what I’m telling you.”
    “Okay.” He raised his hands in surrender.
    Sellitto said, “Hey, some of your good humor’s rubbing off on the troops, Linc.”
    Sachs’s mouth tightened. Then she relented. “It’ll be safer that way, Ron.”
    It was a Lincoln Rhyme apology, that is to say, not much of one at all, but Pulaski accepted it. “Sure.”
    She looked away from the whiteboards. “Need to talk to you, Rhyme. Alone.” A glance at Baker. “You mind?”
    He shook his head. “Not at all. I’ve got some other cases to check on.” He pulled on his coat. “I’ll be downtown if you need me.”
    “So?” Rhyme asked her in a soft voice.
    “Upstairs. Alone.”
    Rhyme nodded. “All right.” What was going on here?
    Sachs and Rhyme took the tiny elevator to the second floor and he wheeled into the bedroom, Sachs behind him.
    Upstairs, she sat down at a computer terminal, began typing furiously.
    “What’s up?” Rhyme asked.
    “Give me a minute.” She was scrolling through documents.
    Rhyme observed two things about her: Her hand had been digging into her scalp and her thumb was bloody from the wounding. The other was that he believed she’d been crying. Which had happened only two or three times in all the time they’d known each other.
    She typed harder, pages rolled past, almost too fast to read.
    He was impatient. He was concerned. Finally he had to say firmly, “Tell me, Sachs.”
    She was staring at the screen, shaking her head. Then turned to him. “My father . . . he was crooked.” Her voice choked.
    Rhyme wheeled closer, as her