sickness in Morris Granville had taken the picture and kept it since May. When she asked him why he hadn't come forward with it before or tried to capitalize on it, he said he wanted to protect his idol, Toby Mills. So, she had said, that raised the question, 'Why show it to a cop now?' To that, Granville said, as if it was obvious, 'He had me arrested.' And then the stalker smiled and asked, 'If he goes to trial, will Toby be there when I testify?' Heat reflected on the stalker mentality and those of them who loved their victims so much that when they couldn't get near, they destroyed them. Some killed them. Apparently others got them arrested. It was all about seeking relevance in an unrequited relationship. Choose your poison.
In Toby Mills's version of the events following Club Thermal, the three of them rode around Manhattan with one objective: partying. Reed and Soleil already had a leg up, and Toby, who wasn't due to pitch until a Monday start at home against the Red Sox, was in the mood that Friday night to blow it out after a losing road trip that had just ended in Detroit. He laughed at the MLB random drug tests. Mills and many other players either banked or bought urine to keep the commish out of their downtime. Mills had with him a small gym bag full of recreational narcotics and was a generous host. He told Heat that while they were parked briefly at the South Street Seaport, watching the East River, Reed and Soleil started getting serious about their reunion sex, and since everyone was tired of riding around in the car anyway, they all went back to Reed's room at the Dragonfly House to continue the party there. Toby, who in normal circumstances would have been the third wheel, had the drugs, so he was most welcome. He confessed that a part of him was hot for Soleil, and he even said to Nikki that he had thought, 'What the hell, who knew where the night would lead?'
Where indeed?
He told Nikki that what happened at the Dragonfly was all an accident. Up in Reed's suite they played a game reciting famous movie titles, substituting the word 'penis' for key nouns-Must Love Penis. ET the Extra Penis. GI Joe: The Rise of the Penis-while Toby laid out the portable pharmacy on the coffee table. Heat pressed him for details, and he listed pot, cocaine, and some amyl nitrate poppers. Reed had a stash of heroin that didn't interest Toby and a bunch of Ambien he said he used to help him sleep. He also said it was awesome for sex, and he and Soleil both downed some with vodka straight from a bottle they kept jammed into a room service ice bucket.
While Soleil and Reed went into the bedroom, Toby said he put on some music to drown out their screwing and watched ESPN with the sound off.
When he heard Soleil screaming, he thought it was her orgasm at first, but Mills said she ran out into the living room naked, out of control, shouting, 'He's not breathing, do something, I think he's dead!'
Toby went in the bedroom with her and flipped on the lights, and Reed was all gray-faced and had saliva bubbles in the corner of his mouth. Toby said they both kept yelling his name and shaking him and got no answer. Toby finally felt his wrist and couldn't find any pulse, and they both freaked.
Toby speed-dialed Jess Ripton and got him out of bed. His handler told him to calm down and to keep quiet and stay put in the room. He told him to turn off the loud music and not to touch anything else and just wait there. When Toby asked if they should call an ambulance, Jess said, 'Fuck no,' not to call anybody or even think about leaving the room. He amended that, directing him to call his limo driver and tell him to be out front and ready to go when he was, but not to say why or sound upset when he called. Jess said he would get there as soon as he could and would call when he was coming up. He warned Toby not to open the door for anyone else.
But when Toby finished his call with Jess, he went to tell Soleil what was happening and she was hanging up the house phone in the bathroom. Two minutes later Derek Snow came to the door. Toby said not to let him in, but Soleil didn't listen and said the concierge would help, that they knew each other. As Nikki knew, Soleil had shot him in the leg only months before and had paid him off handsomely. Many relationships were built on less.
Derek wanted to call 911, but Toby was insistent and started to think he'd have to do something about this concierge. But Soleil took Derek aside and promised him a lot of money to be cool. When Derek asked what he could do, Toby told him to chill and just wait for his man to get there.
It turned out Derek was cooperative, and while Soleil finished getting dressed-not an easy feat considering all she had ingested-Snow helped Toby pack the drugs back into his gym bag. Twenty minutes later, Toby's cell phone rang. Jess Ripton was on his way up. When he came into the room, he told them it was all going to be OK.
Jess wasn't prepared to find Derek there, but he took him as a fact to deal with and put him to use, ushering Toby and Soleil out of there using the stairwell. On their way out, Jess told Derek that only he should touch doorknobs and to come back up after he delivered them to the limo.
Toby concluded his confession by saying that when they got outside the Dragonfly, Soleil was still freaked and didn't want to ride with him. The last he saw of her she was running off crying into the night. Then he told the limo driver to take him home to his family in Westchester. On Chambers Street, outside the front door of Stuyvesant High, Heat was about to get into her car when the Roach Coach pulled alongside her and stopped.
'Still no sign of Jess Ripton,' said Ochoa out the passenger window. 'Not at Bouley, not at Nobu, or Craftbar. We checked all his other usual haunts and watering holes Toby gave us. Nada.'
'Think he's helping Jess duck us?' asked Raley.
'Always possible,' said Nikki, 'but I think Toby wants his Firewall about now, not to have him be MIA like this. A good indicator is that I let him try to call Jess, thinking he'd need his handler.'
'Generous of you, Detective Heat,' said Ochoa.
'In a self-serving, clever, tricky way. Thanks. Anyway, all Toby got was Ripton's voice mail. We have someone staking out his apartment, but let's also detail somebody else to roam on this overnight. I'll ask Captain Montrose to pull a detective off Burglary who can keep making the rounds to Ripton's usuals. Parking garage, his gym, his office.'
Raley said, 'But don't you think if Ripton's trying to go off the grid, he's too smart to go to any of those places?'
'Probably. Might be wheel-spinning, but we have to check anyway,' said Heat.
Ochoa nodded. 'Man, I know somebody's got to do it, but it sounds like a pointless exercise for some poor dude.'
Raley laughed. 'Give it to Detective Schlemming.'
Roach scoffed, shook their heads, and muttered his nickname. 'Defective Schlemming.'
'Sounds about his speed,' said Heat.
Ochoa's face grew serious. 'I think we ought to quit picking on Schlemming. I mean, come on, just because a guy rear-ends the mayor's limo trying to shoo a bee out of his car is no reason to- Aw, hell, yes it is.'
'Can I tell you something?' said Raley. 'All those bodies. It's hard for me to buy Toby Mills as the contract killing type. And I'm a Mets fan.'
'Come on, partner, you ought to know one thing by now and that is that you can never know. His Yanks contract, all those endorsements? That's millions of motives for Toby Mills to clamp a lid on that mess.'
'Or Ripton,' countered Raley. 'He has a stake, too. Not just because he was the cleaner at Reed's hotel that night, but Toby's image is his meal ticket also. You agree, Detective?' He leaned over from the steering wheel to look across Ochoa out the side window to Heat. She was busy scrolling on her cell phone. 'Detective Heat?'
'Hang on, just reading this e-mail from Hinesburg. It's a forward from Hard Line Security of the list of the Texan's old freelance clients.' She continued to scan and then stopped.
'Whatcha got?' said Roach.
'One of his clients? Sistah Strife.'
'Should that mean something?' asked Raley.
'It sure does. It means Rance Eugene Wolf and Jess Ripton both worked together for Sistah Strife.'
As Raley and Ochoa departed, Heat called in to elevate the search status for Jess Ripton to an APB with an alert that his known associate was a professional killer. Spent and aching from the ordeal of her day, she got into her Crown Victoria and felt her body begin to melt into the driver's seat from fatigue. Tired as she was, she felt bad for Rook that, in his journalistic diligence, he had to miss the Toby takedown. She tried his cell phone one more time to fill him in. The iPhone sitting on Rook's desk sounded with Nikki Heat's ringtone, the theme from Dragnet. The writer sat and stared at it from his chair as it continued to loop its ominous 'Dum-dah-dum-dum… Dum-dah- dum-dum…' The screen header he had entered for her flashed 'The Heat,' and her ID badge photo filled the screen.
But Rook didn't answer the call. When it finally stopped ringing, a melancholy swept over him as her image faded and the screen went blank. Then he shifted uncomfortably against the duct tape lashing his wrists to the armrests.
