by Mike Lawson
This was like Mike Tyson challenging his girlfriend to a fight. Morelli had DeMarco outweighed and outclassed, and they both knew it.
Trying to maintain a semblance of dignity, DeMarco said, “I informed the police of your wife’s accusations because I felt I had an obligation to do so. I’ve done everything I intend to do.”
And he realized, at that moment, that what he had just said was the complete truth. He was in so far over his head he wasn’t going to have anything more to do with Paul Morelli, no matter what Mahoney said.
Morelli stared at DeMarco as he considered DeMarco’s response. Finally he said, speaking almost in a whisper, “Joe, who put you up to this?”
Now DeMarco understood the reason for this meeting. It wasn’t to find out what DeMarco knew—or even to threaten him. Morelli had called him here to find out if there was someone with real power behind him—and DeMarco was not about to tell him. The possibility of the Speaker’s taking his side against Morelli was slim, but a slim chance was better than no chance at all.
“No one put me up to anything, Senator.”
“You did this all on your own? Is that what you expect me to believe?
“Yes, sir”
“I don’t think so.”
Apparently Morelli couldn’t picture DeMarco without a master holding his leash.
“Who do you work for, Joe?” Morelli asked again.
“No one, Senator. My office is independent.”
This made Morelli smile. “Joe, you’re a GS-13. There’s no such thing as an independent GS-13 in D.C.”
DeMarco didn’t answer.
“John Mahoney referred you to me. Do you work for John?”
Oh, shit.
“No, sir,” DeMarco said. “I’ve done some work for the Speaker in the past but I don’t report to him. He just asked me to talk to Dick Finley.”
Morelli thought about DeMarco’s response for a moment, then nodded his head. “Yes, John’s a friend. He’d never try to bring me down in such an underhanded manner. So it must be somebody else. Did some Republican put you up to this?”
Now that was rich: Morelli acting like the Republicans were the root of all evil when he was the one who had killed to stay in power.
“No, sir,” DeMarco said. “It’s like I told you, my position is independent of any politician or political party. I’m just a lawyer who exists to serve the members of Congress.”
“You haven’t served me very well, have you, Joe?”
There was nothing he could say to that.
Morelli looked at DeMarco for a moment, then rose slowly to his feet and walked back over to the window where he had been posing when DeMarco entered the room.
“Do you know why I’m going to the White House this morning?” Morelli said, glancing up at the Capitol’s dome.
“No.”
“The president can’t get his welfare reform plan through Congress. It’s not a bad plan but he can’t get the legislature to . . . embrace it. I’m going to the White House to tell the president how to sell his plan.”
He shook his head in dismay, thinking of the president’s incompetence.
“And do you know what I’m doing this afternoon?”
“No.”
“I’m meeting with select members of the House and Senate to introduce the most sweeping gun-control legislation this country has ever seen. I guarantee you that within ten years gun-related crime in this country will be reduced so drastically that you’ll think you’re living in Switzerland. And do you know who’s going to be sitting beside me when I introduce this bill?”
DeMarco shook his head. He had no idea why Morelli was telling him all this, but anything was better than being grilled about who his boss was.
“Some of the most influential members of the NRA,” Morelli said. “I’m going to call it Lydia’s Bill—you know, like the Brady Bill—and the tragedy of my wife’s death will be the wellspring of something glorious.”
DeMarco realized Morelli was being completely sincere: he was proud that he was able to use his wife’s murder to produce legislation that would keep others from being killed. He had taken cold pragmatism to a new level; stone had more conscience than he did.
Morelli fixed his dark eyes on DeMarco, and for a moment DeMarco felt the magnetic pull of his personality. “Joe, you must believe me,” he said, “when I tell you I can create a new American reality. A reality that we will be proud to pass on to our children.”
Paul Morelli was absolutely certain that he was fated to rule the nation and nothing but good would come of his ruling. He saw visions that others were too small and too dull to appreciate—and God help those others if they got in his way.
“I feel we’re at a dangerous crossroads, Joe. This great country, myself . . . and you. You don’t want to choose the wrong path; there’s too much at stake. Now tell me who you’re working for.”
“Senator, it’s like I said, I—”
“Joe,” he interrupted, “I don’t have time for this.” For the first time Morelli’s control slipped—just a bit—and the cold fury behind his soft-spoken words was naked and frightening.
He walked over to the chair where DeMarco was sitting, leaned down, and placed his hands on the arms of the chair. His face was only inches from DeMarco’s, so close his black eyes were lasers boring into DeMarco’s brain.
“You must understand,” Morelli said. “I will allow no one to stop me. No one!”
His eyes pinned DeMarco to the chair.
“Do you understand, Joe?”
DeMarco nodded his head. Here was this politician in a suit—not some outlaw biker with a chain in his hand or some hood armed to the teeth—and Paul Morelli was scaring the crap out of him.
Burrows came back into the office at that moment. “Senator, we have to get going,” he said. “The car’s out front and so’s the press. They must have heard about your meeting with the president.”
Morelli ignored Burrows. He remained in the same position for what seemed an eternity, his face close to DeMarco’s.
“Do you understand?” he said again in that same soft voice.
DeMarco nodded.
Apparently satisfied, Morelli straightened up and said, “I hope so, Joe. I really do.”
Burrows handed the senator his topcoat and helped him into it. Turning to DeMarco, Morelli said in that same even, reasonable voice, “I’ll find out eventually who put you up to this but regardless of who it was, I think you should plan on leaving Washington. It would be in your best interest. Don’t you agree?”
DeMarco nodded again. He was starting to feel like one of those head-bobbing Kewpie dolls on the rear-window ledge of a car.
“Then thank you for coming today,” Morelli said and turned and left the room.
Burrows started to follow his boss out of the office, but then he turned and made his hand into a pistol—thumb raised, index finger extended—and shot an imaginary bullet through DeMarco’s brain. Abe Burrows didn’t look like a clown anymore.
DeMarco stood alone in the center of Morelli’s office, numb and disoriented. He had just been told to leave town by a man who would soon be the most powerful man in the world—the next president of the United States. He looked out the window. The sight of the Capitol’s dome, instead of assuring him that he was safe, protected by law and its many servants, merely added to the unreality of his circumstance.
Chapter 44
DeMarco left Morelli’s office and found himself behind the senator’s entourage as they made their way toward the main entrance of the Russell Building. The group made a reverse flying wedge as it approached the doorway: the two bodyguards from the reception area were walking together, slightly ahead of the senator; the senator and Burrows walked side by side, their heads close as they conversed; a second aide was directly behind the senator, carrying a heavy briefcase. And then came DeMarco, trailing a few paces behind Morelli’s party, like a reluctant goose on a southbound flight.
Morelli exited
the building and was stopped immediately on the landing, just beyond the doorway, his way blocked by a reporter and her cameraman. The reporter was a twenty-something brunette wearing a short skirt to show off her legs and large-framed glasses to convince her audience that she was a serious journalist. Her gray-bearded cameraman looked bored, clearly wishing he was someplace else; it had been a long time since he’d found a politician worth filming.
At this point, time shifted into slow motion.
The reporter was asking Morelli something, pushing the microphone toward his face, but DeMarco didn’t hear what she said because over the senator’s shoulder, at the bottom of the steps, near the curb, he could see a man in an Oakland Raiders jacket. It was Marcus Perry.
Marcus began to ascend the steps toward the landing where the senator was standing. His face was expressionless, his eyes fixed on Morelli. There was a gun in his right hand, held down, partially obscured by his right leg.
Morelli’s bodyguards were looking around nonchalantly, checking the limo parked at the curb, checking the legs of the reporter. They were looking everywhere but at Marcus Perry.
Marcus started to raise his right arm.
DeMarco screamed, “Marcus, don’t!”
Marcus ignored him. The center—and end—of his universe was Paul Morelli.
One of the bodyguards looked back to see why DeMarco was shouting, but the other guard saw the gun in Marcus’s hand. Marcus was now halfway up the steps, less than thirty feet from Morelli. The guard who saw that Marcus was armed scrambled frantically beneath his jacket for his own weapon, but at that moment Abe Burrows shoved past the man, knocking him off-balance.
Burrows stepped in front of Morelli and held up his hand to stop Marcus from coming any closer. DeMarco didn’t think that Burrows was trying to shield the senator; he didn’t think that Burrows had even seen the gun in Marcus’s hand. Burrows was simply trying to keep him from bothering the senator during the press conference. Abe was used to running interference for Morelli—it was something he did automatically, like helping him into his coat. Abe’s final act was a gesture of spontaneous helpfulness for the person he most adored.
Instead of Macus’s bullets hitting Morelli, the first one struck Burrows in the chest, the second one in the throat. Some of the blood from the second shot sprayed onto the second aide’s face, but miraculously, not a drop touched Paul Morelli.
Morelli didn’t move—not one inch. He didn’t duck or turn to run back inside the building or take any other action to avoid being killed. Because DeMarco was behind him, he couldn’t see the expression on Morelli’s face, but that evening on the news he would see it as they played and replayed those moments. Morelli just stood there on the landing, looking down the steps at Marcus Perry with as much emotion as a man would display surveying the morning sky for rain.
How he could have done that—stood there fearlessly, not the least concerned for his own safety—may have been the clearest sign of Paul Morelli’s megalomania. Or he may have had the presence of mind to know that a camera was focused on him, and he was determined not to look like a coward. But DeMarco didn’t think that was it. DeMarco thought that Morelli was unafraid because he knew, without any doubt, that some poor black kid with a gun had no more chance of derailing his destiny than the autumn leaves drifting down from the trees.
Before Marcus could fire a third shot, weapons bloomed in the hands of both bodyguards. The weapons were some kind of small machine guns, Uzis or Mac-10s. Whatever the hell they were, they fired bullets at an incredible rate. DeMarco didn’t know how many bullets hit Marcus. He seemed to stand there forever, jerking like a spastic puppet as round after round struck him in the chest.
When the shooting stopped, time resumed its normal pace. The female reporter was lying on the ground sobbing. The aide who’d been splattered with Abe Burrows’s blood was running his hands frantically over his body, not sure if he’d been hit or not. The two guards, guns smoking, were breathing so hard they were almost hyperventilating.
The senator stood a moment surveying the carnage, then stepped over Burrows’s body and helped the reporter to her feet. Burrows clearly was of no more use to him; the reporter had some potential value. One of the bodyguards, being less pragmatic than Morelli, knelt down and checked Burrows’s pulse, although it was obvious the gesture was a waste of time.
DeMarco walked past them all, down the steps to where Marcus Perry lay. His eyes were open, staring up blindly at a pewter-colored sky.
Marcus had had no plan at all. He had simply driven to the Russell Building hoping to catch Morelli outdoors. Maybe it hadn’t occured to him that the senator would have a security detail—or maybe it did, and he just didn’t care.
DeMarco knew the media would portray Marcus’s attempt to avenge his brother’s death as nothing more than a grisly continuation of the senseless cycle of violence perpetuated daily in the projects: you kill mine, I kill you, and on it goes. But DeMarco knew it was deeper than that. Marcus had genuinely cared for his brother, and he knew, as DeMarco did, that Paul Morelli would never pay for his crime. Unlike DeMarco, though, Marcus had had the courage to do something.
Within minutes of the shooting, the Russell Building was surrounded by flashing blue and red lights. Uniformed members of the Capitol police descended on the scene in droves, delighted to have something more exciting to do than provide directions to tourists. Ignoring everyone around him, Morelli knelt dramatically at the side of his fallen aide and as he did the cameraman recorded his grief and the reporter talked into her mike. The pretty reporter was looking at Morelli with eyes that radiated something more than admiration, something just less than lust.
As DeMarco stood at the bottom of the steps near the spreading pool of blood that had drained from Marcus Perry, he looked up at Morelli and for an instant their eyes met. It may have been DeMarco’s imagination, but he thought he saw the senator’s lips briefly compress into a thin, self-satisfied smile. Morelli knew that with Burrows and Marcus both dead, there was no one left to contradict his story of Lydia’s death.
Chapter 45
DeMarco walked away from the blood-washed concrete in front of the Russell Building and pushed his way through the gathering crowd. As he made his way across the Capitol’s grounds, the spines of fallen leaves snapping under his feet sounded like gunshots. He stopped when he came to a quiet spot where he could talk and pulled out his cell phone.
To get quickly past Mahoney’s secretary, DeMarco told her he was the president’s chief of staff.
“Billy, me boyo,” the Speaker said jovially when he answered the phone.
“It’s me,” DeMarco said.
“What the fuck?” the Speaker responded.
“Turn on your television. Channel 4,” DeMarco said.
Momentarily he heard the sound of the television and Mahoney saying “Jesus Christ” several times. Then Mahoney said into the phone, “Hey, that’s you. What the hell are you doing there?”
“The cops ratted me out to Morelli,” DeMarco said. “I went to see them yesterday, to try to convince them that they needed to reopen the investigation into Lydia’s death, and they told the senator. This morning he called me to his office and said he was going to litigate me into the poorhouse if I continued to pursue this thing. Then he told me to leave town.”
“That dumb son of a bitch,” Mahoney said.
“Morelli?” DeMarco said.
“No, that black kid,” Mahoney said, apparently still watching the television. “What the hell was he thinking?”
“Did you hear what I said?” DeMarco said. “Morelli told me to leave Washington.”
“Yeah,” Mahoney said.
Yeah, what? DeMarco waited for Mahoney to say something else, and when he didn’t, DeMarco said, “But the real reason Morelli called me to his office was to find out who I was working for.”
“Son of a bitch,” the Speaker muttered. Now DeMarco had his attention. “So what did you tell him?”
&n
bsp; “I told him I didn’t work for anyone.”
“Did he believe you?”
“No,” DeMarco said. “And I’ll tell you something else: with Burrows and Marcus Perry both dead, Morelli’s untouchable.”
The Speaker was silent for several seconds. DeMarco could hear the television set in the background. Finally Mahoney spoke.
“Goddamn, son,” he said, “you’ve sure fucked this up.”
DeMarco entered the Capitol and descended the steps to his subbasement office. He bolted the door, took the phone on his desk off the hook, and shut off his cell phone. He needed to think; he needed to figure out what to do next.
He ultimately concluded that the answer was: do nothing.
Like he’d told Mahoney, the likelihood of ever convicting Paul Morelli for murdering his wife was now zero with Marcus Perry and Abe Burrows both dead. In addition to the lack of witnesses, there was the fact that the cops were unwilling to even consider that a man of Morelli’s reputation and stature could be a murderer. And with Lydia dead, it seemed equally unlikely that he’d ever be able to connect Morelli to this powerful man who had been committing crimes for years to advance Morelli’s political career. Finally, it was also obvious from talking to the women that Morelli had raped—he now had no doubt that Lydia had told him the truth about what Morelli had done—that neither Davenport nor Tyler was likely to ever testify against their attacker.
Paul Morelli, it appeared, was bulletproof.
DeMarco also knew that he was worrying about the wrong problem. Forget Morelli. What was going to happen to him? Oddly enough, he realized that he wasn’t afraid that Morelli would have him killed. Morelli wasn’t a crazed serial killer—he was a pragmatic man. He’d only killed his wife because he could think of no other way to silence her. But he didn’t need to kill lowly Joe DeMarco, a man with no clout or authority and not one speck of evidence that could harm him. So Morelli probably wouldn’t kill him but he might make good on his promise to ruin DeMarco professionally and financially and run him out of town. And would John Mahoney be there to save him from Morelli? Yeah, right. DeMarco laughed out loud at that idea. Mahoney’s only concern was that he not get into the crosshairs of the future president of the United States.
