Heat Rises

Eighteen

Rook bolted to his feet and finger stabbed the face of his phone, desperate to launch a callback. Heat’s cell rang and rang as he took a step toward the stairs. Guzman blocked him. “Don’t,” said Rook, “I have to go.” By then he was getting voice mail, “Nikki, it’s me, call back, OK? Let me know what’s happening. Soon as you can.”

“Nikki...” Pascual Guzman sampled the name aloud and turned to Martinez. “I thought I knew her voice. That was the police detective who called me in.”

“Me, too,” Martinez said as he shouldered up to Guzman. Rook tried to slide around the pair, but Martinez pressed the palm of his wide, manicured hand flat on his chest and stopped him.

“Guys, I need to go help her, come on.”

“And what’s this about Ossining?” asked Martinez, who had done time there.

From moments before, when he discovered that his money trail surprisingly led to the exiled human rights novelist, Rook had been watching his narcotics bribe laundering theory come unstitched before his eyes. Combining that with the fact that nobody in that basement had drawn a weapon on him — not even Martinez — he took a chance out of urgency. “OK, here it is,” he said, directing himself mainly to Faustino Velez Arango, who watched quietly from his chair. “My girlfriend is a cop who’s working a murder case that I don’t believe has anything to do with any of you.”

“This is still the murder of Father Graf?” asked Guzman.

Rook thought it over and nodded. Guzman pulled at his thick beard and spoke to Velez Arango in Spanish. Rook couldn’t understand all the words, but the tone was emotional. The exiled author nodded solemnly a few times. When they were done, Rook pleaded. “A life may be in danger. I can’t believe you, of all people, Señor Velez Arango, would hold a writer captive against his will.”

The man stood and crossed over to Rook. “I know that Father Graf did more than give me this holy medal. Pascual tells me that whoever killed the padre took away a saint on earth, devoted to our cause.” Then a trace of a smile eased some of his gravity. “And, of course, I have read your profile of this Nikki Heat.” He gestured to the steps. “Go. Do what you can to save her.”

Rook started off, but Martinez blocked him again. “Faustino, he will give you up.”

The novelist took his measure of the journalist and said, “No, he won’t.”

Rook dashed to the stairs and then, as an afterthought, said to Velez Arango, “One more favor?”

“Qué?”

“I’ll need all the help I can get. Any chance I could carry that St. Christopher?”

Velez Arango folded his hand around the medal. “It is valuable to me.”

Rook said, “Tell you what. Keep my ten grand, we’ll call it even.”

Nikki Heat ran up Vanderbilt Avenue, threading herself upstream be tween the tight flow of pedestrians making their way to Grand Central. She glanced over her shoulder and could see him coming, his black ski mask astonishing the late afternoon business commuters who stopped and turned to look at the man who rushed through them. Those who weren’t stunned looked around, either for cops or to see if somebody was making a movie.

It had happened so quickly. Eager for a cab, Nikki had deployed her secret weapon in that neighborhood, which was to skip the organized taxi cue on Forty-second Street, a great place to make friends because the line is slow. Instead, she waited on Vanderbilt near the Yale Club, a favored drop-off spot and, therefore, an equally favored spot to snag a ride on the fly.

As she was on the phone to Rook, waiting out a suburbanite counting coins for the driver’s tip, the guy came up behind her. Heat didn’t notice where he came from. She only saw motion behind her reflected through the haze of road salt on the cab window. Before she could turn, one hand was stripping her of her cell phone while the other pulled her shoulder. The surprise of it took her off her game a beat, but Heat’s combat sense kicked in, and she spun, going with the momentum of the grab and then using her shoulder to ram her assailant backward into the green light pole near the entrance of the club. Down on his ass on the sidewalk, her attacker started his hand toward the inside of his coat, and Nikki ran.

Half a block north now, he was closing in. Heat bolted across Vanderbilt, risking exposure in the open road, so she wove and dodged to present a poor target. Her goal was to turn the corner at 45th and get inside the lobby of the Met Life, where security guards could help. Beyond that, Grand Central was replete with cops and Homeland Security.

But then, the best of all worlds — an NYPD cruiser pulled up to the stop sign at 45th. “Hey!” she called. “Ten-thirteen!” Assist police officer.

The uniform at the wheel had his window open, and when she was ten yards from the car and closing, he turned to face Nikki. “Heat, get in.” It was The Discourager. At first she wondered if Harvey still had her back — unlikely. Or if this was just luck — less likely; this wasn’t his precinct. She started putting her brakes on as she reached the car and saw the gun on his lap, pointed out the window at her. “Get in,” he said once more.

Heat was calculating the odds of outmaneuvering his aim by bolting to the rear of his blue-and-white when a gloved hand came from behind her and clamped a rag over her mouth and nose.

Nikki tasted sweetness and then blacked out.

Raley came back on the line and told Rook that he checked, and sure enough, there had already been several 911s about a female being chased by a man in a ski mask outside Grand Central Terminal. Ochoa was getting it out on the air that the female was Nikki Heat. Raley expected the surrounding streets would be swarmed by units by the time Rook got there.

Translation: There wasn’t much for Rook to accomplish there, but since it was the last place he had heard from her, he continued down Broadway. Waiting for the light at Columbus Circle, his heart raced as Rook drew the parallel to her pursuer in the ski mask and the crew that had tuned up Horst Meuller in his apartment. He relived Nikki’s interrupted phone call: her excitement at what she had discovered upstate, then the suddenness of the assault, her cell probably taken or smashed.

Rook opened the Recents screen on his phone. Out of habit or spite, Nikki had used her old phone to call him. Which meant that, possibly, she still had the spy store phone he gave her to call for help. Rook wondered if she had it and, if so, whether she had it turned on. He got out his own new phone and began to figure out how the hell to enable the GPS.

Her temples were throbbing when she came out of it. Nikki was en gulfed by a fog thick enough to make her feel underwater. Her head seemed too heavy for her neck, and she couldn’t move her arms or legs. “Coming to,” said the voice that seemed to drift in from another dimension. Heat tried to open her eyes, and the light, coming from unforgiving white-blue fluorescents in overhead tubes, pierced her so harshly that she closed them right away.

What had she seen in that little glimpse? She was somewhere industrial. A definite workshop or warehouse. Unfinished walls with exposed studs and metal storage racks full of boxes, and... tools and parts of some kind. Another look, that would tell her more, but not if she had to stare into those lamps again. She tried to turn over but couldn’t and so lolled her head and peeked once more. Harvey, still in his uniform, leaned with his arms folded against a workbench, watching her. He was wearing blue plastic gloves. That disconcerting view pumped enough adrenaline to lift some of the haze. She rested her lids, chastising herself for not seeing the possibility before that The Discourager hadn’t been tailing her for protection but to keep tabs on her. Harvey had been hiding in plain sight. Nikki remembered bringing him the pizzelles and felt an ache in her gut.

Someone else was moving around the room. With great effort, she rolled her eyes and recognized the jacket of the guy who had grabbed for her on Vanderbilt. He was wearing blue gloves, too, but not his ski mask anymore, which was even more distressing because it meant he was no longer concerned about Nikki’s ability to ID him later. The other man turned and walked up to her and leaned his face into hers. Dutch Van Meter said, “Hey, Heat. Rise and shine.”

She tried to turn away from him but couldn’t, and then realized why. It wasn’t from the chloroform hangover. She was lashed down. Both wrists and ankles were handcuffed. Heat struggled to lift her head. They had affixed her to a pair of wooden crossbeams, their own improvised St. Andrew’s Cross. Van Meter must have seen the realization dawn on her. “That’s right, cover girl. And you’re such a hotshot detective, I’ll bet you even know what comes next.”

A switch clicked and there was a low electronic hum. She spun her head toward him. Dutch was holding up a stainless steel wand the size and shape of a dildo. It had an insulated grip with two corded jacks — one black and the other red — plugged into the handle. “Want to talk irony? These things were developed as a means to relieve pain. See?”

Heat flinched and turned away, bracing for the shock as he touched the TENS to her forearm. At contact, her skin buzzed slightly and the muscle underneath contracted only mildly. “Guess I don’t need to tell you what else this can do.” He removed it and switched the unit off. “So. Which way does this go, hard or easy?” Nikki was still turned from him. “OK, let’s find out. First, easy. Where is the video?”

She swiveled her head back to face him. “That is easy. Because I don’t know.”

Van Meter nodded then turned over his shoulder to The Discourager. “They never make it easy, do they, Harv?”

Harvey said, “Detective, my advice? Just tell him, then we can make this quick.”

“He’s right. Pain or painless, you choose.”

“I told you the truth. I don’t know.”

“Let’s find out, shall we?” Dutch sat on a rolling work stool and flicked the switch. The hum, a little louder, returned. “We’ll start small and give you a chance.” He touched the same spot on her arm, only this time the vibration was greater and the muscle contracted involuntarily, forcing her elbow to bend against her will until he removed the wand. “And that was a low level,” he said. “Any new thoughts?”

“Plenty,” she said. “I’m thinking back to Central Park. When Harvey conveniently lost me. Who was driving the SUV?”

“Dave Ingram,” said The Discourager from across the room. “Guy logs fifteen years on Emergency Services. A sharpshooter, and you waste him with a lucky shot.”

Dutch swiveled his chair to Harvey. “He got sloppy.”

“He underestimated me,” said Heat. She gave Van Meter a look of defiance.

“Well, I haven’t. That’s why my little black box has so many settings.” He twisted the knob and the humming increased.

Heat tried to ignore the awful sound and riveted Dutch with her gaze. “What did Alan Barclay record? What was on his video that was worth killing everybody?”

Detective Van Meter chuckled. “We’re not talking, you are.” Her eyes darted to the wand which was now inches from her face. “Harvey, do they all talk?”

“They all talk.”

“They do,” said Dutch. “All of them. The kraut dancer? He gave up the priest. The priest, he gave up Montrose.” He paused. “Montrose, we didn’t get a chance to stimulate. He got all heroic, so I gave him some Affirmative Action. Right here.” He suddenly jabbed the tip of the wand under Nikki’s chin. The jolt caused her head to shudder uncontrollably and her jaw muscles to tense, clenching her teeth together so hard they ground against one another. Just as quickly, he pulled it away.

Heat gasped for air and fought nausea. Salt from her own sweat stung her eyes. When she had gulped enough breath, she said, “It was you guys, wasn’t it? You guys did something to the Huddleston boy. You were the ones who killed him.” Nikki pulled in a deep lungful. God, she felt like she was drowning. “That was on the video, right?”

“Nikki Heat. Always the detective. You’re handcuffed, we’re torturing you, and you’re asking the questions.” Dutch waved the wand before her eyes and said, “I only have one question. I know what was on the video. All I want to know is one thing — where is it?”

He knew it was an exercise, but Rook left her one more voice mail. As he pressed End, he figured it was probably more for him and his need for contact, even if it was one-sided. No, he told himself. If he left her voice mail, maybe she would survive to hear it.

At Twelfth Avenue and West 59th Street, he gave up using the car. He pulled the Camry over into the nearest spot he could find, and even though the posted notice warned that it was an active driveway, he had bigger concerns than a ticket and a tow. The problem was that his phone GPS worked fine, but it only gave an approximate location within five hundred feet, roughly a tenth of a mile. He stood at the corner where the Westside Highway ramp elevated and watched the blip on the digital map as he turned in a circle. By his reckoning, Nikki’s phone could be in one of four buildings: the paint warehouse, the sign manufacturer, a nameless pale brick structure that looked like private storage, or across the highway at the City Sanitation dock on the Hudson.

A frozen drizzle started to fall. Rook pulled his collar up against the night. He began his search by walking the perimeters of the three buildings on his side of the street. After that, he’d cross over to the Sanitation pier.

“Tell me something,” said Heat. Her throat was raspy, and when she ran her tongue along her teeth, she felt a new jagged chip on a molar. “You put three in Steljess to shut him up, didn’t you?”

Van Meter adopted a pose of mock innocence. “Nonsense. I did it to save your life, Heat.”

“Yuh, right. After you sent him to bomb my apartment. Where’d you get the C4?”

The Discourager started to speak, but Van Meter cut him off. “Shut up, Harvey. Enough.”

“Military grade explosive is hard to get, even for cops,” she continued. “Who’s behind this? Somebody big, right? Is it somebody outside the force? Somebody big who has pull? Somebody down at City Hall? Somebody national?”

Dutch said, “You about done? ’Cause now it’s time to light ’em up. Where is the video?” He twisted the red teardrop-shaped knob half a turn clockwise, and a buzz filled Nikki’s ears like all the beehives in the world.

Behind him, Harv stood and turned his back, unwilling to watch. From that angle, Heat could see the deep fingernail gouge in his handcuff case, which was empty.

“Last chance,” said Dutch. He paused. Then he rolled on his stool down toward her waist and out of her view. Heat felt her blouse being unbuttoned.

And then the lights went out and the buzzing stopped.

“Shit. Harvey, you said there was enough juice here for this thing.”

“The fuck I know. Should be, but it’s an old building, so shit happens. We need to find the circuit breakers, I guess.”

The glow of the city against the clouds filtered through skylights and cast the workroom in a pale lunar radiance. At the door, Van Meter paused and said, “Don’t go away.” Then he and The Discourager left.

Nikki pulled against the handcuffs. All they did was bite her skin. She was resting, trying to suppress panic, when the door opened again. She lifted her head and saw Detective Feller. He wasn’t wearing a ski mask, either.

“Your partner quit and gave up,” she said.

Feller put a finger to his lips and whispered, “I screwed with the power to get them out of here.” She felt the handcuff opening on one ankle, then the other. When he came up beside her to unlock her wrists, she saw the gun he held at his side. “Can you walk?” he asked.

“I think so,” she whispered as she sat upright. “They must have taken my shoes.”

“Deal with it,” said Feller, who was already on his way to the door. He made a check outside and beckoned her forward. He slipped out ahead of her, and when she stepped out into the drizzle, she recognized immediately where she was. The building she had come out of, about the size and shape of a railroad freight car, was a work shed at the far end of the City Sanitation pier on the Hudson River. It was after hours, and all the parking spaces were empty except for Harvey’s blue-and-white and Van Meter’s taxi. Feller hand-signaled toward the other end of the pier and mimed a steering wheel.

They moved as quickly as they dared without making noise. Nikki was more silent crossing the icy concrete in her bare feet. After fifty yards they stopped suddenly. Just ahead of them voices were coming from one of the shacks that lined the wharf. “Try it again anyway.” It was Van Meter barking at Harvey, his voice full of irritation. The door started to open.

Feller tugged her arm and they ran across the pier and ducked behind a Dumpster. He put his face to her ear and whispered, “That’s the electrical closet. They’ll never fix it.” He craned to survey the distance to his car at the other end of the wharf. “I radioed for backup so we’re probably better off sitting tight here till they show.” They both turned to scope Twelfth Avenue, hoping to see red and white lights. None yet.

She whispered, “Sorry I accused you of being with them. I just figured you and Van Meter were attached at the hip.”

“Were. But somehow he got on IA’s radar and they asked me to mole. Shitty thing to do to a partner, I know, but...” He shrugged.

“No complaints here,” she whispered. “How did you find me?”

“I was down at court when I heard the call go out about you at Grand Central. I tried to raise Dutch but got no reply. I wasn’t sure, but thought — what the hell — and tracked the transponder from our cab here.”

Nikki smiled. “What the hell.”

Back up the pier there was a loud crack as the door to the work shack flew open against the wall. Van Meter must have slipped up there, and he was calling out, “Harv! She’s loose!”

Feller cursed. The Discourager emerged from the electrical room and called back, “How?”

“Who cares, start looking. Now!” Across the parking lot a beam from Harvey’s flashlight swept the buildings. Dutch called out again, “Check out that Dumpster.”

Feller pressed his car keys in Nikki’s palm. “Run.” Without waiting, he bolted out from behind the bin and charged at Harvey with his gun up. As Heat ran for it, she heard two shots. She made a quick check over her shoulder. Feller was down. Harvey’s flashlight scanned him. The beam came up, finding her. A shot followed and the slush exploded off the pavement a yard ahead of her.

And then the engine of the taxi roared to life. Van Meter fishtailed out of his spot, chasing Nikki down the pier.

There was no way she could outrun that cab. Heat shot desperate glances to both sides, searching in vain for a space between buildings she could slip through and dive into the river.

The police-modified engine rumbled, drawing ever closer, the tires swishing, kicking up the icy slop that had turned her feet numb.

Instead of running a zigzag, Nikki took a bold gamble and ran in a straight line, letting Van Meter gain speed, letting him forget the steering conditions. She sprinted, her lungs searing, toward the convoy of garbage trucks parked in a row outside the off-loading hangar. She held her course, waiting, waiting, as the high beams drew closer, bathing her back in hot light. When she could see her own shadow cast on the side of the first sanitation truck, Heat dove hard right, her body skimming prone across the water and ice accumulated on the concrete like it was a Slip ’n Slide.

Behind her, Dutch Van Meter, who had taken her bait, mashed his brake pedal and jerked his wheel, but the mix of precip that was icing that pier sent him hydroplaning. Traction gone, his cab floated into a sideways skid, slamming him broadside at top speed against the garbage truck. Nikki got up off the deck and saw him slumped motionless over the airbag on his steering wheel.

A gunshot cracked and hit the fender of the taxi beside her. Heat wanted Dutch’s Smith & Wesson, but The Discourager was bearing down and his next shot might not miss. Nikki hurried into the open hangar door of the garbage receiving station and took cover behind the six-foot-tall bales stacked there for barging.

When she heard Harvey’s feet slapping to a stop at the door, she crouched down and peered out between rows of compacted trash. He had turned off his six-cell so he wouldn’t give himself away, but there was enough ambient light from the West Side that she could see him wince as he rubbed a tender spot on his chest. When he took his hand away, Nikki made out the puncture in his jacket just below his shield, where his Kevlar had stopped Feller’s bullet.

Just as Heat renewed her plan to escape with a dive into the river, The Discourager worked his way around to her left flank, wittingly or unwittingly blocking her route to the open side of the hangar where they loaded bales onto barges bound for landfills. So Nikki crept to her right in the crevice between the stacks and made her way to the end of the row, where there was a small workbench.

Tools, she thought.

She studied the open distance to the workbench. It was risky exposure but better than waiting to become target practice. Heat was about to take a tentative step out of her hiding place when she heard his breathing. Immediately, she crouched low in the opening between the bales and made herself still.

Harvey was being quiet, too. Where the hell was he?

On a shelf above the workbench, among the girlie calendars and chipped coffee mugs, there sat some kind of trophy cup from the city or maybe the union. Nikki fixed her gaze on it and waited. Sure enough, after a few seconds, in the brass-plated reflection, she saw slow movement. The dark blue uniform was approaching the gap in which she was hunkered.

Detective Feller’s car keys were still in her hand. Being careful not to jangle, Heat made a fist around them so that the two keys protruded from her knuckles. Not exactly Wolverine, but it would have to do.

Patience again, always patience. The cop tiptoed sideways to the opening, searching for her in the gap. But his mistake was to look eye-level. Heat was crouched low, and when he was centered in front of her she sprang up at him, driving the keys into his left cheek while she grabbed for his gun with her right hand. He cried out in shock and pain. She jerked his wrist upward and the gun fired. The bullet hit harmlessly, eaten by the garbage bale behind her.

Heat thrashed his face again with the keys and tried to wrest the weapon away. His grip was strong, and when, on her third try, she did manage to wrest the gun free, it flew and clattered on the floor.

Nikki bent to grab it, but he tackled her from behind. She twisted and used his momentum against him, ramming him back-first into the workbench. She elbowed him three times at the sore spot under his badge. He wailed with each blow, until he palmed the side of her head and shoved her into the wall, where her shoulder crashed, breaking glass. Heat looked up inside the shattered case and hauled out the fire ax.

Harvey was coming up from his stoop, the gun back in his hand. Heat quickly reared to swing. Mindful that he was wearing body armor, she went for his gun arm. And severed it at the elbow.

He writhed on the floor moaning and bleeding out. Spent, Heat dropped the ax and scanned the surrounding area for something to use as a tourniquet. Then she heard sudden movement beside her. Nikki spun, bringing her hands up.

Someone was diving at her, she braced herself for a blow, but in the same flash that she heard the gunshot, she recognized that the man pushing her aside was Rook. They both landed on the ground beside Harvey. Heat clapped a hand on his loose service weapon, came up with it, and put two rounds in Dutch Van Meter’s forehead as he stood in the doorway holding his smoking S&W.

Nikki set the gun down and hugged Rook, who was still in her arms. “Oh, man, I don’t know how you found me, Rook, but your timing did not suck.”

But Rook didn’t answer.

“Rook?” Nikki’s heart stopped and her skin flushed with alarm. She shook him, but he didn’t respond. When she rolled him over in her lap and touched his cheek, she smeared it with blood.

That’s when she realized it was Rook’s blood on her fingers.

Frantic, she ripped open his shirt, looking for the wound, and found it right away, a .9 mm entry gushing red below his rib cage.

Sirens drew closer.

Nikki fought tears; coming around to kneel over Rook, she compressed the wound with one hand and stroked his face with the other. “Hang on, Rook, you hear me? Help’s coming, you hang on. Please?”

The sirens stopped right outside and flashing lights filled the hangar. “In here!” shouted Nikki. “Hurry, I’m losing him.” Verbalizing the thought crushed Heat, and she barked out an involuntary sob as his face lost more color.

The EMTs rushed in and took over. Nikki retreated in a daze and wept, her bloody hand covering her mouth. She watched, trembling, as they cut Rook’s shirt off and went to work on him. That’s when Heat saw something she had never seen on Rook before.

The big St. Christopher medal around his neck.