“There goes my weekend in Lahaina.”
“No leaves, not even for the weekend,” he shot back, trumpeting his total lack of irony. As she entered the bull pen he called out, “And Heat. No more letting personnel leave the city for a Friday fuck off without my OK.” It wasn’t his snippy tone that made her flare. Or shouting into her squad room at her like that. It was one more instance of the armchair administrator calling shots. Nikki took it to his face.
“I think we had better be clear on something, Captain.” His eyes popped at the unexpected confrontation. Behind her, Detectives Rhymer and Feller swiveled their desk chairs to rubberneck. “Sean Raley and Miguel Ochoa are seasoned investigators who were working very late hours last night and took the initiative to call me to request permission to explore what they see as a promising lead upstate. I will back these detectives for their tenacity and heads-up play. I will also be respectful and honor your request for the sign-off. But I will not let you characterize the work of these men as a ‘Friday fuck off’.” She left him there and went to her desk, reading the emergency status memo.
It said that Sandy had crossed the Bahamas and begun a more north-northwesterly course. Even though it had diminished from just one mile per hour shy of a Category Three hurricane to a Cat One, it remained potent and dangerous with wind speeds of eighty. Up the Eastern seaboard, North Carolina, Maryland, DC, Pennsylvania, and New York had already declared states of emergency, with New Jersey and Connecticut expected to follow suit. In anticipation of possible landfall sometime Monday into Tuesday, the mayor had officially opened New York City’s Office of Emergency Management’s Situation Room. Not only were leaves and vacations canceled, but also all police, fire, and sanitation workers should be expected to be ready for deployment, as ordered, for public safety and civil order.
Heat shared the memo with Feller and Rhymer, who were back to working their phones, beating the bushes for anything that would resuscitate the stalled Beauvais-Capois murder case. She didn’t think it would be too early to try Rook, so she stepped outside onto Eighty-second Street for some privacy and called his number.
It didn’t go straight to voice mail, which told her the phone was on. And it delivered the full complement of rings before she heard his outgoing message, so at least he hadn’t pushed the decline button to reject her. Hearing his recording, Nikki’s mouth went dry. After the tone, she kept it short and as pleasant as she could manage given her stress level. “Hey, it’s me. Storm’s coming, thought I’d check on you. Call me so we can talk, all right?” She almost hung up but added, “I’m here” first.
She looked up at the sky, which was brilliant blue with only a few vaporous clouds the morning sun hadn’t burned off yet. No hint of the cyclonic pinwheel feeding off humid water a thousand miles southeast. The storm made her think of the Emily Dickinson poem Rook joked about in happier days — at the chicken slaughterhouse. The one that called hope the thing with feathers that sings such a sweet tune. And in her mind, she recited her favorite stanza:
And sweetest in the Gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm.
Then her iPhone buzzed with a text from Rook. It said he thought they should take a breath and get some space. He’d be in touch. He didn’t say when.
Not one feather on that.
When Raley and Ochoa checked in later that morning they were southbound on the Taconic in the Roach Coach. “What did you learn at the farm?” she asked.
“Not much from Walter Sliney, that’s for sure.”
The speakerphone picked up Ochoa, whom she could envision behind the wheel. “Total doucher.”
“Understandable, though,” said Raley. “He was icing us to protect his brother.”
“Who murders old ladies.” Another addition from Ochoa.
“So no leads on Earl Sliney or Mayshon Franklin?”
“Correct. But state police lifted prints that confirm Thug-One and Thug-Two definitely crashed there, so at least there’s a trail to follow, and they are on it, big-time.” Raley added, “Good rapport with the BCI lead, so if they get a handle, we’ll know it soon as they do.”
Since they hadn’t brought it up, Heat initiated. “What about the crop duster?”
“I’m not a pilot,” said Ochoa, “but that plane looked viable.”
Raley, obviously in accord, filled in the detail. “I kind of expected some bucket of bolts biplane rusting under a haystack. The plane is in top condition. It’s a Piper Pawnee Ag aircraft converted to a tandem two-seater, which would allow room for the pilot and Beauvais’s body, if the scheme was to fly him out over the Atlantic and dump him in the ocean.”
“Is that your theory?” Sensitive to recent tension, she asked without judgment, only as a point of information.
“It’s one. I’ll admit, it’s a little bit like the wood chipper in Fargo, but that fits the IQ profile up here.”
Ochoa chimed in, “The plane not only has the room, it’s got the range, about four hundred miles.”
Picking up the rhythm of partner-talk, Raley added, “And it would be an easy in and out from that farm. No tower, no flight plan to file, no logs. Just load and go.”
Heat still had her doubts, but post-shrink, she consciously led with her usual open style. “Let’s factor that in then. And fellas. Nice work. Thanks for the initiative.”
She got left hanging in another one of those awful midair voids waiting out their reply. “Boss?” said Ochoa at last. “Rhymer and Feller called. They told us about you getting up in Fat Wally’s grill for us.”
Detective Raley sounded loose. Like his old self. “Just want you to know we’re good.”
And then, overlapping him, Roach said, “Way good.”
Nikki hung up. May the healing begin.
The subject line on Lauren Parry’s e-mail screamed, “Toldja!” Nikki clicked it open and read the synopsis of the lab results from testing residue under the fingernails of Jeanne Capois and the DNA of Roderick Floyd. High-confidence match. Heat wrote her friend back and busted her chops. “No coroner should ever use a smiley face emoticon.”
Her own smile faded after she walked over to post this news on the Murder Board and saw that it was already sort of up there. The medical examiner’s e-mail had provided confirmation but no momentum. Worse, it only reminded Heat that a puzzle piece she’d long been holding still didn’t fit anywhere. Nikki’s board was replete with floaters, orphans, odd socks, coincidences, contradictions, and names of the deceased — all proving that this was indeed about more than one man falling from the sky. Sounding to herself more like Rook than Rook, Heat believed that when this scattered array of disparate pieces finally did come together, it would expose a conspiracy of some kind. What kind? She wasn’t sure. Nikki found the notation for RODERICK FLOYD — FINGERNAIL DNA, took a marker, made a check mark beside it, and called that progress. For now.
Coming back from grabbing a Greek yogurt from the break room, Nikki heard her iPhone purring on her desk and lunged for it, fearing she’d miss a callback from Rook. But the 631 area code told her it was the Hamptons.
“Detective Heat, it’s Detective Aguinaldo; sorry I missed your call a bit ago, but I think you’ll forgive me when I share my reason.”
“Hey, no problem, Inez.” Heat set her Fage cup down and cleared space for notes. “I didn’t want to be a pest. Just making my rounds; you know how it goes.”
“Well it goes a bit slower here in Southampton Village, but yes. When you called I was back at Conscience Point. I wanted to knock on some doors after we were up there yesterday, but I couldn’t clear any officers, so I went up there myself this morning.”