Raging Heat

SIX

Detective Heat wanted to surprise Keith Gilbert same as he had with her. To Nikki, off guard meant guard down, and she didn’t want him to see her coming by phoning ahead. Even if the commissioner would consent to an appointment, he had shown his hand by applying pressure through his crony at the Office of Emergency Management. Not the move of a man in the full-cooperation mode he professed.

The Port Authority headquarters were on Park Avenue South, but before Heat took a ride down there she made a quick surf of Gilbert’s Web site for his exploratory campaign. Up top she found a Save the Date posting for a policy speech he was making that morning at a businesspersons’ forum sponsored by a local radio station. Leaving Detective Rhymer in charge of the ongoing search of West End Ave., Roach followed Heat’s car to the Widmark Hotel in Times Square. Another light drizzle was falling, reminiscent of the morning Fabian Beauvais smashed into the planetarium. When they parked and met on the sidewalk, Ochoa put his face to the mist and said, “Sure doesn’t feel like a big storm’s coming.”

“You sound like Noah’s neighbor when he saw him building the ark,” said Raley. On the escalator ride from the hotel lobby to the mezzanine, he was still on the topic of Sandy. “Plus this thing’s supposed to be, what, five days away? Monday or Tuesday, I hear.”

“My partner the weatherman.” But Nikki only half listened. Her attention went to the dark-suited security trio at the doors to the Fraunces Meeting Room. Mainly because their attention was on her.

“Do you have tickets?” asked the woman at the reception table. There were fewer than a dozen unclaimed name badges arrayed before her. The amplified voice of the afternoon drive-time newscaster boomed out of the room when one of the doors opened briefly and someone slipped out. Heat noted the new arrival was a fourth security person.

Heat showed her ID and said, “I’m not here for the forum. This is police business,” which caused the young woman to chew her lip and present a “now what?” face to the security detail.

The man who had joined them from behind the door stepped forward, smiling without particular joy. He brought the scent of Old Spice and Altoids to her. “Is there a threat we should know about, Detective?”

“No, not at all.” She introduced herself and Roach. The front man showed his Port Authority PD credential, but his cohorts didn’t. “We’re investigating a case in NYPD jurisdiction.”

“I respect that.” His topic sentence set a tone of obstruction. “However, PAPD is assigned to this event, and we are only to allow ticketed guests.”

“I respect that,” she replied in kind, “but we’re not here for the speeches. We just want to conduct an interview.”

“With?”

This dance had become tiresome to Heat who nonetheless kept things pleasant. “I’m sure as a cop yourself, you can understand not disclosing details of an ongoing case.”

“That is certainly your prerogative,” he said. Then he folded his arms to send the message that’s as far as it goes then.

“We’re here to see Commissioner Gilbert.”

“He is not seeing anyone. The commissioner is preparing remarks to give after the breakfast.”

Behind her, Ochoa cleared his throat and said, “We can wait.”

“Sorry, right after, we’re hustling him to Port Newark to make sure the container cargo docks are ready for Sandy.” The detective reached in his side pocket and came out with a business card for Heat. “Here’s the number of his office. I’m sure his assistant will compare calendars with you.”

“That chaps my hide,” said Raley when they descended to the lobby. “Those guys have no jurisdiction here. PAPD covers Port Authority assets. Last I heard, that did not include the Widmark Hotel.”

Heat shrugged. “The Port Authority asset they’re covering is the commissioner, whatever real estate he stands on. Unless you’re prepared for a skirmish, those guys were not going to budge.”

“What?” asked Ochoa. “You’re just giving up?”

Not for the first time that morning, Nikki thought about Rook. But on this occasion it was not about his departure from the squad room and his not answering her calls. Heat flashed back a few years to when they had to get past security in a hospital outside Paris and he told her that nobody challenges you if you carry something or, even better, are eating. She grinned at Ochoa and picked up a house phone. “Catering manager, please.”

Five minutes later Nikki stood in the hotel kitchen amid the controlled frenzy of banquet service for seven hundred guests. The manager accepted the sealed envelope from NYPD Homicide detective Heat, placed it under the stainless steel dome covering Keith Gilbert’s breakfast plate, and directed the server to take it to the commissioner immediately.

Her message, in her neat printing on a Widmark note card, was succinct: UNLESS YOU WANT A VERY PUBLIC CONFRONTATION BETWEEN POLICE FORCES WHEN I ESCORT YOU OFF THE PODIUM, YOU’D BETTER SEE ME. NOW.

The Widmark Hotel had named its events facilities after American Revolutionary-era taverns and pubs. Clockwise from the Fraunces on the mezzanine came Slaters, Buckman’s, The Green Dragon, and the one banquet hall sitting vacant that morning, the Bull’s Head. That is where Heat stepped into the dimly lit, cavernous space with a dining capacity for fifteen-hundred to find Keith Gilbert standing alone in silhouette in the middle of the empty room. Her footfalls were barely audible on the carpet as she crossed to him. He spoke to her the whole way there.

“Your imposition into this event is not only extraordinary and rude, Detective Heat, but there will be consequences for your intrusion.”

She had only closed half the distance, and he kept talking. “I came to your precinct on my own volition to make a good faith effort to answer your questions and help you put your investigation on the right course. And now this?” They were close enough for him to drop the Widmark envelope at her feet when she stopped. “An extortion note with my eggs Benedict? Really?”

“I tried the front door. It was blocked.”

“I have an office.”

“You’re here. And so am I. And I want some answers.” She made sure to hold his gaze without flinching while he sized her up.

“Me, too. Like why are you on a such a holy mission to go after me? Is this aggressiveness your normal style? Or are you getting pressure? Is someone in city government rummaging for something so they can fire a preemptive strike at my candidacy?”

Of course Heat resented the implication that she would act as a partisan for anyone, but she was experienced enough to see it for what it was. A clever psychological attempt to put her on the defensive and dominate the interview. Well, maybe not so clever. Instead of rising to the bait, she calmly took out her notepad and said, “If you’re finished, we can proceed. Don’t want to make you late for your speech.”

In the semidarkness of the room, she could see his jaw muscle flexing. “There are a few inconsistencies I want to give you a chance to clear up. When I told you the other day that we’d found your Southampton address and phone number in the personal effects of Fabian Beauvais, you denied knowing him.”

“That’s right.”

“And you didn’t recognize him from his picture.”

“Stipulated.”

“You holding to that? Because I went to Beckett’s Neck yesterday and, from what I’ve learned since, I want to give you an opportunity to think and decide if that’s still your answer for the record.”

“The fuck you talking about? Speak English.”

“Your neighbor, Alicia Delamater, said Fabian Beauvais worked for her recently. Kind of a coincidence.” Heat raised her hand. “By the way? Not so big on coincidences. Except as red flags.”

“So maybe she gave him my phone number.”

“Why would she do that?”

“Ask her. See? You’re fishing and trying to hold both ends of the tackle. Are we done?”

Once again, Nikki took the pushback in stride. “Thank you, I will be asking her. But, in the meantime, you’re saying that Mr. Beauvais was across the lane from Cosmo this summer, and you never once saw or spoke to him?”

“That’s correct.”

“Even though he was supposedly in the employ of your mistress?” Her turn to poke at the defenses. Keith Gilbert was either a cool one or he could be taken at face value. All he gave up was a demi-smile.

“Sounds like you talked to some of the village gossips while you were out there, too.” And then the amusement left him. “I do not have a mistress. I have a strong, long-standing marriage and embrace the value of family. I’m also prepared for the unfounded smears that can rise in a political contest.” He shrugged to dismiss them.

Heat stayed on her facts. “What if I told you I had physical evidence placing Fabian Beauvais on your property?”

“What evidence?”

“Would you still hold to your statement that you didn’t know him?”

“I would. What evidence?”

For Heat, the shellac stains and dog-bite marks were a definite holdback. Instead of responding, she turned a page of her spiral. “The two men I showed you the sketches of.”

“Who I also don’t know.”

“An eyewitness in Flatbush identified them after they came into his diner asking around for Fabian Beauvais.”

“Sounds like they’re your lead.”

“You could be right. He wrote down their license plate. They were driving a car registered to the Port Authority, Commissioner.”

Finally, a reaction. Not a big one, but busy eyes while he processed the news. And how to answer it. He composed himself and chuckled. “Do you have any idea how many cars we have at Port Authority? Thousands. What’s that mean? If a Metropolitan Transportation Authority car was around, do you roust the MTA commissioner?”

“Maybe if his address and phone number turned up in a bloody envelope of cash hidden in a dead man’s closet.” And then she watched him keenly, adding, “Or if a text about him from the dead man warning his girlfriend to run was found on her cell phone.”

“What are you talking about?”

Nikki had achieved what she’d hoped for, putting him off balance. She continued to press. “Tell me about Jeanne Capois.”

“Who?”

“You don’t know her, either, I suppose.”

“You said my name was on some woman’s cell phone?”

“It was a warning text. We found it looking through her effects — after she’d been murdered.”

The commissioner found his calm again and said, “I still don’t see what this has to do with me.”

“You were mentioned in the text.”

He appeared stunned. “Me? By name?” Gilbert had her on thin ice there. His initials in that text message were not the same as naming him. He sensed her hesitation and leaped at the opening.

“Here.” He thrust out his arms, presenting his wrists to her. “If you have something solid, cuff me.” Then it became a taunt. “Come on. Slap ’em on, Detective.” His voice grew loud enough to echo among the stacked chairs and tables at the rim of the empty hall. “Come on, do it!” He came closer, leaning into her like a batter taunting an umpire for a called strike. “Ha ha, you won’t because you can’t. You smell blood but you don’t know whose. You got shit’s, what you got.”

But then his wildly manic performance jerked to a stop. Yet his face remained close to hers, and he spoke in a quiet, chilling tone. “This is no game, Detective. Do not try to browbeat me. Do not come to me with bullshit. Do not go further with this. Because you aren’t man enough, and I am not to be fucked with.”

She rose to her full height, unshaken. “I am getting to the bottom of this, no matter what.”

“You know, my father used to butt heads with a rival in the shipping business. A guy named George Steinbrenner. Steinbrenner had a way with words when people pushed him. Like, ‘Next time you drive me to the wall, I’ll throw you over it.’”

“Steinbrenner was always quotable. Are you borrowing his words to threaten me?”

He smiled. “Don’t take that as a threat. It’s just information.”

And then he left to make his speech.

Nikki discovered a voice mail from Rook on her way back to the car and cursed at missing his call. “Hey, it’s me. Sorry to be off the grid, but I’m in the work cave, you know how that goes. Hate to do this, but I don’t think that dinner’s going to happen tonight. I’ll explain later.” So damned…neutral sounding. No anger, no hurt. No warmth, either. Just the facts ma’am. She decided against calling him back and rolled with the Roach Coach back to the precinct motivated by a strong desire to fulfill Keith Gilbert’s wish and slap on those cuffs.

More out of habit than hunger, Heat sat at her desk picking at a turkey sandwich from Andy’s Deli while she worked the phones. One inquiry was spurred by Gilbert’s comment about the number of vehicles that populated the Port Authority motor pool. The Authority, a joint agency of the states of New York and New Jersey, not only oversaw the operation of area airports, air cargo, marine terminals, major bridges and tunnels, key bus terminals, cross-Hudson railroads, and the new World Trade Center, it also had its own highly respected police force of 1,700 officers — four of which Heat had the pleasure of dealing with that morning at the Widmark. Far from begrudging that detail for picket fencing her and Roach, she saw them as police professionals doing their duty. Given reverse roles, she might have done the same. Certainly they had been effective, even somewhat polite.

PAPD also has a Criminal Investigation Bureau of a hundred detectives, and Nikki’s call was to one of the CIB supervisors.

“Inspector, just doing some I dotting and T crossing,” she began. “One of my detectives investigating a Haitian immigrant named Fabian Beauvais heard that another pair of men had also been working Flatbush looking for him recently. I’m not sure who these two are, but their description made me wonder if they could be plainclothes cops, so I’m making the rounds of other PDs to make sure we’re not stepping on brother detectives’ toes anywhere.”

Inspector Hugo said he appreciated the professional courtesy and that he’d check and get back to her. Heat didn’t mention the nature of her case or the commissioner. She also left out the fact that the men were linked to a Port Authority-registered car. But it struck her as due diligence to make this outreach in the event the Impala was a CIB undercover. If Beauvais was part of a PAPD investigation, that would be game-changing information. Their behavior and demeanor — especially knocking them over fleeing the rooming house — was not very coplike, but there was also something about the staging and precise execution of their dual car escape that smelled like training to her.

A half hour later, Heat convened a catch up at the Murder Board with Raley, Ochoa, and Rhymer to report that PAPD called back and said they have no investigation into a Fabian Beauvais.

“It still leaves the open question of, what was a Port Authority car doing there?” said Ochoa.

“Well, the link to Gilbert is pretty cozy.” Heat flicked a thumb to the plate number on the whiteboard under the sketches of the two men. “We’ve sent the plate out on the alert system, so if we get a ding, we may get our answer.”

Detective Rhymer had made contact with the staffer at Happy Hazels, the agency that placed Jeanne Capois as the housekeeper. “Nothing earth-shattering. Kinda sad, though. They loved her, and had all good things to say. Also Fabian was more than a boyfriend. The both of them apparently came from Haiti at the same time and were engaged. But they said the only thing Jeanne cared about was to somehow get back home for the wedding.”

“I found an anomaly of sorts on Jeanne Capois’s MetroCard,” said Raley. “Her pattern on days off was to take the Three line from the Seventy-second Street station to Saratoga Avenue in Brooklyn, which was the nearest station, I guess, to her fiancé’s place near Kings Highway in Flatbush. You could set your clock to that, twice a week, for half a year. But a few weeks ago, she started using the card to round trip it on the One train from Seventy-ninth and Broadway to the Fourteenth Street stop in Chelsea, then come back to the Upper West Side the same day.”

“Were these at repeating times and days?” Heat knew the value of breaks in habit. Big things like changes in lifestyle and income were key indicators to look for in an investigation, but you sometimes got the biggest breaks from the smallest things, like switching gyms or altering subway stops. “I’m wondering if she had some kind of appointment. Like maybe she was pregnant. Or had medical issues. Is there a clinic near there? Physical therapy, maybe?”

“The trips were all at different times, both day and night.”

“Tell you what I’d like to do,” said his partner. “I say we Roachify this.”

Heat cocked her head to Detective Ochoa. “Did you just say Roachify?”

“I did. As in getting all over this. I want us to go back through her purse, her room, everything, to see if something links up to Chelsea.”

“When you put it like that,” said Nikki, “I’d be foolish to say no.”

She had set her iPhone on her desktop and she caught the thing side-creeping across her blotter from the vibration when she came back from the restroom. Once again, not Rook. Detective Feller was calling in from Flatbush.

“Got one for you,” he began. “A detective goes into a bar.”

“Yeah?”

“And comes out with a clue.”

“I’m listening.” By reflex, she flipped to a clean page in her Clairefontaine notebook. Feller liked to clown around, but Heat knew he wouldn’t have called unless it mattered. Did it ever.

“There’s kind of a dive spot around the corner from Beauvais’s flophouse. I know it’s early in the day, and all, but I thought I’d go in and see what kicks. So the bartender doesn’t seem to want to talk but wants to at the same time; you’ve seen those types, right?” She had. “So I noticed there were some guys at the bar, chins over their beers, who he may not want to share in front of, so I ask him if he could come outside and give me directions to the BQE. When I get him alone, sure enough, he knows Beauvais from the neighborhood and says one night about a week ago he comes in about last call, acting like he’s drunk, but he’s not. He’s got blood on his shirt, and says he’s been shot.”

“Did you say shot, as in gunshot?”

“One and the same. Beauvais says no 911 call, refuses a trip to the ER, but remembers the barkeep has a friend who’s a doctor.”

“Did you get a name?”

“Already spoke to him. And guess what? He’ll cooperate,” said Randall Feller, keeping his record unassailable as Nikki Heat’s most-esteemed street cop. “I’m heading there to interview him now.”

“I want to be there when you do. I can be there in half an hour.”

“He’s on Cortelyou near East Sixteenth.” He gave her the street number, repeating it for clarity. “Look for the Klaus’s Auto Parts store.”

“The doctor’s next door?”

“Negative. That’s where he works. Ask for Ivan.”

En route to Brooklyn, Heat tried calling Alicia Delamater to give her a chance to clarify her statement that Fabian Beauvais had injured himself with hedge clippers. Or, more to the point, to present Gilbert’s neighbor-mistress an opportunity to recant it and come clean about her lie. She got no ring, just an insta-dump to voice mail: “This is Alicia. Away for a while. If it’s urgent, call this number…” Nikki called it and got her attorney.

Vance Hortense of Hortense, Kirkpatrick, and Young sounded like the male version of Siri when you asked your iPhone to do something off the menu. His tone was neutral, dispassionate, and unaccommodating — which, to Heat, might have been a better name for the law firm. “Ms. Delamater has left the country.”

“Where did she go?”

“Somewhere she is out of touch.”

“Did she leave a number where I can reach her?”

“I’m sorry, she didn’t.”

“Are you saying you wouldn’t know how to reach her if you had an emergency?”

“If she checks in, I’ll pass on your request.”

“Do you expect her back soon?”

“I can’t say.”

And won’t, she thought.

“Please, I am not in trouble, I hope,” said Ivan Gogol. His eyes, which were set in meaty lids under a constellation of moles, darted nervously from Heat to Feller. “A man need help, is all, so I help.” His palpable fear in a police interview reminded Nikki of every Cold War-era spy movie Rook addictively Netflixed where the KGB breaks a hapless citizen in two while he confesses to anything they want.

“Let me put you at ease,” Heat said in as reassuring a way as she could. “Your cooperation is quite appreciated. We are not here to investigate you, but simply to hear about your experience with this man.”

He took another look at the photo of Beauvais and nodded, relaxing only slightly in his chair. Under the fluorescent lighting of the cluttered office the auto parts manager had let them use, his beard seemed like a dark blue tattoo beneath his pasty white skin. He had told them he was thirty-eight, but his baldness added twenty years. Or maybe it was the toll of a life spent in paranoia.

Her first question felt obvious but, knowing it was an inherent stressor, she approached it offhandedly. “I was surprised when Detective Feller said to meet you here.”

“This is my work. How I pay my way,” he said. “In St. Petersburg, I left medical academy knowing to be doctor of medicine, yes? But when I come to United States, the, what is it…? The criteria…for doctor license not so easy. In Russia, I would have own clinic. Coming here to be with my wife, surprise. I drive cab or work this. Someday I take board exams and have practice in Brighton Beach.”

“So you aren’t technically a doctor,” said Feller, and Ivan’s eyes started darting again. She jumped in.

“Which makes your service to friends who can’t afford doctors so admirable.” She paused while he took out a cigarette and then put it back in his pocket. “Is that how the man in this picture came to you?”

Gogol recounted the late-night call from the bartender, all the details matching up with Feller’s source. “So I dress and get my satchel to drive to the bar where this man, Fabian, is in the back kitchen. He is in pain and not well.”

Heat asked, “How severe was the wound?” Feller had taken a cue and taken a seat beside the desk to observe.

“The wound itself not life threat. He had stopped own bleeding with compression like this.” Ivan held both palms to his rib cage and pressed. “But skin is very thin at ribs and many nerve endings radiate from spine. Very painful.”

“What kind of bullet was it?” And then she added with anticipation, “Did you keep it?”

“Was no bullet. The wound slice like a cut. Slice, not puncture, you see?” Feeling more in control of things, he tore a blank off a Klaus’s Auto gummed pad and drew an anterior outline of an upper torso. To her surprise, his sketch was precise and expert, neater than some drawings she had seen in autopsy files. He added a slash where the bullet struck Beauvais.

“A graze.”

“That is it, graze. But close to heart. Was lucky man.”

For a while, anyway, she thought. “Did you talk at all?”

“Da. His accent make hard, but yes,” he said in his own variant of English.

“Did he say who shot him?”

Both detectives studied him as he shifted in the seat. “No.” Then Ivan fixed his stare on his little drawing and he fussed with it, smoothing down the page with the side of one hand. The silence unnerved him and he filled it.

“All he tell me was earlier that night somewhere in Hamptons.”

“Did he tell you exactly where?”

“Mm, no.”

“In a bar, a house, in the street?”

“I do not know this.”

Feller joined in. “What town?” All he got was a shrug from the Russian before he went back to fiddling with his sketch, which he then slid to Heat as an offering.

“Help me understand,” she said. “Did he not see who shot him, or did he not say?”

“I did not ask him so many questions as you ask. This is best, I think.”

It struck Nikki that she was getting about as far with him as she had with Alicia Delamater’s lawyer on the drive over. Same obfuscation, the difference being the fear she sensed from Ivan Gogol. Was it his own nature or was it the plight of the immigrant to be ever wary, careful beyond measure? Or was he hiding something? “I want you to know that you can share anything with us without worry.”

In response, he stood. “I must go back to work. I have carburetors to deliver.”

One last try. “Fabian Beauvais was murdered. Whoever did that is still out there.” Nikki watched that sink in as she gave him her business card. “If you remember anything more, call me anytime, day or night. I will help you.” She smiled but he broke eye contact and left the room.

When Heat and Feller stepped out onto the sidewalk, Ivan was waiting by their cars. “When I finished stitching his wound, this Fabian left but came back in. He said there was a car and he waited for it to go. He was very scared. He said he wanted to tell me who did this in case something happened to him. And now you say something did?”

Nikki knew better than to speak and fracture this man’s delicate moment of truth. He took a long moment to gather his courage before his leap.

But he took it.

“He said it was a powerful man. And he is. Because I have seen him on the TV. Mr. Keith Gilbert.”

To be honest with herself, Heat had no idea yet how getting shot by Keith Gilbert had anything to do with Fabian Beauvais’s eventual — and more lethal — plummet from a high altitude into the planetarium. But she did have enough experience in homicide to know a few things. Two attempts on Beauvais (one of which was successful), plus the torture death of his fiancée, plus a wad of hidden cash, plus the ransacking of an upscale apartment in a home invasion smelled strongly of a cover-up and conspiracy. And something Heat also knew from experience: The thing about a conspiracy is that there’s always someone behind it. Someone with power. The sum of all that math told her it was time to bring in the prime suspect.

Getting a warrant would take some doing; she knew that. The DA sign-off presented enough of a hurdle. A high-profile arrest like a commissioner on the Port Authority, especially one like Keith Gilbert, who was so prominent and well connected, would require approval at the highest level downtown. But Heat trusted the courageous impartiality of the district attorney and felt confident in asking. The problem was on a much lower rung.

Her precinct commander’s face went florid when she asked his permission to call the prosecutor for the arrest order. The overworked springs of Big Wally’s executive chair groaned as the skipper tilted backward, jaw slack, eyes big as cue balls as he mentally played out the risks-versus-rewards of this action. To nudge him along, Heat led him from his office to the Murder Board to recap the main points, persuasively and, most importantly — ploddingly — laying out her case against Keith Gilbert as if to a first grader. He listened without interruption, bobble-heading in a way that made Nikki feel she had at last fracked through the thick insulation of fat encasing his brain.

But she had underestimated the power of organizational survivor instinct.

“Answer me this,” said the captain. “Your cause of death on the flying Haitian was smacking into the planetarium, right? And now you want an arrest warrant for Gilbert because some Russkie sawbones with a sewing kit and no license claims the commissioner blasted the guy? The gun didn’t kill him, gravity did.”

Once again, her precinct commander fabulously displayed his lack of street experience. Nikki knew how cases get solved. You pick up a piece of the puzzle here, an odd sock there, a coincidence that doesn’t make sense.…You stick with it, and soon, as you get more pieces, you get a whole picture, and the truth is revealed. It never dropped cleanly into your lap the way Wally fantasized.

She made another run. “Captain, come on, he shot the man. And I believe the gunshot was a first attempt. When that failed, Gilbert found some other way. Or had somebody do it.” Irons kept shaking his head. “I want a warrant for his arrest and search warrant for that gun.”

“No sale,” he said when she had finished. “Not with my neck on that cold marble.” Behind his back, the squad pelted the skipper with a barrage of disparaging looks. Heat put her own scorn aside and focused on rescuing the warrant.

“Maybe I can go back over some of these points, if I didn’t make it all clear, sir.”

“Oh, I get your points, just fine. But from where I sit? This is one jumbo button to push. And no way I’m pushing it without the one thing you’re missing.” He made a sweeping gesture to the Murder Board, which had a dismissive feel. “I see no hard link connecting this Beauvais character to Commissioner Gilbert. What I do see is a lot of circumstantials and conjecture.”

“Captain Irons, this is solid. I have arrested and gotten righteous convictions on less.”

“Not this time.” He knuckle rapped the board, smearing some of her notations. “Show me a link from the dead guy to Gilbert. Then we’ll green light your warrant.”

The first thing Heat did when Irons closed his office door was to tell her detectives to stow their harsh remarks and keep their eyes on the ball. “Have your pity party later over brews at Plug Uglies. Right now we need to find a work-around for this roadblock.”

“We need a Wally Work-around,” said Feller.

Heat quelled the laughs with, “I said later, Randall.” Thinking and thinking, she tapped her pen on her lips then said, “OK. We dig deeper into what we’ve got. Detective Rhymer. Run Alicia Delamater through your contacts at Customs to see if she used her passport yesterday or today. Her lawyer says she left the country, and I want to talk to her.”

“On it.”

And then an afterthought came to her. “And, say, Opie. Just in case she hasn’t gone yet, run a list of cruises operated by Gilbert Maritime leaving New York or Jersey and put out a Watch and Advise for her.” If Keith Gilbert was making moves to disrupt Heat’s investigation, he might provide the transport for one of her witnesses.

“Detective Feller. Pay a visit to Port Authority motor pool. Use your personal charm to get them to show you the requisitions for names of employees who checked out that Impala. I want those two dudes sweating in our box, and soon.” She noticed Rhymer still hanging around. Polite to a fault, he waited until she’d finished and raised a finger to be called on.

“Something just jumped in my head.” His Virginia hills accent made it sound like a question. “It’s the phone link. Beauvais had Gilbert’s home number, that’s what started all this.”

Showing some impatience, Ochoa said, “Yeah, but Irons hit us with a catch-22 by not letting us get a warrant for Gilbert’s phone records. Plus we never found a phone of Beauvais’s, so that’s pretty much a dry hole.”

“Understood,” said Rhymer. “But that phone in Jeanne Capois’s purse. She had a text from Beauvais, right?”

Nikki got right there with him. “Brilliant. If we can trace that text to Beauvais’s phone, we’ll have his number and can run that without a warrant. Now that’s a work-around.”

Ochoa turned to his partner. “Why the hell didn’t you think of that?”

Raley shrugged. “Just giving these other men their chance to shine.”

Fifteen minutes later, Detective Heat stood Captain Irons back in front of the Murder Board and pointed to her latest posting. “We have come up with your link, sir. A phone call was made from Fabian Beauvais to Keith Gilbert’s home number on this date.”

Wally interrupted. “Hang on; who the hell authorized a warrant for you to search Keith Gilbert’s phone records?”

“We didn’t search Gilbert’s records. We searched the deceased’s — after tracking Fabian Beauvais to his pay-as-you-go cell phone.”

“He had a burner?” Irons made it sound like a criminal accessory.

“It’s not at all uncommon for low-income people to use short-term cell phones, Captain. Nor is it a crime.”

“Fine. But he called the home number. Once. You call that a link?”

“Which is why,” said Heat, “the series of other calls that ensued over the next few days — including calls originating from Keith Gilbert’s personal cell phone to Fabian Beauvais are so…persuasive. Wouldn’t you agree?”

Wally Irons was a survivor. True, he played checkers instead of chess with his career strategies, but even a blundering donkey found its feed bucket eventually.

“You’re dead sure he’s your man?”

“I am, sir. And beyond that, I am already losing potential witnesses, both to homicide and to flight.” She faced him squarely, hoping to deliver the argument that hit him where he lived. “So to delay action risks calling our leadership into question, if there’s an inquiry.”

All he needed to hear. “Let’s do this.”

The same plainclothes team from PAPD that had shut out Heat and Roach earlier that morning bypassed the strategically vulnerable revolving doors and came out the wider sliding-glass exit that baggage valets used at the Widmark. The security detail made instant note of Detective Heat, who stood by their commissioner’s Suburban. Gilbert followed them through and was slower to register her presence, but when he did, his face flashed with anger. Then a realization by the candidate-to-be that media was photographing and videoing all this caused him to relax his presentation. He actually smiled at Nikki as he drew near, but with his weathered facial crags and goatee, it struck her to be a pirate’s grin.

“You are fucking relentless,” he said, appearing casual for the photo op, but white strings of saliva on his tongue belied all that. “What the hell are you up to?”

“Doing you a favor.” He furrowed his brow at that and she continued. “I will give you an opportunity to come with me quietly or…” She nodded to both ends of the circular driveway where Detectives Raley, Ochoa, Feller, and Rhymer stood beside their unmarked cars, which were blocking the exits. With each stood a half dozen uniformed patrol officers. “…Things could get very awkward.”

“I don’t understand this. Haven’t you asked me all your questions already?”

“I’m not here to ask you questions, Commissioner Gilbert. I’m here with a warrant to arrest you for the murder of Fabian Beauvais.”

Keith Gilbert had gauzed the fingerprint ink off his hands with alcohol swabs and sat in a private holding cell awaiting his attorney before he would be questioned formally. Even though Heat had deftly leveraged his arrest to avoid an ugly scene in front of the press line at the Widmark, news spread quickly, and now a nightmare swarm of media vans and spectators jammed West Eighty-second Street outside the precinct.

So many requests for interviews, both on and off the record, flooded in that Heat stopped taking press calls and began ignoring texts and e-mails, only scrolling through them every ten minutes or so in case one was from Rook. She had left him a brief voice mail, just to let him know of the arrest, making sure not to end by urging him to call. Nikki did not want to appear needy, although she ached for him to make contact. Especially after their uneasy moments that morning about the task force job.

When she saw Wally Irons stride out of the men’s’ room smoothing the button line of the clean white uniform shirt he’d brought on a hanger in that morning, Heat was not surprised. For all his blind spots, the captain constantly had his finger to the wind and now he had cannily reckoned that the most advantageous direction for his future was well away from a murder suspect. Also, the man could not resist the brightness of TV lights. It was like he was part moth. Legend had it that years before, he had knocked over a child in his hurry to a press podium. Heat appeared at his office door while he tied his tie in a mirror and asked him if he was sure he wanted to deal with the media so soon. As he always did, he wrapped his answer in the flag of duty. To the mirror, he said, “Somebody has to stand up and let the people of the city know their NYPD is acting without fear or favor.”

“I wouldn’t use that catchphrase, sir.”

“I got it from you.”

“I got it from the New York Times.”

“Even better,” he said. Heat only hoped the briefing she gave him had taken hold half as well as the slogan. She had her doubts.

Ten minutes later, Nikki stood way off to the side as the Iron Man chinned the bundle of microphones set up at the front door of the station house. “Good afternoon. I am Captain Wallace Irons, commander of the Twentieth Precinct.” He paused while photo shutters whirred and clicked. “For the record, that’s W-A-L-L-A-C-E and then I-R-O-N-S. I have a brief statement to make, which is that following an investigation into the death of a Fabian Beauvais—”

“Can you spell that for us?” asked a woman from Eyewitness News.

Momentarily thrown, the captain said, “I’ll provide all that detail after my statement. Now. Following our investigation into the death of Mr. Beauvais, we have made an arrest of our prime suspect, Keith Gilbert.” Although the reporters already knew this, a murmur of energy ran through the crowd accompanied by an even larger flurry of shutter clicks. “I will not be discussing evidence we have against the suspect, but, as you all know quite well who Commissioner Gilbert is, I am here to personally assure you that your NYPD acts without regard.” Realizing his gaffe, he amended, “This is to say, without regard to stature.”

A stringer for the Ledger asked, “How will this affect the Port Authority’s ability to get ready for Hurricane Sandy? Wasn’t he pretty much it?”

“Mm, I would ask Port Authority about that one.”

“When and where did you arrest him?” called out a reporter for 1010WINS.

“Commissioner Gilbert was taken into custody without incident today after a speaking engagement…” As the Iron Man detailed the arrest, Heat allowed herself to relax a bit, pleased that, as agreed, he would limit his comments to the nuts and bolts of the arrest and procedural aspects, rather than revealing evidence and holdbacks.

A hand rested gently on her shoulder and she turned to see Rook. There was something unsettling in his expression. Then he leaned to her ear and whispered, “Nikki, don’t hate me, all right?”

“Hate you? Come on.…” The weight he seemed to be carrying concerned her, but she smiled and discreetly leaned her body against his. “Why would I hate you?”

“Because I have something to tell you.” She turned to face him, and Rook whispered again in her ear. “You’ve arrested the wrong man.”