Heat Rises (18 page)

The first thing she took in was the quarter inch of ice and frozen slush coating the entire top of the car, notable because there was a clear circular patch about the size of a
DVD
on the roof above the driver’s seat. Raising herself up on her toes, she saw the dimple of the bullet’s exit point. She bent forward to look through the back window, but it was like trying to see through a shower door. Then the shooter from Forensics took another picture inside the car, and the slumped body formed a horror movie silhouette.

“Single head shot,” said the voice. Nikki rose up and turned from the rear window, and one of the suits, Neihaus, was on the curb with his pad.

“You have positive ID this is Captain Charles Montrose?” was the first thing she said. When he nodded, she asked Neihaus to say it. “You’re absolutely certain Charles Montrose is the victim?”

“Yes, I have matched him to his ID. But speaking of, you knew him, right?” He tilted his head toward the open passenger door, and she felt her stomach swim. “Going to need confirmation, you know that.”

“That’s him.” Detective Ochoa rose up from his crouch at the open car door and walked back toward them. He showed his palms to Nikki and shook his head slightly, signaling Don’t. And for the hundreds of victims she had seen in the hundreds of awful ways people can die and what it does to their bodies, and for the traumatic day she had had already, Nikki decided there was no point testing her armor.

“Thank you, Detective,” she said in a formal tone.

“No problem.” His face said anything but.

Nikki shifted gears, asking Neihaus, “Who found him?”

“Guy from a cleanup crew looking for a parking place to get in the Graestone.” In near unison, Heat and Roach looked up the block. A commercial van from On Call, a smoke and water damage recovery company, was double-parked at the rear service gate of the prestigious Graestone Condominiums. Detectives Feller and Van Meter were interviewing a man in coveralls. “Says he was mad he couldn’t find a spot while some jerk had parked at the hydrant, and he was going to give him some shit. Surprise.”

“How about witnesses?” She had to ask, even knowing that if anybody had seen or heard anything, a 911 call would have preceded the accidental discovery by the van’s driver.

“None so far. We’ll canvass, of course, but you know . . .”

“Did you ask the housekeeper if he had some reason to be here at the rectory?” Nikki asked. “Her name is Mrs. Borelli. Have you talked with her?”

“Not yet.”

“You want some extra manpower?” said Heat.

“I know this is your skip and your precinct, Detective, but this one’s ours.” Neihaus gave them his most assuring look. “And don’t worry, this is family. Commissioner’s going to give us any resources we need.”

“You go over the car yet?” said Raley.

“No note, if that’s what you mean. Forensics is on latents, that’ll take a while. His weapon’s down on the front floor mat. Nothing unusual in the vehicle on first go-over. Trunk’s got the standard-issue kit, vest and whatnot. Oh, and two canvas grocery bags of canned dog food. Must have had a pooch.”

“Penny,” said Heat, her voice cracking as she continued, “a dachshund.”

On their walk back to the Roach Coach, Feller and Van Meter hailed them and they stopped. “Sorry about the captain,” said Feller.

“It’s fucked up” was Van Meter’s take.

“You get anything from the On Call driver?” asked Nikki.

Feller shook his head. “Just the details of the discovery. No unusual activity.”

Nikki said, “You know what? No way this is isolated. Whatever’s going on here, I don’t know what it is except that it is bigger than we suspected.”

“I hear that,” said Ochoa.

“Bunch of paramilitary types come after me in the park, trying to kill me . . . ,” she said. “Guys with no history or connection to me, at least not from the one I put down. Now, a couple of hours later, Montrose is dead. . . .”

“In front of Graf’s rectory? I’m sure not buying coincidences,” agreed Raley. “Something’s up.”

Detective Feller said, “Look, I know how you felt about him, it’s a big loss, I’m sorry for you. All of you. He was a good man. But . . .”

“But what?” she said.

“Come on, let’s be objective. With all respect, you’re too close,” said Van Meter. “Your skipper was under huge pressure. 1PP had his nuts in a vise, his wife dies . . .”

Feller picked up his partner’s point. “It’s no secret how unhappy the man was. Nikki, you know this is going to come down as a suicide.”

“Because it is,” from Van Meter. “You’re going all Area 51. He ate his piece.”

The urge to scream at them overwhelmed Nikki, but instead she sought her cop’s detachment, and when she had reclaimed it, she let herself examine what they were saying. Was it possible with all those pressures—plus all the strange behaviors she had witnessed—that the Cap had taken his own life? Her boss, who had snooped the rectory and had so obviously worked to cut off her investigation, was slumped in his car with a bullet in his head. And people were sure it was suicide?

Was it suicide?

Or was he involved in something? Could the captain have crossed over and gotten into something dirty? No, Nikki dismissed those thoughts. She couldn’t imagine the Charles Montrose she knew doing anything like that.

Detective Heat shivered. She didn’t know what was going on, but she knew one thing. Standing there on the snow, deep in the coldest winter in a century, she saw herself on the tip of an iceberg. And all around her in the water were sharks.

The purple bunting was already hung above the main entrance to the precinct when they got back. Of course, business in the house was still being conducted, but the air was somber. On the trip through the lobby to Homicide, Heat noticed that the uniforms wore mourning bands across their shields. Conversations everywhere she passed were hushed and had the odd effect of making the ring of telephones sound louder. Captain Montrose’s office remained empty and dark. There was also a seal on his door.

Detective Rhymer gave her an interval to settle at her desk before he came over. After they shared brief condolences, he handed her a file. “Just came in. An ID of your dude from the park.”

Detective Heat flipped open the cover and a mug shot of the rifleman she had stabbed at Belvedere Castle stared back at her. Sergio Torres,
DOB
February 26, 1979, was a shoplifter turned car radio thief who did enough jail time to hook up with Latin gangs on the inside. That relationship earned him a few new stretches stacking time for carjacking and assaults. She closed the file on her lap and stared into the near distance.

“I’m sorry,” said Rhymer. “I should have waited.”

“No, no, it’s not that,” said Heat. “It’s just . . . This is not sitting right. I mean, Torres had no military background. I saw this guy in action. He had skills. How does a gang banger get trained like that?” Her phone rang.

It was Rook trying her again. It must have been his tenth call. And for the tenth time, Nikki didn’t pick it up, because if she did, she’d have to talk about it. And once she did that, it became real. And once it became real, it was all over. And Heat couldn’t afford for it to be all over right now.

Not in front of everyone else. Not while she was going for lieutenant.

“Hey?” said Ochoa. “Timing sucks, but before all this went down I set a meet with
Justicia a Garda
and they’re here. Want me to try to push it to tomorrow?”

Heat gave it serious thought. No, she had to power forward. Keep paddling or risk sinking. “No, don’t cancel. I’ll be right there. . . . And Miguel? Thanks for stepping in like that, ID-ing the captain.”

“Before you thank me you should know something,” he said. “The God’s truth? I couldn’t look.”

“Thank you for coming,” said Nikki as she entered the waiting room. She was met by silence. A man and woman, both about thirty, sat across the table from Detective Ochoa, arms folded, without so much as a glance her way. Heat couldn’t help but notice that they also still wore their coats, another nonverbal cue.

As soon as Nikki sat, the woman, Milena Silva, spoke. “Mr. Guzman and I are here as hostile participants. Also, I am not only one of the directors of
Justicia a Guarda
, I have a law degree, so you have fair warning before you begin.”

“Well, first of all,” began Heat, “this is just an informal meeting . . .”

“In a police station,” said Pascual Guzman. He looked around the room, clawing fingertips through his Che beard. “Are you recording this?”

“No,” she said. It bugged her that they were trying to run her meeting, so she pressed on. “We invited you here to help give some background on Father Graf, to help us find his killer or killers.”

“Why would we know anything about his killers?” said Guzman. His co-leader put her hand on the sleeve of his olive-drab coat, and it seemed to calm him.

Milena Silva said, “Father Graf was a supporter of our human rights work for many years. He marched with us, he organized with us, he even traveled to Colombia to see firsthand the abuses of our people at the hands of the oppressive regime your government supports there. His death is a loss to us, so if you are thinking we are involved in his killing, you are mistaken.”

“Maybe you should look at your
CIA
.” Guzman punctuated his shot with a pointed nod and sat back in his chair.

Heat knew better than to level the playing field by engaging in polemics with them. She was more interested in Father Graf’s last hours and, especially, if there was any bad blood in the movement, so Nikki kept to her own agenda. “Father Graf was last seen alive at your committee offices the other morning. Why was he there?”

“We don’t have to share the confidential strategies of our group with the police,” said the woman with the law degree. “It’s a First Amendment right.”

“So he was there for a strategy session,” said Nikki. “Did he seem upset, agitated, acting out of the ordinary?”

The woman fielded that one, too. “He was drunk. We already told your
cobista
here.” Ochoa’s face revealed nothing at the insult and he remained quiet.

“What kind of drunk? Falling down? Disoriented? Happy? Nasty?”

Guzman loosened the knit scarf around his neck and said, “He became belligerent and we asked him to leave. That’s all there is to know.”

Prior experience told Nikki that when someone declared that that was all there was to know, the opposite was true. So she drilled down. “How did he show his belligerence, did he argue?”

Pascual Guzman said, “Yes, but—”

“What about?”

“Again,” said Milena Silva, “that is confidential under our rights.”

“Did it get physical? Did you fight him, have to restrain him?” When the two didn’t answer but looked to each other, Heat said, “I am going to find out, so why not just tell me?”

“We had an issue—” began Guzman.

Silva chimed in, “A private, internal issue.”

“—And he was irrational. Drunk.” He looked to his companion and she nodded to go on. “We were . . . passionate in our disagreement. Shouting became shoving, shoving became punching, so we made him leave.”

“How?” She waited. “How?”

“I . . . threw him out the door.”

Nikki said, “So it was you who fought with him, Mr. Guzman?”

“You don’t have to answer that,” said Milena Silva.

“Where did he go?” Heat asked. “Did he have a ride, get a cab?”

Guzman shrugged. “He went away is all I know.”

“This was about . . . ,” Heat looked at her notes, “ten-thirty &A.M.& Early to be drunk. Was that common for him?” This time they both shrugged.

“Your organization is well armed back in Colombia,” said Heat.

“We have the spirit to fight. We are not afraid to die, if necessary.” It was the most animated she had seen Pascual Guzman.

“I understand some of your members even attacked a prison and helped Faustino Velez Arango escape.” The pair exchanged glances again. “Yes, I know Faustino Velez Arango.”

“Dilettantes and Hollywood stars pretend to know our famous dissident writer, but who has read his books?”

Nikki said, “I read
El Corazón de la Violencia
in college.” Ochoa regarded her with an arched brow. She continued, “How much of that . . . fighting spirit . . . did you bring here?”

“We are peaceful activists,” said the woman. “What use would people like us have for guns and rifles here in the United States?”

Heat wondered the same thing, only not rhetorically. She placed the mug shot of Sergio Torres on the table between them. “Do you know this man?”

“Why?” asked the lawyer.

“Because he’s a person I’m interested in knowing more about.”

“I see. And because he’s Latino and a criminal, you ask us?” Guzman stood and tossed the photo. It fluttered halfway across the coffee table and landed facedown. “This is racist. This is the marginalization we rise up to fight against every day.”

Milena Silva stood, too. “Unless you have a warrant to arrest us, we are leaving.”

Nikki was done with her questions and held the door for them. When they were gone, Ochoa said, “You read
El Corazón de la Violencia
?”

She nodded. “Lot of good it just did me.”

The remainder of the afternoon she spent using her focus on work to fend off the malaise that had settled like a toxic fog in the halls of the Twentieth Precinct. In any other field, after the startling death of a leader, business would have closed for the day. But this was the New York Police Department. You didn’t clock out for sadness.

For better or worse, Nikki Heat knew how to compartmentalize. She had to. If she didn’t put an airtight lock on her emotional doors, the beasts pounding on the steel plates to get out would eat her alive. The shock and sadness, they were to be expected. But the raging howls she worked hardest to silence came from guilt. Her last days with her mentor had been contentious and full of suspicions; some voiced, some merely contemplated—her own dirty secrets. Nikki hadn’t known where it was all leading, but she had clung to a tacit belief that there would be a resolution that would make the two of them whole again. She never imagined this tragedy cutting short the story Nikki thought she was telling. John Lennon said life was what happened while you made other plans.