Driving Heat (47 page)

“More academic than you know,” said Duer. “My buddies at the Department of State are brokering a deal on this Mehmoud character as we speak. That kid’s going to be on a
plane back to the desert by the weekend.” The congressman then rotated his hooded gaze to Tangier Swift, who continued to play the role of the victim.

“You’re smart enough to know, Kent, this is a total railroad job. Nothing here can be proved.”

“You’d better hope not. Because I’m going to dig until all the dirt is out of the hole. Starting tomorrow when I call closed-door hearings with the Pentagon and Intelligence
Services.” Kent Duer got to his feet. The hero who had earned a Purple Heart leaned on his cane. “I’m all for profit. I’m more about giving this nation the best defense in
the world. I think you can forget about the DOD program.”

“I’m innocent. I have a contract.”

The congressman nodded as he made a quiet decision. “I think I just canceled it.”

When Duer left, Heat got out her cuffs and rounded the table toward Swift. Two of his bodyguards took a step as if to block her. Raley pulled back his coat to show tin and his .357. They
stopped.

“Tangier Swift, I am placing you under arrest for fraud, conspiracy, sabotage, and terror activity. Plus I am sure there will be numerous federal charges coming that will help your lawyers
afford a boat like this of their own.” She cuffed him and added, “Meanwhile, you can have a nice ride on mine.”

Nikki indulged herself by sleeping in the next morning—though indulgence
for her meant one extra hour and getting up at a
slovenly six-thirty. Rook had been tossing most of the night with shoulder pain and bagged the notion of sleep altogether at about 4:00
A.M.
to get up and keep pushing words
forward in his article.

“Is making coffee going to bother you?” she asked after they kissed at the counter where he had set up shop.

“Only if you don’t give me any.” He finished the sentence he was typing and said, “BTW. Saw it online. Hack attack’s over.”

“Yeah, I got my first clue when my BlackBerry was vibrating across the nightstand, and I had a gazillion e-mails and memos.”

“Most of which you haven’t needed in a week, and bet you don’t need now.”

“True. I won’t call it preferable,” she said, pouring water from the Brita into the kettle. “But it does make you wonder how much tech we need.”

“Personally, there’s a certain drone I could have done without.”

“With you there.” She scrolled through her messages. “Surprise, surprise, an email from Zachary Hamner.”

“I picture that guy wearing an opera cape and sleeping in a coffin. And rising each day to breakfast on the hearts of young idealists who never heard his wings flapping.”

“Not so fast, babe. Get this.” Nikki then read the message aloud for him. “‘Captain Heat, it is my pleasure to relay congratulations from the chief of detectives on
resolving your homicides. Your role in ending the cyber attack is also greatly appreciated and duly noted up the chain.’” She laughed as she read the rest. “‘Nonetheless
your less-than-stellar performance as a precinct commander will be subject of an in-service review by your district supervisor. Also be mindful your CompStat numbers will still be expected next
week along with your required presence at the One PP meeting. Warmly, Z.’” Heat laughed again. “‘Warmly?’”

“Must have just eaten a freshly beating heart. Bet he munches them like apples.”

“Here’s one from Special Agent Delaney. ‘Your FBI thanks you for TS. Almost makes up for losing GG.’”

Rook closed the lid of his laptop. “Want to know the worst part of busting Tangier Swift? Brace yourself for the onslaught of tabloid headlines: ‘Swift Justice. That’s
SwiftRageous!’ Or when they show him in his orange jumpsuit, ‘Tailored Swift.’”

“
Confessions of a Blown Whistle
is starting to sound better and better.”

“I’ll stop.”

“Do.”

Heat drove Rook to his doc’s for a check of his bullet wound. While they were there, he gave a twofer, re-dressing Nikki’s forehead with a smaller bandage and pronouncing her stitch
work pristine. If she slathered on the SPF, she might get away with minimal evidence of the scar.

“Good,” said Rook, “because we’re getting hitched, and when I lift that veil, I don’t want to be looking at Freddy Krueger.” When Heat and the doctor gawked
at him, he said, “I, um, should probably cut back on the painkillers.”

The squad applauded when they came into the homicide bull pen. But each did it by clapping one hand on a thigh because they all had their other arms in slings. “I told myself I
wouldn’t cry,” said Rook. “And I won’t.”

Ochoa took his sling off. “Breaking news.”

Heat said, “I know. Cyber attack’s over. Thank your partner.”

“Yeah, that, too. But I’m talking about something bizarre. Ready?” He inclined his head toward Raley, who took the handoff. They were just like the old Roach again.

“Lon King’s files turned up.”

Nikki felt a witch’s finger scratch her gut again. “Where?”

“At Wilton Backhouse’s apartment. Forensics has them.”

She turned to Rhymer and Aguinaldo. “I thought you searched there.”

“We did,” said Inez. “They just showed up. A bunch of banker’s boxes on his kitchen table.”

“Strange,” said Rook. “Almost covert.”

“Yeah,” Heat said. And excused herself to go to her office.

The Forensics detective she spoke with confirmed the files were there,
and that they all had remained in alphabetical order, although
there was no way of knowing who had had them or how they got back. There was no labeling, and they were trying to lift prints off the boxes, but so far there were none. Whoever had handled them
wore gloves.

Nikki wasn’t certain which pained her more: to think that the written record of her most intimate thoughts and private confessions had been unaccounted for or that her file had been found
and was now part of the investigative process, potentially available to be scrutinized by colleagues and detractors. She didn’t even want to imagine what Internal Affairs would do with it.
Things had been said that she had only said because she had trusted them to be confidential. Forever.

She hadn’t come to that trust easily. But now she felt naive and stupid. And frankly, scared.

Nikki closed her door and asked if he would look to see if there was a file there under the name Heat. If it registered with the detective at all, he was too discreet to comment. She listened to
the lid come off some boxes, heard tabs being riffled as he searched.

The phone scraped across the tabletop as the Forensics detective picked
it back up. “No Heat,” he said. “And I
checked the whole box, in case it got misfiled or shuffled. Want me to keep an eye out for it?”

She told him she’d like that and hung up, then had to sit down, just to collect herself.

Her feet kicked into something under her desk. She tilted her head sideways and saw a gift box wrapped in wedding paper. Nikki set the box on her desktop. It had no note. She used her scissors
to snip the ribbon and carefully slit the decorative paper to touch as little of it as possible. She removed the wrap and saw a gift box like you’d find at any Hallmark. She hesitated, then
lifted off the top.

Inside was a manila file folder, the kind you’d see at a doctor’s office. The tab read: “Heat, N., Det. Grade-1, NYPD.” Taking it by one edge, she opened the file.

It was empty. But there was something.

She took out the manila folder. Beneath it, the box was filled with bits of paper that had been run through a microshredder. She scooped some of it up in her palm and couldn’t read any of
what was on it.

But she knew what it was.

An ecru Crane’s envelope was nested inside the confetti. No writing on it, and it wasn’t sealed. Nikki slipped the card from the lined envelope and, when she read it, the warmth of
another’s grace filled her, and she smiled.

Heat carefully rested the note inside the box on top of her shredded files, face up, so she could appreciate once more the woman’s neat handwriting and the message that contained only two
words.

“All in.”

O
n the dazzling August morning of Nikki Heat’s wedding day, she stepped before the full-length mirror in her dress fashioned
of silk taffeta with a sheath of silver bullion lace and wished her mother could be there to see her. She kissed her fingertips and touched them to the heirloom wedding ring she wore on a thin
chain around her neck and knew that her mother actually was there, and that in a way she always would be.

Lauren Parry, her maid of honor, and Margaret Rook gasped at her beauty, declared her stunning, fussed with her hair, which was up, accentuating her elegant ballet dancer’s neck, and
assured her that the scar did not show at all. Time heals, and four months had done Nature’s work. Nonetheless, she asked Lauren to brush on a bit more powder. Just in case.

Heat’s only worry was Rook. He had been in Los Angeles pitching the book he had sold based on his magazine exposé—
For Whom the Whistle Blows
—to movie studios,
and was supposed to have returned the day before. But some welcome thunderstorms had rolled through, breaking New York’s heat wave, but also causing the cancellation of his flight. His plane
had finally arrived that morning at JFK, and the Hitch! he had hitched to the Hamptons had caught fire in Shinnecock Hills. Detectives Rhymer and Feller had sped off an hour before using sirens and
a gumball to retrieve him, but there was no sign of the groom yet.

Nikki parted the drapes on the beach side of the suite to make sure everything was ready. The day was simply spectacular. That storm had broken the oppressive humidity, and Saturday in
Bridgehampton felt more like May than August. The guests seemed relaxed enough, most of them already seated in the rows of white folding chairs facing the gazebo where the lawn met the white sand
and the blue Atlantic beyond.