Naked Heat

  After ringing the super downstairs and getting the key, Heat took the stairs rather than the elevator, mindful of the racket it made when it braked at Rook's floor. When she got up there, she put her ear to his front door. That's when she heard the scuffle in the distant reaches of the loft. Normally, she would have followed procedure and taken time to call for backup before she went in, but Nikki's fears for Rook were already spiking and it sounded like time was of the essence. She used the key to let herself in.

  And now, for the second time in a week, Heat found herself in Rook's place, in crisis, looking for an opportunity to turn the situation around. As she watched the Texan reach behind to the small of his back and come up with a .25-caliber Beretta, she began reciting her mantra: Assess. Improvise. Adapt. Overcome.

  "Move into the room," said Ripton. He gave her a slight nudge away from the easy chair with the Glock. Heat made note that it was the soft push of an amateur. She wasn't sure what to do with that impression other than to underscore her conclusion that between the two, if she ever got the chance, Wolf got her first bullet.

  "I've got backup, you know. You're not getting out of here."

  "Really?" Since Wolf had her covered with his gun, Ripton stepped to the door and shouted up the hall toward the front door, "Come on in, everybody!" Then he cupped an ear to listen. "Huh . . ."

  Nikki's heart sank when Ripton went to the easy chair and picked up her Sig. She watched the handler slip it into his waistband and then she turned to Rook. "How are you doing, OK?" He was staring down at the floor under his desk, fidgeting. "Rook?"

  "Sorry, cramp. You'll pardon me if I don't get up."

  Wolf spoke. "You know, Jess, maybe now's the time to pull the pin."

  Before Ripton could answer, Nikki went for a stall. "We've arrested Toby Mills, you know."

  "No, I didn't." He appraised her a beat. "What for?"

  "You know."

  "You tell me."

  Now it was her turn to do some appraisal. Why was Ripton pushing her to answer first? It felt to her like poker games she had been in when it comes down to who's going to be first to show the hand. Translation: He wanted her to reveal what she knew--because he was wondering how much she knew. So Nikki gave up as little as she could in order to keep conversation going and buy time. "Your client was booked for the confession he made about what happened the night Reed Wakefield OD'd at the Dragonfly."

  The Firewall nodded slightly to himself. "Interesting."

  "Interesting?" she said. "That's all you've got to say about what you've done? 'Interesting'? Sooner or later it's going to come out that Toby had you guys kill the story by killing everyone who knew it, and all of you are going to take the weight."

  The ballbuster in Jess Ripton kicked in. "You don't have any idea what you're talking about."

  "I don't? I have his confession saying that he and Soleil Gray were there when Wakefield overdosed. Your client gave him the drugs. You snuck Toby out of there. And my take is that when the hush money wasn't enough to keep a lid on this, Toby Mills had you kill the concierge and the limo driver because they were tipping off Cassidy Towne. Who he also had you kill. Tracks for me."

  "They'll never make a connection for one simple reason," said Ripton. "Toby Mills had nothing to do with those killings. He doesn't even know I'm involved in all that."

  "Sounds like you're making a confession," said Heat.

  He shrugged, and in it conveyed his certainty that whatever he said would never go beyond Rook's office. "Truly. Toby doesn't know. He still doesn't even know about Cassidy Towne's book. Or the leaks and the spying by that limo driver and the concierge. All Toby knows is he has a dirty little secret to keep about a party that got out of control."

  "Come on, Ripton, I don't think this is the time to be doing your spin. Not after you've killed three people just to save your client's precious endorsement deals."

  Wolf was getting anxious to go. "Jess? Ready?"

  Rook blurted, "That's not why they killed them." He made a quick glance down at his foot and then looked up again at Nikki. "They didn't kill those people to protect Toby Mills's image. They killed them to cover up the fact that Reed Wakefield's death was not accidental--it was murder."

  Heat was taken aback. She had no idea Rook could be so good with a bluff. But then she was floored again because his expression told Nikki he wasn't bluffing. She turned to assess the reactions of Jess Ripton and Rance Wolf. They weren't disagreeing with what he'd said.

  "So you do have the last chapter," said Ripton. He took a step closer to the desk. "You wouldn't know about the murder unless you did."

  Rook shrugged. "I've read it."

  "Murder? How is it murder?" said Nikki. "In Toby's confession he said it was an accidental overdose."

  "Because Toby still believes it was," answered Rook. "Because Toby and Soleil didn't know it, but Reed Wakefield was still alive when they left that hotel room." Rook punctuated the point by glaring at Ripton. "Right Jess? Then you and Tex here killed him."

  "Where is it?" Ripton looked under the desk where Rook had been fidgeting, and when he didn't see the chapter, he said, "You're going to tell me where you hid that chapter."

  "Let her go first," Rook said.

  "I'm not leaving."

  "Damn right." Ripton turned to scan the mess again.

  "Nikki. Trying to help you here."

  "Where is it, Rook? Last time."

  "OK," said Rook. "It's in my pants!"

  A brief quiet fell over the room. Rook gestured with his head to his lap and then nodded, affirming.

  "Check it out," said Ripton.

  The instant Wolf turned and took his gun off Nikki, Rook pressed the toe of his shoe on the radio controller sitting on the floor at his feet. Over on the windowsill behind the Texan, the orange CB180 helicopter whirred to life. As soon as the main rotor began to spin, its tip buzz-sawed against the windowpane, jarring the room with a grating vibration. Wolf twirled around and shot at the copter, shattering the glass. Jess Ripton, who was startled into a frozen state, brought his hands up defensively. Heat threw herself at him, slamming into his side. She grabbed Ripton's forearm and raised it up while, at the same time, sliding both her hands down past his wrist toward his gun.

  The Texan spun back around to take aim at her, giving Nikki no time to pull the Glock away from the manager's grip. So Heat slapped both her hands around Ripton's, took her best aim, and using his finger, squeezed off a shot. It missed the mark, puncturing the sling. The Texan moaned and fired.

  As Nikki began to fall backward, she gripped harder onto Jess Ripton's hand and squeezed off four more rounds into the left front pocket of Rance Eugene Wolf's Western shirt before she hit the floor.

  Chapter Twenty

  Almost two hours later, sitting by himself at the counter that separated his kitchen from his great room, Jameson Rook stared at the two streams of bubbles rising in perfect parallel lines from the bottom of his pint glass of Fat Tire. It was his second beer, and he was headed for a third, figuring he wasn't going to get much writing done anyway. It was just past midnight and the OCME and CSU strobes were still flashing up the hall.

  Across his loft in the reading den he had partitioned the year before, a cozy enclave with soft furniture and clubby lighting surrounded by shoulder-height bookcases, he could hear the steely voices of the Chief's shooting investigation team. Rook had spent a half hour with them earlier, giving his version of the gunfight; that when it was clear they were about to be assaulted, Rook created a diversion, allowing Detective Heat to seize control of Ripton's weapon and fire once at Wolf, and when the Texan fired the shot that missed her and killed Ripton, she was able to return fire and take him out. Rook made the mistake of thinking they would find it cool that he had created his diversion with a radio-controlled chopper, using his foot and a 2.4-gig transmitter. These were sober dudes doing serious work, and he would have to look elsewhere for his high fives.

  Nikki was in with them for her secon
d visit, and though he couldn't make out the words from where he sat, he could tell from the voice tones that the meeting was shifting into a wrap-up cadence.

  When the squad finally left, Nikki passed on Rook's beer offer but sat with him. Raley and Ochoa came out from the office, peeling off evidence gloves, and asked her about the ruling. "No disposition yet, not tonight," she said. "Between the lines--as much as the 1PP guys give you--this looks like it will clear just fine. They just need to give it twenty-four because they have to show due diligence since it's my second incident of the day."

  "They should give you a rewards card," said Rook, and before they could say anything, he backpedaled. "Jeez, that was insensitive, sorry, sorry. It's the beer talking."

  "How do you explain the rest of your day?" said Raley.

  But Rook wasn't listening. He was fixed on Nikki, searching her face, which told him she was off in her head somewhere else. "Nikki?" And when she came back, he said, "You did great in there."

  "Yeah, well, considering the alternative results, I'm not unhappy."

  Ochoa said, "Hey. You dealing OK with, you know . . . ?"

  Without having to say more, they all knew he was referring to her killing of Rance Wolf, who--criminal or not--would now lose his nickname and never be the Texan to her again. Unlike some Hollywood versions of the job, taking a life is profoundly affecting to a cop, even when it's the life of a cold, professional killer and the taking is completely justified. Nikki was strong, but she knew she would be coping for a while with the multiple losses of that day. Heat would take the counseling, not because she was weak but because she knew that it was effective. She also knew she'd be all right. Heat answered Ochoa's question with a single nod, and that's all anyone needed.

  Raley said, "Hey, man, is it true? You stashed that chapter they wanted in your pants?"

  Nodding proudly, Rook replied, "Indeed, I did."

  "That answers one question," said Ochoa, dangling his latex gloves. "Why they made us wear these when we handled it."

  They didn't laugh. Something unwritten about the decorum that was appropriate for what was happening up the hall kept them from doing that. But they did enjoy Ochoa's barb, all silently bobbing their heads and smirking.

  Rook explained that he had just finished reading the chapter and gone to the kitchen to get his cell phone to call Nikki. He had just picked it up off the counter when he heard the elevator groan to a stop. Rook wasn't expecting visitors, and when the picks started shimmying in his lock he ran back to the office, figuring he could get out the fire escape. But his window wouldn't open and he was trapped in that room. Knowing there was a good chance it could be Wolf coming for the chapter, he didn't know where else to hide it, so he jammed it down his pants.

  Ochoa shook his head. "That's amazing."

  "I know," said Rook, "I'm surprised there was enough room for it." When the others groaned, he added, "What? It's a big chapter."

  By that time, all of them but Nikki had read Cassidy's climactic pages, so Rook filled her in on the broad strokes of the narrative. If nothing else, it explained the zeal with which Jess Ripton and Rance Eugene Wolf pursued getting their hands on it. The final chapter was the smoking gun that busted Ripton's client Toby Mills as well as Soleil Gray for a debauched evening culminating in the apparent OD of Reed Wakefield and their cowardly flight from responsibility. The druggy night, celebrities running off and not even calling 911 to get basic medical aid for a companion--that was shocking and sensational by itself. Cassidy had plenty of fireworks right there to guarantee a best seller plus create devastating legal and financial ramifications for all concerned. But the gossip writer took that expose and shouldered it to the next level. And that level was murder.

  Her key was the concierge. Popular with hotel guests, not just for his service but his discretion, Derek Snow was a handler of sorts in his own right. Jess Ripton knew the story of his shooting by Soleil Gray, and therefore saw Derek as a man who took his money and kept his mouth shut. So when Snow came back up to the hotel room from delivering Toby and Soleil to the street, Jess Ripton had reasonable expectation that, for an agreeable sum, Derek Snow would pretend like that night never happened. And Snow, upon accepting the terms, assured The Firewall he needn't worry about him.

  When the slim man in the Western wear arrived to assist with the cleaning, Ripton reinforced the need for silence by having the man from Texas plainly threaten to find him wherever he hid and kill him if he talked.

  Things got more dicey when the Texan opened his black bag and took out a stethoscope. Derek was in the living room, wiping down knobs and switches with some special wipes they'd given him, when he heard the cowboy's voice from the bedroom say, "Shit, Jess, this man's still alive."

  The concierge said at that point he almost fled the room to call 911. But he was frightened by the chilling threat from the Texan and so he didn't. Derek Snow continued his fingerprint wipe-down but moved closer to the bedroom door. He looked in once, and they almost saw him so he stayed back, positioning himself so that he was hidden but could see their reflection in the vanity mirror in the bedroom.

  He said they spoke quietly but that he definitely heard Ripton say to the other man, "Do something about him." Tex asked him if he was sure and Ripton said he didn't want Wakefield delirious in some ER telling cops or paramedics what happened and who he was with. "Put the fucker down."

  At that, the other guy took some squeeze bottles and vials out of his bag. After he forced some pills down Wakefield's throat, he began spraying large amounts of something into his nose. Then the Texan got out his stethoscope again and listened for a long time. Derek was afraid of getting caught by them, so he moved away to the far side of the living room with a fresh wipe and looked busy. It was quiet in there for a long time, until he heard movement and Ripton say, "Well?" and the other man said, "Put a fork in him, he's done." When they came back out into the living room, the concierge pretended he didn't know what had happened and just kept cleaning. All Ripton said was "Nice job. Do the TV remote once more and then you can go."

  What made Derek Snow talk to Cassidy Towne was his guilt. He was no angel; he took her money just as he had taken Ripton's. But sharing with the gossip columnist the details of what really happened, which was the murder of Reed Wakefield, became for Derek a quest for absolution. He said he was afraid of the Texan, who had said he would kill him, but he was more afraid of living his life burdened by his own complicity.

  Snow also told Cassidy how painfully difficult it was for him to not be truthful with Soleil Gray, who had begun to call him regularly and sob about her guilt over the responsibility she bore for her ex-fiance's OD. He saw her descending deeper and deeper into an abyss. He said to Cassidy that when she was done with him for her book, he might contact Soleil and tell her the truth. Towne begged him to wait and he said he would. But not forever. Soleil's pain only added more weight to his own guilt.

  Rook asked Nikki, "Do you think that's why Derek was calling Soleil that night when she got that call at Brooklyn Diner?"

  "I had the same thought," Heat said. "It was the same night Cassidy Towne was killed. I'll bet Derek spotted Rance Wolf snooping around for him and tried to tell Soleil before it was too late."

  "Which it probably was," said Ochoa.

  "It's sad," said Nikki. "Soleil not only never got to hear the truth from Derek Snow, but the manuscript she stole was missing the last chapter so that everything she read up to that was an indictment of her behavior, feeding her guilt."

  Rook nodded. "The double tragedy for her was that she died not knowing she was off the hook for Reed's death."

  Ochoa eyed his partner. "What's got you all twisted up in yourself?"

  "What makes you think that?" said Raley.

  "Hey, I know you, you're like my wife."

  "You mean 'cause I'm not sleeping with you, either?"

  "Funny. I mean I know you. What is it?"

  Raley said, "OK, about Soleil Gray . . . If Jess Ripton w
as running all this--I mean the killings--whether it's on Toby's behalf or his own, then how did she figure in? I mean besides being paranoid and guilty about the night of the OD."

  Heat said, "Knowing what we know now, I don't think she was involved at all with Ripton or Wolf or Toby. At least not as part of any of the killings."

  "And yet she did mug Perkins to get that manuscript," said Raley. "Are you saying she did that coincidentally?"

  "No, not coincidentally, simultaneously. There's a difference."

  Rook took another pull of his beer. "Well, then what made her suddenly decide to do that?"

  "I have an idea," said Nikki. She got off the bar stool and stretched. "I'll let you know if I'm right tomorrow. After I have a talk with somebody in the morning."

  Something was different when Nikki Heat walked along West 82nd from the precinct the next morning. In the distance she detected a low droning sound she hadn't heard in over a week. As she got nearer to Amsterdam, a modest cough of diesel smoke rose and the droning became a brief roar that stopped with the hiss and squeal of air brakes as a city garbage truck came to a halt. Two sanitation workers hopped off and attacked the hill of refuse accumulated there from the strike. First one car and then another pulled up behind the trash truck as it idled, temporarily blocking the street while the men tossed black and green plastic bags into the rear loader. As she walked past, Heat could hear a driver curse through the rolled-up window of his blocked car and shout, "Come on!" Nikki smiled. The garbage strike was over, and now New Yorkers could be frustrated by something else.

  It was five after eight. Cafe Lalo had just opened and Petar had been the first one there, waiting for her under one of the large European art posters in the back corner against the brick wall. He gave her a hug. "I'm glad we could do this," he said.