Getting a warrant would take some doing; she knew that. The DA sign-off presented enough of a hurdle. A high-profile arrest like a commissioner on the Port Authority, especially one like Keith Gilbert, who was so prominent and well connected, would require approval at the highest level downtown. But Heat trusted the courageous impartiality of the district attorney and felt confident in asking. The problem was on a much lower rung.
Her precinct commander’s face went florid when she asked his permission to call the prosecutor for the arrest order. The overworked springs of Big Wally’s executive chair groaned as the skipper tilted backward, jaw slack, eyes big as cue balls as he mentally played out the risks-versus-rewards of this action. To nudge him along, Heat led him from his office to the Murder Board to recap the main points, persuasively and, most importantly—ploddingly—laying out her case against Keith Gilbert as if to a first grader. He listened without interruption, bobble-heading in a way that made Nikki feel she had at last fracked through the thick insulation of fat encasing his brain.
But she had underestimated the power of organizational survivor instinct.
“Answer me this,” said the captain. “Your cause of death on the flying Haitian was smacking into the planetarium, right? And now you want an arrest warrant for Gilbert because some Russkie sawbones with a sewing kit and no license claims the commissioner blasted the guy? The gun didn’t kill him, gravity did.”
Once again, her precinct commander fabulously displayed his lack of street experience. Nikki knew how cases get solved. You pick up a piece of the puzzle here, an odd sock there, a coincidence that doesn’t make sense.…You stick with it, and soon, as you get more pieces, you get a whole picture, and the truth is revealed. It never dropped cleanly into your lap the way Wally fantasized.
She made another run. “Captain, come on, he shot the man. And I believe the gunshot was a first attempt. When that failed, Gilbert found some other way. Or had somebody do it.” Irons kept shaking his head. “I want a warrant for his arrest and search warrant for that gun.”
“No sale,” he said when she had finished. “Not with my neck on that cold marble.” Behind his back, the squad pelted the skipper with a barrage of disparaging looks. Heat put her own scorn aside and focused on rescuing the warrant.
“Maybe I can go back over some of these points, if I didn’t make it all clear, sir.”
“Oh, I get your points, just fine. But from where I sit? This is one jumbo button to push. And no way I’m pushing it without the one thing you’re missing.” He made a sweeping gesture to the Murder Board, which had a dismissive feel. “I see no hard link connecting this Beauvais character to Commissioner Gilbert. What I do see is a lot of circumstantials and conjecture.”
“Captain Irons, this is solid. I have arrested and gotten righteous convictions on less.”
“Not this time.” He knuckle rapped the board, smearing some of her notations. “Show me a link from the dead guy to Gilbert. Then we’ll green light your warrant.”
The first thing Heat did when Irons closed his office door was to tell her detectives to stow their harsh remarks and keep their eyes on the ball. “Have your pity party later over brews at Plug Uglies. Right now we need to find a work-around for this roadblock.”
“We need a Wally Work-around,” said Feller.
Heat quelled the laughs with, “I said later, Randall.” Thinking and thinking, she tapped her pen on her lips then said, “OK. We dig deeper into what we’ve got. Detective Rhymer. Run Alicia Delamater through your contacts at Customs to see if she used her passport yesterday or today. Her lawyer says she left the country, and I want to talk to her.”
“On it.”