He turned to her. “You shut up.” Gerald Buckley then looked at Nikki and spoke gently, resigned. “I’ll tell you who hired me to steal that art.”
Nikki turned to Rook. “You’ll excuse us, won’t you? I need you to wait outside while Mr. Buckley and I talk.”
Heat Wave
EIGHTEEN
On their drive back from the M.E.’s office, Nikki didn’t need to turn around to know Rook was pissed off in the backseat. She was dying to, though, because seeing his torment would have added to her wicked pleasure.
Ochoa was sitting back there with him and said, “Hey, homes, you carsick or something?”
“No,” said Rook. “Unless I caught a chill when I got sent out in the hall when Buckley was going to talk.”
Heat wanted to turn around so bad.
“Some play. You kicked me out during the last scene.”
Raley braked at the light on Seventh Avenue and said, “Hey, when a subject’s about to open up, the fewer the better. You especially don’t want a reporter there.”
Nikki leaned back on the headrest and scoped the digital temperature on the JumboTron outside Madison Square Garden. Ninety-?nine degrees. “You probably know who Buckley named anyway, right, Rook?”
“Tell me and I’ll let you know.”
That brought a round of chuckles inside the Crown Vic.
Rook snorted. “When did this become a hazing?”
“It’s not a hazing,” she said. “You want to be all with the detectives, right? Do what we do and think like one.”
“Except Raley,” said Ochoa. “He doesn’t think right.”
“I’ll even help you out,” said Heat. “What do we know? We know the paintings were fake. We know they were gone when Buckley’s crew got there. Shall I go on, or do you have it figured?”
The light changed and Raley drove on. “I’m developing a theory,” Rook said.
At last, she hooked her elbow over the seat to face him. “That doesn’t sound exactly like naming a name.”
“All right, fine.” He paused and blurted, “Agda.” Rook waited for a response and just got stares, so he filled the silence. “She had full access to that apartment that day. And I’ve been thinking about her interview. I don’t buy the na?ve nanny pose and the innocent shoulder rubs. That girl was doing Matthew Starr. And I think he dumped her like he did all his mistresses, only she got pissed enough to want some payback.”
Heat said, “So Agda had him killed?”
“Yes. And stole the paintings.”
“Interesting.” She thought a moment. “And I guess you also figured out why Agda killed the art appraiser. And how she got the paintings out.”
Rook’s eyes lost contact with hers and fell to his shoes. “I haven’t plugged every hole, this is still a theory.”
She looked around to poll her colleagues. “It’s a process. We get it.”
“But am I right?”
“I don’t know, are you?” Then she turned all the way around so he wouldn’t see her smile.
Rook and Detectives Raley and Ochoa had to hustle to keep stride with Heat when they got back to the precinct. As soon as she entered the bull pen, Nikki beelined for her desk and pulled open the file drawer.
“All right, now I’ve got it,” said Rook as he arrived in her wake. “When did Agda start working for the Starr family?”
“Two years ago.” Heat didn’t bother to face him. She was occupied sorting through pictures in a file.
“And when did Casper say that painting was fenced? That’s right, two years ago.” Rook waited, but she just kept shuffling her deck of pictures. “And Agda got the paintings out of the Guilford because she doesn’t work alone. I think our Swede could be part of some art theft ring. An international art theft and forgery ring.”
“Uh-?huh…”
“She’s young, she’s pretty, she gets into the homes of wealthy people and has access to their artwork. She’s their inside man. Woman. Nanny.”
“And why would an international forgery ring be dumb enough to steal a bunch of fakes?”