"Or at a murder scene," she added.
"Odds are," said Rook.
Nikki wouldn't be seeing Don until later that night, so she agreed. Rook caught a cab back to his loft to get some writing done, while she took the elevator to the garage to drive back to the precinct and wrap her day.
At her garage level, the elevator doors opened and Raley and Ochoa were there, about to get on. "We miss the autopsy?" asked Ochoa.
Nikki stepped out with them and the doors closed behind her. She held up the file. "Report's right here."
"Oh," said Ochoa. "Good, then." Heat wouldn't have been much of a detective if she couldn't read the disappointment in him. He was, no doubt, hoping for an excuse to see Lauren Parry.
"Got something for you, though, Detective," said Raley. He held up a heavy-duty manila envelope bulging with something square inside.
"You're kidding," she said, daring to feel some energy in the case again. "The typewriter ribbons?"
"Some typewriter ribbons," cautioned Raley. "Her nosy neighbor recycled a bunch of them before the garbage strike, so they're long gone. These are strays he had in his bin. Four of them."
"Nothing in her typewriter," added Ochoa. "We'll run them up to the precinct so Forensics can get on them."
Nikki looked at her watch and then to Ochoa, feeling bad for the guy that his plan to see Lauren Parry had been thwarted by minutes of bad timing. "Tell you what would be a better plan," she said. "As long as you're here, I don't want to have the Padilla case fall through the cracks. Would you go up and see where they are on his autopsy? They're beyond swamped, but if you ask nicely, I bet Lauren Parry will do it as a favor."
"I guess we could ask her," said Ochoa.
Raley knuckle-tapped the manila envelope. "We're going to lose a day with Forensics, though."
"I'm heading uptown, anyway," said Nikki. "I'll drop them at Forensics."
Getting no argument, she signed the chain of evidence form and took the envelope from them. "Let's hear it for nosy neighbors," she said.
Uptown traffic was impossible. Ten-ten WINS said there was a major crash under the UN on the FDR and the work-around traffic was clogging everything northbound on the island. Nikki cut across town, hoping the West Side Highway would at least be crawling. Then she did some calculation and wondered if she should call Rook to rain check. But her gut told her that would just revive the friction she was trying to cool. Another plan.
She was only minutes from his loft. She could stop by, pick him up, and he could come with her to the precinct. They could have a drink around there. The weather was still nice enough for a patio table at Isabella's. "Hey, it's me, change of plan," she said to his voice mail. "We're still on, but call me when you get this." Nikki hung up and smiled, thinking of him writing to his remastered Beatles.
Heat parked in the same loading zone she had parked in once before, the night of the pounding rainstorm when she and Rook had kissed in the downpour and then run through it to his front steps, soaked to the skin and not caring. She put her police sign on her dash, locked the manila envelope in the trunk, and, a minute later, stood at the foot of his steps, pausing, feeling a bit of a flutter remembering that night and how they couldn't get enough of each other.
A man with a chocolate Lab on a leash passed her and climbed the steps. She followed behind and petted the dog while the man got out his keys. "Name's Buster," he said. "The dog, not me."
"Hello, Buster." The Lab eyeballed his man for permission and got up to offer Nikki his chin for a scratch, which she was glad to oblige. If dogs could smile, this one was doing it. Buster looked at her in his bliss and Nikki flashed back on her encounter with the coyote and its defiant stare-down in the middle of West 83rd. She felt a sudden chill. When the man opened the front door, the dog moved by reflex to go with him. She was just reaching for Rook's door buzzer when the man said, "You look trustworthy, come on."
And she followed him in.
Rook had the penthouse loft. The man and his dog rode as far as three and got off. Nikki didn't like the idea of surprising men in their apartments or hotel rooms, having had one poor experience resulting in a tearful flight home from Puerto Vallarta one spring break. Tearful for him, that is.
She reached for her phone to call Rook again, but by then the car was at the top of the shaft. She put her phone away, pulled the metal accordion doors open, and stepped into his vestibule.
Heat approached his door quietly and listened. Nothing to hear. She pressed the button and heard it buzz inside. She heard a footstep, but realized it wasn't coming from inside the loft but from behind her. Someone had been waiting in the vestibule. Before she could turn, her head slammed into Rook's door and she blacked out. When Nikki came to, it was in the same blackness she had just left. Was she blind? Was she still unconscious?
Then she felt the fabric on her cheek. She was wearing some kind of sack or hood. Her arms and legs wouldn't move. They were duct-taped to the chair she was sitting in. She attempted to speak, but her mouth was duct-taped, too.
She tried to calm herself, but her heart was pounding. Her head ached above her hairline where it had banged into the door.
Calm yourself, Nikki, she said to herself. Slow breaths. Assess the situation. Start by listening.
And when she listened, what she heard only made her heart pound louder.
She heard what sounded like dental instruments being set out on a tray.
Chapter Seven
To keep herself from getting swept away in a current of panic, Nikki Heat clung to her training. Fright wouldn't get her out of this alive. But fight would. She needed to be opportunistic and aggressive. She pushed her fear away and focused on action. She repeated silently to herself: Assess. Improvise. Adapt. Overcome.
Whoever was arranging the metalware was nearby. Maybe two yards away. Was her captor alone? She listened, and it seemed so. And whoever it was seemed very busy with the small-sounding tools.
She didn't want to call attention, so, without making overt movements, Heat flexed her muscles, slowly tensing herself against her bonds, knowing she couldn't rip free of them, but testing them, hoping for some sort of give, anything that would betray some area of weakness in the duct tape. All she wanted was a little slack somewhere, anywhere-at her wrist, at her ankle-just a quarter inch of play to give her something to work at.
No luck. She was bound efficiently to her chair at the upper forearms, wrists, and at each ankle. As she ticked off each point of restraint, she replayed her memory of Lauren Parry indicating each place on Cassidy Towne's autopsy template. Her own were identical to that diagram.
So far, the assessment of give sucked.
Then the sorting stopped.
A foot scraped, and she heard two hollow heel strikes on uncarpeted floor as someone came near. The footfalls could have been the heels of a woman's shoe, only they seemed more substantial. Nikki tried to remember the layout of Rook's loft-if that was even where she was. He had rugs everywhere except the bathroom and kitchen, but that flooring was slate. This sounded like hardwood. Maybe this was the great room where he held his poker games.
Cloth rustled beside her, and she could smell Old Spice aftershave right before she heard the voice in her ear. It was a man, forties, she guessed, with a Texas drawl that would have been appealing in other circumstances. It was a crisp, simple voice that would make you feel comfortable about buying the man's church raffle tickets or holding his horse. Gently, calmly, he asked, "Where is it?"
Nikki made a small mumble against her gag. She knew she wouldn't be able to talk, but maybe if the Texan thought she had something to say, he would remove the gag along with her hood and shift the dynamic at least that much. Heat wanted to create an opportunity she could capitalize on.