Silence. Then: "But he got away."
"Yes, he did," Rhyme said.
"How?"
"We got a team together as fast as we could but the cover wasn't the best. The UNSUB was closer than we thought. He saw an unmarked or one of the team, I guess. He took off. But he ditched some evidence that could be helpful."
"Which is on its way to the lab in Queens? Or to you?"
Rhyme glanced at Sellitto. People rise in rank in institutions like the NYPD based on experience, drive and quick minds. Malloy was a good half-step ahead of them.
"I've asked for it to come here, Joe," Rhyme said.
No silence this time. The sound from the speaker was a resigned sigh. "Lincoln, you understand the problem, don't you?"
Conflict of interest, Rhyme thought.
"There's a clear conflict of interest with you as an adviser to the department and trying to exonerate your cousin. And beyond that, the implication is that there's been a wrongful arrest."
"But that's exactly what happened. And two wrongful convictions." Rhyme reminded Malloy about the rape and coin-theft cases that Flintlock had told them about. "And I wouldn't be surprised if this's happened other times too. . . . You know Locard's Principle, Joe?"
"That was in your book, the one from the academy, right?"
The French criminalist Edmond Locard stated that whenever a crime occurs there's always a transfer of evidence between the perpetrator and the crime scene or the victim. He was referring specifically to dust but the rule applies to many substances and types of evidence. The connection may be difficult to find but it exists.
"Locard's Principle guides what we do, Joe. But here's a perp who's using it as a weapon. It's his M.O. He kills and gets away because somebody else is convicted of the crime. He knows exactly when to strike, what kind of evidence to plant and when to
plant it. The crime-scene teams, the detectives, the lab people, the prosecutors and judges . . . he's used everybody, made them accomplices. This has nothing to do with my cousin, Joe. This has to do with stopping a very dangerous man."
A sighless silence now.
"Okay, I'll sanction it."
Sellitto was lifting an eyebrow.
"With caveats. You keep me informed of every development in the case. I mean everything."
"Sure."
"And, Lon, you try not being straight with me again and I'll transfer you to Budgets. Understand me?"
"Yeah, Captain. Absolutely."
"And since you're at Lincoln's, Lon, I assume you want a reassignment from the Vladimir Dienko case."
"Petey Jimenez's up to speed. He's done more of the legwork than I have and he's set up the stings personally."
"And Dellray's running the snitches, right? And the federal jurisdiction?"
"That's right."
"Okay, you're off it. Temporarily. Open a file on this UNSUB--I mean, send out a memo about the file you've already started on the sly. And listen to me: I'm not raising any issues of innocent people being convicted wrongly. Not raising it with anybody. And you're not going to either. That issue is not on the table. The only crime you're running is a single rape-murder that occurred this afternoon. Period. As part of his M.O. this UNSUB might have tried to shift the blame to somebody else but that's all you can say and only if the subject comes up. Don't raise the issue yourself and, for God's sake, don't say anything to the press."
"I don't talk to the press," Rhyme said. Who did, if they could avoid it? "But we'll need to look into the other cases to get an idea of how he operates."
"I didn't say you couldn't," the captain said, firm but not strident. "Keep me posted." He hung up.
"Well, we got ourselves a case," Sellitto said, surrendering to the abandoned quarter of a cookie and washing it down with the coffee.