The Betrayed

by David Hosp

  She turned out the light and lay back on the pillows, staring up at the ceiling. Why had she let her mother bully her in front of the two police officers as she had? She was no longer a scared little child, and she was beholden to her mother for very little anymore. And yet she had let it happen.

  Then, as she lay there in the quiet, another question came to her—one that suddenly seemed more pressing: why had her mother so adamantly defended Leighton? Certainly Leighton had originally been her mother’s choice for Elizabeth, and as had always seemed the case, she had gotten her way. When the marriage ended, Sydney knew there had been recriminations between Elizabeth and her mother. Still, even for all her mother’s prior support of Leighton, it was hard to imagine that

  she would still protect him. Things had gone too far for that, hadn’t they?

  And yet Sydney had allowed herself to be silenced by her mother, and she was angry with herself for that. Never again, she vowed.

  Chapter Seven

  LESS THAN A MILE from the Chapin home, Peter King walked up Twenty-eighth Street, Northwest, at a neutral pace. He kept his head still, seemingly indifferent to the world around him, but his eyes darted from side to side, taking everything in. Physically, he was the kind of man who drew no attention. He was neither tall nor short; neither fat nor thin; and his hair was the sort of middling brown that stood out to no one. As he walked, he unconsciously clutched his right hand into a fist, rubbing his thumb compulsively over the stub of a little finger that had been blown off during a particularly trying mission in the first Gulf War.

  At R Street he turned left, crossing Twenty-eighth. As he walked, he turned his head, ostensibly to look for traffic, and his trained eyes assessed the entire street, noticing every detail. He’d chosen the time and place well. Washington was a sleepy town after midnight, and the area was deserted. He swung his head in both directions and saw no one; within an instant he’d ducked into Rock Creek Park unnoticed.

  So far, so good, he thought as he entered the park and turned right, to the north, up the chosen path. He kept alert, though he knew there was no danger now. His planning had been perfect, and his execution . . . well, if not perfect, at least exceptional. Besides, this wasn’t like the old days, living in a world where any slip could have cost him his life. Here in the civilian world, there was room for error, even if no one in his profession would acknowledge as much out loud.

  He followed the narrow path along the ravine that had been carved over centuries by the waters of Rock Creek as they flowed through the area that now served as a central artery of the nation’s capital. The park was thick with vegetation and the heavy scent of lilac and rotting wood; trees overhung the narrow paved paths that runners used every day, and the underbrush looked impenetrable.

  As King walked, he kept alert for anything that might seem out of place, more out of habit than caution. It was a practice born of more than a decade’s worth of mercenary work. He noticed nothing.

  A few hundred yards into the park, he came to a fork in the path and followed it left, deeper down toward the center of the ravine. After another fifty yards, he came to a cul-de-sac in the path, where his client was waiting for him.

  “You do nice work,” his client said as he approached. Standing as he was in the dark, only his silhouette was visible, though King could make out the wisps of short blond hair around the edge of his head.

  King had met the man only once before, though he’d checked his references carefully. Lee Salvage was one of the most “connected” private investigators in the District, and not necessarily in the good way. The word on the street was that he had a healthy disrespect for the finer points of the law, and an unhealthy taste for cheap booze that had become exacerbated in middle age. King was used to working only with former military personnel, and the idea of working with a man like Salvage disturbed him. But, largely because of his moral flexibility, Salvage still had access to the wealthiest clients, and farmed out much of his dirty work. As a result, King was pleased to have been contacted by the man.

  King nodded and reached into his pocket, drawing out a small stack of computer disks. He handed them over. “Is this all of them?” Salvage asked, and King nodded again. “What about the computer?”

  King put his hands in his pockets. “She said she lost it a week ago. Said she left it on the Metro, maybe, but she wasn’t sure.”

  “A reporter? Losing her computer? Seems unlikely, doesn’t it?” Salvage seemed perturbed. “You believe her?”

  King nodded. “I was very persuasive in my interrogation. If there had been anything she could have told me to make me stop, she would have.” He let a slight sneer show on his face. “You told me she would be difficult, but she folded quickly.”

  “I may have overestimated her,” Salvage admitted. “I could only go by what my client told me.” He leaned over and picked a suitcase out of the bushes to his right, handing it over.

  “Fifty thousand?” King took the suitcase in his gloved hands.

  “You want to count it?”

  For a moment, King worried that he’d offended the man, and he quietly shook his head. “Let me know if you have any other jobs in the future,” he said.

  “I will. You should disappear for a while, though. Just to be sure.”

  King gave a thin smile. “If you insist. Just keep me in mind in the future. And next time, see if you can make it a little bit more of a challenge.” He hoped the other man appreciated a hint of bravado.

  Salvage nodded. “As I said, I may have overestimated her.”

  As King turned and started heading back up the path in the direction he had come, Salvage pulled a small nine-millimeter pistol out of his pocket; a silencer was already attached to the barrel. He pulled the trigger three times in rapid succession, hitting King twice in the back and once in the base of the skull. He pitched forward and fell facedown at the edge of the path.

  “Then again,” Salvage said to King’s corpse, “I may also have overestimated you.”

  He put the pistol in his pocket and moved forward, rifling through the dead man’s clothing, removing his wallet and checking to see if there was anything else that might be used to identify the body. Then he rolled King’s body off the edge of the path, over a small ledge and into the thick bushes, making sure it couldn’t be seen by a casual observer wandering down the path. With luck, it might be weeks before the remains were discovered. Indeed, he wasn’t too far from the spot where a young intern’s body had evaded hundreds of police and National Guardsmen following her affair with a prominent congressman. And even once the body was found, there was nothing to tie King to Salvage—or his client—and there was little need for worry.

  Satisfied with his evening’s work, he took a quick look around. “No loose ends,” he said to himself. Then he picked up the suitcase and headed out of the park.

  Chapter Eight

  THE PHONE STARTLED CASSIAN out of a deep sleep, and he reached over to grab the receiver off the bedside table. “What?” he grunted.

  “Rise and shine, partner, we got work to do.” Jack recognized Train’s voice, and he rubbed his eyes, glancing over toward the clock. Seven-thirty. He’d overslept.

  “Yeah, yeah,” he grumbled. “Gimme twenty minutes.”

  “I’ll be there in ten.” The line went dead and Cassian let his arm fall over his eyes, stretching against the fatigue. He took a deep breath, feeling his chest expand, bringing him to life. He rolled his legs off the bed and sat up, looking around his bedroom. He lived in a two-bedroom off Dupont Circle—nicer than the places most cops could afford, but then Cassian was still single, and the revenue from a modest trust fund his parents had established for him and his brother augmented his salary. He was lucky in that respect; while his family had never been wealthy in the manner of the Chapins, he’d been left with enough money to choose a career based more on his interests than his income. He’d wandered for a few years after college, working at a random series of jobs that included everything
from carpenter to assistant curator at an art museum. He hadn’t joined the force until his mid-twenties, but in spite of the difficulties, he’d never second-guessed his decision. It was the least he could do for Jimmy.

  Thinking about his brother wouldn’t help him through the day, though, and he stood up and headed to the shower. Train wouldn’t be happy to be kept waiting.

  Eleven minutes later, Cassian walked out the front door of his apartment. Train sat in the obese unmarked Crown Victoria, double-parked on the narrow street, leaving just enough room for other cars to get around him. He turned his wrist and tapped his watch, looking back up and shaking his head at his younger partner. Jack shrugged and walked around the car, climbing into the passenger seat.

  “Just getting up, are we?”

  “That’s right,” Jack admitted. “Some of us worked into the early morning.”

  “On?”

  “Research,” Jack said. “I thought it might be interesting to know a little bit more about the Chapins. They’re even bigger than I thought.”

  “Yeah, well, I’m sorry to say that you probably could have gone to bed early and gotten a good night’s sleep, for all your poking around is likely to get us in the end.”

  “How so?”

  “I talked to Deter first thing this morning. We got a clean print off the pocket torch we found in Elizabeth Creay’s apartment, and it came up cherries on the computer.”

  “Really?” Jack thought of the hours he’d spent the night before doing research. He almost felt disappointed. “Anyone we know?” he asked.

  “Yep,” Train answered. He raised his eyebrows as he looked over at his partner. “Jerome Washington.”

  “Jerome Washington?” Jack groaned. “Our Jerome Washington?”

  “That’s the one.”

  “Shit, I thought he was still locked up. When did he get out?”

  “He served two years and got early parole nearly a year ago. Word is that he went right back to the streets.”

  “Big shocker. Where else were you expecting him to go?” Cassian asked sarcastically.

  “I don’t know,” Train said, a simmering anger in his tone. “Don’t they teach these people anything in lockup? Don’t they give them some sort of job training or something?”

  Cassian frowned. “You serious?” He wagged his head. “What do you think, a few lessons in woodshop and an ex-con can walk out to live the American dream? We don’t have enough computers in the schools in the District, but you think the government is going to spend any money educating a bunch of degenerates and killers? And remember, this is Jerome we’re talking about. You really think he’d be interested in studying to be a mechanic or a refrigerator repairman?”

  “You never know.”

  “Yeah, you do. You remember what he did to that kid who crossed him? Ugly shit, partner.”

  “He was never convicted of that. We only proved up the B&E.”

  “Right. Never convicted. Musta’ been innocent, then, huh?”

  Train was pulling his car through traffic on Pennsylvania Avenue, around the endless detour at the 1600 block that had been in place since the attacks of September 11, 2001. “Yeah, I know,” he admitted. “But I knew Jerome before he was a killer. I grew up around his family—good people for the most part. He just got sucked into the life when his father left. Started dealing some drugs on the corner and breaking into houses; it was downhill from there and he got meaner and meaner. Family was helpless.”

  Cassian looked out of the window at all the suits hurrying on their way to work. They all looked the same in their dark blue pinstriped uniforms with their power ties and their expensive leather briefcases. Washington was a city where image was everything, and the minions that turned the great gears of democracy protected their administrative turf from any perceived attack, guarding their images carefully. They cast a polished veneer on the city during the daytime, projecting cleanliness and efficiency. But at night, when they had all headed off to their suburban homes in Virginia and Maryland, the real city came to life, its heart beating out a less even, more human rhythm. “A year and a half in lockup’s a long time,” Cassian pointed out. “You think he was mean before, I bet he was a pussycat compared to where he’s at now.”

  “I know,” Train replied. “I just keep thinkin’ that maybe there’s hope. He was a good kid once.”

  Jack scratched his chin. “I don’t think you change from the kind of mean he became, bro. Once it’s in you it eats everything good left.”

  Train was focused on the road, and wouldn’t look over at Cassian. Finally, he gave a heavy sigh. “I guess we’ll find out soon enough.”

  z

  The trip from Dupont Circle to the southern reaches of the District was a journey filled with contradictions, much like the city itself. Expensive apartment buildings nestled close to decaying brick houses, and excavators and chain-link fences promising shiny new glass-and-steel office towers seemed to creep perilously close to lonely freestanding structures, the great trenches dug to accommodate future parking lots undermining the integrity and stability of their neighbors both figuratively and literally. At one traffic light, a young man in an expensive silk suit and polished thick-soled shoes crossed in front of Train’s car, followed closely by an old man in rumpled, threadbare clothes. Beggars and thieves of all walks of life, Train thought. The old man pulled out a greasy squeegee from under his stained jacket and advanced on Train’s car. Cassian pulled out his badge and tapped it on the windshield in warning, drawing an angry, if resigned, frown from the man, who simply moved on to attack the next car. Once out toward the southern part of the city, though, the neighborhoods settled into a more regular pattern of decreasing affluence as the officers headed toward one of the most dangerous areas of Washington.

  Train pulled the car up to the cracked sidewalk at the corner of First and P streets, Southwest. It was the neighborhood where he’d grown up; where he’d been a hero as a football star at Anacostia High, setting city records in nearly every defensive category—records that stood to this day. He could still remember the celebration on a long-ago Thanksgiving weekend when they’d won the city championship. The entire street was lit up, with people out on their front porches, sipping beers and homemade peach wine, and smiling. Smiling! He had never seen his neighborhood smile with pride the way it had that night, and for a brief moment they’d had reason to hope. In that awful fall of 1968, after the city had been torn apart by riots and protest and war, and just when it seemed to many black Americans that all hope had been stolen by assassins’ bullets, Darius Train had given this tiny, run-down, desolate neighborhood something to believe in again. It was still a moment that inspired great pride for Train—and great pain.

  As he and Cassian got out of the car, Darius paused, looking up at the ramshackle little townhouse. A battered plastic pink flamingo stood in the tiny garden in front of the structure, giving the two detectives a wary eye, as though it had already seen too much.

  “This isn’t gonna be pleasant,” Train said. He’d known Jerome Washington’s mother, Shantal, and her family growing up. Their mothers had been friends, and when Shantal was a little girl, more than ten years his junior, she, like everyone in the area, had worshipped D-Train—the local hero. Three years ago, when Cassian and Train had arrested her son for dealing drugs, it had devastated Shantal; not just because her son was going to jail, but also because her family had been disgraced in front of the great Darius Train.

  Cassian nodded. “You want me to take care of it, and you can wait in the car?”

  Train couldn’t tell whether his partner was kidding, and there was part of him that was tempted to take him up on his offer, but he knew he couldn’t. He shook his head. “Let’s get this over with.”

  They ambled up the front walkway, only to be drawn up short by a high-pitched call from the front porch of the house next door. “Darius Train!” came the voice, startling them both.

  Train looked over and smiled as he recognized
the face. He made a motion for Cassian to relax for a moment, and he strode across the burnt-out grass to the little house, its yellow paint chipping away. “Is that Miss Thelma Thornton?” he called out in a deep, resonant voice.

  “Oh, you know it is, child.” The woman on the porch laughed. Darius could barely see her over the solid wood railing. She was a frail slip of a woman, her hair thinning a bit on top, her shoulders bent forward with age. “Lord, it has been too long since we’ve seen you ’round here, son. A body might begin to think that you’d forgot where you came from.”

  Train leaned his huge frame over the railing and took the woman’s tiny hand in his, kissing it as though meeting a queen. “No, no, Miss Thelma,” he said, letting a slight drawl slip into his voice. “You know there ain’t no chance of that. I live over closer to center of town since I transferred to the station on Capitol Hill.” He gave her a huge smile. “I don’t get down around here quite as often as I like, but you know I could never stay away from you for too long.”

  Thelma Thornton chuckled lightly at that. “Oh, you always were the smooth child, but you shouldn’t be wastin’ it on an old hag like me.” She smiled brightly, revealing a gap where her two front teeth had once been. Then she noticed Cassian behind Train and her smile dimmed slightly. “Have you lost your manners, Darius?” she scolded Train. “Who’s your friend?”

  Train looked over his shoulder and flushed. “That’s my partner, Jack Cassian,” he said, looking guilty.

  “Nice to see you, ma’am,” Jack offered.

  “Humph,” the old woman grunted, turning her attention back to Train. “You boys here on official business, then?” she asked, raising an eyebrow.

  “Well . . .” Darius sputtered, caught off guard by the question.

  “Never mind,” Thelma said. “I don’t want to know. My business is my business, and yours is yours.” She cast a quick glance over toward the Washington house, where the detectives had clearly been headed before she stopped them. “The same goes for everyone else in this neighborhood.” She bowed her head a moment, as if in mourning. Then she raised it again and her smile had returned, though Darius thought he saw a tinge of sorrow in the corner of her mouth. “I’m just glad to see you, son,” she said. “It’s people like you that have given a lot of us hope.” She looked over his shoulder again, toward Cassian. “You know you’re riding with a legend here, right, mister?” she called out.