TWO

Nikki Heat’s footsteps echoed back at her off the concrete tunnel as she ran. The passage was wide and high, big enough to truck in exhibits for both museums in the complex: the American Museum of Natural History and the Rose Center for Earth and Space, aka the planetarium. The orange cast of sodium-vapor lamps gave good visibility, but she couldn’t see ahead around the curve of the wall. She also didn’t pick up any other footfalls, and coming around the bend, she saw why not.

The tunnel came to a dead end at a loading dock and nobody was there. She bounded up the steps to the landing, from which a pair of doors fed off—one to the natural history museum on the right, the other to the planetarium on her left. She made a Zen choice and hit the push bar to the natural history door. It was locked. To hell with instinct; she went for the process of elimination. The door to the planetarium service bay popped open. She drew her gun and went in.

Heat entered in the Weaver stance, keeping her back to a line of crates. Her academy trainer had drilled her to use the more square and sturdy Isosceles, but in tight quarters with lots of pivoting, she made her own call and assumed the pose that let her flow and present less target area. She cleared the room quickly, startled only once by an Apollo space suit dangling from an old display. In the far corner she found an internal staircase. As she approached, somebody upstairs threw a door open against a wall. Before it slammed shut, Heat was climbing steps two at a time.

She emerged into a sea of visitors roaming the lower level of the planetarium. A camp counselor passed by leading a herd of kids in matching T-shirts. The detective holstered-up before young eyes could freak out at her gun. Heat waded through them, squinting in the blinding whiteness of the Hall of the Universe, speed-scanning for Rook or Kimberly Starr’s attacker. Over by a rhino-sized meteorite she spotted a security guard on his two-way, pointing at something: Rook, vaulting a banister and clambering up a ramp that curved around the hall and spiraled to the floor above. Halfway up the incline, her suspect’s head popped over the railing to back-check on Rook. Then he raced on with the reporter in pursuit.

The sign said they were on the Cosmic Pathway, a 360-degree spiral walkway marking the timeline of the evolution of the universe in the length of a football field. Nikki Heat covered thirteen billion years at a personal best. At the top of the incline, quads protesting, she stopped to make another scan. No sign of either of them. Then she heard the screams of the crowd.

Heat rested a hand on her holster and orbited under the giant central sphere to see the guest lineup for the space show. The alarmed crowd was parting, backing away from Rook, who was on the ground taking a rib kick from her man.

The attacker drew back for another kick, and during the most vulnerable part of his balance shift, Heat came up behind him and used her leg to sweep his out from under him. All six feet of him dropped hard onto the marble. She cuffed him rodeo quick and the crowd broke into applause.

Rook sat himself up. “I’m fine, thanks for asking.”

“Nice work slowing him down like that. Is that how you rolled in Chechnya?”

“The guy jumped me after I tripped.” He pointed under his foot to a bag from the museum store. “On that.” Rook opened it up and pulled out an art glass paperweight of a planet. “Check it out. I tripped on Uranus.”

When Heat and Rook entered the Interrogation Room, the prisoner snapped upright at the table the way fourth-graders do when the principal walks in. Rook took the side chair. Nikki Heat tossed a file on the table but stayed on her feet. “Stand up,” she said. And Barry Gable did. The detective walked a circle around him, enjoying his nervousness. She bent low to examine his blue jeans for any rips that could match the fabric shard the killer had left on the railing. “What did you do here?”

Gable arched himself to look at the scuff she was pointing to on the back of his leg. “I dunno. Maybe I scraped them on the Dumpster. These are brand-new,” he added, as if that might put him in a more favorable light.

“We’re going to want your pants.” The guy started to unhitch them right there, and she said, “Not now. After. Sit down.” He complied, and she eased into the seat opposite, all casual, all in charge. “You want to tell us why you attacked Kimberly Starr?”

“Ask her,” he said, trying to sound tough but shooting nervous looks at himself in the mirror, a giveaway to her he had never sat in Interrogation before.

“I’m asking you, Barry,” said Heat.

“It’s personal.”

“It is to me. Battery like that against a woman? I can get very personal about that. You want to see how personal?”

Rook chimed in, “Plus you assaulted me.”

“Hey, you were chasing me. How did I know what you were going to pull? I can tell a mile away you’re not a cop.”

Heat kind of liked that. She arched an eyebrow at Rook and he sat back to stew. She turned back to Gable. “Not your first assault, I see, is it, Barry?” She made a show of opening the file. There weren’t many pages in it, but her theater made him more uneasy, so she made the most of it. “Two thousand six scrape with a bouncer in SoHo; 2008, you pushed a guy who caught you keying the side of his Mercedes.”

“Those were all misdemeanors.”

“Those were all assaults.”

“I lose it sometimes.” He forced a John Candy chuckle. “Guess I should stay out of the bars.”

“And maybe spend more time at the gym,” said Rook.

Heat gave him a cool-it glance. Barry had turned to the mirror again and adjusted his shirt around his gut. Heat closed the file and said, “Can you tell us your whereabouts this afternoon, say around one to two P.M.?”

“I want my lawyer.”

“Sure. Would you like to wait for him here or down in the Zoo Lockup?” It was an empty threat that only worked on newbies, and Gable’s eyes widened. Underneath the hard-ass face she fixed on him, Heat was loving how easily he caved. Gotta love the Zoo Lockup. Works every time.

“I was at the Beacon, you know, the Beacon Hotel on Broadway?”

“You do know we will check your alibi. Is there anyone who saw you and can vouch for you?”

“I was alone in my room. Maybe somebody at the front desk in the morning.”

“That hedge fund you operate pays for a mighty nice address on East 52nd. Why book a hotel?”

“Come on, are you going to make me say this?” He stared at his own pleading eyes in the mirror then nodded to himself. “I go there a couple times a week. To meet somebody. You know.”

“For sex?” asked Rook.

“Jeez, yeah, sex is part of it. It goes deeper than that.”

“And what happened today?” asked Heat.

“She didn’t show.”

“Bad for you, Barry. She could be your alibi. Does she have a name?”

“Yeah. Kimberly Starr.”

When Heat and Rook left Interrogation, Detective Ochoa was waiting in the observation booth, staring through the magic mirror at Gable. “Can’t believe you wrapped this interview and didn’t ask the most important question.” When he had their attention, he continued, “How did that swamp doofus get a babe like Kimberly Starr into the sack?”

“You are so superficial,” said Heat. “It’s not about looks. It’s about money.”

“Weird Al,” said Raley when the three of them entered the squad room. “ ‘It’s Raining Men’? My guess is Al Yankovic.”

“Nope,” said Rook. “The song was written by…Ah, I could tell you, but where’s the sport in that? Keep trying. But no fair Googling.”

Nikki Heat sat at her desk and swiveled to face the bullpen. “Can I break up tonight’s episode of Jeopardy! for a little police work? Ochoa, what do we know about Kimberly Starr’s alibi?”