Back at Central, Eve called Jenkinson and Reineke into her office to update them.
“What’d we miss?” Reineke asked her.
“You didn’t miss anything. We’ve got new information, new lines, and a new theory. Rosie Kent wasn’t a one-shot or the start of a serial in the traditional sense.”
She ran it through for them as she added Kent to her board.
“So we’re after a whacko who’s living inside a book?” Jenkinson frowned over it. “Maybe a tranny, a cross-dresser.”
“Possible, but it’s not about the lifestyle. It’s about the scene, and re-creating it as closely as possible. So for Kent’s murder, we’re looking for a female—for Rylan’s, a man. That’s how the killer saw himself, that’s how he approached it, and how he presented.”
“What’s the why?” Reineke muttered. “What’s the frigging point?”
“DeLano’s going to be the point, or the books, or a combination. The vics—including the one coming up next in the books—are female. The creator of the scenes is female, the detective in the books is female. That’s going to play in. When DeLano divorced, she moved in with her mother. She has two daughters. That’s a lot of females, and it has to factor in.”
“How about DeLano’s ex?”
Eve nodded at Reineke. “I’m going to take a hard look there, but he doesn’t fit the profile—I’ll send that to you. Add that these are complex, detail-oriented killings, and he’s mostly a domineering asshole with violent spurts. My sense, at this point, is his dick’s too important for him to pose as female.”
“He timed it good, with Kent.” Jenkinson studied the board. “Picked her up right after she came out for the night. We figured either he got real lucky, and luck’s mostly bullshit, or he’d scoped her out before, maybe even bought her before. Now you’ve gotta figure it didn’t have jack to do with luck. We can go back, talk to the working girls and boys again. Any of them been on the stroll awhile would spot a cross-dresser or tranny, even somebody pretending to be.”
“It wouldn’t hurt, but it’s possible—and how I’d play it—the killer did the scoping as whatever the hell sex he was born with. And if that’s male, geared up for the kill, not before.”
“We’ll play it out anyway. It’s pissing me off now.” Jenkinson took one last hard look at the board. “Yeah, it’s pissing me off. Let’s hit the streets, partner.”
Alone, Eve grabbed coffee, sat, wrote up a report for Mira.
She took time to run some probabilities, chewed them over. Dissatisfied, she brought the security footage from the vid palace up on her screen, ran through it. Slowed the speed, picked through it.
She watched Chanel and Lola cross to the concession stand, chatting, chatting. Chanel pulled off her hat, shook out her hair, laughed at something Lola said.
Eve studied people who filed into line behind them, a couple of teenage boys, another couple she judged to be on a date.
She toggled to the snack area, the tables, studied every face. Toggled back, followed Chanel’s progress toward the theaters, with her popcorn and soft drink.
The teenage boys headed in the same direction—two jumbo corns, two jumbo drinks, assorted candy. She spotted the student she’d interviewed on scene, watched a few others—no solos.
Sat back, drummed her fingers. Then ordered the feed to start thirty minutes earlier.
People coming and going, a matinee letting out—kids show, she had to figure by the number of children and exhausted-looking adults herding them.
A full twenty minutes before the victim and her roommate entered, Eve felt a little buzz.
A solo, wearing sunshades, and something about the way he—the stride, the boots, the long, bulky coat read male—checked his wrist unit, turned his head as if checking the lobby area for someone, seemed studied to her.
No hair showing with the thick, dark cap pulled low on the forehead. No clear view of the face, with the cap, the shades, and the scarf bundled around the neck, skimming over the chin.
No bag, she noted, but deep pockets in the coat.
Another check of the wrist unit—a chunky, mannish one. Gloves on the hands. An impatient shrug before he marched across the lobby, head down, face averted, and disappeared into the corridor that led to the theaters.
She ran it back, stopped on the best angle of the face, zoomed. Caucasian, she determined. Hard to judge the age, she thought, but if she had to guess, between thirty and fifty. About five feet, seven inches in height, and no way of knowing if there were lifts in the boots. Medium build, say a hundred-fifty—but, again, no way to know what was under the coat.
She zipped it forward to TOD, slowed it again. When the first show let out, she slowed it more, worked her way through the crowd looking for the dark coat, the cap, the body type.
She kept it running after the first responders arrived, after alarm spread on faces and body language in the lobby.
Ran it back again, picked through again.