NH: Is that stupid? I mean, we are getting married.
LK: The things we feel are never stupid. They are simply what we feel. What we try to help with here is to find out why you are feeling them. If your feelings are holding you back from life or keeping you upset, then it’s constructive to explore them. Do you want to explore this?
NH: Yes, yes, I do. I just don’t know where to start.
LK: Why don’t we start with these feelings?
NH: Oh, God…
LK: What is this bringing up in you? Can you name it?
NH: I know it’s logical that I should just move into Rook’s loft. Maybe I should just do that.
LK: Nikki, you’re going back to logic, your safe ground. Let’s get you back to your emotions and explore them.
NH: I’m just trying to picture moving day. Looking back inside before I close the door on that empty place where I’ve lived so much of my life.
LK: And where you mother was murdered.
NH: Yes. And where my mom was murdered.
LK: There are many reasons we form attachments to places or things. Is that why that place is so significant? Your loss? And if so, why do you feel you need to hold on to loss?
NH: I feel like I would be…I don’t know. I just feel like I would be…quitting.
LK: Help me understand ‘quitting.’ You found her murderer. You honored her memory. You did your job. She would be proud, don’t you think?
NH: [Nods]
LK: And yet you still feel conflicted.
NH: [No response; long pause]
LK: Sometimes an attachment isn’t what it appears to be.
NH: I feel like I know what it is.
LK: Well, maybe there’s more to this.
NH: Oh, I am completely committed to Rook.
LK: Interesting.
NH: What?
LK: I didn’t mention Rook.
Heat felt the familiar tug on her eardrums as the air seal broke when she pushed open the door of the sound lock that separated the Observation Room and Interrogation One. Completely foreign to her, however, was to see Jameson Rook waiting for her in the interviewee’s seat, elbows on the metal tabletop, anticipating his promised third degree. She dropped a blank notepad and a stick pen at her place and sat down across from him at her customary spot for examining suspects, conspirators, and persons of interest. He kicked things off, but not with any information, only to state the obvious. “This is nutty.”
“You think?”
“Usually, when we’re sitting across a table, there’s far less fluorescent lighting and usually a better class of beverage.” He knuckle-tapped the water bottle before him, making the water inside ripple.
“We are in here because this is not a game, Rook, and I chose a more formal setting to make sure that you know that.”
“Oh, trust me, I know it,” he said. “How could I miss it? Hell, my fiancée had me tailed by an undercover detective. By the way, how cool is that? I’m definitely going to have to work that into the toast at our wedding reception. By the way, speaking of: I talked to my buddy Alton Brown of the Food Network. For the event, he is sending me his secret recipe for Jameson Irish Whiskey Punch. He says it follows the classical paradigm of one of sour, two of sweet, three of strong, four of weak. Which I think also describes the Knicks this season.”
“Rook, will you stop? Just. Fucking. Stop.” While Nikki watched his face grow more sober as he left off his posturing, she chastised herself. On her walk down the hall to I One, her self-talk had been all about not letting this turn emotional; about not buying in. About using this setting as a wake-up call to get him to see what was going on. To give him an opportunity to say, This is real. I need to lay off with the high-and-mighty stance. And here, thirty seconds into the interview, she had risen to the emotional bait and even cursed aloud for the second time that day. Nikki vowed to get it together and to stay up on the moral high ground. If there was any hope of getting Rook to open up and not damage her relationship with him, she had to be the grown-up.