TOMMY MOLDANADO wore jeans and a green T-shirt speckled with paint. There were specks of paint in his curly brown hair and teardrops of it on his tan work boots and chips of it on the frames of his thick glasses.
It was the glasses that worried Sean. Any witness who walked into court wearing glasses might as well have put a target sign on his chest for the defense attorney. And the juries, forget about it. Experts all in regard to eyeglasses and the law thanks to Matlock and The Practice, they watched the bespectacled take the stand the same way they watched drug dealers, blacks without ties, and jailhouse rats who'd cut a deal with the DA.
Moldanado pressed his nose up against the viewing room glass and looked in at the five men in the lineup. "I can't really tell with them looking head-on. Can they turn to the left?"
Whitey flicked the switch on the dais in front of him and spoke into the microphone. "All subjects turn to the left."
The five men shifted left.
Moldanado put his palms against the glass and squinted. "Number Two. It could be Number Two. Could you get him to step closer?"
"Number Two?" Sean said.
Moldanado looked back over his shoulder at him and nodded.
The second guy in the lineup was a narc named Scott Paisner, who normally worked Norfolk County.
"Number Two," Whitey said with a sigh. "Take two steps forward."
Scott Paisner was short, bearded, and round with a rapidly receding hairline. He looked about as much like Dave Boyle as Whitey did. He turned face-front and stepped up to the glass, and Moldanado said, "Yeah, yeah. That's the guy I saw."
"You sure?"
"Ninety-five percent," he said. "It was night, you know? There are no lights in that parking lot and, hey, I was buzzed. But otherwise I'm almost positive that's the guy I saw."
"You didn't mention a beard in your statement," Sean said.
"No, but I think now that, yeah, the guy had a beard maybe."
Whitey said, "No one else in that lineup looks like the guy?"
"Shit, no," he said. "They ain't even close. What're they-cops?"
Whitey lowered his head to the dais and whispered, "Why do I even do this fucking job?"
Moldanado looked at Sean. "What? What?"
Sean opened the door behind him. "Thanks for coming down, Mr. Moldanado. We'll be in touch."
"I did good, though, right? I mean, I helped."
"Sure," Whitey said. "We'll FedEx that merit badge to you."
Sean gave Moldanado a smile and a nod and shut the door on him as soon as he crossed the threshold.
"No witness," Sean said.
"Uh, no shit."
"The physical evidence from the car won't hold up in court."
"I'm aware of that."
Sean watched Dave put a hand over his eyes and squint into the light. He looked like he hadn't slept in a month.
"Sarge. Come on."
Whitey turned from the microphone and looked at him. He was starting to look exhausted, too, the whites of his eyes gone pink.
"Fuck it," he said. "Kick him loose."