Beam nodded. “That how you see it, Nell?”

“Unless that letter J is different from the rest.”

“It isn’t,” Beam said.

“Then the shooter was our guy. This was a regular stop for the judge, usually just so the driver could buy a paper. But this time the limo needed gas, so opportunity presented itself. Way I see it, the killer musta moved fast when the driver went inside. Walked over to the limo and knocked on the window. The judge pressed the power button so the window’d glide down and he could talk to whoever’d knocked, and pop!”

“Sounds right,” Looper said.

Beam looked again at the scene. There was another set of pumps beyond where the limo was parked, so visibility wasn’t good from the street. Probably no one driving past would notice someone standing alongside a vehicle gassing up, or think anything about it if they did. As for the black limo, they were common as roaches in New York; it wouldn’t have attracted any attention.

“A judge this time,” Looper said, tapping his barren shirt pocket again. “Da Vinci’s gonna shit a brick.”

They stood silently for a few minutes, watching the ambulance pull away with the judge’s body. A white and silver tow truck, belching noxious diesel exhaust, vibrant bass notes, and gleaming in the sun as if it had just been washed and waxed, arrived to transport the mayor’s limo to the police garage. The limo would be dusted for prints, black-lighted, vacuumed, and partially disassembled.

Beam didn’t think it was a waste of time. It was always possible the killer had left something, even if he hadn’t gotten inside the limo. We all leave a wake as we move through life.

His cell phone vibrated in his pocket.

Da Vinci hadn’t waited long to get into a frenzy. “You at the Parker scene?” he asked Beam, over the cell phone.

“We’re here,” Beam assured him. He filled in da Vinci on what little there was to know.”

“So we’ve got the red letter J tucked under the wiper, and it looks like the judge was shot with a thirty-two caliber slug.”

“Could be a thirty-two. We’ll know soon as they do the postmortem, then ballistics can see if we’ve got a match with the other JK shootings.”

“It’ll match,” da Vinci said glumly. “Remember Raymond Peevy?”

Beam didn’t have to search his memory far. “The shitbird who shot up a van full of kids on the Verrazano Bridge about five years ago?”

“Yeah. It was six years. He lives in California now and grows grapes. The late Judge Parker refused a prosecutor’s appeal on a verdict that set Peevy free on a technicality.”

“Can’t think of a better way to become the late Judge Parker.”

“Why we’ve got us another JK killing, Beam. You and your team have gotta nail this bastard before the commissioner nails me. I’m the one talked you up, Beam, and I told it true. You’re the best one to get inside this freak’s mind, anticipate him, be where he is, and stop his evil heart. Are you working toward that goal?”

“You know damn well I am.”

“Okay, okay. “Da Vinci seemed to calm down.

“Why do you think he uses a thirty-two?” Beam asked.

“It’s what he has. Scumbags like JK usually don’t go out and buy weapons. They use what’s at hand.”

“He doesn’t use a twenty-two, like some pros,” Beam said. “Three or four in the head at close range. A thirty-two’s got more punch, but it isn’t as sure as a thirty-eight, forty-five, or nine millimeter.”

“It’s had enough punch so far.”

“True. But this is such a careful killer, you’d think he’d want to make sure his shots counted.”

“They can count, with a thirty-two.”

“If the shooter knows how to use one. Or increases the load.”

“So you’re saying he’s a gun nut and a good shot, but not a pro?”

“Or he knows guns and is a good shot trying not to look like a pro.”

“Hmm. Could be you’re overthinking this.”

“Could be,” Beam admitted.

“And at this point I’m more interested in results than in theory.”

“Understandable.”

“I’m asking, Beam, please don’t disappoint me.” He sounded as if he thought Beam really had a choice.

“I’m trying not to disappoint anyone,” Beam said.

“Aren’t we all?” da Vinci said.

Sometimes Beam wondered.

He slid the phone back in his pocket and watched the glowing taillights of the truck towing the limo disappear around the corner like the watchful red eyes of some retreating animal.

The city was full of predators.

Gina had always thought Carl Dudman was the one most responsible for setting Genelle’s killer free. It wasn’t only that he was jury foreman. She’d watched him in TV interviews after the trial, a big man with sandy hair and an easy smile. He had charisma and confidence and it was obvious that things came easy to him. What would it be like to be a man like that in this world, instead of a helpless young girl like Genelle?

Gina had some idea, only she wasn’t as helpless as Genelle had been. She was four years older than when her twin sister died, and she was wiser. She was also more determined. She’d always been more determined than Genelle, and obviously the stronger of the two. They’d both known it almost from infancy, and their parents had reinforced the knowledge. Their father had loved them both, but he was fond of saying Gina had self-confidence coming out of her pores. Of course, he was right. And now Gina had a mission. A celestial responsibility that only a surviving twin could understand. She had a duty to her dead twin.

With that duty had come sudden opportunity. Dudman perfectly fit the profile of the Justice Killer’s victims. All Gina would need to do after shooting him was leave the red letter J near his body. She’d seen reproductions of it in the press after the murders where the letter had been scrawled on paper, and once with lipstick on a bathroom mirror, and she’d practiced and could duplicate it precisely.

Could she do it? Actually squeeze a trigger and put a bullet in Dudman? There was no way anyone could know something like that for sure until the time came. She’d know it when she was looking down the barrel at him.

But she had confidence.

And in her purse she had the hard, cold thirty-eight caliber semiautomatic Reggie had sold her. He’d smiled as he counted her money, and he’d casually told her that if she did use the gun she should wear gloves and she could drop the weapon anywhere—and she should as soon as possible—because it couldn’t be traced to her or to anyone else.

But she wasn’t going to drop it anywhere. The Justice Killer didn’t leave his gun where the police might find it.

She straightened up from where she’d been leaning against a building and eating a knish she’d bought from a street vendor at the corner. Her eyes narrowed against the sun reflecting off a windshield. There was Carl Dudman, emerging from the building across the street, where his real estate agency was located.

Gina hadn’t seen him since the trial, and he looked slightly older and heavier. But he still made the hair stand up on the back of her neck. If she were a different sort of person, not as careful, less determined, she would have simply gone into the real estate agency offices and shot her way to where he was and then killed him. The way those people did on the news almost every week somewhere, and for less reason than Gina’s. Newscasters often described them as “disgruntled.” Sure they were disgruntled.

But Gina was more than disgruntled, and she knew that indiscriminate blasting away left too much to chance. Besides, she didn’t plan on being apprehended or to kill innocent people.

There would be no direct and easy way to kill Dudman, not even one involving wholesale slaughter. Dudman was no fool. He must know he was in danger and was being careful. She’d have to bide her time.

A tall, hefty fellow, with a buzz cut only a little longer and gray in front, and wearing a tight blue suit, was right behind Dudman, looking this way and that. He strode with a step surprisingly light for such a big man. He reminded Gina of nothing so much as a bull getting a feel for the ring and a matador. A dangerous looking guy.