Stabbing in the Senate

by Colleen J. Shogan

  Duh. I wasn’t born yesterday. So this guy was going to make it difficult. I’d have to fight fire with fire. “I know, but it was an emergency.” I paused for a moment to increase the dramatic effect. “A female situation, if you know what I mean.”

  Instantly, Kyle and mystery man’s faces turned a dark red. That was the end of the conversation. Kyle could barely stammer a response. “Of course, if there was an emergency, it makes sense for you to find a bathroom. Don’t worry about it.”

  He motioned for us to leave the office, and the three of us followed, Meg and me lagging behind. Jabbing me in the ribs, Meg whispered, “Female troubles? Was that really the best you could do?”

  I muttered, “Shut up. It worked. Now let’s get out of here.”

  Meg went into wrap-up mode and gushed at Kyle about how kind he was to welcome us into the office and how impressed she was with the quality of the staff, and so on. I willfully suppressed any appearance of incredulity because Kyle seemed to buy her line of bull.

  As we were about to leave, Kyle glanced at his desk. Good gracious. Since I’d fled to the bathroom, I never had the opportunity to put his phone back on the receiver. Frowning, Kyle said, “Why is my phone off the hook? How could that have happened?” He looked over at us with what I hoped wasn’t suspicion.

  Maybe it was the pressure I had been under lately or the fact I felt like I’d been lying constantly during the past seventy-two hours. At any rate, I was speechless. I had run out of fibs, fabrications, or downright falsehoods. A little voice inside of me wanted to shout the truth. YES, I TOOK THE DAMN PHONE OFF THE HOOK. I WAS SNOOPING IN YOUR BOSS’S OFFICE BECAUSE HE MIGHT HAVE KILLED MY BOSS.

  Fortunately Meg’s real voice drowned out my little one. She must have taken one look at me and figured out I had been the one to put Kyle’s phone out of commission. Without losing a beat, she piped up, “Oh, I knock my phone off its cradle on a daily basis. If I’m not careful, it happens a couple times a day. These phones they give us in Congress are so flimsy.” She giggled coquettishly.

  I looked over at Kyle. Surely, he wouldn’t buy this?

  Remarkably, it seemed he had. His brow furrowed. “It never happens to me, but I guess you’re right. If you’re looking for papers on your desk and you happen to brush the receiver, there’s not much to keep it in its place.”

  Meg breathed a sigh of relief. “Of course. And your voicemail isn’t blinking, so you didn’t even miss a call. No harm done!” She rewarded Kyle with her most radiant smile.

  He returned her grin with one of his own. “Meg, I wish you belonged to my party. I’d hire you in a second! You always focus on the positive side of any situation. Your boss died unexpectedly, and yet you took valuable time to walk over here and talk to us about a constituent problem. You’re truly a laudable public servant.”

  I turned away in case the grimace I felt coming on surfaced. This charade needed to end so I could get out of here with a straight face. We had come to investigate his boss for killing our boss, and now Meg was being nominated for Capitol Hill Staffer of the Year? It was time to get the heck out of Dodge. “Kyle, you’re one hundred percent correct. Truly, there’s no congressional staffer like Meg. Thanks for taking the time to meet with us today.”

  I turned toward Meg. “Shouldn’t we return to our office? People might start to miss us, right?”

  Meg got my drift. “Yes, absolutely. Kyle, it was great to see you!” She turned to leave.

  Kyle wasn’t going to let her off that easily. “Aren’t you forgetting something, Meg?”

  She looked at her purse and checked to make sure she had everything. “No, I don’t think so. I have my BlackBerry, and I gave the casework file to you and your staff.” She smiled sweetly at him.

  He shook his head. “We were so busy talking business, you didn’t tell me where we’re going after work tonight.” Kyle’s hopeful gaze reminded me of Clarence when he begged for a doggie treat.

  I prayed Meg wouldn’t dump Kyle right at this moment. First, it would be incredibly uncomfortable to watch. Second, it might seem suspicious to Kyle that she’d had such an abrupt change of heart. Third, I wanted to get out of that office before someone figured out I’d been snooping around the Congressman’s desk while Meg had been flirting with the chief of staff. I didn’t need to feel the cold steel of handcuffs on my wrists twice in one week.

  Meg must have decided to avoid a scene. She flashed her pearly whites and touched Kyle lightly on his arm. Drawling sweetly, she teased, “Of course. Don’t you worry. I didn’t forget about our plans. You’re not getting off that easy.”

  Relief washed over Kyle’s face.

  She offered, “Why don’t I text you closer to six so we can figure out what makes sense?”

  Kyle looked skeptical. He clearly would have preferred a game plan before he let Meg out of his sight. He said, “I guess that makes sense. Do you have my number?”

  Meg winked at him and tapped her BlackBerry. “All your info is right here.”

  He looked slightly relieved that Meg had his number already programmed into her mobile device. Kyle obviously had little experience with women such as Meg, however. I had witnessed her moves over the years, and this was a replay of her classic brush-off routine.

  We bid our final farewells and cruised out of the office. Before debriefing, we waited until we had exited the elevator—a notorious Capitol Hill location for eavesdropping. When I told Meg what I had found in Jessop’s appointment book, she was giddy with excitement. “Can you believe our plan worked perfectly?”

  “I can’t believe we didn’t get caught. How did you manage to keep Kyle busy for all that time?”

  “It was easy. I took a relatively simple constituent problem and turned it into something as complicated as the national debt. Every time he thought we had wrapped it up, I mentioned a new wrinkle. It will probably keep that poor guy who inherited it in Jessop’s office busy for the next month!” She threw her head back and laughed.

  I turned to face my friend, hands on my hips. “If I didn’t know you better, Meg, I’d conclude you actually enjoyed breaking into a member of Congress’s office.”

  Her face lit up. “You know, it’s funny you should say that. Although I was nervous, especially when we found you in Jessop’s bathroom, I did enjoy myself. This afternoon was the first time in months I actually felt alive!” The look on her face was as serious as I’d ever seen on Meg. “Have you ever thought Senator Langsford’s death might give you a new career opportunity?”

  Even though our conversation had been light in tone until this point, Meg wasn’t kidding. Though she was a notorious flirt who placed too much importance on her social life, she was no slouch. All joking aside, Kyle had been right. Meg was an impressive Capitol Hill staffer. Senator Langsford had always thought of her as a valuable policy advisor. Meg was no stereotypical Capitol Hill party girl. Sure, she liked her happy hours and moved from guy to guy like they were going out of style, but that in no way diminished the formidable depth of her abilities and intelligence. As she had demonstrated in the past several days, she could think quickly on her feet and had a sharp wit that would serve her well, no matter where she worked in Washington.

  “I need to start thinking about a new job,” Meg said, “but to tell you the truth, I haven’t focused yet. It’s pretty irresponsible. The truth is I haven’t come to terms with the fact we’re not going to be working for Senator Langsford anymore.”

  Meg and I were walking the block separating the House from the Senate. We had just passed the Library of Congress on our right and were almost directly across from the East Front of the Capitol. So far I had kept my emotions in check since the senator’s death. I had been obsessed with clearing my name, then finding his real killer. The preoccupation with these two goals had driven all thoughts of sorrow out of my head. Suddenly I was overcome with sadness, and tears started streaming down my face. Slightly embarrassed, since there were gaggles of tourists surrounding the public
entrance to the Capitol Visitor Center, I tried to wipe away the waterworks.

  Meg stopped in her tracks. “Hey, Kit, I’m sorry I brought up our next jobs. I know you were attached to Senator Langsford more than I was. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

  I shook my head at Meg’s apology. She had worked on the Hill for other senators before coming to Langsford’s office, and she knew what it was like to leave one Capitol Hill office for another. This was new territory for me, but it wasn’t her comments that had brought on my tears. My own suppression of the dark feelings I had about ending my tenure as a Langsford staffer had triggered the emotional outburst, along with my genuine grief over my boss’s terrible fate and my unknown and possibly nonexistent future in Washington, D.C. Doug was settled in his job, and he would always have his colleagues at Georgetown. Now I would be forced to find a whole new professional home, and it wasn’t a change I ever thought I’d have to consider.

  Panic seized me. What if I couldn’t find another job in Washington? I doubted Doug would leave his appointment at Georgetown to take a job at another university. We weren’t married, and that was another source of worry. With no firm commitment from him, a long span of unemployment could doom our relationship.

  I had to stop thinking this way. Negativity had the power to paralyze me, and I couldn’t afford a mental breakdown right now.

  “It’s not your fault, Meg. I haven’t made plans beyond working for Senator Langsford because on some level, I don’t want to think beyond this job. If I leave this job ….” I paused to correct myself. “When I leave this job, I’ll need to start over. Most likely, that new job will mean moving onto an office without you. And to tell you the truth, the prospect of facing Capitol Hill without you scares me!”

  It wasn’t easy baring my soul, even to Meg. On one hand, I was grateful for the opportunity to tell her how I truly felt. On the other hand, it was tough for me to admit my deepest insecurities about my career and future.

  Meg faced me directly and put her hands on my shoulders. I had gotten her attention, since this departure from my typical even-keel approach was unusual. “Kit, I should be the scared one. You’ve always been the voice of reason for me in Langsford’s office. I worked in other places on Capitol Hill before Senator Langsford, but no office was as high profile. Anytime I came close to trouble, you had my back. We’ve had four years to work for one of the best senators in recent history. Don’t you think we’ve learned something during that time? I didn’t want Senator Langsford to die. We can’t control the fact that his life was taken from him. Now we have to move on. As I look at it, we need to count our blessings for the time we had together and use that experience to figure out our next step.”

  My tears had dried, and I grasped Meg’s hands in mine. “You’re absolutely right. Instead of focusing on the fact that we no longer work for Senator Langsford, I should have been thinking about the good times we had together.”

  Meg put her arm around my waist, and we continued to walk toward our office. On our way back, we talked about the great moments we’d witnessed as staffers for Senator Langsford. He’d been a major player on several landmark pieces of legislation, and it had been extraordinary to share those victories as part of his team.

  We also talked about the fun times we’d had together as a staff. Matt had been a constant source of inspiration as our legislative director and immediate boss. It would be hard to find another supervisor like him. Lucinda had her quirks, but demonstrated the value of loyalty in Washington, D.C. When I thought about her relationship to Carter Power and any possible connection to Langsford’s death, I remembered the tears she shed on the morning of his death, when others who were close to him showed little or no grief. Despite Meg’s opinion of him, I would even miss Trevor. I had gotten used to his wisecracks, and in the past few days his practical wisdom and sound advice had helped with the investigation.

  As we neared the Hart Building, for the second time today I had a strange feeling I had missed something important. I couldn’t put my finger on it. Nothing Meg and I had discussed during our stroll down memory lane had been particularly riveting. I pushed aside the nagging internal voice as we returned to our office suite. Emails and phone messages required my attention, but I made a mental note to revisit my odd premonition later when I could focus on it.

  For the next several hours, I provided information about tomorrow’s wake or an address for condolences. Several supplicants asked who my successor would be when Senator Langsford’s replacement was named. I deleted those messages out of pure annoyance. There were only so many mental tribulations one person could endure in one day.

  I glanced at the time on my computer and decided it was time to go home. I was gathering my possessions when the phone rang. I didn’t recognize the number. That wasn’t surprising since I barely knew many of the people who had called today about the wake.

  With my purse in tow, I picked up the phone with my left hand and balanced the receiver under my chin. Fiddling with my mouse to shut down the computer for the night, I answered, “Kit Marshall speaking.”

  There was a pause on the line. I could hear faint breathing. Then a robotic voice came on the line.

  “QUIT SNOOPING AROUND OR YOU’LL BE NEXT.”

  Chapter 19

  It took me several seconds to realize the voice on the line had been digitally altered. I stammered, “What d-did you say?” The next sound was a dial tone.

  I glanced at my desk phone. As I suspected, the call had already disconnected and no number was visible on the screen. I had no idea who had called me. It hadn’t come from inside the Senate since no identifying name had popped up with the number. There was absolutely no way I could recall the row of digits that had flashed before my eyes.

  Abject fear would have been a normal reaction, yet my response was quite the opposite. I slammed the phone down in its cradle. My side of the office suite was empty. I asked loudly, “Meg, are you there?”

  Almost instantly, she was standing right next to me. “How did you get here so fast?”

  “I was walking over to say goodnight. What’s up?”

  She listened intently, her eyes growing wider as I recounted the mysterious caller’s ominous threat. “Kit, this is serious. You need to contact Detective O’Halloran right away. Your life could be in danger.” She wavered a second. “I mean, my life could be in danger, too.”

  My angry defiance hadn’t subsided. “Not so fast, Meg. Do you know what this phone call means?”

  “That Langsford’s killer wants to make us the next victims?” she asked.

  Meg had conveniently interpreted a brazen threat on my life as synonymous to a threat on her own. There was no point in calling out her self-centered behavior at this point.

  “No. It means more than that. It means we’re on the right track, and the killer knows it.”

  Meg grabbed my shoulders and gave me a gentle shake. “Kit, when the killer isn’t happy about something, do I need to remind you what happens? Someone dies.”

  “No one else is going to die, especially if we ask the right questions. We’re going to figure this out before that can happen. If we tell O’Halloran about the phone call, he’ll forbid us from any further investigating. If that happens, how long is it going to take for the police to catch the killer?”

  “You’re right. If we tell the police, we’re off the case.” She rubbed her chin, seemingly deep in contemplation of our options.

  I interrupted the silence. “This phone call should be our little secret for now. Let’s see what we can find out tomorrow at the wake.”

  “Aren’t you going to tell Doug about it?”

  “No way,” I answered immediately. “He’d be worse than O’Halloran. He wouldn’t let me out of the condo for a week if I told him. Like I said, I think we should keep this between us for now.” I gave her arm a squeeze.

  My reasoning appealed to several of Meg’s personality foibles. She treasured secrets and the exclusivity that came
with them. She also loved knowing something I wasn’t going to share with my boyfriend. At times, Meg and Doug competed with each other for privileged status. Meg often lost to Doug, but sharing this secret with only me gave her a huge advantage.

  A smile slowly spread across Meg’s face. “I’ll make a deal with you. I’ll keep your secret, but if you get another threatening phone call, you have to promise to call Detective O’Halloran right away.” She grabbed my hand in hers. “I mean it, Kit. No fooling around. Will you promise me?”

  I clenched her hand in response. “I promise. It’s not going to come to that, though. We’re going to find out who did this to our boss. We’re making the killer nervous, and that means we’re closing in.”

  Meg’s BlackBerry buzzed, and she glanced at it. “I should have known. Guess who?”

  “I wouldn’t even want to venture a guess, given your long list of suitors.”

  Meg grinned. “It’s Kyle, of course.”

  “Are you going to try to come up with an inventive excuse to avoid meeting him tonight?”

  Meg fiddled with her device, and I thought I saw her blush. “Actually, I might go out with him. He’s not a terrible guy.”

  I raised my eyebrows, since Meg’s taste in men usually ranged from burly Capitol Hill police officers to attractive and sophisticated lobbyists on K Street. From what I had seen, Kyle didn’t fit within the realm of hunks Meg regularly entertained. Nonetheless, Kyle did seem like a nice guy. Maybe Meg was starting to cast her net a bit wider. If I pressed her, she might change her mind. The less said, the better. I exclaimed with as much enthusiasm as I could muster, “Why not? Have fun tonight!”

  I reminded her that the pick-up time was early tomorrow morning at the Metro if she wanted a ride to the senator’s wake. We finalized our plans, and I decided it was time to head home to Doug and Clarence, who were no doubt awaiting my arrival with bated breath. Before we parted, she reminded me once again to be careful. My three-fingered Girl Scout promise acknowledged her warning.