Cold Facts

Chapter 5

Bobby and Alex had been expecting the call from Mike, Carolyn, Karen and Jerry. It didn't matter who had called whom, the meeting was inevitable. As much as the meeting was with friends, it was still a tense group that gathered together in the home of Mike and Carolyn. Carolyn was comfortably ensconced on the couch with her feet up. She was sternly informed that she was not to move and no one was to upset her. This caused a great deal of amusement from everyone except Mike who was serious about it.

Alex was sitting by Carolyns feet on the couch, Bobby was standing over by the window trying to look like he wasn't on sentry duty, Jerry had procured a kitchen chair, Karen sat in the padded living room chair while Mike alternated between sitting on the arm of the couch and bounding up to get Carolyn anything she needed at her slightest twitch.

"We need to figure out what's going on? We're up to what five killings now? I think I'm safe in saying the NYPD is not looking like a good place to work right now. What do we know so far?" Alex asked.

"We've been tracking down people who have escalating police trouble for the last few weeks, but it's slow going." Carolyn started. "There are quite a few and they have some restricted records that we're having trouble accessing. Either from their lawyers, the courts or juvenile records. Sometimes all three. We're making progress, but it's slow going."

We've gotten calls from all precincts asking for the information on the killer. Anything we can tell them. The entire force is anxious, because all we've come up with is that this is more than likely a man, and he's got it in for Bobby and I."

"Anyone who looks like either of you is advised to wear a vest. Who would've thought there were so many people in the department who looked like you, huh, Goren?" Mike teased his friend.

"Shut up, Mike." Bobby told him idly. "There isn't anyone like you anywhere else. You'd make a great target. Sorry, Carolyn."

"That's okay. I like having the one and only him. Irritating as he can be. So what about you, Jerry? You haven't said much. You look a lot like Bobby. What do you have to say concerning all of this?"

"We've both been ordered to wear vests. We need to catch this guy. Five deaths are too many and pretty soon he's going to start narrowing down all the people who look like us and it's only a matter of time til he gets his target."

"He's looking for tall, big men who carry a briefcase or somekind of folder, who drive a dark sedan or a small, petite woman with blondish hair that drives a dark mini van. But he can't have pinpointed your location, because all his hits have been scattered throughout the area. Could he be just targeting people with a general body styles hoping that one of them will cause us to react in a certain way and give him a clue that he's getting close?" Karen asked.

"Maybe he doesn't have our home address after all." Bobby said from over by the window.

"Coming here might not have been the smartest move. Now they know where Mike and Carolyn live." Jerry said.

"But they aren't after us." Mike refuted that idea. "Besides, Carolyn needs to be where she's comfortable."

"Is there a problem? Are you alright?" Alex asked her friend, anxiously.

"I'm fine. Daddy here is the anxious one. The doctor was considering putting him on bed rest."

"Not with this going on she's not." Mike told her.

"Don't worry, they wouldn't dare." Carolyn patted his knee. "So, where do we go from here? We can't just keep sitting on our collective butts while this guy stalks you and Bobby. We need a plan to go after the man or draw him out."

"Bobby and I've been thinking about that. If he really is after us, then we need to give him something to go after us for. What were the victims doing when they were shot?"

"They were around their vehicles." Mike said.

"More than that. They were around their homes. And their families." Alex added.

"Did all the victims have kids?" Karen asked. "The one we had didn't, but there was toys for small children in the yard of the house next door. Could he have been mistaken for the Bobby because of the toys?"

"And the shooting was in a complex with duplexes? Maybe they thought the one he came out of was the one with kids. Which means he might have seen your kids." Mike said.

Bobby stiffened at the window, meeting Alex's look. "Tell them about the school." He growled.

"What school?" Carolyn asked.

"Mitzzi said there was a man at school who gave them a lecture about being around guns. She defended us, saying we only killed bad guys, but he persisted in arguing with her that all guns were bad, even the ones in police hands. Apparently, the man was making the class uncomfortable, so the teacher asked him to leave, but she had to practically throw him out physically to get him to go."

"Did you check into the man's organization?"

"We hit a dead end. It doesn't look like they were connected with any one group what we recognize. No one is sure how they managed to get in to the school to speak to begin with. No one actually gave them authorization. Apparently no one at the school realized it. So they were given free run of the place. But they only spoke at specific classrooms."

"Classrooms with kids whose parents were somehow connected to the NYPD?"

Jerry asked.

"It seems so. The techs are running down the names as we speak. We also got a tape from one of the teachers with the lecture on it, but they don't have much of a picture of the speaker. The camera angle wasn't correct for this kind of presentation."

"Damn." Karen muttered. "Did the teachers give us good descriptions?"

"Five of them. All different."

"Suppose we're not looking for just one person then, who's doing the hits. Suppose we're dealing with an organization." Jerry asked.

"Why would an organization have it in just for Alex and I?" Bobby asked. "It makes sense that there'd be more than one shooter, but an entire organization?"

"Organized crime? The Massuccis?" Carolyn asked.

"I don't doubt they'd like to take us out, but this is too amateur for them. The Massuccis have professional hit men. They'd be putting a lot more bodies on a slab before this. I'm thinking something smaller." Bobby said.

"An organization, but not very efficient. Suppose it's not an organization, but a family?" Karen asked.

"Another crime family?" Mike asked.

"Not a crime family, per se. Maybe just a family that thinks Alex and Bobby has done their family wrong."

"So who would it be? We know all the families here. Could someone being trying to start a new one?"

"Jerry?" Bobby prompted. "You have an idea?"

"I might. Could we have a group of people who came in to NY just to exact revenge on you two because of one of their relatives were killed? Or injured somehow and they blame you two for it?"

"A regular family wouldn't be that intent on revenge. They'd go after someone in the courts." Carolyn put in.

"Not necessarily. Would they, Jerry?" Karen asked her partner catching his eye.

"Jerry?" Alex encouraged.

"It's just a theory." Jerry told them. "But it's possible that some of those people could be families that you might refer to as hillbillies. It would be rare for them to come out of their home areas to do this kind of activity, but it's not unheard of. If they felt enough insult had been given to them, they might come looking for revenge."

"Isn't that a long shot?" Carolyn asked skeptically.

"It is, but it also fits as well as anything else we've come up with."

"The bullistics reports support that theory." Bobby said.

"That's just too far fetched to believe. You haven't insulted anyone with a long beard and bare feet lately have you, Alex?"

Carolyn reached over and smacked him on the head. "These are not the Hatfields and McCoys, you idiot. Some of those people are now highly educated professionals in law and medicine."

'So why would they came after Alex and her family?"

"That is the question, isn't it?" Bobby said quietly.

Almost simultaneously the cell phones in the small apartment began to ring or vibrate according to their settings. Carolyn of course wasn't wearing hers, but everyone else reached for theirs.

The message was disturbing. There had been another incident and this one was in broad daylight. This time it wasn't just one victim, but an entire family going down the road. In a minivan on a major road. The crash had taken out two other vehicles, but the passengers were fine. Their cars had been totaled as a result of the minivan careening out of control. There eye witness descriptions of the vehicle from bystanders. The detectives were needed immediately.

Mike tried to prevent Carolyn from going, but she gave him no choice. "I'm not staying home. I'm not going to do anything stupid, but I need to be there, Mike. Either move or I'll go over you." Seeing one of the looks that she rarely gave him anymore, he realized that she was serious.

The flaw in that plan was that there wasn't a vest big enough to fit her current form and all NYPD officers were required to wear one. Bobby graciously offered her his vest. It was much too big in the shoulders, but fit well enough for her to wear it otherwise. "But what about you?" Alex asked quietly to her gallant husband.

"He can wear mine." Jerry offered. When Bobby opened his mouth to argue, Jerry grinned at him. "I bought a second one. I just leave it in my car. I always forget it so I just carry a spare. It's all dusty so I'll wear it and you can have this one."

"A-Are you sure? I can go back to the precinct and get another one."

"Why? You're needed at the scene. Take it, Bobby. You can give it back when you're done." Jerry grinned at him.

"We sure have a couple of great guys, don't we?" Karen asked Alex.

"Yeah we do." Alex agreed with a smile for her glowing partner.

TBC