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CHAPTER SIX

He spends Sunday morning at the gym and then heads to the office, even though there’s very little for him to do. They’re waiting on the ballistics, waiting on the phone records, waiting on forensics, and he’s climbing the walls with impatience. There’s a gnawing in his belly that he doesn’t know what to do with. He can feel the time slipping through his fingers, and he’s already dreading the 9 A.M. briefing on Monday. He can see Danny Jobs sitting in the front row, smirking as Rav updates them on his so-called progress on the Vanderford case. Told you the little prince was a lightweight , that smirk says. Then there’s Lieutenant Howard. Her face won’t give anything away, but she’ll be wondering if she made a mistake giving him lead on this case. Maybe he wasn’t ready , she’ll be thinking, and maybe she’ll be right.

“You’re worrying way too much,” Ana tells him as they stroll along the waterfront later that afternoon, sipping frozen margaritas in to-go cups and watching shirtless guys play beach volleyball in the shadow of the Williamsburg Bridge. “Who gives a damn what Danny Jobs thinks?”

“It’s not just him. Half the squad is convinced I’m only there to fill some unspoken quota. I’m the token queer hire.”

Ana snorts. “Is that the same quota system that gave you one lady detective on the whole squad?” She shakes her head. “Quotas. Por favor. Anyway, what do you care what they think? What counts is that you know, and Howard knows, you’re nobody’s token anything. You busted your ass to get where you are. Shit, you’ve only been talking about making Homicide since we met.”

This is true. Rav and Ana go back to their academy days, when they were both young and bright-eyed and fresh out of college. They bonded over their mutual outsider status—queer people of color being in short supply among that year’s crop of recruits—and they’ve been each other’s biggest cheerleaders ever since. Ana wants to be captain of her own precinct someday, but she’s not in a hurry, moving up the ranks at her own pace and giving herself time to have a life outside of work. Rav, meanwhile, has been in a flat-out sprint since college. He had it all planned out. Make detective in five years—check. Get promoted to Homicide—check. Show everyone how it’s done—in progress, anyway. This Vanderford thing was supposed to be the one , the case that got the dinosaurs like Jobs off his back and proved he could handle even the hot potatoes with poise and efficiency. Instead… “I feel like this one’s slipping through my fingers.”

“It won’t. And look, even if it does, there’ll be a next time. Nobody expects you to be perfect. Nobody but you, anyway.” She claps his shoulder and gives him a serious look. “There’s a fine line between perfectionism and narcissism, and you are dangerously close to crossing it. So do yourself a favor and get your head out of your ass, hermano .” She pauses to slurp noisily at her margarita. “Speaking of asses, that boy in the blue shorts…”

She’s trying to distract him, and it almost works. The volleyball game going on a few feet away is straight out of Top Gun , but Rav can’t even properly enjoy it. He chews the end of his straw, his gaze going right through the toned bodies leaping up to spike the ball in each other’s faces.

“The Nicks,” Ana says. “Man, I was obsessed with those guys a couple of years back.”

“ Mmm ,” Rav murmurs distractedly.

“Hey, what’s going on with you? Ignoring me is one thing, but there are four total hotties flexing their abs right in front of you and you’re not even looking.” There’s a pause; Rav senses her eyes on him. “Bumped into Devon at the gym the other day. Straight-up asked me, Is your boy ever gonna call me back? I told him Rav doesn’t do callbacks. It’s one and done.”

Rav tsk s into his drink. “That’s not true.”

“No? When was the last time you went on a second date?” She doesn’t wait for an answer. “It’s been forever, because second dates say maybe there’s something here , and you don’t have time for that. You’re too busy being a workaholic so you can prove something to Danny Jobs and your dad and a bunch of other assholes who aren’t worth it.”

“Wow,” Rav laughs. “Now who’s overthinking it? I didn’t feel a connection with Devon, that’s all.”

“Because you won’t let yourself. Seriously, when’s the last time you felt a connection with anyone?”

Well, actually… Rav sips his margarita.

“Hold up, I saw that.” She narrows her eyes. “You got a crush you’re not telling me about?”

Rav’s drink goes down the wrong pipe, and he coughs until his eyes water.

“I’ll take that as a yes ,” she says wryly, pounding his back. “Why’re you being so cagey, Trivedi? Wait, oh my god! It’s not Will, is it?”

His cough morphs into a gasping laugh. Granted, his romantic judgment isn’t always top-notch, but even he isn’t masochistic enough to go crushing on straight boys. “Don’t be insane,” he rasps.

“Good. You know he’s mine.”

It’s a favorite joke of hers. At least, he hopes it’s a joke. The idea of his wholesome, corn-fed Midwesterner partner with his tough-as-nails, no-fucks-to-give best mate is legitimately terrifying. “You would eat him alive , Rodriguez.”

“Yeah,” she says with a wicked grin. “Come on, I need ice cream.”

Evening finds Rav back online, trawling Vale’s social media. It’s something he would do with any suspect, but this feels different. For one thing, he concluded long ago that most of Vale’s social media is handled by someone else, so it’s not likely to provide much insight into the man himself. On top of which, there are some angles he’s actively avoiding. Like, say, romantic history. If he finds out Jack Vale is into guys he’s going to spontaneously combust.

He turns in early, vowing to redouble his efforts tomorrow. Eyes on the prize , he reminds himself. He has a murderer to catch, and that’s all that matters.

“This place is starting to feel like home,” Will remarks dryly as they walk through the doors of the Palace Hotel on Monday morning. “I spend more time here than at my own apartment.”

“Hopefully, this is the last time.” They’re here to interview Ryan Nash and Claudia Baldwin. The fourth member of the New Knickerbockers, Sarah Creed, is upstate, so they’ll have to interview her remotely. If they need to speak to any of the band members again after that, it’ll mean they’re on to something.

“How do you wanna do this?” Will asks. “Nash seems to have a chip on his shoulder about your father, so I’m thinking I do that one, and you can interview Baldwin.”

“And let Nash think he’s gotten under my skin? Not bloody likely. I’ll take that one.”

“Fair enough.” Will jabs the elevator button, and they head up to Vale’s suite on the thirtieth floor. The door is ajar, and voices tumble into the hallway.

It’s chaos in there.

It almost looks like a crime scene, with all the people milling about. Joanne Reid and a posse of lawyers stand stiffly to one side as a trio of desperately stylish young people sets up for a photo shoot in the lounge. In the sunroom, ángel Morillo is briefing the newly beefed-up security team; Rav counts almost two dozen people in there. Eloise flits back and forth, clutching her tablet, while Charlie Banks and the band’s publicist go over ground rules for an upcoming interview.

In the eye of the storm is Jack Vale, doing his best to juggle all the people demanding his attention. There are schedules to look over, questions to approve, makeup to dodge, leather trousers to politely decline—all while trying to absorb legal advice from Joanne Reid and her team. From the chatter, Rav gathers they’re doing a feature for Variety . And they really want him to wear those leather trousers. A Tan France look-alike with gravity-defying hair keeps holding them up hopefully, as if Jack will change his mind, until the publicist finally loses her patience. “It’s a no on the leather pants, okay? He’s not Harry fucking Styles.”

Like a dog on ten leashes , Rav thinks, recalling Vale’s words from the other day. How on earth does he cope? Not happily, judging from his body language. He’s putting on a brave face, but there are tells: the tense set of his shoulders, the way he keeps pushing his hand through his hair. He spots Rav through the crowd, and his eyes spark—with what, Rav can’t tell. For a second, he almost looked happy to see Rav, but that can’t be right. Why would anyone be happy to see the cops?

“This is ridiculous,” Will growls. “How are we supposed to do interviews like this?”

Rav tries to catch Joanne Reid’s eye, only to find himself being hustled toward the door by the grumpy publicist. “What are you doing in here?” she hisses. “God, I hope nobody from the magazine saw you!”

“We have an appointment,” Rav says, too surprised to resist as she herds him into the hallway.

“On the twenty-ninth floor,” she says, pointing at the stairwell. “In private .” She makes a shooing motion and closes the door behind her, the lock clicking noisily.

“Wow,” Will says.

Rav just shakes his head and makes for the stairwell.

There are two suites on the twenty-ninth floor, but only one of them has a bodyguard standing outside. At least, Rav assumes she’s a bodyguard, though she could pass for a model: six feet and svelte, stylish three-piece suit, wearing a Cartier ring of all things. She introduces herself as Erika Strauss, the new CPO on Nash’s detail. “I gather you guys went upstairs first,” she says with a look of wry amusement. “Bet they loved that.”

“If there was a message about the meeting being down here,” Rav says coolly, “we didn’t get it.”

“Doesn’t surprise me. It’s a mess up there today.” She swipes them in and leads them to a lounge, where they find a pair of lawyers flanking a petite young woman with close-cropped platinum hair and Zoe Kravitz cheekbones. Rav recognizes her from the photos. This is Claudia Baldwin, guitarist/keyboardist for the New Knickerbockers, and she looks nervous enough to throw up.

The bodyguard notices, too. “Do you want someone in the room with you, Claud? I can ask Mo if he has a few minutes.” Glancing at Rav, she explains, “Claudia’s new CPO doesn’t start until later this week.”

“That’s okay,” Baldwin says, stuffing her hands deeper into the pockets of her cargo pants. “He should stay with Jack.”

“We want you to feel comfortable, Ms. Baldwin,” Will says. “If you’d rather reschedule…”

The offer alone seems to relax her a little. “Thanks, but I’d rather just get this over with.”

“You’re in good hands,” Rav assures her. “Now, where will I find Mr. Nash?”

Strauss leads him to a second lounge, where the bass player and his attorney are waiting. Nash sits hunched on the sofa, elbows propped on his knees, glaring. His look is edgier than Vale’s: work boots, torn jeans, leather jacket over a graphic T-shirt. His black hair is unwashed—and, unless Rav is much mistaken, dyed. It seems like an odd choice, given that the lead singer’s hair is also black. As if he’s Vale’s adoring kid brother or something. It works on him, at any rate. Brings out the blue of his eyes, in all their ice-cold intensity.

“Thank you for taking time out of your morning,” Rav says. “It looks as though it’s a busy day.”

Nash shrugs. “For Jack. Rest of us don’t really count.”

“I’m sure that’s not true.”

“I’m sure you don’t know shit about it,” Nash returns mildly.

Rav smiles, clicking the end of his brand-new (cheap) pen. “You don’t like cops very much, do you, Mr. Nash?”

“Does anyone?” His eyes flick over Rav dismissively. “Don’t much fancy trust fund brats, either. Or politicians’ sons.”

“The trifecta! Lucky me.” Rav sits back and crosses his perfectly pressed Armani trousers. “We don’t have to be friends, but I have a job to do, so perhaps we can shelve the baggage for now. I’ll treat you with respect if you’ll do the same. Fair?”

The lawyer leans in and whispers something in Nash’s ear. He rolls his eyes. “Whatever. Can we just get on with it?”

“Happily. To start with, how would you describe your relationship with Richard Vanderford?”

“He was a prick.”

“So you didn’t get on?”

The lawyer leans in again. “Yeah, all right,” Nash growls, waving her off impatiently. “Look, I barely spoke to the guy. That was Charlie’s job, and Jack’s. The rest of us didn’t interact with him much. He didn’t even show his face at our album release party. He knew what we all thought of him.”

“Which was?”

“I didn’t like him. I didn’t like his politics, his business practices, his shiny fucking suits. I didn’t like the way he cashed in on Tommy’s death, and I really didn’t like what he was doing to Jack.”

“Tell me more about that. What was he doing to Mr. Vale?”

“ Killing him ,” Nash says with feeling. “I saw it every day. Every time we heard a Nicks tune on a commercial, flogging online betting or a fucking pickup truck. Our music, Tommy’s voice, pumping up the crowd at some right-wing political rally. Claudia and Sarah and me, we’d hear it and be pissed, but Jack… he’d die a little inside. Tommy was his brother. And Jack is my brother. Seeing him go through that…” Nash shakes his head and looks away. “Can’t even describe it. And now here’s you lot, trying to jam him up.”

“What makes you think we’re trying to jam him up?”

“You’re here, aren’t you?”

“Interviewing the victim’s acquaintances is standard procedure.”

“And taking Mo’s gun? Is that standard procedure?”

Rav spreads his hands. “There’s nothing malicious here, Mr. Nash. We’re just trying to find out who killed Richard Vanderford.”

“Yeah, well, it wasn’t Jack. You’d see that if you were any good at your job.”

Rav will say this for Nash: he’s a loyal friend. Most people in his shoes would be trying to stay off the cops’ radar, not antagonizing them out of misplaced protectiveness. “Where were you on the night of the sixteenth?”

“At a mate’s, shooting pool. There were four of us.”

“I’ll get you their details, Detective,” his bodyguard puts in from by the door.

“Look.” Nash sits back with a sigh. “I get that you’ve got a job to do, all right? I’m not trying to crawl up your arse. I just hate what this is doing to Jack. He knows you’re looking at him, and for what? Because he had a beef with Vanderford? There’s dozens of people who could say the same, and I promise you, not one of them is a better human being than Jack Vale.”

The interview doesn’t last long after that. Nash doesn’t recall the last time he saw Vanderford, but he reckons it was at least six months ago. And while he can’t vouch for Vale’s whereabouts on the night in question, he confirms that it’s not unusual for the singer to write alone, late into the night.

“Baldwin said the same,” Will says when the two of them compare notes in the hallway afterward. “So, what do you wanna do? Should we ask for a follow-up with Vale?”

Rav glances at the ceiling, imagining the scene up there. Is Vale out on the terrace again, gulping Xanax and wishing someone would distract him? He pictures the look in those blue-green eyes—and he remembers what it did to him, how close he came to forgetting himself.

There’s what Rav wants, and then there’s what’s best for the investigation. “No need,” he says, punching the elevator button. “Let’s go.”

The phone records come back later that afternoon, and Rav has the satisfaction of confirming a hunch.

“Vanderford was expecting company that night.” They’re sitting in Lieutenant Howard’s office, filling her in on the latest. “He sent a text to a prepaid number at 9:12 P.M. with the address to his building.”

“A burner phone?” Howard grunts thoughtfully. “His dealer, maybe?”

It’s possible. They did find a small amount of cocaine in the apartment. “But wouldn’t his dealer already have the address? Besides, I’m still hung up on that bottle of Petrus. I’m inclined to think the rendezvous was romantic in nature, or at least sexual. The doorman says he brought one-night stands home on a regular basis. Women, mostly, but occasionally men.”

Howard flicks a glance at the ceiling. “Of course. Heaven forbid we should be able to narrow it down to only half the population.”

“There’s a hole in the timeline as well. According to his colleagues, Vanderford left a label function a little before 7 P.M . Security footage has him entering the lobby of his building at 10:13 P.M . We can’t account for his whereabouts in between, except that cell phone towers place him on the Lower East Side until just before ten. No activity on his credit cards. Whatever he got up to, he paid in cash, or someone else paid. Which is dodgy, right? Who even uses cash anymore?”

Howard nods. “Whoever did this was either very meticulous or very lucky. What about the security footage from his building?”

“Not much help,” Will says. “Too many unidentifieds.”

“You can actually avoid some of the cameras altogether,” Rav adds, “if you scoped it out beforehand. It’s one of the reasons we liked the bodyguard for it.”

“Where are we with that?”

“Cell towers place his phone, and Vale’s, in the vicinity of the Palace Hotel, nowhere near Vanderford’s place.” That doesn’t prove anything, of course. Either or both of them could have left their phones behind while they killed Vanderford. But if Morillo’s Glock does come back clean, they’re back to square one. On top of which, having spent a little more time with Vale, Rav is skeptical he would have what it takes to gun someone down in cold blood.

He tells them about the incident on the terrace.

“Panic attacks?” Will gnaws at his pen. “Interesting. How come you didn’t mention it?”

Because we had a moment out there and I was kind of spinning out about it. Probably best to keep that to himself.

“It’s neither here nor there,” Howard says. “Panic attacks don’t speak to who he is or what he’s capable of.”

“And his motive is pretty compelling,” Rav points out.

“Don’t the other band members have the same motive?” Howard asks.

“Up to a point. But Vale is the principal songwriter, and he was closest to Tommy Esposito. Financially and personally, he’s more invested than the others. Also, he’s the only one without an alibi.”

“But you have nothing on him.”

“There’s the person in the security video. Vale is the right build.”

“Assuming that person is even involved. It’s thin.”

It’s worse than thin; it’s translucent. Ordinarily, Rav would start looking elsewhere, but he doesn’t entirely trust his own judgment right now. What if he’s only seeing—or not seeing—what he wants to?

“We need progress, gentlemen. I’ve already got the higher-ups breathing down my neck. If the Vale angle isn’t working, find a new one.”

“Just find a new one, shall I?” Rav mutters as he slinks back to his desk with his tail between his legs, pretending not to notice the smirk Danny Jobs is directing his way. Fuck you, Jobs. As if you ever had to work a file with burner phones and cash payments and goddamned professional assassins. How does he get stuck with this as his first big case? The universe obviously hates him.

“Well, whaddya know?” Will is scrolling through something on his phone as he drops into his chair. “Our boy will be in your neck of the woods tomorrow night.”

“Vale? What for?”

“Charity thing. Some youth organization is throwing an event at that skate park near your place.”

“Where are you reading this?”

“I set up a Google alert when we decided Vale was a suspect.”

“So you do know how to use the internet.”

“Shut up.” Will tosses his phone on his desk. “So what now?”

“We get in touch with Vanderford’s PA again, I guess. Ask about her boss’s favorite restaurants on the Lower East Side. Maybe we get lucky and find the one he went to that night.”

“Blind canvassing?” Will groans. “It’s official, we’re grasping at straws.”

“Keep it down, will you?” Rav glances in the direction of the Jobs–Jiménez axis. “I really don’t need the commentary from the peanut gallery today.”

“Guess we’d better get on with it,” Will sighs, grabbing his keys.

On their way out, Rav feels something bounce off his arm.

It’s a straw.