Nikki kept her voice low, showed her badge, and smiled. “Official police business.”
But the singer, alert to everything happening on her set—or perhaps on the alert for something like this—lowered the towel from her face and stared at Nikki with wide eyes. Her makeup artist stepped in to repair the damage from the towel, but Soleil waved her off, keeping her attention on the visitors as she slid out of her chair.
Heat cleared the security man and, on her way to her, said, “Soleil Gray, NYPD. I have a warrant for your—”
And then Soleil turned and ran. Slightly behind her, to the port side of the ship, sat a small changing tent for the extras and, beyond it, a passage leading to a flight of metal stairs. Halfway there, Raley and Ochoa came around from behind the changing tent, followed by three uniformed officers. Soleil turned to make a break the opposite way, toward the hatch where Heat and Rook had come on deck, but another pair of officers was posted at that door. Rook ran into her path and she turned sharply again. Distracted by his move, she didn’t notice that Nikki was a half step away. Heat made a lunge for her, but Soleil heard her footfall and spun clear. Heat’s momentum carried her into a wardrobe rack, and in the instant it took her to regain her balance, her suspect was bolting across the almost football field–wide deck to the starboard side of the aircraft carrier. Soleil’s shooting company—grips, electricians, dancers, the director—all looked on in a stunned zone of inertia and disbelief.
Her training kicked in and Heat drew her gun. A gasp rose from the crew, sharp enough and full of sufficient horror to let Soleil guess what had just happened behind her back. She slowed to a stop at the edge of the flight deck and turned to see Heat approaching, gun up, aimed at her. And then, without hesitation, Soleil Gray turned, and leaped over the edge.
Amid a clamor behind her from the frozen onlookers, Nikki rushed toward the side where the woman had gone over, trying to recall what lay six stories directly below her jump. Parking lot? Pier? The Hudson? And in those quick seconds, she also wondered, could someone survive a fall from that height even into water?
But when she got to the edge and peered over the side, Nikki saw something completely unexpected: Soleil Gray tucking and rolling her way out of a safety net suspended from the deck below. “Soleil, stop!” she called, and took aim again. But it was all for show. Heat certainly wasn’t going to open fire on her under these circumstances, and the singer bet on that. Nikki reholstered about the same time she saw two men, stunt coordinators she would learn later, reaching for her suspect and pulling her out of sight onto the deck below, oblivious to what had just taken place above and unwittingly helping her escape.
Heat calculated options, thought of all the places to hide on a ship built to carry over 2,500 sailors, including all the mazes belowdecks. Then she thought of how slow the elevator or the stairs would be. “Roach,” she said, “call down and have them seal the exit.”
And then Detective Heat holstered her Sig and jumped over the side.
The pair of stunt coordinators helped her out of the net but then tried to subdue her. “What are you doing? I’m a cop.”
One of them said, “She told us you were a crazed fan trying to kill her.”
“Which way did she go?”