“This isn’t just because you scored a ninety-eight. I’ve had my eye on you since your magazine article. We are two women with a lot in common.” She read Nikki’s expression and said, “I know, I know, you’re a cop, and I’m a civilian—and an administrator, at that—but where I really connected with you in that article was when I read we are both victims of family murders.” Heat noticed she used the present tense, a sign of one who knows the pain that never heals.
Looking at Phyllis Yarborough, Nikki found herself peering into a mirror image that bore the imprint of a distant agony. The kindred spirits out there never fail to recognize the sear of fate in each other and in it an invisible brand marking the nexus of their upended lives. For Nikki, it had been her mother, stabbed to death a decade before. Yarborough’s loss was her only daughter back in 2002; roofied, raped, beaten, and dumped on a beach in Bermuda, where she had been on college Spring Break. Everyone knew the story. It was inescapable in the mainstream news and then milked beyond its shelf life by the tabloids long after the coed’s killer confessed and went to prison for life.
Nikki broke the brief silence with an affirming smile. “Yet we go on.”
The deputy commissioner’s face brightened. “Yes, we do.” And then she looked deeply into Nikki, as if taking her measure. “It drives you, doesn’t it? Thinking about the killer?”
Heat said, “I wonder about him, if that’s what you mean. Who? Why?”
“Do you want revenge?”
“I did.” Nikki had given it lots of thought over the years, and said, “Now it’s not so much revenge as justice. Or maybe closure. What about you?”
“Academic. My accounts are settled. But let me tell you what I’ve learned. Hopefully, it helps you.” She leaned closer to Nikki and said, “There is justice. But there is no such thing as closure.” Then she made an exaggerated show of looking at her watch. “Well now. I’m ten seconds away from not being a woman of my word.” She rose, and as Nikki stood, they shook hands again. “Kick some butt out there today, Nikki Heat.”
“I will. And a pleasure meeting you, Deputy Commissioner.”
“Phyllis. And let’s make sure this is just our first meeting.”
Heat left One Police Plaza with the second business card she had been given in a half hour. It felt like the one she would actually keep handy.
* * *
A firefighter came out of the Engine 205 station house on Middaugh Street in Brooklyn Heights and trotted, hunched against the frozen rain, to his pickup truck at the curb. Detective Raley said, “Whoa, whoa, hold up, here. Guy looks like he’s pulling out.”
Detective Ochoa gave the Roach Coach some brakes and turned the rearview mirror so he could see Nikki in the backseat. “See what I put up with on a daily basis? ‘Turn here, stop there, look out for the homeless guy . . .’ It’s like I’ve got the Felix Unger dude from Two and a Half Men as my talking GPS.”
“Go before somebody takes it,” said Raley as the pickup left.
After Ochoa parked, the three detectives sat in the Crown Vic with the blades on intermittent so they could observe the apartment house where the male stripper had just moved. It was a 1920s eight-story brick building surrounded by scaffolding for its renovation. No workmen were in sight, which Raley said could have been due to the extreme wintry weather.
“Figures a male stripper would move in across from a firehouse,” said Ochoa. “In case he needs a pole to practice on.”
“What’s his name again?” asked Heat.
Raley consulted his sheet. “Horst Meuller. He’s from Hamburg, Germany. My witness at the strip club says when Meuller started, he danced in a World War I getup as The Red Barin’. Now he does a Eurotrash strip in silver lamé as Hans Alloffur.” He half-turned to Nikki. “All these guys have theme acts, you see.”
“Tell her the name of that one stripper last night.” Ochoa chuckled. “You’re gonna love this.”
“Marty Python,” said Raley.
Nikki shook her head. “I won’t even ask.”
The super let them in so they didn’t have to warn Meuller by buzzing his intercom. They took position outside his door and Ochoa knocked.
“Who is there?” came the accented voice from inside.
Raley held his shield to the spy hole. “NYPD to speak with Horst Meuller.”