Flowerbed of State

by Dorothy St. James

  Lorenzo had mentioned last night that Pauline had been auditing Brooks and Lillian Keller’s bank books and then would socialize with them at night. If that was the case, they might know what had made Pauline so excited the night before her death.

  Before I could question them, Special Agent Steve Sallis stepped in my path. He gave me a hard look, his brows furrowing. “I hope you’re keeping out of trouble.”

  “As much as possible,” I said.

  “Good.” He chuckled, his expression lightening. “You’re on CAT’s radar this morning. And they don’t sound especially happy about it.”

  “Lovely,” I said with a sigh. I didn’t need an entire division of the Secret Service thinking up ways to make my life miserable. “I didn’t mean to cause trouble.”

  “I know that, Casey, and you know that. But CAT obviously doesn’t. I suggest you keep a low profile for a while.” He turned toward the bankers. “Break time’s over, folks.” He raised his voice just a bit so everyone could hear him. “The afternoon session is due to start in less than ten minutes.”

  Much to the young staffer’s annoyance and relief, the bankers listened to Steve and started to file back inside the West Wing.

  Lillian and Brooks Keller rushed past me. I started to intercept them, but the sight of Brooks’s shoes hit me like a blow to the head. He was wearing the same black-and-white leather shoes with that lightning bolt on the side that I’d seen on the killer’s feet. The wonder twins of banking hurried past as I stood frozen, staring at his shoes. “I don’t care what you think.” I overheard Lillian’s sharp whisper.

  “Go to hell!” Brooks shot back. He pushed the businessmen in front of them out of his way in his rush to get away from his sister and into the Palm Room. The hard soles of his shoes tapped against the pavement like a ticking time bomb.

  Had a killer invaded the White House walls?

  I grabbed Steve’s sleeve. “Brooks Keller,” I whispered. “His shoes.”

  “What about them?”

  “The man who’d attacked me, he was wearing those shoes.”

  Steve peeled my hand from his arm. “Do you know who Brooks Keller is?”

  I nodded and pointed toward the door Brooks had just blasted through.

  “Apparently you don’t know.” His expression softened just a touch. “I’ll quietly mention what you’ve told me to the lead investigator.”

  “Is that Mike Thatch?”

  Steve nodded sharply and walked away.

  “I wonder what that could have been about.” Richard Templeton, as dangerously handsome as a rock star, came to stand next to me. He jammed his hands in his pants pocket and watched as Lillian glanced nervously around her while trying to pretend that nothing had happened. “Lillian and Brooks, they’re an odd pair.”

  Richard kept his gaze trained on Lillian, which made me wonder if he realized I was standing next to him in the small niche under the magnolia tree. I discretely cleared my throat to give him fair warning.

  “When our lunch break included a tour of the gardens,” he said with a wry smile, “I was hoping to see you.”

  I looked over my shoulder, because he couldn’t possibly be talking to me. But the only thing back there was the waxy-leafed magnolia.

  “You’re talking to me?” I asked, because it would make more sense if he was having a conversation with the famous Jackson magnolia tree than a plain Jane gardener like me.

  “Yes.” His dazzling gaze met mine. “I’m talking to you.” His smile was irresistible.

  Chapter Nine

  A sudden breeze rattled the Jackson magnolia’s thick leaves. Southern magnolias like this one graced nearly every plantation, grand estate, and suburban backyard in my native Lowcountry.

  At the moment, though, I wasn’t thinking of home. The charismatic Richard Templeton had completely captured my attention.

  “I’ve been at my wit’s end with a hydrangea bush in my garden. I’ve had it for years. But this past winter it’s turned completely brown.” His stylish light gray suit emphasized the lines of his fit body. He’d pinned a patriotic red, white, and blue flag to his lapel. “I thought perhaps you could give me some advice on what I can do to save it.”

  The rest of the bankers had slowly filed back inside, leaving me alone with Richard Templeton and Special Agent Steve Sallis.

  Steve stayed a polite distance away. He crossed his arms over his chest and pretended disinterest, a skill the Secret Service had perfected to an art form.

  “A hydrangea, you say?” Templeton had to be pulling my leg. “And you’ve had it for years?”

  He nodded and gave me the most sincere look I’d ever seen. “I’ve lovingly tended it ever since it was just a little shoot.”

  That made me laugh.

  “I don’t understand,” he said.

  “Hydrangeas go dormant in the winter and drop their leaves, which you’d know if you actually had one in your yard for years.”

  He laughed, too. “Mental note to self—get my gardening facts straight before flirting with a gardener.”

  My jaw dropped open. “You’re flirting with me?” I looked around again for another woman, because Richard Templeton, the man famous for dating supermodels, couldn’t possibly be flirting with me.

  He shrugged. “Why wouldn’t I? You’re a beautiful woman.”

  “You think so?” I beamed.

  I’d once overheard my grandmother say that she thought my Aunt Willow’s bulldog, Beauregard, had been hit one too many times with an ugly stick. But I’d never heard anyone mention getting hit with a pretty stick. And yet that must have been what had happened to me when I got hit on the side of my head, because I couldn’t remember the last time two men complimented me on my looks in the same day.

  “Er . . . thank you,” I said graciously, remembering the manners Grandmother Faye had painstakingly drilled into me. I also remembered something else, something Lorenzo had said last night.

  Pauline had told Lorenzo several weeks ago that she’d dined with Richard Templeton while in New York City.

  I wanted to ask Templeton about it. But Turner had warned me not to talk about the investigation to anyone, and with the threat of the pepper spray incident hanging over my head, I didn’t need to dig myself into an even deeper hole. I was very aware of Steve Sallis’s presence nearby.

  It was one thing to discuss Pauline’s murder with Lorenzo. They’d been intimately involved.

  Had Pauline also been involved with Richard Templeton?

  I needed to find a way to work the question concerning Pauline’s relationship with Templeton innocently into the conversation.

  “I don’t usually put my foot in my mouth around attractive women.” Templeton rubbed the back of his neck. “Perhaps we could start over? I’m Richard Templeton. We met briefly in the hallway yesterday when Senator Pendergast stepped on your foot.”

  He extended a hand for me to take. I rather felt as if I should pinch myself because it didn’t feel real. He cleared his throat and glanced pointedly at the hand I’d yet to take.

  “Sorry.” My cheeks burned a bit as I placed my hand in his. “I’m Casey Calhoun. It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Mr. Templeton. Have you been enjoying your visit to the nation’s—”

  “Please, call me Richard.”

  He kept hold of my hand. Not shaking it in greeting, just holding on to it as if he’d found a precious object. The soft-winged butterflies that had fluttered in my belly yesterday started whipping up a windstorm.

  He lightly caressed the back of my hand with his thumb.

  “I hope you’re feeling better today. John told me what happened.”

  “John?”

  “Bradley, the President. We were roommates in boarding school. The stories I could tell.” A wistful expression tugged at his lips as his gaze turned toward the Oval Office. “But I won’t. I respect our friendship too much to want to embarrass him.”

  “President Bradley told you what happened yesterday?�
�� I suppose when you have money and power and connections, those connections included access to state secrets.

  Richard must have heard my frustrated huff. He turned all one hundred watts of his intense blue-eyed gaze back toward me. I could see why the tabloids called him “tempting.”

  “He gave some broad details. What is this world coming to? A woman murdered across the street from the White House.” He shook his head. “And you were attacked.”

  I suppose if the President considered Richard a confidant, why shouldn’t I? He obviously had more security clearance than I did.

  Could a banking CEO work out as a gardener/part-time sleuth’s sidekick? It might work.

  I decided to test the waters with one of the questions I’d wanted to ask earlier. “It must have been upsetting for you, too, hearing about what happened to Pauline. Were the two of you close?”

  “Pauline? Who is she?”

  “Pauline Bonde, the woman who was murdered yesterday. I’d heard that she’d been auditing your company’s books.”

  “Had she?”

  “So you didn’t know her?”

  “No, I’m sorry. You say she’d been working in my office. That’s terrible. We have federal auditors in and out all the time. It’s a part of the banking business. It keeps our investors and depositors confident that their money is in safe hands. I assure you I have a team of employees who handle that end of things. I never meet the auditors.”

  “Yes, of course you wouldn’t.” Had Pauline been lying about having dinner with Richard just to make Lorenzo jealous? “After learning about how intimately involved Pauline had been in the banking audits, I couldn’t help but wonder if someone killed her because of something she might have uncovered.”

  “I’ve not heard anything about that.” He frowned as he considered the idea. “The Treasury Department audits were fairly benign. It’s the SEC guys that tend to go for the jugular. Even so, I can’t imagine anyone killing over anything an auditor might or might not have found.”

  “Oh.” Turner had warned me that I was on the wrong track.

  “I have to admit that you’ve got an interesting theory. With a killer lurking around the White House, I hope the Secret Service is investigating all angles,” Richard said. “At least they seem to be making progress. Right before the break, I overheard that the FBI had picked up a suspect for questioning.”

  “They did?” Apparently Richard knew much more about what was going on than the few crumbs Turner had shared with me. “Do you know who?”

  “No, but it sounded pretty serious. I mean, they might actually have their guy.”

  “I hope so.” I touched my bandaged temple. My fingers were trembling.

  “Perhaps I shouldn’t have said anything. It’s upset you.”

  “No, it’s better that I know.” Still, I felt shaken.

  “At least you saw the killer,” Richard said. “You can help the police identify him.”

  “I—I think so.”

  Richard’s brows furrowed. He tightened his hold on my hand. “You’re not sure?”

  I closed my eyes, trying to remember. It felt as if some vital piece of information hovered at the edge of my consciousness. Every time I tried to grab it, the memory slithered farther out of reach.

  I shook my head. “It’s still a little fuzzy. But the memories are there.” I hoped. “Give me a few days and I’m sure I’ll be able to give an accurate description of him.”

  “That’s good to know.” He glanced at his watch. “I’d better go before your anxious Secret Service friend over there decides to use force to get me back to the Roosevelt Room. Would you consider meeting me for coffee after I get done for the day with this interminable summit? Say, five thirty at Capitol Perks?”

  “Actually, I prefer the pastries at the Freedom of Espresso Café over on K Street.”

  “Why not? I’m always willing to try something new.”

  “Great. It’s a date.” I smiled so hard, I think I strained a muscle.

  Chapter Ten

  I rushed back to the grounds office underneath the North Portico anxious to find out what I could about who the FBI had picked up for questioning.

  I was surprised to find Special Agent Cooper sitting at Lorenzo’s desk with the ever-proper Ambrose standing watch behind him, arms crossed over his chest. The FBI agent with the thick, bulldog-like jowls had the middle drawer open and was riffling through its contents. The organized stacks of paperwork that always graced Lorenzo’s desktop were spread across the floor in a messy jumble.

  Loud whirling and banging noises could be heard through the thick concrete wall separating our office from the carpenter’s shop next door.

  “What’s going on?” I demanded over the racket. “What are you doing in Lorenzo’s desk?” I glanced over to my desk to see if Cooper had sifted through my stuff. It was hard to tell if my disorganized mess of paperwork had been moved or not.

  Cooper rose. “Good. You’re here. I need to have a word with you.” His tweed suit looked suspiciously like the one he’d worn yesterday, only more wrinkled.

  “Casey,” Ambrose said. His frown deepened when he turned to me. The corner of his tight mouth started to twitch.

  “What’s going on?” I asked again. “Does Gordon know about this?” I glanced pointedly at the paperwork that had been moved off Lorenzo’s desk.

  “They could have brought an entire team in here,” Ambrose exclaimed. Tension put a squeak in his voice.

  “We still might,” Cooper added.

  “A team for what?”

  Cooper glared at me as if I should know.

  “They’ve taken Lorenzo into custody to question him regarding his involvement in that woman’s death.” Ambrose took a deep breath. “I can’t believe it. A White House employee being held under suspicion of murder. It’s unthinkable.”

  I couldn’t believe it either. I suddenly needed to sit down. “Lorenzo is a suspect?”

  “Not yet,” Cooper said, holding his stubby hands out. “You don’t need to get upset. We’re only talking to him. He’s not being held. No charges have been filed.”

  Still, the fact that the FBI had been concerned enough about Lorenzo’s connection to Pauline that they’d sought a warrant to search his desk and to bring him in for questioning would be evidence enough to convict him in the eyes of many in the press. This could ruin Lorenzo’s career.

  “You should have told me that Mr. Parisi and the victim had been intimately involved,” Cooper scolded. “I wasn’t happy to learn that you’d shared that information with the Secret Service and not with us.”

  “That’s what this is about? You’re ruining Lorenzo’s life because of something I told Turner this morning? I wish I had called you, because I would have told you unequivocally that Lorenzo didn’t have anything to do with Pauline’s death.”

  “I understand your loyalty to your coworker. I assure you that we’re following several lines of investigation. But to be honest, many of them are leading us to Mr. Parisi.” Cooper tilted his head and regarded me with close scrutiny. “Are there any other pertinent details you’d like to share with me?”

  I pressed my lips together. I sure as hell wasn’t going to tell him about Lorenzo’s shoes, although I seemed to remember Lorenzo had been wearing them this morning and presumably still had them on. But that wasn’t the point. I’d promised to help Lorenzo, not hurt him.

  “Either you or Jack Turner have twisted my words around,” I told him. “It’s not Lorenzo’s affair with Pauline that’s suspicious. It’s her involvement with the banking audits and the timing of her death that was worrying me. Did you know she was supposed to be part of a Senate hearing today to present her findings?” I held up today’s paper. The cover story had provided that information along with some other interesting facts regarding her work with the Treasury Department.

  “All avenues of investigation are being pursued. But as I’ve said, many of those avenues are leading to Mr. Parisi.” Cooper stood
directly in front of the office chair I’d landed in. He propped hands on his hips and puffed out his chest, straining the button on his tweed suit coat. “I ask you again, are you sure you don’t know anything else? Have you remembered anything new about the attack?”

  The door swung open as Gordon rushed into the office, his arms lightly coated with sweat, his face flushed from working in the gardens. The sweet scent of grass clippings clung to his khaki pants and white button-up shirt, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows.

  “I was told there’s a problem,” he said, his gaze darting from Ambrose to Special Agent Cooper and then to me. “Has something happened, Casey? Has someone tried to hurt you again?”

  “No,” I assured him. “I’m fine. It’s Lorenzo. We’ve got to help him.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Neither do I.” I bit my lower lip to keep it from quivering. “Apparently the FBI thinks Lorenzo killed Pauline and then attacked me.”

  “We’re exploring several different—” Cooper started to say.

  “Impossible!” Gordon exclaimed. “Preposterous! Who came up with such a crazy idea? What is this attack on my gardeners?”

  “Ask Casey,” Ambrose said. The corner of his mouth twitching. “She’s the one who’s been discussing his personal life.”

  “I didn’t—” But I had.

  I don’t remember Miss Marple ever causing this much trouble for the friends she’d promised to help. Now what was I supposed to do?

  GORDON, AMBROSE, AND I SPENT THE AFTERNOON being grilled first by Special Agent Cooper, who was decidedly less friendly than yesterday, and then by Detective Hernandez, who’d arrived about fifteen minutes later and played the part of good cop. For a while I felt like a suspect. Acid burned in my stomach every time I thought about Lorenzo and how he must be feeling.

  It was nearly four in the afternoon by the time Cooper and Hernandez left. Gordon had answered the rapid-fire questioning like a seasoned trooper. Ambrose, after a moment of panic, handled the crisis with the calm finesse that had made him an invaluable part of the White House staff.