by Matthew Iden
“What’s your green list?”
“The properties and plots that we consider safe, at least for now. Either we’ve gotten a no-sell commitment from the owner or some kind of city injunction against development. The Trumble, especially, is one of those places that we wanted to protect, because we knew a bunch of developers have been licking their chops over it since it was condemned.”
Click. Things fell into place. “Including Atlantic Union?”
“Especially Atlantic Union.”
I started the car and pulled away from the curb at speed. “Okay. Jerry, this is important. I don’t want you to panic, but Michael is in trouble. If he calls the office, have him get in touch with me the second he does so. If he won’t do that, I need you to call me directly.”
“What…what kind of trouble?”
“Nothing I can go into right now,” I said. I came to a red light, glanced in both directions, and blew through it. “But it’s important we make sure it doesn’t get any worse. And it could get a lot worse.”
There was silence on the other end of the line.
“Look, Jerry. I know your loyalty is to Michael. I can respect that. And I can’t give you details right now, but if we don’t help him through this, Michael won’t be coming back to PoP. He won’t be coming back at all.”
Jerry was quiet. This was definitely going against his instinct. Finally, “Okay. I’ll have him call you if he comes in.”
“Thanks, Jerry. If I’m wrong, none of this will matter. If I’m right, we might be saving the guy’s life.”
I hung up and concentrated on driving recklessly and at high speed through the back streets of Washington, DC. On a good day, in an MPDC cruiser with a light on top, I would’ve made it in eight, maybe nine minutes—I also wouldn’t have been using the back streets. But I’d seen a digital road sign on the way in that had warned that this evening’s events featured both a Gay Pride celebration and a Washington Nationals baseball game. And I wasn’t in a cruiser and I didn’t have a light.
The first obstacle came in the form of a broken-down float on 8th Street, just a few blocks past the prosperous restaurant district that was in stark contrast to the Quarters, its sister neighborhood on the north side of the 695 cut-through. Athletically built men in Speedos and spandex grinned and waved at drivers who honked as they inched past, trying to convince oncoming traffic that two lanes should become three. Stuck behind a panel truck that didn’t seem to mind the wait, my own honking became something less than friendly and congenial, which led to an offended float passenger to comment, “Ease off, bitch,” as I swung out around the truck and gunned it.
When lights and signs made it hazardous to go any faster than twice the speed limit, I pulled out my cell and tried Dods’s number two more times. No answer, just voice mail. I was starting to hate the sounds of Dods’s voice.
Decision time. Actually, past it. I should’ve called 911 the second I couldn’t raise my old partner on the horn. Maybe a senior detective in Homicide wasn’t available, but there were a few thousand or so regular cops in the department that I could’ve gotten to intervene
But was it the best move? Let’s say I called 911 and told the dispatcher that the man who had recently killed two people and shot a third—a DC city councilman, no less—was conspiring to kill the CEO of a major regional corporation as we spoke. By the time I got to the good old Trumble theater, the place would have either been shot to shit by an MPDC Tactical Unit trying to flush Michael out or surrounded by enough cops to shut down a small country. There wouldn’t be any talking, no chance to communicate…and if I was wrong about the whole thing—if I’d put two and two together and gotten five—Denton would sue me and Dods would shoot me himself.
I skidded onto Georgia Avenue, nudged the car through traffic, then gassed the car north through the city as fast as I could go. The Petworth neighborhood on Georgia Avenue was just six or seven blocks away and the Brickyard section just beyond it. Cars choked my path. I used my horn, the turning lane, and the sidewalk more than once to shove past the traffic and finally enter the Brickyard. The Trumble—an elegant three-story theater from bygone days—was easy to spot, as its marquee towered over the one- and two-story shops around it and I came to a bucking stop right in front of the picturesque building.
I jumped out of the car and ran to the doors, noticing as I did Rheinsfeld’s stretch limo parked across the street. There was just one set of double doors, steel with narrow bottle-glass windows, and they were locked tight as a drum. I might be able to break the glass, but I didn’t want to tip Denton off and there was no guarantee that the lock was something I could find or fiddle with through the tiny window anyway.
Swearing, I ran back to the car, put it in gear, and did a wild U-turn in the middle of the street. Two quick lefts and I was in the narrow alley that ran behind the shops of the Brickyard. I swerved in and out of trash cans and unidentifiable piles of junk. Based on the number of beer kegs lining the alley wall I was behind the bar flanking the Trumble. I jumped out of the car, pulled my gun, and jogged down the alley. Dusk was starting to settle in and a stiff wind ripped through the narrow draw, making me squint and hunch my shoulders to protect myself.
I scanned the rusting fire escapes and eyed the darker corners. The slightest feeling of claustrophobia crept up on me when I thought about how close the walls of the alley were. The smell of urine was strong, thickest near the alcoves and nooks formed by the backs of the other buildings. Empty drug vials and foil packets were strewn along the edges of the alley. This close to the row of buildings and the marquee of the Trumble was out of sight. I glanced back at my car to get even an approximate idea how far I’d come.
The alley widened, becoming less of a rat hole and more of an actual thruway, and the claustrophobic feeling eased. At the alley’s widest point, I came to a solid steel door with no handle. With one hand, I traced faded lettering, the white paint long since gone. STAGE ENTRANCE. From a time when the Trumble was an actual theater, I supposed, not just a movie house.
I put away my gun and pulled out a penknife and slid it into the crack of the door near where the lock should be. There was a one in a million chance that the thing was old or decrepit enough that I could finagle it open. Five minutes of frustrating fiddling led nowhere and I put the knife away.
Time was running out. A voice in my head was yelling for me to call the MPDC and let them take it from here. I ignored it and tilted my head back. The Trumble had an old fire escape like the other buildings, but was as out of reach as the rest of them. I wasn’t about to make the fifteen-foot vertical leap to the first rung of the ladder. And there were no Dumpsters or other props to help. I dismissed that idea and jogged down the alley, looking for other entrances. There were two more doors like the first—solid steel with no handle—and one of them was plainly soldered shut. There were no windows on the back of the theater at all and the alley spilled into a thoroughfare just a few yards beyond.
I cursed and headed back for my car at double time, planting my feet into the ground angrily, stomp stomp stomp. It was time to call this one in. I pulled out my phone, my finger on the 9—
And my feet went plonk plonk plonk.
I stopped in my tracks and looked down. I was standing on top of a matrix of thick glass squares, the kind that, back in the old days, were set in an inch of concrete so they could stand up to the abuse of being walked and driven over. But they were specifically there to let the light in. Into a basement.
Feeling a surge of excitement, I retraced my steps, looking down this time, kicking trash out of my way as I went. Between the first and second doors, I found it, a small freight door set in the ground with inset handles. Trash had blown over the door, which explained why I hadn’t seen it on my first go-round. I cleared away the garbage and pulled out my knife again, praying for a simple latch. I wiggled the blade as deeply in the crack as I could get it, put both hands on the handle of the knife, yanked up with all
my strength…and fell back on my ass in the middle of the alley. There’d been no resistance. I got back to my feet, leaned over, and pulled on the handles.
The doors swung up and open. Daylight revealed a ramp heading into the earth. I paused, looking and listening. Why had it been unlocked? Was it the local junkie’s den or squatters’ pad? Or had someone beaten me here?
It didn’t matter. It was my only way in and there was a good chance that I was too late as it was. I pulled my gun, took a deep breath, and followed the steps into the darkness.
Chapter Thirty-Two
I’ve been exposed to my share of odors and, while I’d smelled worse than the basement of the Trumble, I’m not sure I’d ever smelled anything stranger. There was the same predominant whiff of urine as in the alley, but it mingled with the tang of rainwater, rat droppings, must, and old papers to mix a cocktail that had my eyes tearing. I took a deep breath, pulled out a small pocket flashlight, and headed down the freight corridor.
The tiny beam of the flashlight showed that the short hall spilled into a larger room. I moved forward cautiously, panning the flashlight from wall to wall. I was in a basement full of rotting cardboard boxes, old popcorn machines, and the relics of a once-successful theater now forgotten except for the name. Crumpled paper and rolls of old paper tickets littered the floor. Ratty movie posters, decaying curtains, window-washing tools, open buckets of paint now dried solid, and the red velveteen ropes with their brass poles littered the cellar, giving me a glimpse into a storied past that was going to find its way into a collector’s inventory—or a landfill—if Atlantic Union got its hands on the place.
A set of concrete steps led up to a wooden door. I crept up the stairs and put my ear against the door. Nothing. I eased it open, cupping my hand over the light. Beyond was total darkness. The air was musty—a drier, dirtier smell than the moldering basement—and I fought down a sneeze. I cautiously opened my hand over the flashlight, letting just enough light spill out until I could see that I was in a narrow backstage corridor running left and right. I bobbed my head out and back. Nothing. I listened again. This time, a faint murmuring reached my ears, coming from the right. I squeezed the grip of my gun and set off towards it.
The murmuring got louder and, on a hunch, I turned off the flashlight. A gray, muddy light spilled along the corridor. The Trumble didn’t have windows…skylights, maybe? I crept along, feeling my way cautiously, afraid of kicking something or stumbling in the dim light.
The light and sound continued to grow—the voices raised and angry now—and I got that strange, intuitive sense we all have of burgeoning space opening up in front of me. My outstretched hand touched something soft and yielding and I yanked my hand back until I realized I’d touched the back of the colossal curtain that separated backstage from front-and-center. If I’d kept my bearings, I was back and stage right. With infinite care, I edged along the curtain until I found the glowing seam that told me I’d found its end. I peeled it back an inch.
The dishwater light was stronger here, illuminating a drama not on the stage, but in front of it, the open space between the orchestra pit and the first row of seats. Michael Denton, his back to the curtain, was pointing a pistol at Jeremy Rheinsfeld. The real estate baron was standing very still, with his arms at his sides like they were sticks, not taking his eyes off Denton’s face.
Next to and slightly behind Rheinsfeld was Harmon, looking more relaxed than his boss—this was more his kind of situation—but his face was stony and I knew he was making every calculation necessary to save his own skin, reach his gun in time to shoot Denton, and rescue his employer, in that order. But Harmon hadn’t moved yet and I could guess why. As notoriously inaccurate as handguns were, and as much as Denton was an amateur, the gun was still just twelve feet away from its target. It wouldn’t take a pro to hit something from that distance.
“I don’t care what your reasons were,” Denton said, shouting the words. “I don’t care what you meant to do. She wasn’t a statistic. She wasn’t an asset to be moved from one goddamn column to another.”
Rheinsfeld mumbled something inaudible. I frowned. The CEO was remarkably composed. He had to know Denton hadn’t arranged the meet to talk—he was here for some exposition and a final reckoning. Surely he’d already told them that he’d killed Wendy Gerson, Alex Montero, and Toby Waites…and wasn’t stopping there.
Then a thought slipped through my mind like ice water down my neck. There was a reason why Rheinsfeld was so stoic and not down on his knees, begging for his life. And it wasn’t just the poor odds that kept Harmon from going for his gun.
Martinez wasn’t with them.
The cellar door. A pro like Martinez would’ve been cautious—he wouldn’t have waltzed in with the two of them, and Rheinsfeld wouldn’t have gone in alone. Harmon had volunteered or been picked to play bodyguard while Martinez had slipped around back to recon the place, found the freight door, and snaked his way through the basement, just as I had.
I risked moving the curtain back another half inch to get a better view of the seating and scanned the mezzanine and the far corners of the theater, or as much as the dim light would let me. Nothing overhead on the wide balcony, no movement near the doors, although Denton would’ve seen him coming through the entrance.
My eyes flicked to look across to stage left, the twin to my position across the open theater. I squinted, trying to will my eyes to see in the dark. There. A glint from just beyond the curtain. Martinez’s chrome-plated revolver. Being raised.
I brought up my own Sig, zeroed in on that glint, and yelled, “Denton!”
Denton’s voice had been rising on a crescendo and I felt, just as I’m sure Martinez did, that the activist was psyching himself up to carry through with his last act of justice. But my entrance froze everything. Denton’s gun wavered, then steadied. Somehow, he summoned the force of will to keep from turning around.
“Martinez!” I said at the same volume. “My gun’s pointed at you, not Denton. Put that elephant gun down and walk out onstage. Now.”
Martinez’s gun winked at me from the darkness, in and out. Was it a trick of the light? Or was he ignoring my warning and moving slowly out of range?
“Singer,” Denton called, his gun trained on Rheinsfeld. “There’s no reason for you to be here.”
“I’m trying to keep you from getting shot,” I said, keeping my eyes glued to the far side of the stage. I swallowed. The longer we talked, the less confident I was that this would end well. “Just like I’m trying to save you from making a huge mistake.”
He laughed. “That ship sailed a while ago. Rheinsfeld, here, saw to that. But we’re going to finish this little Greek tragedy right.”
“Denton, don’t do it. Please. These scumbags aren’t worth it,” I said, then saw the glint again, moving. “Martinez, put that fucking gun down.”
It all went to hell so fast I hadn’t gotten the last word out of my mouth before the first shots rang out, like there were a handful of people in the audience, clapping for our performance. Martinez came halfway out from behind the curtain and fired two oblique, booming shots at Denton, who—at the sound of my yell—had straightened his own arm and squeezed the trigger at Rheinsfeld. Denton staggered, hit. Rheinsfeld collapsed. Harmon sprang forward, reaching out for the activist with those trunklike arms.
Martinez took his shots at Denton, then swung his cannon towards me and pulled the trigger. I threw myself to the floor and squeezed off three wild shots, locking onto the gleam of his chrome-plated revolver as my target. One hit him center mass. Martinez took two drunken steps backwards into the dark and, almost comically, sat down with a thud. His legs splayed awkwardly from his body, like a doll dropped to the floor, then he fell back, flat on the stage.
I scrambled to my feet and stepped from behind the curtain, trying to get a better field of view. Harmon had Denton in a bear hug and was squeezing the life from him. The activist was screaming—hit by one o
f Martinez’s shots, maybe. I ran forward, trying to get a clear shot at Harmon, yelling at him to stop. But Denton, who’d never dropped his gun, raised it, put it under Harmon’s chin, and pulled the trigger. The two of them collapsed in the aisle.
I leapt off the stage and ran over to the trio of bodies. The back of Harmon’s head was missing and Rheinsfeld lay in an awkward tangle of his own arms and legs, telling me that both were beyond help. Denton rested on his side, his chest rising and falling in incredibly short, shallow intervals. A golf-ball-sized hole oozed blood just under his right shoulder blade. I turned him over gently to find the plate-sized exit wound that Martinez’s revolver had created.
It was the ultimate in futile gestures, but I took off my jacket and pressed it to his belly while I dialed 911 with the other hand. His pulse was feeble, barely there, but his lips moved slowly, rhythmically. I bent close, trying to pick up what he was saying, but there was no sound and, watching his mouth, the only thing that made any sense was Mama, Mama, Mama.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Four of us described a cozy drawing room tableau, a scene that could’ve been lifted from a Wilkie Collins novel. I was seated in one of the easy chairs, while Terry and Sarah Gerson sat, knees touching, on the sofa. Paul stood by the fireplace, resting one hand on the mantel. A coffee service with three full china cups growing cold rested on the table in front of me. Mine was empty. A fire crackled in the stone fireplace again, the flames larger than the first time I’d come and more appropriate for the bite of late October. I’d just finished describing what I knew about Wendy’s death and the three of them were quiet, digesting what I’d told them. I’d left out Caitlin’s name and anyone else who was alive and functional, but had otherwise given them every sordid detail of the case.
