Deadly Heat (27 page)

A sound.

One tiny piece of grit, cracking under a shoe.

Heat rotated her head toward it. The instant she moved, a muzzle flashed across the hood of a Jetta and the air sizzled beside her ear. The slug hit the wall behind her, and concrete dust and paint fragments stung her cheek. She called, “NYPD, drop it,” then rolled away from that spot for cover, coming up beside the engine block of an SUV.

The next shot punctured the Escape’s hood. This time Heat returned two rounds from her Sig Sauer, aimed behind the flare. And waited.

She listened through heavy earwash as the gun echoes withered. She heard nothing. No movement, no moans. What to do?

A good cop is always thinking tactics and cover.

With ample cover and the anticipation of backup, Nikki decided to hold position.

But the game changed. Headlights blazed and an engine turned. A white Japanese compact squealed out of a parking slot and fishtailed away from Heat toward the exit ramp. Heat rose, braced on the hood of the SUV, and squeezed off another 9. The back window of the Versa spider-veined, but the driver turned the hairpin corner and disappeared up the ramp toward ground level.

Heat raced for the stairwell.

The Nissan’s horn sounded a long and constant bleat, even frying the air outside the parking garage as it zoomed up the incline from below. Pedestrians heard it and scattered on the sidewalk to either side of the entrance as it flew out of the mouth of the structure and crossed the driveway out onto Fulton.

Jameson Rook floored the Crown Victoria Police Interceptor and T-boned the Nissan Versa, broadsiding the compact when it hit the street. The impact lifted the two nearest tires half a foot off the pavement and pushed the small car sideways into the rear of a cement truck, deploying the airbag in Salena Kaye’s face.

It only took seconds for Heat to rush onto the driveway, but by then Kaye had already climbed out the broken windshield. Nikki searched the block and spotted her jogging away with a limp down Fulton Street. Heat knew she could take her down at that distance, but she wouldn’t put bystanders at risk to prove it.

“Pearl Street. I’ve got her,” said Heat, running past Rook as he got out of her Crown Vic.

He called out, “Hey! I stayed with the car!” Rook couldn’t be sure she heard him. Nikki had already rounded the corner. Improvising his own tactics, Rook briefed the rent-a-car manager to tell the backup which way Heat had gone, and then he ran off to take Cliff Street, the road that ran parallel to Nikki’s.

“Vehicles, two minutes away,” said Callan to Heat. “You should be hearing the chopper any second.”

“I’ve lost her,” she said into her cell phone. “How the hell could I have lost her in fifteen seconds?” She gave the DHS agent Salena Kaye’s clothing description and pinpointed her position on Pearl Street, scanning storefronts and nail salons, as she walked and talked. “Just get here. Get here with everything now.” Then she hung up.

Rook knew the neighborhood, and his plan was to follow Cliff until it intersected with John Street, where he would, theoretically, complete a pincer movement and meet up with Nikki in the middle of the block, closing off Kaye’s escape. But before he reached John Street, he glanced inside a deli window and saw her—saw Salena Kaye at the steam table trying to blend in with the crowd.

And Salena saw him clock her. She started reaching inside her jacket.

“Bomb!” shouted Rook as he rushed in. “Everybody out, now!”

Amid the screams of panic and the stampede that jostled Salena Kaye, her draw got slowed enough for him to lunge for her. Rook’s
momentum slammed them into the steam table and her Glock came loose, sliding across the linoleum toward the back of the deli.

Rook was more a boxer than a combat fighter, and she easily broke free of his clinch, shoved him onto the floor, and started for her weapon. But as a proud college slacker, Rook possessed a talent more formidable than jujitsu: Frisbee. From a one-kneed kneel, he picked up a plastic dinner plate and executed a perfectly flung scoober that caught Kaye behind the ear. She didn’t go down, but the plate edge stunned her enough to slow her.

She turned in disbelief only to be met by a barrage of salad-bar ice he shoveled at her frantically with both hands. Salena gave him a dismissive look, turned to get her gun, but her feet shot out from under her, slipping on the ice cubes. She landed hard. With no time to run to her, Rook hurled himself on his chest, slid across the floor on a bed of cubes, grabbed her gun, and stood, holding it on her. “Citizen’s arrest,” he said.

Heat appeared, making her way through the crowd outside, and stood in the front doorway. “Hey, Detective,” he said. “Look what I caught.”

As he finished the words, Salena Kaye yanked the legs out from under him by the pant cuffs, and he toppled backward onto the floor. In a flash, she scrambled through the vertical strips of hanging vinyl leading to the kitchen. Once more, Heat couldn’t chance a shot that might take out a cook or a clerk. Slowly, she picked her way through the ice cubes and followed into the kitchen. The back door stood open. Nikki brought her gun up and rolled out into the alley—and found it empty.

Heat sprinted to the end of the passage where it opened onto Pearl Street and looked both ways. She even looked up. How did that happen?

Salena Kaye had simply vanished.

Fulton Street had become a shining river of black vehicles when Heat and Rook walked back to Surety Rent-a-Car. SUVs and sedans with
muscular engines and white US government plates filled the block, which had been sealed off. Air support and TV news copters circled overhead. Forensics technicians in coveralls dusted the mangled Nissan and took photos from all angles. More of the same went on one garage level below, with the added feature of the NYPD shooting team down there to rule on Heat’s judgment under fire.

Heat and Rook found Agent Callan sitting in the backseat of his Suburban with the door open and his feet on the outside running boards, talking on a secure sat-phone. The boyish quarterback look seemed to have gained some weathering. He flicked a brow greeting to them, but pulled the door closed to finish his call.

A minute later, he stepped out, pocketing his phone. “Detective Heat, we have just kicked into a new era of heartache.”

Heat shook her head. “How could she have vanished off the sidewalk? I was right behind her. There’s no way she could have disappeared into thin air like that.”

“Yeah, well a bigger whale just hit the fry pan. I’m sure you’ve been kind of busy the last half hour, but have you done any of the math on this?”

“Sure I have,” Nikki said.

“Come on, Callan, we all have.” Rook made a perimeter check to make sure they were out of earshot of press or civilians. “Salena Kaye’s part of a bioterror plot, and she comes to rent a truck.”

“We can all reach the same bottom line on that,” said Heat.

“Well now we have a new figure to add to the equation.” The agent side-nodded to the rental office. “Manager says she wanted to rent an E-350 cargo truck for this weekend.” Nikki felt herself go weak. Rook let out a low whistle. Callan continued, “That’s right. I just briefed the president’s national security advisor that we have a high probability of a bioterror attack in New York City. And it’s as soon as three or four days away.”

Special Agent in Charge Callan didn’t make it optional for Heat to join him in the Homeland Situation Room for a meeting of his Bioterror Task Force. He drew her away from Rook and said, “Listen, you will be there. And if there’s some personality conflict between you and Agent Bell—”

“I think you know I’m more professional than that,” she said, interrupting him. “I know what’s at stake, and I would never let personal feelings interfere.” And then, for his benefit, she added, “Personal feelings on any level, about anyone.”

A hint of a smile, the first lightness Nikki had seen in him since his arrival on-scene, creased the corners of his mouth. “Guess we’re all pros here, then.”

“And given the very big clock that’s counting down, I need to put my energy where it can do its best: working the street. Do I have time to button up my loose ends here?”

Callan slid the cuff off his aviator-style watch as he led her back to his Suburban. “I’m jumping on this now, but if you think you can make better use of time in the field, do it. I’ve got people en route from the Pentagon and CDC, and they’ll be joining the meeting in-progress, also.”

Rook heard that and cleared his throat. Nikki said, “He can come, right?”

“I’m her wall. She bounces things off me.” He raised his hand in oath. “And it’s all off the record.”

The agent scrutinized him. “Yes, Mr. Rook can join us, if that means you’ll actually show up, Detective Heat.”

“Oh, we will,” said Rook.

“Parting orders?” said Agent Callan as he got in his vehicle. “Not a word about this. Not just press, Rook.” He addressed them both. “Not to anyone. No mentions to sweethearts, family, friends, anybody. In this era of social media, we don’t want word to spread and start a panic.”

“Right,” said Rook. “Who needs a viral threat to go, well, viral?”

“On second thought, Heat, leave him in the car.” He slammed the door and roared off to Varick Street with the hidden emergency lights strobing in the grill of his SUV.

“You look just like on TV,” said Alan Lew, manager of the Surety Rent-a-Car location. “Nothing like a police officer. You’re beautiful like a model. Or Bond girl.”

“Thank you, Mr. Lew. And thank you for calling in your tip. It was brave and extremely helpful.”

“The picture on that Web site,
FirstPress
? Didn’t do you justice.”

“Oh, you saw the article,” said Rook with a sly wink to Nikki.

“Yeah, it was OK. Good story. But the writing… not exactly Shakespeare, you know?”

Rook’s smile vanished. “I think the detective has some questions for you, sir.”

“We’re going to keep the rental agreement she filled out, if that’s all right.”

“Absolutely.”

“This photocopy you made is obviously of a fake ID and an alias.”

“I pretended the copy machine was slow so I could stall her until you got here.”

“Very resourceful. Can you tell me what she was doing during that time?”

He came around the counter and stood where Salena Kaye had been. Heat made a little sketch, out of habit, and marked the spot. Sometimes these interviews were perfunctory; sometimes they yielded clues. In her experience, motivated people like Lew made good witnesses, so Nikki paid close attention. “She was mostly right here the whole time. Looking around a lot. Watching me in the back when I called you. It took two tries to reach you, and I didn’t want her to get away.”

“May I?” asked Heat. Mr. Lew stepped aside, and she stood where he had and rotated. “Looked around like this?”

He nodded eagerly. “Except she was doing this.” He repeated her move, but mimed holding a cell phone to his ear.

“She was on her phone. Did you hear anything she said? A name?”

The manager said, “She didn’t say anything, she was just holding it.”

She turned to Rook. “Go to the entrance where I came in, so I can see you coming.” He trotted out to the sidewalk and walked in the garage driveway, as Nikki had. As soon as Heat saw him, she ran to the glass door and retraced Salena Kaye’s route to the man lift, timing herself. She walked back to the office, looking thoughtful.

A patrol officer came in. “Excuse me, Detective? Got an eyewit.”

Outside the deli on Cliff Street, a bicycle messenger said he saw Salena Kaye race off in a silver minivan. “Did you get a plate?” asked Nikki.

The eyewitness shook his head. “It didn’t have any plates.”

“Was she driving?”

“Some dude.” He didn’t get a description of the driver. “I was too focused on staying alive. Van almost creamed me, booking ass out of there.”

A technician from ECU had found Salena Kaye’s shoulder bag under the deli steam table. Rook said, for the benefit of all in earshot, “She must have dropped it—when I took her down.” Heat was too busy placing the bag’s contents out on a table to pay attention.

She laid out a slim Eagle Creek travel wallet with the fake ID, a credit card in the same alias, a few hundred in cash, a popular lipstick and compact available from any drugstore, and a hotel room key with the identification tag removed. Heat also found a clip of 9mm ammunition. “A gal always needs a spare,” said Nikki as she set it beside the other items. To her gloved touch, the outer pocket of the bag felt like it held another clip, but it turned out to be a cell phone. Nikki opened Recents and saw the last call received. It matched the time Kaye had been in the rental office. Using her own cell, Heat called the squad. Hinesburg picked up.