“Are you buying?”
“I’m searching. Trying to get a residence list at the time of Scarlett Gould’s murder. Our victim was spending a suspicious amount of time there before her death.”
“You learned that from Denise?”
“After much interrogation.”
“So it was all business last night.”
“It always is, chief,” she said.
“You’re getting as bad as me.”
“After Scarlett broke up with Bradley boy, she had a few dates here and there, nothing special. But she always confided in her dear friend Denise. And then, suddenly she clammed. Nothing going on, she told Denise. But Denise suspected something, especially when Scarlett suddenly vanished from her Find Friends app. That’s always the tell, right? And still being in love with her college fling, one night, after one of their after-work drinks, Denise followed Scarlett until she disappeared into the lobby of this apartment building, which happens to be not a stone’s throw from Rock Creek Park. And Denise got the sense, by the way Scarlett greeted the doorman and strode into the building, that she had been there before.”
“Did Denise tell this to the police?”
“That she was still so romantically unhinged over her ex-lover that she had been stalking her before the murder? No, she did not.”
“But she told you.”
“I have skills.”
“I assume all the residents have some money, but this is about more than money. When you get the list, try to match it up with a database of political heavyweights. See if we can come up with a name.”
“Will do.”
“Then get me photographs.”
“What is it with you and photographs?”
“You know those bulletin boards you see in the cop shows with all the photographs and articles and the crazy pieces of yarn to show the connections, the one that makes all the detectives look a bit unhinged?”
“Yeah, so?”
“I want one.”
From the digital recording:
Q: When was the first time you got drunk?
A: I don’t know. I was eleven or something. I stole the liquor from my father.
Q: When was the first time you set something on fire?
A: How do you know I did?
Q: You didn’t?
A: There was a job site on our block in New Jersey. They were building a house. I thought it would be this wild, exciting thing, but it was just a few burned timbers and a bit of smoke. Disappointing, actually.
Q: How old were you?
A: I don’t know. Grade school.
Q: When did you lose your virginity?
A: Eleven.
Q: It was a busy year.
A: Why do you think I stole the liquor? She was fifteen. She was only with me for the booze.
Q: Did you ever hurt an animal as a boy?
A: Next question.
Q: Okay, Phil. Agree or disagree: I make a point of trying not to hurt others in pursuit of my goals.
A: Actually, I agree with that. I have found that making everyone happy is the best way to run off with everything. You make enemies, you make problems. I’m pretty good at manipulating other people’s feelings, and the most profitable way to manipulate them is to make them like you.
Q: Agree or disagree: I would be upset if my success came at someone else’s expense.
A: Now you’re making a joke.
“Hello. Is this Dick, Dick Triplett?”
“Alberto, it’s good to hear from you,” I said into my cell phone. I was in the living room of our suite, taping photographs and maps onto the wall. “I just didn’t expect to hear from you so soon.”
“I didn’t expect to be calling you so soon myself, but it has begun.”
“What has begun?”
“You said there would be pushback.”
“Yes I did.”
“First I need to warn you. There will be an article in the newspaper.”
“Oh man, Alberto. Is this you ginning up business?”
“Heavens no, I tried to stop it. It is nothing that I wanted, but it is unavoidable. The Goulds, our clients, called the press. They have a lot of anger, which I unfortunately had to stoke to get their signatures. I specifically asked them to stay quiet about our arrangement, but they felt the need to talk. A reporter called me and asked about my plans. I had no choice but to speak to her.”
“Did you mention me?”
“No, of course not. I just mentioned that the family had some new information we intended to pursue. It was a brief conversation, but shortly afterward the police called. A Detective Pickering. The detective asked about this new information.”
“The reporter must have called the police asking for comment. I bet the cop wasn’t pleased.”
“Not at all, my friend. I tried to calm the situation. First I told the detective not to talk to my clients. Then I promised that if we found anything definitive, we would certainly turn it over. In the course of our conversation my unfortunate history was brought up and I was threatened with obstruction of justice. Imagine that, someone in my position, an officer of the court being threatened with obstruction of justice. Imagine how that made me feel.”
“And how did that make you feel, Alberto?”
“Alive.”
“Good. Hold on a second, please.”
Riley had come over with a handful of papers. “I found something,” she said.
I put the phone on mute. “Go ahead.”
“I’ve been riffling through the DC Recorder of Deeds website, trying to find the condo owners on the relevant date, and this came up. Rufus and Melissa Davenport. Penthouse. Four point five mil.”
“Sweet.”
“They’re still there. It turns out rich little Rufus is the son of Jules Davenport, the senior senator from Rhode Island and chairman of the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs.”
“Banking?” I said, my eyes brightening.
“Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs.”
“Funny, I don’t think it’s a concern for urban affairs that pays for the son’s four-point-five-million-dollar penthouse. Photographs?”
She handed me a photo of suits and smiles, with three figures circled. An older man with a rock jaw and leonine hair, a much younger man, squat with rodent eyes, and a woman quite attractive with dark hair and white teeth, holding a champagne flute with a slender hand. One of them, I assumed, was the face of the murderer I had been assigned to protect.
I pulled off a strip of tape and stuck the photograph to the wall, between photographs of Denise Brucker and Scarlett Gould. Then I unmuted the phone and put it back to my ear.
“Thank you for telling me about the article and the police, Alberto. If we keep quiet for a bit, this all will pass. No more talking, all right?”
“Of course. But the phone call from the detective is not the pushback I was referring to. A call from the police is simply to be expected. No, the pushback was a bit more alarming.”
“Go ahead, Alberto.”
“A man came to the office and sat down without being invited and began talking about football.”
“Football?”
“About football, Dick. I have been in this country more than forty years and still I care not a whit about American football. But he spoke about the back and forth, the strategy, the violence. And as he talked of the danger, he mentioned some names. I wrote them down as soon as he left. Mike Webster. Andre Waters. Junior Seau. Who are these men, Dick?”
“Just players.”
“My sense was that they are not in such good shape anymore.”
“Your sense is correct, Alberto.”
“So it was a threat.”
“Yes, it was a threat.”
“Then he asked who brought me in.”
“What did you tell him?”
“The Goulds, I said. The family of the dead girl. But all he did was laugh. He said, and I wrote this down to get it exact, he said, ‘You tell Phil to
hurry up because I am right behind and I owe him one.’ Alarming, no?”
“Alarming, yes, Alberto, but nothing I can’t handle.”
“Who is Phil, Dick?”
“Someone not to be messed with.” I stepped away from the wall, turned to a window that faced the White House, with the Washington Monument sticking out behind it like a spike that had been driven though its heart. “Did this visitor, perhaps, leave a name?”
“Oh yes. I wrote this down, too. He said his name was Preston, Tom Preston.”
From the digital recording:
Q: Have you ever killed anyone, Phil?
A: No.
Q: Why not?
A: You know.
Q: No, I don’t know.
A: Because, my God, to take someone’s life is the ultimate act of savagery. There are lines, Caroline. What do you think I am?
Q: There is something in your voice that sounds disingenuous, like you are making a joke of murder. We often joke about our fears. Are you afraid of killing someone?
A: It’s amazing what we can get away with in this world. I can swindle you, steal your car, screw your wife, and then beat you to a pulp behind a bar because you complain about it all, and I’m looked at as something of a hero. But suddenly, if I kill you, everything changes. My mother killed a man. She ran off with him and then shot him through the head. It sounds like a country and western song, I know, but she’s in jail, and will be for decades.
Q: Do you visit her?
A: When I have to. There’s a peculiar stink to her prison. When I visit my mother in her blue-and-white uniform, the stink sits in my stomach like a frog.
Q. What does it smell like?
A. Boiled green beans, ammonia, cheap perfume, fate.
Q. Whose fate, Phil?
A. Mine.
Q. What fate is that? Prison?
A. Something worse. Something that comes at me hard and fast in a motel room in New Orleans. It’s why I set limits on myself.
Q. Limits like refusing to kill.
A. And other things. Steps I refuse to take.
Q. Are you upset about having these limits, Phil?
A. A little bit, sure. I think it’s why I haven’t achieved all I deserve to achieve.
Q: Is that why you came to me, to try to find a way to succeed despite these limits?
A. That would be good, yeah.
Q. Or are you here, instead, maybe to eradicate your limits altogether?
A. No limits? That would be a filthy piece of business, Caroline. You wouldn’t want to see me without limits, trust me. Your eyes would bleed.
19. Pressure Points
I flew into Miami the morning after Alberto’s call. I traveled light with just a briefcase. I wasn’t planning to be there long.
I Ubered to a hardware store and then to the white modern palace on the seaward side of Biscayne Bay. I had the car let me out before the iron gate. Fisi. I stood there for a moment in my suit, sucked my teeth, and felt the beat of the music coming from the far side of the house. Then I pressed the button on the speaker. I didn’t answer the request for identification, I didn’t recite the purpose of my visit, I didn’t wave. I just stood there, my legs spread, my sunglasses on, the briefcase heavy in my grip. A moment later the gate slowly slid open.
On my way up to the office, I stopped by the pool. The music was deathly loud now, as a crowd of good-looking strangers made themselves at home, lounging in the sun, dancing on the deck, swilling booze, and swimming naked. Bert in his red vest was behind the bar, shaking a cocktail. When he noticed me he tilted his head in puzzlement even as he kept working the Boston shaker. I turned away from him and surveyed the scene. Flesh, youth, alcohol. I hadn’t seen a party like this at the house since our competition.
Cassandra was lying facedown on one of the lounges, the strings of her bikini top untied and her cheek resting on her folded arms while a man with pectorals and a tight Speedo massaged lotion into her back and shoulders. Her eyes were closed, her lips were curled in satisfaction.
“Has she shown you her knife yet?” I said to massage boy.
She opened her eyes. “Phil,” she said in a slow, satisfied voice, “what a pleasant surprise. Is Mr. Maambong expecting you?”
“I’m sure he is.”
“Bobo, this is Phil. Phil is one of our most valued employees, at least for the moment. Phil, this is Bobo. He’s a hard charger. Now be a dear, Bobo, and leave us for a minute.”
As Bobo stood and walked away, glancing back at me with a cruel curl on his lips, Cassandra turned onto her side and slid her long legs beneath her so she was now sitting on the edge of the chaise, one arm modestly holding the small top against her breasts.
“Don’t mind me,” I said.
“Oh, I don’t mind you at all,” she said as she tied the strings of her bikini top behind her back. “How’s Washington?”
“Lousy with politicians and whores.”
“What’s the difference?”
“Heck of a party.”
“Mr. Maambong has been told to step up recruiting. We need two more teams to handle the workload.”
“I guess Bert’s lie detector has been busy.”
“They’re looking for new leaders, too. How’s the job?”
“Fine.”
“They think Riley might be ready to step into management.”
“Riley’s crackerjack. I wouldn’t want to lose her.”
“The big decisions are beyond us. It helps to remember that. Drink?”
“I’m not in the mood.”
“I can tell. You’re wearing a suit. In Miami.”
“I wanted to impress him with the seriousness of my visit.”
She stood. “Come on, dear, have a drink with me. It will lighten your mood.”
“I don’t want it to lighten. I want it to be dark as midnight. Is he in?”
“Yes, he’s in.”
I looked up at his office window. Through the glare I imagined him in the swivel chair behind his glass desk, looking down at me. “What have you heard, Cassandra?”
“Oh, this and that.”
“What about this and who about that?”
“They’ve been comparing you to Rand.”
“My predecessor.”
“It’s not a good comparison.”
“What ever happened to good old Rand?”
“Be careful, Phil. You have such promise, let’s not waste it. I had hopes you and I would burn down this town together.”
“And now you’re afraid you’ll be left with nothing but Bobo.”
“He can be enormously consoling.”
“Not from what I saw in the Speedo.”
“It’s the steroids,” she said. “Will you have time to play before you leave? Just a drink someplace private? The Eden Rock maybe? We could get a room.”
“I have to get back,” I said. “I’ll leave you in Bobo’s capable, if tiny, hands.”
“It’s good to see you again, Phil, even if only for a few minutes.”
“If I find myself in trouble, would you stand up for me?”
“If you have to ask, then you already know the answer.”
I reached a hand to her red hair and fingered it as I leaned over and kissed her. She tasted of mint and coconut milk. In the distance Bobo was looking on.
“You’ve always been the most honest one in this whole damn crapshoot,” I said. “Sweet dreams.”
I started toward the spiral stairs leading to Mr. Maambong’s office, then I stopped and turned back to her. She was staring at me, her porcelain features inscrutable.
“I won’t disappear as easily as Rand,” I said.
“I’d be disappointed if you did.”
I walked past Bert without a word and climbed the circular stairway. At the office doorway I looked around. Beneath me were the goings-on at the pool. Beyond that was the canal and then the palm trees fronting the line of hotels and then the beach and then the ocean and then the world. This was bright and s
unny and rich. I had earned my spot in the Hyena Squad, I had earned this. So why the hell had they set Tom Preston on my tail?
“Mr. Kubiak, welcome back,” said Mr. Maambong, greeting me warmly in his office, grabbing my shoulder like we were former frat brothers, friends yesterday, tomorrow, always. “We’re surprised to see you back so soon.”
I didn’t return the smile.
“Sit down.”
“I’ll stand.”
“As you wish.” He took his seat behind the sleek glass desk that was empty as always, leaned back in his chair, trained his beetle-eyed glasses on me. “Have we completed our project in the nation’s capital?”
“Not yet.”
“But you are here, nonetheless. Do you have good news for us, then?”
“A demand,” I said. “Call off the dogs.”
“Dogs? We have no dogs.”
“You have Tom Preston. I thought we had gotten rid of that vile creature, but suddenly he’s sniffing my tail, mucking up my work, and making threats.”
“Threats? Oh my. That is unfortunate. Threats.”
“Why is he there?”
“He is insurance, Mr. Kubiak. Perhaps you have not appreciated the seriousness of this task we have given to you. Perhaps you thought you could take your time and play your old tricks and hope for the best. But this is nothing so simple as obtaining a kidney.”
“I have this under control. I am making progress.”
“Bringing in some third-rate attorney with a questionable past and a weakness for cheap bourbon is not quite the progress we had hoped for.”
“Menendez is the cover we need to do what we have to do.”
“And what is it that you need to do, blunder around the case, stirring up dead waters? There is a reporter sniffing around the case now, and the police have redoubled their efforts. The detectives are being pressured to find the truth before your Mr. Menendez makes them look like fools. Instead of squashing the investigation quickly, you have excited it.”
A Filthy Business [Kindle in Motion] Page 16
