Much of the book was material the public had all known about Wakefield, but with insider detail that only Cassidy could have sourced. She didn’t spare the actor any blemishes. One of the more damning, albeit minor, stories was attributed to a former costar of three of his films. The ex-costar and now ex-friend said that, after Reed became convinced he had lobbied the director of Sand Maidens, a sword-and-sandals CGI epic, to re-edit their battle scene for more close-ups of him than Reed, Wakefield not only wrote him off as a friend but took revenge. Photos captured on a cell phone arrived at the costar’s wife’s office. They were candids of the costar with his hand up the skirt of one of the hot extras at the wrap party. The message written on the back of one of the photos said, “Don’t worry. It ain’t love, it’s location.”
Both Heat and Rook had made a note to discuss that with each other, and both agreed that, even though the touchy-feely costar ended up divorced, it provided no motive for killing Cassidy Towne, since he had been the one to tell her the story.
The bulk was an anecdotal chronicle of a talented, sensitive actor’s hard partying, boozing, snorting, popping, and shooting lifestyle. The conclusion Heat and Rook independently drew from reading the book was that if the final, missing chapter fulfilled the hype, the book would be a blockbuster, but from the material they had read, nothing in these pages seemed explosive enough to warrant the murder of the author to cover it up.
But then again, in the second to last chapter, where the manuscript left off, Reed Wakefield was still alive.
Detective Raley, who often cursed his designation as the squad’s go-to screener of surveillance video, sealed his fate that morning. While she and Rook followed Ochoa, who had summoned them to Raley’s desk, Nikki Heat could see from Raley’s expression across the bull pen that he had a righteous freeze on his screen. “What do you have, Rales?” she said as they formed a semicircle around his desk.
“My last video to screen and I hit it, Detective. Parking garage only gave me legs and feet on the perp. Assailant seemed to run east after the attack, and so I worked that block and the one after. Small electronics retailer on the corner of Ninety-sixth and Broadway had this from a sidewalk pass-by, time coded six minutes after the mugging. Matches the description plus our subject is carrying a thick stack of papers, like the manuscript.”
“Are you going to let me take a look?” asked Heat.
“By all means.” Raley got up from his chair, knocking over one of the three coffee empties on his desk. Nikki came around to look at the freeze frame on his monitor. Rook joined her.
The freeze caught the mugger on a full-face turn to the camera, probably reacting to showing up live on the LED TV screen in the electronics shop window. In spite of the dark hoodie and the aviator sunglasses, there was no mistaking who it was. And further, even in grainy, surveillance-grade black-and-white, the mugger was caught red-handed carrying a stolen half ream of double-spaced manuscript.
“That’s bringing it home, Raley.” The detective didn’t say anything, just beamed through some bleary eyes. “I’ll give you the pleasure of cutting the warrant. Ochoa?”
“Ready the Roach Coach?”
“Now would be good,” she said. And then when the two left on their assignments, she turned to Rook, unable to suppress a smile. “Ready for my close-up, Mr. DeMille.”
Chapter Fifteen
Detective Heat knew Soleil Gray had a music video shoot that day because her lawyer had mentioned it the afternoon before when she accused Heat of harassing her client at her places of business. Well, she thought, add one to the list. Nikki looked up the number in her interview notes for Allie over at Rad Dog Records and found out where the video was being shot. The record company assistant said it wasn’t on a soundstage but on location and gave Heat all the particulars, including where to park.