Silent Night - By Tom Barber Page 0,32

customers waiting to be served in front of her and the line was growing.

But as he walked over to log in to the till beside her, something caught his eye.

A white shopping bag was sitting on the floor by a table stacked with merchandise to his right. It was unattended. Someone must have put it down to check out some clothing, then walked off and forgotten it. It happened all the time.

He went over to retrieve the bag and put it aside for collection when the forgetful customer had realised what they’d done. But as he bent down to pick it up, he looked closer and frowned. He thought his eyes were playing tricks on him in the low lighting of the store.

Some kind of yellow gas was seeping out of the bag.

SIXTEEN

‘OK,’ Marquez said, ending the call, still in Dr Tibbs’ apartment. She turned to Jorgensen. ‘CSU are already on their way. They should be here any minute. Apparently Archer and Josh are onto something downtown.’

‘Onto what?’

She shrugged. ‘Check the TV.’

Jorgensen turned, then using his sleeve to shield his fingerprints, grabbed the remote for the television off the couch and pushed the power button. Flicking channels, he found Fox News.

‘Holy shit.’

The report was showing footage from 34 and 7, outside Macy’s. There were civilians, ESU, Hercules Teams and CRT specialists everywhere, as well as news crews. They looked at the headline.

Breaking: Macy’s evacuated after bomb threat.

‘Looks like we’re missing the party,’ Jorgensen said.

Outside in the corridor, the guy from the front desk was still recovering from the shock of seeing Tibbs’ corpse. He turned as the sound of approaching footsteps came from the corridor. Jorgensen flicked off the TV and tossed the remote back on the couch as a four-man CSU team quickly entered the room, each carrying a suitcase containing their gear. Both Marquez and Jorgensen knew the team. The lead investigator walked over and shook both detectives’ hands. Then she looked down at Tibbs’ body.

‘This is how you found him?’

‘Walked in and this is what we saw,’ Marquez said.

‘Four gunshot wounds. Tight groups. Must have been silenced, otherwise everyone in the building would have heard.’

Behind her, her team started pulling on their gear.

‘We’ll get to work,’ she said, hinting that she wanted them to leave.

‘We need to head out anyway,’ Marquez said to Jorgensen, who nodded. She looked out of the apartment and saw the guy from the front desk out in the hall. She turned back to the CSU investigator. ‘The receptionist saw the body when we did. He might need a few minutes.’

The woman nodded.

‘We’ll get him out of here. I’ll have someone stay with him.’

‘Thanks.’

‘I’ll contact Shepherd when we get something.’

The two detectives nodded, stepping past the CSU team and walking out of the apartment, quickly headed down the corridor to the lifts. As they walked, Jorgensen pulled a pad from his pocket and checked the next address.

‘Frankie Glover. Lives across town on 70 and 3. Dr Number Three.’

Marquez nodded and they stepped into the open lift, pressing the button for the ground floor. In the silence, both of them thought about the dead doctor laid out in the apartment they’d just left.

A strip of duct tape across the mouth. Two to the sternum, two to the head.

‘Poor bastard,’ Jorgensen said. ‘Not a good way to go.’

‘Is there ever a good way?’ Marquez replied, as the doors slid shut.

Josh and Archer were just heading out onto the Pier when they heard the screams.

They swung round and saw a handful of people staggering out of a store twenty five yards behind them. They were all choking. Several of them collapsed to their hands and knees, heaving and hacking blood onto the sidewalk.

‘No!’ Archer shouted, turning and running towards them.

People standing closer to the store stopped and stared as they suddenly saw people falling out of the doorway in front of them, retching and gasping for air. Blood was starting to leak and spray from their mouths, their bodies fitting and spasming violently as the people watching began to scream and back away.

Some members of the ESU and CRT teams had been close by. They reacted fast, sprinting across the street. Archer and Josh had almost reached the store when a CRT guy turned and ordered them back, blocking their path.

‘Remain where you are!’

Obeying orders, Archer and Josh watched in despair as people who’d made it out of the store writhed and flailed on the sidewalk, their mouths and chins covered in blood. The ESU, gas