Page 13 of The Accomplice
‘Mom, I’m fine, I’m just leaving the office right now—’
‘Well, that’s no good now, is it ? Ring me when you’re home safe. Not before.’
Delaney heard a faint rattle on the other end of the line. It wasn’t the connection ; it was her mom clutching her rosary beads. She knew better than to argue.
‘I’ll call when I’m home. I love you.’
‘I love you too, sweet pea.’
She hung up, returned to the monitor.
Thirty-one databases.
And just like this morning there were no hits or leads on Daniel Miller’s bank accounts, nor his credit cards, nor his license plate on that panel truck, nor had his face been picked up on a facial recognition security camera. The Sandman maintained his number-one slot on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted list. Tidying her desk for the next day, Delaney found her task list. She normally scrunched up the list and threw it in the shredding pile at the end of her shift. If any items on the list still had to be completed, she stayed late until they were done.
There was one job left.
Delaney dialed the number and waited for the call to connect. It went straight to voicemail, just like it had the previous three times she’d called. Carrie Miller’s trial began in two days. The witness list was long, and the labor had been divided between the NYPD and the FBI. Any witnesses that Delaney had a relationship with, it would be her responsibility to check, making sure they’re ready for trial and giving them updates on when they would likely have to answer their subpoenas.
She’d gotten a hold of every witness, except one.
There was always one.
Chester Morris. He worked as a doorman for Le Blue Hotel on 4thAvenue in Brooklyn. After Carrie Miller’s picture first appeared in the press, Chester came forward and spoke to NYPD. He said that at the end of his shift one night he stopped at the diner on the corner of 4thand 6thStreet for a take-out burrito. As he left with his food, he noticed two people standing at the front door to the apartment building next to the diner. A male and a female. They stood under the awning, huddled close together even though it wasn’t raining. The man looked as though he was fumbling with his keys, trying to open the door. He saw the man working the lock, with a key, or something else. Chester walked on toward the bus stop and didn’t interfere.
It wasn’t until the next evening he heard on the news that two women in that same apartment building had been murdered by the Sandman. While the two people outside the building concerned him, the police were only looking for one man. Not a couple.
Only after Daniel and Carrie Miller’s pictures made the front page did Chester make a call to the NYPD to tell them he’d seen those people outside that apartment building the night of the murder.
It was important evidence, and Chester would be a good witness. Of course, Chester wanted something in return for testifying at the trial. He had a pending assault charge that could pull his ticket as a doorman if he was convicted. Bill Seong and Drew White had made a deal with Chester promising the assault case would go away if he co-operated. Somehow, the media had gotten wind of Chester’s deposition, and there had been a few articles about it.
Now, he wasn’t answering his phone. Delaney left a message. He was probably on shift, dealing with a guest.
She stood up from her desk, stretched her back. It was five after eight. She had done enough for the day. As she reached for her cell phone, she heard the ping of a new message. And then a chime signaling an email on her computer.
The message was an alert from the financial fraud team at American Express. She checked her email. It was a back-up notification, to make sure she had seen the first text. Before Delaney could call the bank, her phone started to ring. It was the White Collar Criminal Investigation Division in Quantico.
‘Special Agent Delaney, it’s Agent Rudnick here at CID. Got a hit on your boy,’ said the voice.
For a time, Delaney couldn’t speak. She had waited for a break for so long, and now, here it was right in front of her. This wasthecall. Since Daniel Miller had gone on the run, the FBI had been monitoring his bank accounts and credit cards. They hadn’t been frozen, simply observed for any activity. It was thought that Miller, who was independently wealthy, had a large amount of hard cash to keep himself under the radar. But cash runs out.
‘Where ?’ asked Delaney, expecting an alert to come from a car dealership in Suriname, a private air charter service in Colombia or just buying some groceries in El Salvador. She was sure he had fled the country and was now holed up in a backwater town far away from the reach of the FBI.
‘The Sandman just used his American Express at Grady’s Inn Hotel and Bar in Queens.’
CHAPTER SIX
DELANEY
The parking lot of Grady’s Inn was lit up by police cars. Headlamps, flashing blue and red lights and even some large spot beams were making the place look like the fourth of July. She had been to the hotel before, on the hunt for the serial killer Dollar Bill, who had been sequestered here as a jury member. If anything, the place looked even more run down than last time.
Delaney pulled up and parked by an old station wagon with four flat tires. There was one other civilian car in the lot – a Toyota. At least the hotel wasn’t that busy, and if the Sandman tried anything there wouldn’t be a hotel full of people to worry about. Around thirty cops were standing outside the hotel with either shotguns or assault rifles in their ready hands.
Bill Seong escorted a man in black pants, a black waistcoat and white shirt out of the hotel. The duty manager, probably. Behind them came a lady in her fifties wearing sweats and an apron, the only cleaning staff the hotel needed with so few guests. An officer took the manager and the maid to a nearby SWAT van and escorted them inside.
‘Is he here ?’ asked Delaney, with a heaviness to her voice. She could already tell they had missed him.
‘Tom, the duty manager, says he checked in around forty, maybe forty-five minutes ago. He left his bag ; said he was going to get something to eat.’
