consider going out with a woman who turned thirty-six yesterday?”
“I didn’t say I wouldn’t consider it. Obviously if I met a woman and I liked her, and she turned out to be a little older, I wouldn’t care. But if you ask me who I picture in the abstract, then yeah, I guess I picture someone my age or younger.”
Ellie rolled her eyes. “Well, at least you include your own age. My litmus test — the men I’m crossing off — are the ones who cap their age range below their own age. Half the men on here, no matter how old they are, say their perfect woman is somewhere between her midtwenties and exactly one year younger than he is.” She continued crossing off names, clearly disgusted. “I mean, what is it about the midtwenties?”
Jess’s eyes glazed over as he hung his tongue from his mouth in mock bliss. Ellie pretended to shoot a roundhouse kick in his direction.
“All right, Gloria Steinem. But I bet you a million bucks that the women on there are just as superficial. They’re just screening for different qualities. Money, power, prestige. It’s market forces, little sis.”
“On that very romantic — and totally depressing — note, I think you’ve convinced me that my online surfing should remain strictly professional.”
The telephone rang and Jess beat her to the handset.
“You’ve reached the marvelous Ellie Hatcher…. Oh, you’re just the man I’d like to talk to. I hope you know how lucky you are to be working with my sister.”
Ellie smacked him on the arm and grabbed the phone. “Sorry, Flann. My brother got out of the butterfly net.”
“I just got a call from ballistics. They got a cold hit. The gun that killed Caroline Hunter a year ago was used to shoot another woman nine months earlier. Our guy’s been at it longer than we thought. There’s a third victim.”
AN HOUR LATER, Charlie Dixon hung up his telephone. He was angry. He did not like bad news. Only eighteen hours earlier, the FirstDate situation appeared to be under control. NYPD’s investigation had nothing to do with him. They were chasing down some stupid theory cooked up by a detective known as a wing nut. He had gotten worked up over nothing.
Now this.
He picked up his telephone again, punched in a familiar number, and asked for his boss. He tried to calm his nerves while he listened to the Muzak.
“Mayfield.”
“I’m sorry to bother you, sir, but there’s been a development.”
“I heard. Snow by six.” Dixon’s boss had a dry way about him, even in the face of stressful developments. That trait might explain where he sat in the hierarchy. Barry Mayfield oozed confidence, able to control any situation and the people involved in it without ever changing the serious but restrained tone of his voice.
Dixon, in contrast, honestly did not have the best personality for this job. Two years ago, during a particularly unpredictable turn of events, he ripped himself an ulcer that felt as if his intestines were marinating in Tabasco. Now Dixon was thinking about that ulcer again, convinced he was starting to feel the familiar hot inside of his gut.
“It’s about FirstDate.”
“I had an inkling. Those detectives again?”
“Afraid so.”
“Did they find a way to a court order? I told you before it wasn’t worth worrying about. The chances of this leading back to you—”
“It’s something else.” The something was worse than a fishing expedition at FirstDate. “I got a call from my PD source. Flann McIlroy just requested the file on the Tatiana Chekova murder.”
“Now, that is a problem.”
PART TWO
DATE BAIT
12
ENTERING THE EIGHTH FLOOR OF ONE POLICE PLAZA, ELLIE WAS as excited as a four-year-old on Christmas morning. She was anxious to catch a first-hand look at the department’s fancy new Real Time Crime Center. It might not wear a plush red suit or sport a jolly white beard, but the center was the high-tech feather in the department’s crime-fighting cap, a vast
“I didn’t say I wouldn’t consider it. Obviously if I met a woman and I liked her, and she turned out to be a little older, I wouldn’t care. But if you ask me who I picture in the abstract, then yeah, I guess I picture someone my age or younger.”
Ellie rolled her eyes. “Well, at least you include your own age. My litmus test — the men I’m crossing off — are the ones who cap their age range below their own age. Half the men on here, no matter how old they are, say their perfect woman is somewhere between her midtwenties and exactly one year younger than he is.” She continued crossing off names, clearly disgusted. “I mean, what is it about the midtwenties?”
Jess’s eyes glazed over as he hung his tongue from his mouth in mock bliss. Ellie pretended to shoot a roundhouse kick in his direction.
“All right, Gloria Steinem. But I bet you a million bucks that the women on there are just as superficial. They’re just screening for different qualities. Money, power, prestige. It’s market forces, little sis.”
“On that very romantic — and totally depressing — note, I think you’ve convinced me that my online surfing should remain strictly professional.”
The telephone rang and Jess beat her to the handset.
“You’ve reached the marvelous Ellie Hatcher…. Oh, you’re just the man I’d like to talk to. I hope you know how lucky you are to be working with my sister.”
Ellie smacked him on the arm and grabbed the phone. “Sorry, Flann. My brother got out of the butterfly net.”
“I just got a call from ballistics. They got a cold hit. The gun that killed Caroline Hunter a year ago was used to shoot another woman nine months earlier. Our guy’s been at it longer than we thought. There’s a third victim.”
AN HOUR LATER, Charlie Dixon hung up his telephone. He was angry. He did not like bad news. Only eighteen hours earlier, the FirstDate situation appeared to be under control. NYPD’s investigation had nothing to do with him. They were chasing down some stupid theory cooked up by a detective known as a wing nut. He had gotten worked up over nothing.
Now this.
He picked up his telephone again, punched in a familiar number, and asked for his boss. He tried to calm his nerves while he listened to the Muzak.
“Mayfield.”
“I’m sorry to bother you, sir, but there’s been a development.”
“I heard. Snow by six.” Dixon’s boss had a dry way about him, even in the face of stressful developments. That trait might explain where he sat in the hierarchy. Barry Mayfield oozed confidence, able to control any situation and the people involved in it without ever changing the serious but restrained tone of his voice.
Dixon, in contrast, honestly did not have the best personality for this job. Two years ago, during a particularly unpredictable turn of events, he ripped himself an ulcer that felt as if his intestines were marinating in Tabasco. Now Dixon was thinking about that ulcer again, convinced he was starting to feel the familiar hot inside of his gut.
“It’s about FirstDate.”
“I had an inkling. Those detectives again?”
“Afraid so.”
“Did they find a way to a court order? I told you before it wasn’t worth worrying about. The chances of this leading back to you—”
“It’s something else.” The something was worse than a fishing expedition at FirstDate. “I got a call from my PD source. Flann McIlroy just requested the file on the Tatiana Chekova murder.”
“Now, that is a problem.”
PART TWO
DATE BAIT
12
ENTERING THE EIGHTH FLOOR OF ONE POLICE PLAZA, ELLIE WAS as excited as a four-year-old on Christmas morning. She was anxious to catch a first-hand look at the department’s fancy new Real Time Crime Center. It might not wear a plush red suit or sport a jolly white beard, but the center was the high-tech feather in the department’s crime-fighting cap, a vast
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