3 Time to Steele (22 page)

I’d also expected some resistance upon asking for help, purely due to the added financial strain of giant manhunts upon the department’s coffers, but the Captain surprised me yet again. He pulled out all the stops. He ordered for an all points bulletin to be issued for Scar Face and sent beat cops to stake out the old Physics and Chemistry building, the flophouse outside Little Welwic, and both Darryl’s apartment and Anya’s brownstone. He sent teams of technicians to the flophouse and the condemned science building to sweep every last nook and cranny for evidence that might help lead us to Scar Face’s next location. Cairny was instructed to double time it on her coroner’s reports. And, in a return to his sensitive, caring form, he growled at Rodgers and Quinto to pour through Scar Face’s journal while yelling at Shay and I to keep leaning on Wyle until he cracked.

So it was that I found myself standing over Harland Wyle, who sat in my desk chair with his head hanging low, while Shay perched on the corner of my massive desk, overseeing the action. Shadows stretched out from each of us as the sun dipped low in the sky, sending rays glancing at acute angles through the Captain’s office windows and into the pit.

“Keep talking to me, Wyle,” I said. “We need to work through this together.”

“I don’t know what else to tell you, man,” he said. “We’ve gone through what I know a dozen times already. My story isn’t going to change.”

Says you,
I thought. “Then let’s go through it once more. Some say thirteen’s a lucky number.”

Wyle groaned.

“Tell me again what you know about Buford Gill,” I said. “Surely there’s something important about the man. Some reason he was murdered.”

With Wyle, I’d kept operating under the pretense that his story held water instead of insisting it was a total crock. It made conversation easier, as I didn’t have to preface each statement with ‘Let’s assume you’re right and…’ or ‘If what you say is true, then…’, but the fact was I didn’t know what to believe anymore. Part of me, the open-minded part, wanted to believe Wyle’s time travel hypothesis—it would explain a lot—but the man made that so hard, with his constant waffling and imprecise descriptions of his own magic. The whole case would be much simpler to understand if I could catch Wyle in a lie, but I’d yet to do so. What was his angle, and how did he know where Scar Face had been hiding?

“Look,” said Wyle, “I’ve told you. To the best of my knowledge, Buford Gill isn’t an important historical figure. His death, which barely altered the time streams, supports that.”

“But then why did Scar Face kill him?” I asked. “Why torture Darryl and Anya to find him if he’s not important? Is it possible this isn’t about changing the fate of technology? Could there be a deeper connection between Scar Face and the Gill family?”

Wyle wiped a hand across his face. “Look, I don’t know, ok? It doesn’t make sense to me, either.”

I tapped my fingers impatiently against the desk. “Give me something, Wyle.”

Wyle spread his hands and looked bewildered. “Look, maybe…things are more complicated than they appear. Maybe Scar Face isn’t who we think he is. Maybe he knows more than I gave him credit for. Citizens for Simplicity is a pretty radical sect. Maybe they’re operating on a fringe theory of temporal reconstruction.”

Shay rolled her eyes. “I’m going to brew some tea. You want any?”

I shook my head. “Grab me a coffee, though, will you?”

Shay nodded, hopped off my desk, and walked off toward the break room. My mind threatened to wander as I watched her sway, but I wrestled it back to the case at hand.

“What fringe theory?” I asked.

“There are a couple unpopular hypotheses,” said Wyle. “One’s known as period accurate temporal reconstruction. Which essentially means you can change the past, but only if you do so in a manner that doesn’t
directly
contradict it.”

My brow scrunched up in thought. “I’m not sure I understand. How’s that even possible?”

“Let me give you an example,” said Wyle. “Let’s say someone came back in time and tried to kill, oh…I don’t know, the mayor of New Welwic. Well, he couldn’t just pop back and blast the guy with a heater in front of a huge crowd of people.”

“A what now?” I said.

“A, uh…never mind,” said Wyle. “The point is, he’d have to make the death seem possible, even likely. Maybe poison the man, or fake a cancer or, I don’t know…hit him with a hammer, I guess.”

I frowned. “And the other theory?”

“The other one’s called anti-event temporal reconstruction,” said Wyle.

“Say what now?”

“It’s the idea that you can’t change the past through
direct
action,” said Wyle, “and that only by preventing established events from unfolding can you impact the future. Look, they’re both convoluted theories, but they both operate under the assumption that to effect real change, you can’t just
do
things, you have to…
nudge
the past in the direction you want it to go. I don’t know how Scar Face would know what to tweak, but maybe that’s what these murders are. Nudges.”

I tried to see how many creases I could fit in my forehead when I noticed the Captain gesturing to me from the doorway to his office, a mug of coffee grasped between his thick, blacksmith-like hands. I sauntered over.

“Get anything?” asked the bulldog.

“Not really,” I said. “But I’ll keep trying. I just need more time, and maybe a fresh strategy.”

“Well, don’t take too long,” said the Captain.

“Trust me,” I said, “I know all too well with every passing second, the chances increase that the murdering SOB who took out the entire Gill family line will strike again.”

“Yes, but that’s not what I meant,” said the Captain, taking a gulp from his mug. “We can’t keep Wyle in custody forever.”

“What?” I said. “Why not?”

“You know damned well why not,” said the Captain. “Despite his lunacy and his apparent involvement with the Gill murders, you can’t implicate him in any of the slayings, can you?”

I shook my head.

“Exactly,” said the Captain. “And while we can charge him with a couple counts of trespassing, we have nobody left to pursue those charges. And as far as we know, he didn’t even steal anything, so burglary is off the table.”

“Just give me a little more time, Captain,” I said. “We can hold him for twenty-four hours without anyone batting an eye. Then we can figure out what to do with him.”

The Captain drew the mug of coffee back to his lips, but before he said anything, I heard the front doors to the precinct bang open. A panting bluecoat entered, spotted us, and jogged over.

“Captain…news,” he said.

I stuck my fat mouth into the fray before the Captain could get involved. “Did we get a sighting on the APB?”

The beat cop shook his head. “No. Sorry. This is from the World’s Wonders Fair. You know that wealthy businessman? Bock? He’s gone missing.”

“Linwood Bock?” My conversation with Mel Crestwick popped into the forefront of my mind. “This can’t be a coincidence. Stay here. I’m going to get Detective Steele.”

35

The sun had just set when Steele and I arrived at the home of Linwood Bock, a palatial estate smack dab in the center of the ultra-swanky Brentford neighborhood. Centenarian oaks and pines lined the property, set inside an eight-foot perimeter wall constructed of pale gray granite slabs that each must’ve weighted as much as one of Mr. Bock’s patented reciprocating engines. The towering wrought iron gates at the front of the property stood open, admitting us to a curved cobblestone path leading to the house proper—a mansion in every sense of the word. Four stories of polished stone and beaten copper roofing, with rooms enough to house, feed, and pamper a small army, surrounded by grounds so meticulously manicured they’d make the curator at the municipal botanical gardens blush with envy—or suffer a more orgasmic response.

A throng of officers milled outside the mansion’s front doors, including a handful standing at a table set between a pair of tall braziers that burned fiercely in the cool evening air. A mobile command center, if looks were any indication. A man, tall and lean, with a straight back and precisely trimmed black hair, leaned over the middle of the table staring at a map and giving orders. I headed for him and waved for Shay to follow.

“Excuse me,” I said, pushing through the crowd to reach Tall and Slim. I flashed my badge. “You in charge?”

“Sort of,” said the man. “Chief Investigator Reynolds is inside, talking to Bock’s wife, Sophia. I’m Lieutenant Drake. Who are you?”

“I’m Daggers,” I said. “She’s Steele. Homicide.” Shay nodded in acknowledgement.

Drake stood, straight as a rod, and his face lengthened. “Don’t tell me…”

“No,” I said. “Bock’s not dead. Not that we know of, anyway.”

“Oh.” Drake sighed. “Thank the gods. Then why are you here?”

“It’s complicated,” I said. “But suffice it to say we have an active investigation that may tie into Bock’s disappearance. You mind filling us in on what you know?”

“Sure,” said Drake, “but forgive me if I’m brief. We’re scrambling to stay ahead of this before the news spreads. Essentially, Bock was last seen at the World’s Wonders Fair, behind the main stage an hour, hour and a half ago. They were prepping for the evening exhibition of his…
apparatuses
, or whatever you want to call them. Apparently, Bock visited the facilities and never returned. One of his protégés went to the bathroom to look for him and found signs of a struggle. A busted window, scuff marks on the tiles, and Bock’s pocket watch, broken and discarded on the floor. We’re treating it as a kidnapping, but that’s all we know right now. No one’s contacted the family. Yet, anyway.”

“Thanks,” I said. “And you mentioned the CI—what was his name, Reynolds?—is inside?”

Drake nodded. “Yeah. You going to tell me how this ties into your investigation?”

“I will,” I said. “But I need to talk to Reynolds first. Time may be tight.”

I pushed into the house proper and paused inside the broad front doors, momentarily awed by the foyer’s opulence. I don’t think I’d ever seen so much marble, which covered not only the floors but the ceilings—the ceilings!—although it was the sheer quantity of gilt that made me feel inadequate. It graced the walls in ornate filigrees, enrobed the banisters of the dual, sweeping staircases that curved around the sides of the three-story chamber, and glinted off the fierce light of a crystal chandelier, one with so many candles the Bocks probably employed a manservant whose entire job it was to light, extinguish, and replace the waxy cylinders.

A burly bluecoat standing guard in the center of the room gave us a fish-eyed look, but I flashed my badge again and told him I needed to see Reynolds. He grunted and pointed to his left.

Shay and I entered the hallway his finger had indicated and soon heard voices, one male and one female.

“But I don’t understand how this could’ve happened,” said the woman. “Weren’t there guards or watchmen at the fair? At the very least there were crowds. How is it no one noticed my husband’s disappearance? What sorts of lawless rabble do they allow into these damned things?”

“Look, Mrs. Bock, you have my sincerest condolences,” said the man, “but know we’re doing everything in our power to find your husband. We’re throwing the full weight of our department behind this effort. Every man we have has been called in, and all of them have been placed on this case. We have dozens of officers canvassing the festival grounds and interviewing fairgoers. Someone will have seen something. We’ll find your husband.”

I turned the corner into a sitting room furnished with a quartet of old world provincial-style sofas, except no couch in the old world would’ve likely been built out of such fine leather or fur trim. Seated on one sofa was a woman wearing a violet gown and a cream-colored pashmina over her shoulders. An excessive amount of makeup caked her faced, partially obscuring the lines in her forehead and at the corners of her mouth, and her hair, held in a bun at the base of her neck, looked a little
too
dark given her age. She’d be Sophia Bock.

Across from her sat a square-shouldered man with a crew cut and a thick, graying moustache. He wore a police-issue jacket that looked as if it had been pulled right off the steaming rack. He’d be Investigator Reynolds, if I was anywhere close to being worth my salt as a detective.

I knocked on the door frame. “Excuse me. Detective Reynolds?”

The man turned. “Yes? Who the hell are you?”

“Detective Daggers,” I said. “Homicide. This is my partner Steele. We heard about Bock and got here as quickly as we could. As it turns out, we’re working a case that may be related to his kidnapping.”

Reynolds and Sophia Bock glanced at each other, the former with a look of confusion and the latter with a look of concern, before turning their gazes onto Steele and me.

Reynolds scowled and stroked his moustache. “Homicide, eh? Brief me.”

“We’re after a man—someone we’ve been calling Scar Face due to his appearance—who we believe has committed three murders over the past two days,” I said. “We tried to apprehend him a few hours ago at an abandoned building, but he escaped our capture. Based on knowledge we’ve gathered in our case and the timing of his evasion of us, we believe he may be involved in Bock’s disappearance.”

I dug into my jacket pocket and produced a sketch of Scar Face—an alternate Boatreng had drawn for us on request. I handed it to Reynolds. “This is the man. You can distribute that sketch to your men at the fair grounds if you’d like. We have a spare. Mrs. Bock, does this man by any chance look familiar?”

Sophia Bock took one look and the sketch and shook her head. “No. Certainly not. I wouldn’t associate with anyone like that, and I doubt my husband would either.”

Reynolds pocketed the sketch. “I’ll get this to my men immediately, but you’re going to have to explain the situation further. How does this man connect to Mr. Bock?”

Steele piped up from my side. “The three murder victims are all related. They include Darryl Gill, his sister Anya Crestwick, and their father, Buford Gill, a physicist. We understand he was a professional colleague of your husband, Mrs. Bock.”