As the hostess ushered them through the lively late dinner-and-bar crowd, Nikki said, “This is so you. You want me just to race out and arrest him without evidence.” When they reached their table, she took the banquette side against the distressed brick wall, not for the cushion but following her cop’s habit of always maintaining a full view of her surroundings. They accepted their menus, then Nikki waited for the hostess to leave before she continued. “I can’t go around busting people for murder just because Wilton Backhouse pointed a finger and Swift reminds you of Largo from Thunderball.”
“See, this is why I’m crazy about you. Excellent recall of Bond villainy.”
“I can’t help it. It’s catching.” She rested a hand on the center of the table, palm up, and as he gently lowered one of his to complete the sandwich, Nikki felt his warmth flow into her. “Are you trying to distract me from my point?” He shrugged impishly. “Well, I can hold hands and still advocate.”
“And a man’s dream comes true.”
“Unfounded allegations and dick measurement by motor yacht are not sufficient cause to break out my cuffs. That’s a luxury you have as a writer that I don’t. I need evidence.” Heat studied him. “Unless you know something and are still holding back.”
“I think we’re past that, aren’t we?”
“Are we?”
“Look, Nik, I’m sorry I kept a secret from you. But not so sorry. It sure wasn’t to hurt you, and certainly not to impede your investigation. But, c’mon, everybody has secrets, right? In fact, what do the two of us do for a living? We dig out the truth behind people’s secrets. We uncover the stuff they’re hiding for one reason or another.”
“Well, let me make something clear. I don’t want to have to dig out yours.”
“Oh, you made that very clear. I believe you invoked a threat of jail with a denial of my constitutional right to due process.”
Nikki held up her menu to study it and smiled. “I have my moments.”
They both ordered margaritas, which Rook, as he always did, declared to be the best south of ’Cesca and east of the Zuni Café. The Jean-Georges kitchen turned out chic Latin American and, even though they had both said they would mix things up, they went for their standbys. He ordered the glazed short-rib tacos with habanero relish, and she went for the charred octopus with guajillo vinaigrette.
“Do they even have mug books anymore?” Rook asked as they traded bites.
“They’d better, because Detective Rhymer is going to be spending all night flipping through something.” She explained to Rook that, as high-tech as the NYPD was, they had had enough foresight—or, maybe, stubbornness—to have paper backups of everything. “That’s the good news. The bad is retrieval. We’ve all gotten used to our instant info at the swipe of a finger. Some foreign hacker with a grudge decides to teach New York City a lesson, and suddenly we’re back to paper-based everything.”
“Which only makes me yearn all the more for my Montblanc.”
“Rook, nothing’s keeping you from your computer to write.”
“True, but when all technology fails us, and someday it will, I shall have my pens. My mother bought that Hemingway for me when I was in school to encourage my writing.”
“And how’d that work out, you of two Pulitzers?”
“Do you know, back then Mother paid six hundred dollars? On eBay now bids on the Limited Edition Hemingway top out at thirty-five hundred. Although I’d never sell.”
Nikki leaned in close to his face. “I’ll go thirty-six and a sexual favor of your choosing.”
“Sold.”
They laughed and she picked up her margarita glass. “One more of these first.”
He cackled. “Joke’s on you. That pen’s going to be community property soon enough.” But the smile had fallen from her face and, in the pool of light from the votive candle between them, her complexion had blanched to the color of a white-marble tombstone. “Maloney,” was all Heat said before she dashed for the front door.