Vlad Nikolov’s house was modest but well tended, Swann noted. A spray of flowering plants, thick and brilliant courtesy of the delicate spring temperature and a recent rain, bordered the front of the beige brick bungalow. The grass was trim, the slate slabs leading to the front door had been swept, possibly even scrubbed, in the past day or two. The centerpiece of the yard was two boxwood bushes, diligently shaped.

The utility bill information, including smart electric meter patterns, and food and other purchasing profiles that the tech department had datamined, suggested that the forty-two-year-old Nikolov lived alone. This was unusual for Russian or Georgian immigrants, who tended to be very family-minded. Swann supposed that perhaps he had family back in his native country.

In any event, the man’s solitary life worked to Swann’s advantage.

He continued past the house, glancing briefly at a window, covered with a gauzy curtain. Lace. Maybe Nikolov had a girlfriend who came to visit sporadically. A Russian man would be unlikely to buy lace. Another person inside would be a problem—not because Jacob Swann minded killing her but because two deaths increased the number of people who might miss a victim and bring the police here all the more quickly. It made a bigger news splash too. He hoped to keep the driver’s death quiet for as long as possible.

Swann came to the end of the block, turned and slipped a plain black baseball cap over his head, pulled his jacket off, turned it inside out and slipped it back on. Witnesses see upper garments and headgear mostly. Now, if anyone was looking, it would seem that two different people had walked past the house, rather than one man doing so twice.

Every grain of suspicion counts.

On this second trip he looked the other way—at all the cars on the street in front of and near the house. Obviously no NYPD cruisers but no unmarkeds either that he could sense.

He walked up to the door, reaching into his backpack and withdrawing a six-inch length of capped pipe, filled with lead shot. He wrapped his right hand around this, making a fist. The point of the pipe was to give support to the inside of the fingers so that if he happened to connect with bone or some other solid portion of his victim when he swung, the metacarpals wouldn’t snap. He’d learned this the hard way—by missing a blow to the throat and striking a man on the cheek, which had cracked his little finger. He’d regained control of the situation but the pain in his right hand was excruciating. He’d found it was very difficult to flay skin with the knife in one’s non-dominant hand.

Swann took a blank, sealed envelope from his bag too.

A glance around. Nobody on the street. He rang the bell with his knuckle, put a cheerful smile on his face.