The Lion

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

I went first to the nurses' station and reminded them to be security conscious, though in truth I thought the immediate danger had passed; Asad Khalil was obviously in the New York City area where he'd murdered Gabe and his family. Still, he could easily return here if he thought Kate was alive. She'd be safer in Bellevue Hospital in Manhattan where guarding injured victims, witnesses, or prisoners was an everyday occurrence. I mean, the last time an assault victim had to be guarded in Sullivan County, he had a musket ball in him. Anyway, I arranged a code phrase-Crazy John-that would allow me to get medical updates.

I went next to the elevators where there was a new shift of uniformed State Troopers, and I chatted with them for a few minutes. I was much less worried about Kate so I think I made a slightly better impression on these two, plus I was dressed now in neat trousers and an expensive sports jacket that I had intended to wear to the apres-jump party where I was going to push Craig's face in the toilet bowl.

I reiterated to the troopers, "This guy is a good impersonator." A good joke makes a good point, so I said, "If in doubt about someone, ask him if he smokes Camels or rides them."

They smiled politely.

Satisfied that everything was under control here, medically and otherwise, I took the elevator to the lobby and went into the gift shop, where I bought a cute stuffed lion for Kate and asked them to deliver it to her room. I'm a thoughtful guy. And speaking of growling, my stomach was making noises, so I bought some crap snacks and a coffee, then went out to the parking lot and got into my Jeep.

I began the two-hour drive back to Manhattan. It was another perfect day, and the mountains in May are really nice. I could see why Kate sometimes spoke about getting a place up here.

I opened a bag of cheese maggots or something and began stuffing them down my throat. How can they sell this crap in a hospital?

My cell phone rang, and I took the call. I have a hands-off feature for talking while driving-I take my hands off the wheel.

It was Captain Paresi, who asked, "How's Kate?"

"On the road to recovery."

"Good. Where are you?"

"On the road to New York."

"Okay. Look, a body was discovered by a commuter early this morning at the Douglaston train station near Gabe's house. The victim was a livery driver, found behind the wheel of his Lincoln Town Car, with two bullet wounds fired through the back of his seat."

Coincidence? I think not.

Paresi gave me a few more details of the murder, including the reclining position of the body covered with a newspaper.

I asked, "Which paper?"

"Which…? I think Newsday."

"Then maybe he died of boredom."

He continued, "The M.E. says the victim could have been dead since about noon yesterday, give or take a few hours. He'll know better later, but that fits the timeline in regard to the… Haytham murders."

"Right." I asked, "Was the victim a Mideastern gentleman?"

"The coroner's report describes him as an obese Caucasian, mid-thirties, name of Charles Taylor." He continued, "Forensics recovered two bullets from the dashboard, and they were.40 caliber. Ballistics is comparing them to the ballistic file on Kate's weapon."

"Okay. We won't be surprised to discover a match."

"No, we won't." He informed me, "They lifted lots of prints from the limo and of course from the Haytham residence." He asked, "Do we have Khalil's prints on file?"

"We do. They printed him at the American Embassy in Paris three years ago."

"Good. So, if we get a match, that nails it all down. The limo driver and the Haytham family."

"Right. Plus, as you mentioned yesterday, Khalil called the responding officers at Gabe's house from Gabe's cell phone and threatened to kill me next. And, as you also mentioned, someone using Gabe's cell phone, who we will assume was Asad Khalil, called Walsh and inquired about Kate's condition. Also, we have Kate's positive ID of Asad Khalil as her assailant, not to mention my ID of him. So, yeah, we might have a good case against him."

Captain Paresi detected a note of sarcasm in my voice and said, "We need the forensic evidence, Detective, to have an airtight case. I don't have to tell you what those defense attorneys can do with eyewitness testimony and circumstantial evidence."

Indeed, I knew what defense attorneys could do, which was why prosecutors needed forensic evidence. A lot of this crap could be avoided if they tried terrorists in a military tribunal instead of Federal court. In this case, however, it was better to skip the trial, pass jail, and go directly to the morgue.

Captain Paresi continued, "They also found two.40 caliber shell casings under the driver's seat and a plastic water bottle with two holes in the bottom."

I informed Captain Paresi, "The water bottle is Khalil's M.O. from last time." I added, "It's not the best silencer, but it's better than nothing, and he seems happy with it."

Paresi speculated, "If the bullets are from Kate's weapon, that could mean Khalil has no weapon of his own."

I replied, "If Khalil has contacts in this country-and I'm sure he does-then he has his own gun." I concluded, "He chose to use Kate's gun to say to us, 'Fuck you.'"

"Yeah… I guess…" He further informed me, "Ballistics confirms that Gabe was also killed with Kate's gun."

Captain Paresi seemed uncomfortable telling me that it was Kate's weapon that killed Gabe, and probably killed the livery driver. I changed the subject and asked, "What else?"

He continued his briefing. "We contacted Charles Taylor's livery company on Long Island and discovered that Mr. Taylor was to pick up a passenger at Republic by the name of Mr. Brian Gold and take him to a destination or destinations as directed by the customer." He added, "The livery company was prepaid by credit card, and we're trying to track down the cardholder, which is a corporation in Lichtenstein… where the hell is that?"

"I think it's near Hoboken."

"Yeah, anyway, the corporation is called Global Entertainment, and they have a P.O. box or something."

"Right. Global Entertainment." I advised him, "Tell Walsh not to waste too much time on the money trail. Let the Treasury Department go nuts with that."

"Agreed." He concluded, "We're checking Taylor's GPS for clues."

"Good." I asked, "Okay, so did Charles Taylor take Asad Khalil, a.k.a. Brian Gold, to the Haytham house?" I answered my own question and said, "Not likely. Khalil met up with someone else, probably at the train station after he whacked Taylor." Recalling Khalil's last visit and Kate's advice, I said, "Look for a dead Libyan cab driver."

After a few seconds of awed silence, Paresi informed me, "We got one." He asked, "How did you know?"

"Tell me about it."

"I'll let Walsh tell you."

"All right. But tell me if they found a cell phone on this dead Libyan taxi driver."

"They did not." He let me know, "But we're checking his cell phone records."

"Excellent detective work. So where did this body turn up? How was he killed?"

Paresi ignored my questions and said, "Next subject. The medical examiner confirms that Gabe's daughter died of the knife wound, which entered her heart. No surprise there. And the M.E. also says that the wife died of a broken neck." He stayed silent a second, then said, "And those flowers on the daughter's chest…" He concluded, "This guy is a very coldhearted killer. Up close and personal."

"Right." Like using Gabe's cell phone to call the cops who'd just found three murdered people in the house. Khalil never missed a chance to stick something up our asses. Can you hear me now?

Captain Paresi went on, "Based on what the M.E. said about the time of death, and what the two responding officers discovered, I think we just missed Khalil by… maybe minutes."