Out in the hallway Rook said, “I made it to Gramercy Park. Your apartment’s fine.”
“What’s it like out there?”
“Not good. Storm’s past, but now we’re getting the nasty back ass of it. Power is still out below Thirty-ninth, subways, tunnels, and some bridges are closed; they’re still putting out house fires in Breezy Point…Oh, and somebody put a roller coaster in the ocean off the Jersey shore.” He led her into the break room and indicated the clothes on the coat rack. “Got you these from your apartment.”
“Oh, great. Thanks.”
“It’s the least I could do after you saved my life.”
She pulled the outfit off the hook. “Oh yeah, this suit definitely makes us even.”
“I beg to differ, Detective Heat, but I think we are finally even for that bullet I took for you.”
“You know, I don’t see it as even. I see it as your turn to take another one.” And she stepped into the ladies’ room to change.
The voice of Keith Gilbert echoed up the hall from the bull pen as Nikki returned in her refreshed wardrobe. She looked up at him in front of the forest of microphones on TV when she stepped into the room and thought she saw something on his face that went beyond weariness from running the PA’s emergency sitch room overnight. Did she see stress? A twinge of fear?
Rook came up behind her and voiced her thoughts. “Do you think Commissioner Gilbert knows that his soldier of fortune’s fortunes have turned unfortunate?”
“Oh, so you’re with me now on Gilbert?”
“When did I ever doubt you?”
The news from the press conference was grim. Over ninety deaths in a sixty-mile radius, forty-three of them right there in New York City, mostly in Queens and on Staten Island, which took a wallop. Kennedy, LaGuardia, and Newark airports were closed. All seven East River subway tunnels had flooded and were closed. Same with the Midtown, Holland, and Battery Park automobile tunnels.
“Got breaking news here.” Ochoa lofted the phone on a stiff arm toward the ceiling. “Feller and Rhymer calling in from da Bronx.”
Nikki muted Gilbert’s press briefing. “Put them on speaker so we all can get it at once.” She, Raley, and Rook circled Ochoa’s desk. “Whatcha got, Detectives?”
“We found Zarek Braun’s crib,” said Feller.
Another chill, a good one this time, raised hairs on Nikki’s arm. “How’d you manage that? Neither of these guys carried ID, not even a wallet.”
“Hence the term, going commando,” added Raley.
“Correct, but as all of us who have endured long hours of stakeout know, you need to do something to pass the time.”
Detective Rhymer said, “Before you start with the dirty jokes, we combed through that Fort Knox on wheels they were driving and found a Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition stuffed in the driver’s side pocket.” He paused. “Huh. Still no dirty jokes, what’s wrong with you guys? Anyway, your deceased BearCat driver, Mr. Bill Santinelli, was a subscriber, and — employing all our savvy and cunning as professional investigators — we went to the address on the magazine label. By the way it’s off Bathgate. Same block as the rest of his crew was living when I checked their places out.”
Everyone thought the same thing — about Wally Irons walking into an IED trap. “You two should hold,” said Heat.
“Not to worry. Bomb squad sniffed it and passed it a half hour ago while you were in with Zarek Braun.” Randall Feller cleared something from his throat. “By the way, if he’s still hanging around, I’d like to soften him up for you.”
Everyone on that call felt the same. Heat steered them away from that black hole. “Are you sure Braun lived there, too?”
“Affirm. Got some picture ID here with numerous assumed names. Driver’s licenses, fake passports, even a private gym card.” They could hear door hinges squeak and the acoustics change as Feller stepped outside. “I’m walking to the detached garage, which ESU is still clearing so we can’t go in yet. But, standing here looking in, I can see all sorts of ordnance, ammunition, tear gas, flash bangs.”
“Zip cuffs?” asked Ochoa.
“Don’t see any right off, but I would bet on it. The infamous Impala is also parked in here under a tarp. And there’s a big space here with some wide-track tire marks that I’m sure belong to a BearCat.”
Heat said, “Just before you called we got a trace back on that ’Cat. It was reported stolen by Mexican police last year.”
Rook said, “That explains how Braun got it. You can’t just buy those things on eBay. I’ve tried.”
“Hang on, hang on.” The phone rustled on Feller’s end and they heard muffled chatter. Then he came back on. “The bomb sarge found a wallet on the workbench. No picture ID in it, but there’s a paycheck stub from the chicken slaughterhouse. It’s made out to Fabian Beauvais.”
Feller and Rhymer hung up to resume their search of Braun’s hideout up in the Bronx. Before Heat got involved in other things, Roach led her to the Murder Board. Like the other detectives, they had taken to heart Nikki’s directive to drill down on every aspect of the case. Since both of them felt a proprietary interest in Jeanne Capois and her unresolved connection to Opal Onishi, that’s where they had put their initial efforts.
Ochoa began, “I read over the notes from your interview with Onishi.” He took his pen out of his teeth and tapped the woman’s name in his quadrant on the whiteboard. “Squirrelly, that one.”
“You think?” said Nikki. “If we ran a polygraph on her, we’d probably have to order in more ink.”
“Yeah, my antenna was up all over. So I thought, what’s in that interview that I could at least run some kind of check on? So I left word with the Happy Hazels. Remember, Opal told you that she hired Jeanne Capois through that agency?”
“I sort of prompted her with that, but, yeah.”
“But no. It took awhile because of all the craziness with the storm, but the happiest Hazel called me back about a ten ago. She never referred Jeanne Capois to anyone other than her boss, the old man from the home invasion.”
“Shelton David,” said his partner.
“And she has never heard of Opal Onishi. I’ll admit,” he said, “that it’s not so much a lead, as a confirmation of a lie.”
“At this point, everything helps, Miguel.” And then she said, “You actually read my notes?”
“Hey, just doin’ the fact-donkey dance.”
Rook scooted his chair over and said, “The next question is, why? Why lie?”
Heat agreed. “And why move in the middle of the night like some traveling circus?”
“Was she in debt?”
Raley hopped on that one. “No. I ran a credit check on her ’cause I wondered the same thing. It’s maybe the most logical reason to make a midnight run like that. Opal’s not rich, but she’s making all her payments on time. And she’s got a steady job.”
“We’re back to where we started,” said Heat. “Wondering what the connection is between Opal Onishi and Jeanne Capois.”
“Which is where some of my donkeywork might help,” said Raley. Nikki could tell by looking, Sean was holding. “Although I did mine wearing the crown.”
“As my King of All Surveillance Media?”
“A little more like a commoner. I didn’t scrub surveillance vids; I only used the Internet. To Google Opal Onishi. You can find out a lot about people online.”
“But don’t believe all of it,” said Rook. He felt their stares and dismissed them with a wave. “I reveal too much. Go on.”
Rales said, “What got me started was, in your interview — which I also read, thank-you — Onishi said she had been sleeping with an actress on a film shoot, she’s referencing old films, and we knew she went to NYU film school. Anyway, that got me thinking: gopher on Iron Chef? Rental clerk for movie equipment? That’s not career work for a film grad, that’s the J-O-B job you do to pay for your passion. Film.” He had their attention but could see they were only partly with him. “Maybe it’s better if I can just show you.” They followed him to his desk where he clicked on a bookmark that brought up a page of search engine hits.