Heat nodded grimly. “It may help me find her killer,” she said, hoping that would end up being the only significance of the secret account.
He gave it a moment of thought then wordlessly disappeared again to the back hall, this time to the second bedroom. Rook gave Nikki an affirming smile that did little to make her feel any better. When her dad returned moments later, he carried a brown cardboard accordion file with an elastic strap around it. He didn’t come to Nikki with it, though. He stood by the front door and waited. The two of them joined him there and he gave her the file.
“Thanks,” she said.
“Tell me something, Nikki,” he said in a low, hollow voice. “What makes you any different than that other cop who came here to disrespect me?” He swept an arm toward the phone with its blinking message light. “Or those reporters?”
Her eyes began to sting. She spoke the truth, and meant it. “The difference is that I’m trying to help.”
It offered him no comfort. Her father said, “I think it might be a good idea for you to give me some space for a while.” Then her dad retreated to the back hall so they could let themselves out.
Their usual ride would have been in Heat’s motor pool Crown Victoria, but since she was stuck on leave, they had taken a car Rook had rented. That’s how he ended up as the lucky duck to endure the stop-and-go braking of the Sunday caravan back to Manhattan by weekend day trippers. He had prepared himself for a silent, moody ride but Heat had immersed herself in full work mode. Rook considered the emotional slap Nikki had just gotten from her father and, reflecting on her emotional wall, was glad for her sake that she had the capacity to seal herself on the good side of it, if only temporarily.
From the passenger side, Heat made a quick pass of the bank file, eyeballing the sparse amount of paperwork and monthly statements in it. “These are incomplete,” she said. “My mom only carried a balance of a few hundred dollars, with just enough activity to keep the account active, but the statements abruptly come to an end without any sign of the account being closed.”
“When’s the last statement you see?”
“October 1999. The month before she was killed.” She got out her phone and did some scrolling until she came to Carter Damon. As she listened to his phone ring, she wondered if the former lead detective on her mom’s case would be too pissed to talk to her after their last encounter. “Detective Damon,” she began her voice mail, using his former rank as an olive branch, “Nikki Heat. Hope I’m not disturbing you on the weekend, but I wanted to ask you a question about the old case and challenge your memory about a bank account.” She left her cell number and hung up.
For guilty pleasure and to cement their return to the good old USA, they turned in the car then went to a local favorite of Rook’s called Mudville9 for an early dinner of barbecue wings and Prohibition Ale. They chose a table near the TV showing the local news, so they could catch up on the progress of the earthquake cleanup, which, the scrolling text under the official in the hard hat said, was 95 percent complete, with a price tag in the millions. Rook dipped a fry in his extra Buffalo Wow sauce and started to ask Nikki how he’d look in a hard hat. “Not for safety, mind you, but as a fashion choice.” But she had become so suddenly riveted to the screen that he turned back around to see what had caught her attention.
A blazing headline graphic filled the top of the wide screen: BREAKING NEWS: POLICE ARREST KILLER IN FROZEN MURDER CASE.
THIRTEEN