Deadly Heat (15 page)

They sat up most of the night, working together, banging their heads, trying to figure out the code. They switched from hefeweizen to French Roast, but the coffee only made them more alert, not any more enlightened. Heat answered all of Rook’s questions but tried to avoid sharing too much of her path; his fertile imagination would do its best work unconstrained.

Even when he signed on the Internet, covering the same ground she had again and again, Nikki didn’t warn him off or try to stop him. With his Beginner’s Eyes Rook might find something she hadn’t, and she didn’t want to pollute his fresh thinking.

His quest went beyond her searches of the Egyptians, Mayans, and urban taggers, to the Phoenicians and Druids. Rook even investigated a site devoted to the mutt languages of some TV series called
Firefly
. That was when they knew it had come time to call it a night and start fresh at sunup. “You mean in about forty-five minutes?” she asked.

Immune to the caffeine, Heat fell into the deepest sleep she had enjoyed in ages. Call it the power of sharing her burden. When she awoke, the sheets on Rook’s empty side of the bed felt cold to her touch. She pulled on her robe and found him sitting on the bench seat of the bay window, staring down at Gramercy Park, although Nikki couldn’t be certain he was actually seeing anything at all except pencil marks on sheet music.

“Now you know where my head’s been all these weeks,” she said, resting her palms on his shoulders.

“My brain itches.” He tilted backward and she kissed the top of his forehead. “You’re going to hate me.”

“You’re giving up?”

“No.”

“You don’t believe it is a code?”

“I do.”

“Then what?”

“I’ve been thinking.”

“Always a source of concern.”

“We’re not going to crack this on our own. At least not soon enough to do any good. We need an assist.” Nikki tensed and withdrew her hands. He turned from the window to face her. “Relax, I’m not talking about going to Yardley Bell. Or Agent Callan.”

Old doubts about sharing with Rook began their noxious trickle. “Who then?”

It was only eight in the morning, but when Eugene Summers opened the door to his Chelsea loft, he greeted them looking radiant, groomed, and polished. The professional butler turned reality TV star bowed his silver head and smartly kissed the back of Nikki’s extended hand, dismissing her apology about coming by so early and on short notice. “Nonsense. I’m delighted to see you. Plus it got me out of my robe.”

“No kidding,” said Rook. “You’ll have to show me how you get a perfect dimple like that in a necktie.”

“Will I?” said Summers. In spite of the fact that Rook was an unabashed fan of the reality star (or maybe because of that), his idol seemed less than thrilled to see him again. But the Maven of Manners, as the network promos and billboards advertised him, shook pleasantly nonetheless and gestured them to the living room, where he had set out warm croissants and jam beside a porcelain coffee service.

Back in the mid-1970s, then-twentysomethings Eugene Summers and Cynthia Heat had operated as spies for Tyler Wynn’s CIA operation in Europe. They both had been part of his team, nicknamed the Nanny Network because Wynn’s moles gained access to the homes of intelligence targets by working in domestic service. Heat’s mom worked undercover as a piano tutor; Eugene, as a butler. That connection was why Rook had proposed that morning’s visit to Nikki: to find out if the Nanny Network had a secret code.

Initially she was opposed. Sharing the existence of the code with Rook had been a giant step. Widening the circle of awareness—especially to someone once handled by Tyler Wynn—represented great risk. But Rook’s calling out of the truth, that they were stuck, led her
to agree. As long as they agreed to back-door the subject and not reveal they were personally in possession of the coded message.

“What brings you here so urgently, Detective?” asked the butler, politely waiting until after he’d poured their coffees and sat. His posture was perfect, and when Rook got appraised by the star’s TV trademark Summers Stare, he rose up out of his slouch. And smiled.

She began her lie with “Just routine, really. As you must have heard, Tyler Wynn is still at large. We’re just doing our diligence, following up with everyone who knew him.”

“I had heard.” Summers placed a palm against his top vest button and continued, “And I read the account of your horrible ordeal in Mr. Rook’s Web article. Terrifying and heartbreaking.” He paused, and she nodded to acknowledge his sympathetic look. “But I honestly don’t know if I can be of use. The man certainly hasn’t been in contact with me.”

“Naturally that’s one of my questions,” said Heat. “Thank you.”

“Good java.” Rook set his cup down, sounding as offhanded as possible. “Some of Tyler Wynn’s other acquaintances may have received communications from him.”

“May have?” Eugene had smarts. They could see the granules of each sentence getting sieved and sorted behind his frameless glasses. “You aren’t sure?”

“We’re wondering, that’s all,” said Heat. “As we go through some of the effects of Tyler’s accomplices, it occurs to me that there might be messages in code that we would never recognize as such.”

“You want to know what you’re looking at,” said the butler. “For clues.”

“Precisely,” said Rook.

“Did you ever use a code in Wynn’s network?” asked Heat.

Summers shook his head. “The closest we came were the drop boxes I told you about last time. We only put plain messages in them. Handwritten, and certainly not in any code.” He grinned. “We were all a bit too rowdy and undisciplined to learn codes, let alone use them.”

“What about Tyler Wynn?” she asked. “Did he use a code?”

“That I don’t know. You could ask me anything else about Tyler
Wynn. I could tell you his favorite wine, where he got his shoes custom made, the shop where he bought his Brie de Meaux. But as far as his means of encrypted communication, I’m sorry.”

Nikki stared down at the coffee she’d let grow cold. Just as she put away her notebook, lamenting the trip and the exposure that had come with it, Rook spoke. “Eugene,” he began, “something you said just gave me an idea. Tyler Wynn is a man of specific tastes, right?”

“Oh, please, you have no idea how particular.”

“If you would indulge me some time, could I take a few hours to pick your brain about some of his habits, his likes and dislikes? It would really help me color my next article about him. You know, the American James Bond with his custom shoes and his personal
fromage
.”

“A couple of hours… I have an interview with Lara Spencer this morning.”

“Great,” said Rook. “Then lunch after?” Boxed into the obligation, the famous butler gave Rook his trademark Summers Stare, then said yes.

On the elevator down from his loft, Heat said, “Tell me something, Rook, is everything in my life all about helping you write your next article?”

“That? That’s not for any article. Here’s what I’m thinking. If I can get a line on a few of Tyler Wynn’s personal tastes and buying habits, we might be able to track him down through his purchases.”

The doors opened in the lobby and Nikki said, “That’s a horrible idea.”

“Why?”

“Because I didn’t think of it.” Then she stepped out ahead of him, hiding her grin.

The bull pen sounded like a telemarketing boiler room when Heat came in from her meeting with Eugene Summers. All the detectives were either working their phones or at the Murder Boards conferring on leads they’d checked out. Except, of course, for Sharon Hinesburg, whom Nikki glimpsed shoe shopping on Zappos before she boss-buttoned the screen to an NYPD internal site.

Raley and Ochoa were saddling up for Sotheby’s, to interview a contact that they met last summer when they solved the murder of one of the auction house’s art appraisers. Raley said, “If anyone could tell us what oil painting this hand belonged to, she could.” That made Heat think of Joe Flynn. A top art recovery specialist like him would also be a great resource. As Roach left, she even scrolled her iPhone for his number. But before she pressed Call, Nikki remembered her last visit to Quantum Recovery, and his needy, longing looks. She put her phone away. Flynn could wait until Sotheby’s had a shot.

Heat checked in with the Sixty-first Precinct over in Brooklyn to get an update on their search for Salena Kaye spottings. After getting bounced to three different voice mails, she hung up, called over Sharon Hinesburg, and assigned her to head out to Coney Island and conduct a search herself. “It’s early in the season for tourists, so hit the hotels and, especially, the by-the-week apartments.”

The detective gave Heat an exasperated look. “Shouldn’t I be working the serial killer instead of pounding the pavement on this?”

“Nothing wrong with pounding the pavement.” Nikki couldn’t resist a shot. “I’m sure you’ve got the shoes for it.”

Early in the afternoon, her cell phone vibrated. Greer Baxter of WHNY, by the caller ID. Heat let it dump to voice mail, then listened back. “Detective Heat, Greer Baxter, Channel 3 News. Have you forgotten that I need you on my live segment? We’d love to hear what’s happening with our serial killer.” Then the news anchor paused for effect and added, “Unless, that is, you’re hoarding this story for your boyfriend’s exclusive. Call me.”

Heat felt a brief swell of light-headed rage. At the dig, at the manipulation, at the distraction. She set the phone gently on her desk and rested her eyelids to collect herself. “Detective?” She opened her eyes. Feller stood over her, looking ready to burst. “I got one. I just found the coolest connection between our victims.”

Detective Feller wanted to show, not tell. Nikki followed him to his desk, where he gestured her to sit. “Like you told us to, I’ve been drilling down on our three victims, searching for anything that ties them together.” He reached for the mouse on the desktop and double-clicked. An image loaded on the monitor, of Maxine Berkowitz seated on a kitchen floor in sweats and Uggs, surrounded by puppies. “Been going over all her social media and found this Facebook posting she made three years ago.” Nikki’s heart grew heavy, as it always did, at the sight of the joyful smile of a murdered young woman beaming at a camera. “Note the beagle pups,” said Feller.

“Adorable.”

“You’ll love them even more when you see this.” He opened another window, beside the Berkowitz image. It was an advertisement for Bedbug Doug posed beside Smokey, his bedbug-sniffing beagle. “Apparently beagles are great at finding bedbugs, and exterminators are using them like crazy. Doug even made Smokey his company mascot.”

“Yeah, I’ve seen the ads,” said Heat. “So you’re telling me your connection is that both victims liked beagles? Kind of thin, Randall.”

“Stand by, please.” With the eraser end of a pencil he pointed to the litter surrounding Maxine Berkowitz. “Mixed litter, lots of colors. You’ve got one here that’s mottled, these two are lemon and white, and then there’s this boy here.” He zoomed on the image of one puppy. “This, they call open marked. White coat with tan and black spots. Notice the pattern of these three black spots on his shoulder?” He zoomed on the image of Smokey.

“Identical,” she said, more interested now. “Is it the same dog?”

The detective smiled. “You tell me.” He moused open a YouTube video. While it loaded, he said, “This was shot a year and a half ago in Danbury, at a canine scent-training academy. Basically, it’s Smokey’s graduation from bedbug school.” Nikki watched the amateur video of Douglas Sandmann climbing a riser to applause as he accepted a diploma, with his beagle matching stride, on heel. After Sandmann took the certificate, there was a jump edit to a video that chilled Nikki. Clearly taken in the parking lot after the ceremony, the camera captured Douglas Sandmann and Maxine Berkowitz kneeling and praising her little guy, Smokey, who licked her face.

Heat gave Feller a nod of appreciation. “Who’s a good boy?” he said.

Rook came into the bull pen from his lunch meeting and joined Heat and Feller. Nikki recapped Randall’s beagle connection for him then turned to the Murder Boards. “So we already had one connection from Roy Conklin to Maxine Berkowitz. Now we have one from Maxine to Bedbug Doug. We don’t know what they mean yet but it’s something.” She turned to Detective Feller. “What you just did for Maxine? Do it for Douglas Sandmann. And the locksmith, Glen Windsor, too.”