next residence-the Bayside house-but also his abandonment of the property to keep a step ahead of drug enforcement.
“OK,” said Rook, grasping for any good news, “there’s still the suitcase. He possessed the suitcase that connects to Heat’s mom. If he’s not the killer, maybe he knows him.”
Ochoa said, “She’ll get there. You watch. This is her art.”
“Why were you hiding from us in that basement?” Heat asked. No reply. “We identified ourselves as police. Why did you need to hide?”
He released his gaze from the mirror and smiled. “I don’t need to hide. I could get out of here now, if I wanted to.” Scott yanked up both wrists beside him, pulling his manacles taut and then releasing them. “These mean nothing to me.”
Nikki played along on the tightrope walk of trying to pull straight answers from a delusional, likely schizophrenic, man. But right then William Wade Scott was her best hope. If he wasn’t a good suspect, he might be a great witness. Acting unfazed, she moved a mental chess piece, a pawn. “Was it about the cigarettes you stole the other night?”
“This is all bullshit once I am taken up. You must know that.”
“Maybe I’m not as informed as you. ‘Taken up’?”
“To my vessel,” he said. “I received the special communication.”
“Of course. Congratulations, William.” Her affirmation surprised him and made him rivet her with a penetrating squint, listening intently. “Is that why you needed the suitcase? For your trip?”
“No, for the shoes! I found it and thought there’d be more shoes inside.” He leaned forward and winked. “They’ll be so pleased when I bring them shoes.”
She leaned forward, also. “But weren’t there shoes inside the suitcase? Didn’t you see shoes?”
“I… did.” He began to fidget but stayed with her. “But they were
… They were still on her.”
“On whom?”
“Her!” he said, then stooped over to grind his eye sockets with the heels of his palms. “I couldn’t take them off her.” He grew more agitated. “I couldn’t keep her.”
“Did you kill her?”
“No. I found her.”
“Where?”
“In the suitcase, pay attention.”
“Where did you find the suitcase?”
“Behind the nursing home around the corner.” He calmed and confided his big secret with a stage wink. “They throw out lots of shoes there.”
Heat made a hand gesture to the mirror, but inside the Ob Room, Raley and Ochoa were already on their way out the door for a return drive to Bayside and the nursing home.
“So when you saw her in the suitcase, why didn’t you take her back to where you found her?”
“The nursing home? Why? She was dead,” he said as if the logic of that should be obvious. “But I didn’t know what to do with her. A body is, well, it’s a complication to The Plan.” Nikki opted not to press and gave him plenty of line. He fidgeted some more and said, “I dragged her around all night. Then I saw it. A preservation vessel. It was perfect. Plenty cold inside. Even had a ramp.”
“You sure you don’t want to just crash?” asked Rook when he and Nikki got back to his loft. “It’s coming up on two A.M. No harm, no foul if you want a rain check.”
“I’m too wired to sleep. And besides, you promised me one of your Killer Caipirinhas, and I’m holding you to it, writer boy.”
“You’re on. Worth every bit of being held at gunpoint by an international arms dealer just to score his bartender’s recipe.” He opened the fridge to hunt fresh limes. She settled on the bar stool at the counter to watch the magic.
Long as the day had been, Heat’s fatigue couldn’t match her frustration. When Roach called in from the security office of the nursing home in Bayside, they had mixed news. Due to the late hour, they were fortunate to interview the same watchman who had been on duty the night before, when William Wade Scott said he found the suitcase there. Unfortunately, however, the facility had no surveillance cams at the disposal Dumpsters, which meant no pictures of the homeless man finding the suitcase and, worse, no shots of whoever left it there. The security guard did recognize the freeze of Scott rolling the luggage and verified seeing both him and the baggage leaving the property about two hours before Raley’s surveillance picture had been taken. He also said he saw Scott arrive empty-handed, validating his story that the case had been scavenged. Adding more cold water to the embers, he didn’t recognize the Jane Doe. Roach had called in the Evidence Collection Unit to survey the Dumpster area-a long shot that had to be covered-and then clocked out, telling Heat they’d return at sunup to interview staff and residents about the suitcase, Jane Doe, and whatever some nonagenarian insomniac might have seen staring out a window in the long night of the soul.
“What’s going to happen to Willie Shoetaker?” asked Rook as they clinked glasses.
“Real sensitive, Rook.” She sipped her cocktail. “But I forgive you because this Caipirinha is awesome. To answer your question, I Article Nined William Scott for an involuntary psych evaluation. It lets me hold him a few days, plus he’s better off in Bellevue. Not that I expect to get any more from him. I’m afraid he seems to be a gap in the chain, not a link.”
“Hey, you never know.”
“Don’t patronize me. I do know.”
Recognizing the rise of her firewall, Rook busied himself with his drink to fill the strained silence with something other than strain. After a decent interval, he said, “Well, here’s what I know. This may be a dead end, but only on one front.”
“Here we go. Are you back to 1999 again?”
“No. Before that. I want to look into your mom’s life.”
“Forget it, Rook.”
“Carter Damon said your mom was a piano teacher, right?”
“Tutor. Piano tutor.”
“What qualified her for that?”
Nikki scoffed. “Qualified? Pal, do you have any idea how qualified?” But then she was surprised by the answer he gave without taking a beat.
“You mean like an advanced degree from the New England Conservatory of Music while training to become a top concert soloist? That kind of qualified?” As she sat there just gawking at him, he clinked her glass and said, “Hey, you don’t get a pair of Pulitzers by being a slouch in the research department.”
“All right, so you have your special gifts, smarty. Where’s this going?”
“Riddle me this: What is Detective Heat’s First Rule of Investigation?” Before she could reply, he answered it himself. “‘Look for the odd sock.’ The odd sock being the one thing that doesn’t go with, or seems out of place in, all the evidence.”
“And?”
“And what is the odd sock of your mother’s life? Simple. Why have all that passion, talent, and classical training only to give it up to teach rich brats ‘Heart and Soul’?” He waited, same as he’d seen her wait out the homeless man through the glass.
“I… uh…” She lowered her gaze to the counter, having no answer to share.
“Then let’s find out. How? Let’s follow the odd sock.”
“Now?”
“Of course not. Tomorrow. Tomorrow’s Saturday. We’re going to Boston to visit your mom’s music school.”
“Do I have a say in this?”
“Sure. As long as it’s yes.”
They certainly seemed to know Jameson Rook at the front desk of the Lenox Hotel. After a short walk from the Back Bay Amtrak station, the two of them had planned to drop their overnight bags at the bell desk and move on with their day, but a beaming old gent whose nameplate read “Cory” welcomed the famous writer back and
