by T. E. Woods
Phoebe considered that for a moment. “So your plan is to find the tape? If it exists.”
“Yes.”
“And you think Roger hid it here?”
“Either here or at City Hall. And I don’t have an in down there.”
“Even if you did, it wouldn’t do you any good. Melanie White wasted no time clearing out Roger’s things and installing herself in the mayor’s office. She even had one of her people deliver boxes of my husband’s personal belongings to me at the hotel three days ago. Besides, Roger would never make himself vulnerable to public exposure. If he was holding something to use against someone, he’d have it here.”
Sydney thought about the blood-soaked office downstairs. “Are you up for me having a look? With your permission, I could go alone. There’s no need for you to see that again.”
“This is my home, Sydney. I’ll get used to it. Besides, I’ve known my husband more than three decades. If he’s stashing something, I’ll be able to sniff it out.”
“Thank you, Phoebe. I know how difficult this must be.”
Phoebe stood, smoothing her hands over her flowing dark skirt. “One thing’s for sure. Windy did or didn’t kill my husband. Either way, I want to know. Come on. If Roger had a tape, it’s in his safe. Let’s see if the police found it.”
They took the front stairs this time. Each woman kept her hands to her sides. Neither felt the need to warn the other to steer clear of the dusting residue coating the banister. Sydney was impressed with Phoebe’s straight-ahead determination as they passed again through the blood-spattered hallway and entered her husband’s work zone. Phoebe walked directly to the floor-to-ceiling drapes framing a wide window overlooking a rear patio. She pushed the heavy material to one side, exposing a wall paneled in mahogany.
“No dust here,” she commented. “Must have figured if there was no blood on the curtains, why look behind them?” Phoebe flattened her hands against a panel, pressed, then lifted a two-by-four-foot mahogany veneer free from the wall, revealing a black steel-plate door with a mounted keypad. “Roger had this installed about two months after he won his first election to the Common Council. Used to have a rotary combination lock. He liked new gadgets. Got the keypad about two years ago.”
“Do you know the combination?”
“Let’s see. There was a time Roger shared everything with me.” She keyed in a series of numbers. The red light on the keypad remained unchanged. “Well, it’s not our anniversary anymore.” She sounded more sad than disappointed. “Let’s try his birthday.” She keyed in another set of numbers. The light remained red. “Here’s a long shot.” Again she keyed in a series and frowned. “Surprise. It’s not my birthday, either.”
“Did he have a favorite pet? Maybe a lucky number?”
Phoebe shook her head. “He always said we’d get a dog when we had kids.”
“A hobby? Maybe a favorite golf hole? An address of his bowling alley? Anything like that?”
“The only thing Roger loved was this city. And being its mayor.” Her eyes brightened. “Hang on.”
She tapped her fingers over the keypad. When she was finished, the red light turned to green. An electronic lock slid open with a subtle beep. Phoebe opened the safe.
“Wow! What was it?”
“Three-four-one-eight-five-six. March fourth, eighteen fifty-six. The date Madison officially became a city.” Sydney heard the wistfulness in her voice.
“He was a good mayor.” Sydney hoped Phoebe could remember the positive.
Phoebe waved away the attempted kindness. “Shall we?”
Phoebe pulled out a black velvet pouch. She opened it. “His father’s watch.” She set it aside and reached for a manila envelope. “Oh my. There’s got to be a thousand dollars here. Maybe more. What would Roger need with that much cash?”
Sydney recalled Windy telling her the mayor paid for her sexual performances with crisp hundred-dollar bills.
“Who knows?” she evaded. “Lots of people like to keep cash around. Do you see anything that looks like it might hold a recording?”
Phoebe pulled out a red file folder. “This is marked with my name.” She opened it, glanced down, and looked back to Sydney. “You keep looking.” She stepped over to the window seat and settled in to examine her find.
Sydney went to the safe. There was a gift box containing a gilded pen set. It was engraved to Roger. With the eternal gratitude of the U.S. Senate. Another box was small and square. She opened it and discovered a ring. Platinum with a sizable solitaire diamond. She assumed it was Phoebe’s engagement ring and pushed it to the side, as she did the deed to the house, the couple’s passports, and several insurance policies. She pulled out another file, this one marked Melanie, and set it aside. She made one final reach to the back of the safe. Her fingers felt hard plastic. She reached in blindly, bringing a small rectangular container out into view. It was blue. A soap container one might keep in a traveling kit. She opened it. Inside were two thumb drives. Each with a lanyard attached. One was gray, the other white.
“This could be it!” she exclaimed. “Phoebe, did Roger keep a computer here? I need to see what’s on these.”
Phoebe didn’t respond. She stared straight ahead, her hand covering the open file in her lap.
“Phoebe? Did the mayor have a computer? Did the police take it?”
Still the widow didn’t respond.
Sydney walked over and sat beside her. “Are you okay?” She glanced down at the file. “What did you find?”
Phoebe looked up. Tears pooled in her eyes. “It was over. All over.”
“What? What was over?”
Robotically Phoebe lifted the red folder. She spoke aloud, more to the room than to Sydney in particular. Her tone was drenched in disbelief. “He was leaving me. After all these years. All I’ve done. What we’ve been through. The son of a bitch was going to divorce me.”
Chapter 27
NOW
“What is it with you, Sydney?” Andrew made no attempt to contain his anger. “Is it something medical? ADD maybe? Perhaps some sort of brain malfunction that makes you forget promises you’ve made? Or are you simply a person whose word can’t be trusted?”
It was nearly seven o’clock. Andrew had tried to hold off Sydney’s request that they meet right away.
“Cynthia’s battling monster nausea. Morning sickness in the evening,” he’d explained. “Poor thing. Part of the experience, I suppose. I wouldn’t feel right leaving her.” He’d suggested they meet first thing in the morning. But when Sydney told him she’d just left Phoebe Millerman’s and had two thumb drives to review, Andrew’s tone had instantly shifted. He’d meet her in twenty minutes, he’d told her. Sydney had been waiting for him in front of his building.
“You always ride your bike to work?” she asked as he pulled off his helmet.
“Any chance I get. It’s faster when traffic’s heavy.” His tone was tight with anger. “And it lets me blow off a bit of steam when things aren’t going well.”
There were still a few junior associates milling about at Andrew’s firm. She was grateful he waited until he closed his office door before unleashing his tirade.
“What is it about confidentiality you don’t understand?” he rasped. “I specifically told you not to discuss the possibility of a tape with anyone. My investigators are more than capable of finding it. That is, if it exists. I’m still trying to reconcile Windy’s maybe, possibly, it’s-all-so-foggy memory of not having killed the mayor.”
“I’m paying you to believe she didn’t.”
“You’re paying me to mount the best defense possible. I’m trying to do that. Why you keep sabotaging my efforts at every turn is beyond my comprehension.”
“I have these.” She handed him the thumb drives. “They were in Roger Millerman’s private safe.”
“And how exactly did you get these?”
Briefly she told him about her conversation with Phoebe.
Andrew slappe
d his right hand hard on the back of his leather chair. “Damn it, Sydney! Can’t you see what you’ve done?”
“I got the tapes! Your investigators wouldn’t have been able to get inside Millerman’s office without Phoebe. She trusts me. I was able to get it done.”
“What you were—are—is reckless. Careless. Clueless.” He pointed the storage drives at her. “These could hold recordings of Common Council meetings, for all we know. Or maybe the mayor was into cat videos. We have no idea what these are. However, we do know the dead man’s widow now knows our defense strategy. You don’t think she’s going to go straight to the police with that? Once again you’ve handed the prosecution a conviction on a silver platter! We had one shot at reasonable doubt. We needed to catch the prosecution unaware. I can hear the opening arguments now.” He shifted his pose as though addressing a courtroom. “Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, you’ll hear the defense throw alternate suspects at you. One after another. Don’t confuse desperation with plausibility. The police have investigated these alternatives, and the conclusion that must be drawn is that only one person had access to the mayor that day. Only one person could have killed him. Wanda Fields!”
“Phoebe won’t do that!”
“Why wouldn’t she?”
“Because no one who knows Windy could think she’d have it in her to kill anybody.”
“Would you have thought she’d allow herself to be pimped out? Or that she would pick up extra cash servicing the mayor when his wife wasn’t home? Don’t be naive, Sydney! People do all kinds of things folks who know us wouldn’t expect. It’s dangerous business to ride on trust. We’ll get surprised every time. Hell, I trusted you when you said you could keep this quiet. Look what that got me.”
Sydney had no rebuttal for his assessment. She had gone against her word. She’d acted impulsively and now she’d risked destroying Andrew’s entire defense. She tried to tell herself it wasn’t like her to be so impulsive, but her brain instantly shot down that rationalization. Hadn’t she impulsively decided to support Windy despite the solid case the police had? Rashly spent twenty thousand dollars on Andrew’s retainer? Several thousand more posting Windy’s bail? Hadn’t she recklessly given the medallion to Horst? She had even acted in brazen disregard of all her employees when she placed Windy in her kitchen, running the risk of jeopardizing the entire restaurant if people decided they didn’t like her support of the mayor’s killer.
“Let’s see what’s on the drives before you condemn me.”
Andrew stopped pacing his office long enough to give her a long, disgusted glare. “You have Phoebe Millerman’s permission to be in possession of these? She knows you intend to look at them?”
Sydney thought back to earlier in the evening. When she had left, Phoebe had been distraught over her discovery that her husband had been planning on leaving her. Had she specifically given Sydney permission to take the tapes? She’d certainly allowed Sydney to go through the safe. Of that Sydney was certain. And she knew about Brooks Janeworthy. Phoebe might have been vocal about her doubts, but there could be no question she knew Sydney and Andrew were looking for the tape Windy thought had been made of their encounter.
“I showed her the drives. I told her I wanted to see what they held. I even asked if I could use the mayor’s computer, but there wasn’t one.”
Andrew was quiet as he weighed the legalities. “Barring any will that might say something contrary, we can assume any property the mayor left behind will be inherited by his wife. These tapes are technically hers. Think hard. Did she give you permission to view them?”
Sydney tried to re-create her last few moments with Phoebe. “I told her I was taking them. I thanked her for her help. I asked her if there was anything she needed. She was so upset…”
“About what?”
Sydney told him about the red file with Phoebe’s name on it. “It was a listing of property. Marital property, I assume. Two columns. One for what he wanted, the other for what he proposed to give her. He had a time line, too. A contact list of four divorce attorneys. An outline of his reasons. Phoebe said it was just like him. She said he always sketched out his thoughts before giving a speech of any consequence. There was no other conclusion for her to come to than that the mayor was planning on leaving her. And from the looks of things, he planned on telling her very soon.”
Andrew’s face flushed crimson. He ran a hand through his thick hair. “Do you have that file?”
“No. Phoebe was holding it when I left.”
“The reasons the mayor gave? For divorcing her. What were they?”
“What you’d expect. They’d grown apart. Their interests weren’t the same. He no longer found her attractive.”
“No mention of someone else? A lover maybe?”
Sydney shook her head. “Would that matter?”
“Everything matters.” He resumed his pacing. But this time his movements seemed less driven by anger than by possibility. “The night the mayor was killed. You told me Phoebe was at your restaurant.”
“She was. She waited several hours for Roger.”
“And you sent her home in a cab? After she made a scene?”
“This again?”
“Yes, Sydney. This again. Only now we have a concrete motive. Phoebe devoted her life to her husband’s career. Suddenly she learns he’s dumping her. Stripping her of her first lady title. Leaving her with a diminished social status. At her age. Women have killed for far less.”
“This evening was the first Phoebe learned about her husband’s plans. I’m sure of it.”
He stopped and leveled a condescending stare. “Another one of your hunches, Sydney?”
“Phoebe didn’t murder her husband.”
“And I’ll say again it doesn’t matter whether she did or not. Phoebe had access to every inch of that house. She knew the mayor’s schedule. She had her alibi set up by being at Hush Money’s opening. The only snag was Windy walking in.”
“So you believe Windy now? That she just happened to arrive moments after the mayor was shot?”
“It’s not important what I believe. It’s what I can sell to a jury. Phoebe shoots her husband, gets surprised by Windy, knocks her out cold, and heads over to Hush Money. It’s simple. It’s logical. And every juror on the panel will be stunned to think the police failed to investigate the surviving spouse. Especially when they find out he was planning on dumping her.”
She could tell he was warming up to the idea.
“More importantly,” he added, “Phoebe Millerman will not betray this strategy to the police. I could even make the case she wanted you to pursue Brooks Janeworthy. Maybe she knew the tapes existed and wanted to toss you a bouncing ball to chase. Let the prosecution prepare for Janeworthy. We’ll spring Phoebe on the jury and still maintain our element of surprise.”
“Phoebe didn’t kill the mayor.”
“You can say that as many times as you’d like, but it’s not going to change things.” He took a deep breath and gave her his first smile of the evening. “I was harsh on you earlier. Rightly so. However, in the end I think things turned out better than we could have hoped.”
“Does that mean you don’t want to see what’s on the drives?”
“Pet videos? Pictures from the mayor’s last trade mission? What does it matter?”
“You’re not interested in who murdered the mayor?”
He must have seen the disappointment on her face. He glanced at his watch and sighed. “What the hell.” He went to his desk and powered on his computer. “Cynthia’s probably resting. Let’s have a quick look.” He held up the two drives. “Which first?”
She pointed to the gray. Andrew inserted the drive and clicked it open. Within twenty seconds a scene unfolded that left no doubt Windy had been telling the truth about her encounter with Brooks Janeworthy. She looked so vulnerable. So desperate. Janeworthy, on the other hand, seemed to be enjoying his rough-handed use of the young woman.
“Enough.” S
ydney turned away from the screen. “I don’t need to see any more.”
Andrew appeared genuinely shaken by what he had just viewed. His jaw was set in firm determination as he pulled the gray thumb drive from its port and replaced it with the white.
“The mayor was a bastard,” he spit. “I don’t care what he’s done for this city. Nothing earns anyone a pass for that kind of disgusting privilege.”
He tapped the second drive open. They watched as another scene came into view. An office. Sydney didn’t recognize the two men, but she immediately identified the woman.
“Can you turn up the audio?” she asked.
Andrew manipulated the mouse, and the conversation between the three parties on the screen was amplified.
“No,” Sydney whispered.
“My God.” This time it was Andrew who couldn’t believe what he was seeing.
Nearly twenty minutes later the scene ended. Neither of them moved. After moments of stunned silence, Andrew was the first to find his voice.
“That’s a motive for killing if ever I saw one.”
“What do we do?” Sydney asked. “This is big. Maybe the biggest thing ever.”
Andrew pulled the thumb drive from the computer. He took both devices and placed them in a locked desk drawer. “What are your plans tonight?” His gaze held as much threat as it did determination.
“I’m going to check in at Hush Money and the Ten-Ten. I’m meeting Ronnie, my best friend, at her place for a glass of wine.”
“You’re not going to the Ten-Ten tonight.” His tone left no room for negotiation. “I can’t risk you getting another wild hair and discussing what we’ve discovered. And you’re not going by Dr. Pernod’s, either. It’s imperative no one knows we’re in possession of this evidence until I outline the best way to deal with it. Do you hear me?”
Sydney nodded.
“I’ll make some calls. People I trust. I’ll speak in hypotheticals and get their input. In the meantime, I don’t trust you to keep this under wraps. I’m half tempted to bring you home with me and lock you in our guest room. If you truly want to do what’s best for everybody, you’ll go home, hide your phone, and stay put until I call you.”
