“And our IT security department tells us someone from outside the precinct pinged our police directories under a guest log-in. We tracked the IP address to your home.”
Bruce stayed silent.
“Then you disabled the security cams,” Draccon went on. “If she setyouup to do it for her, then you gladly became her accomplice.”
All you’d need to do to disable the system is to use the right scrambler, set at the right frequency.Those had been her words—allyou’dneed to do. You, Bruce.
She had told him exactly where her web was, and he had still walked into it.
Draccon nodded at his lack of response. “Don’t make this harder for yourself, Bruce. I know this has been difficult for you, and that I sent you into her path to begin with.” She tapped her pen on the table. “But you understand why I’m skeptical.Whywould Madeleine go out of her way to thank you for her escape? If you truly had nothing to do with it, then why didn’t she just escape and leave it at that?”
Bruce shook his head. “I have no idea,” he answered. “But you have to believe me. She knew that by leaving this note, she would make sure that I end up in your interrogation rooms. Think. Why would she send me here?”
“Sometimes killers don’t need a reason,” Draccon replied. “Sometimes they just want to have fun.”
“This doesn’t make sense,” Bruce said, his voice turning urgent again. “Please,Detective. You and I have worked out enough about Madeleine to know that she doesn’teverdo something for no reason at all. I—”
He paused, realizing how he must sound. Draccon raised an eyebrow at him. Even the way he talked about her now made it sound like he knew her well,toowell, that he had cared for her in a way beyond mere objective curiosity. And he had, hadn’t he?
To Bruce’s surprise, Draccon seemed tired instead of angry, and listened to Bruce with an expression of bone-deep weariness. “It’s my fault,” she said with a sigh. “I never should have involved you in this case. I should’ve left you to finish your community service sentence, and let that be it. When I thought we could rely on you to get information out of Madeleine for us, I didn’t think you’d end up being her ticket to freedom.”
Bruce slammed his hand down on the table. “But I didn’thelpher.”
“What would you have us believe, then, Bruce?” Draccon said. She rested her hands on the table and crossed her arms. “I’ve seen the surveillance tapes. I’ve seen your body language toward her change as time went on. Bruce—Madeleine escaped. She’s on the loose now. She’s probably found a way to reunite with the Nightwalkers. Our police are out in force, trying to track her down…but she’s covered her tracks well.”
Bruce put his arms on the table and leaned his head into his hands. What would he need to do to work his way out of this? “How long do I have to stay here?” he muttered. “Is there bail?”
Draccon shook her head. “Sorry, Bruce,” she replied. “You’ll have to remain here overnight. We need as much information as we can get, and the precinct doesn’t want you wandering around the city. It’s as much for your protection as it is for our benefit.”
“You mean you don’t trust me,” Bruce countered. “You think I’m a flight risk?”
Draccon’s eyes didn’t waver. “You’re not in the best position to argue right now,” she replied.
Bruce closed his eyes and let out a long breath. “Fine. My phone call, then, please.”
—
Moments later, Bruce was inside a clear glass booth and puzzling over the details of how to dial out on a rotary phone.When I get leave of here, I’m donating new phones to the precinct,he thought darkly. On the other side of the glass, he could see the lines of the police cubicles, and beyond that, a series of flat-screen TVs mounted against the wall. The news was showing a journalist standing in the middle of a street, in front of a black carpet. Bruce looked away when he finally managed to dial Alfred’s cell phone number.Thank god,he thought as the ringing began.
Alfred picked up on the first ring.
“Alfred Pennyworth speaking,” he said.
“Alfred! Are you still at the hospital?”
“Master Wayne?” Alfred replied. “I was beginning to think the police wouldn’t let you call. I’m doing fine—they’ll discharge me tonight. How are you holding up?”
“I’ve had better days.”
“Your friend Dianne has been calling nonstop about you,” Alfred went on. “She had hoped they would release you on bail. She’s already at the gala—many attendees are still going there in support of you and in honor of the mayor.”
Dianne. The gala.The black carpet on the TV.Bruce suddenly remembered, and his eyes shot back up to focus on the TVs. Sure enough, the Ada drones from WayneTech were already out in full force, looming at the entrance leading into the Gotham City Concert Hall. The event’s tone had turned somber since the mayor’s death, and black draped the sides of the concert hall’s walls, the cloths threaded in silver with the gala’s original diamond-shaped logo. Guests arrived in black, too, treating the event as less of a celebration and more as a memorial to the mayor.
Bruce’s eyes went back to the gala’s diamond-shaped logo—a logo that looked almost exactly like the diamond shape that Madeleine’s letter to him folded into. He froze. A fist of ice closed around his heart.
All of Gotham City’s elite would be at the gala tonight.The Nightwalkers are going to strike there, in one fell swoop.All this time, they had been stockpiling weapons in anticipation forthis,their biggest operation. And Madeleine had hinted it to him with the shape of her note.
“Alfred,” he said urgently. “Call Dianne. Tell her to catch a cab back home right away.Now.She shouldn’t be there tonight. Get her out of there. Tell her,tell her—”
