3 Strange Bedfellows

by Matt Witten

She bit her lip so hard I was afraid she'd draw blood. "He never hit me before. I knew he was under so much pressure from the campaign. Jack was from a poor family. This was all new and scary for him. So I tried to give him a break, you know?"

  I nodded as if I did know. But really I didn't. I'm one of those people that, despite my best efforts to empathize, can never quite fully understand why abused women don't just leave.

  "Jack promised he'd never hit me again. But he did. And then one night he didn't come home 'til after midnight, and I got suspicious, so I looked in his old e-mail. There was something from . . ."

  She faltered, so I tried out a name. "From Linda Medwick."

  Susan nodded. So now we had one more vote for a Linda-Hack liaison. Was Linda doing the horizontal hula with both Pierce and the Hack?

  Meanwhile Susan was saying, "The next night, Jack called me from his cell phone. Said he was sleeping over at a supporter's house in Greene County. I got off the phone and started crying, and Jack's father—he was over our house that night, helping with Sean—anyway, he asked me what was wrong. So I told him. And he just held me, you know, and . . ."

  Now the tears started falling down her cheeks in earnest, smudging her face with mascara. "George is such a great old man," she said. "Nothing like Jack. And I felt so terrible that George was, you know, dying. He's got nothing. Jack was his only child, and Jack was a jerk. So we were holding each other and, well, one thing led to another."

  She looked at me defiantly through her tears. "And it wasn't disgusting. It was love."

  That word again. "Did he love you enough to kill Jack?"

  "That's impossible," she answered sharply. "George was with me that night."

  "Great alibi," I said sarcastically, trying to rile her into tripping up. "So the two of you have agreed to say that about each other?"

  "It's the truth."

  "You're saying the two of you were . . . together?"

  She blushed and nodded.

  "And your son was here at the time?"

  She bared her teeth angrily. "No, he was sleeping at his friend's house. Whatever you may think about me, I'm a good mother. Sean doesn't know any of this."

  Based on what I'd learned about kids' elephant ears, I doubted she was right. Besides, Sean had been home last night when Susan was with George. But I let it pass. "Okay, so maybe neither of you killed Jack. But what about Zzyp?"

  I eyed her closely to see if the name got a rise out of her. But she didn't blink. "Who?"

  I tried again. "You know who. Zzypowski."

  Still no blinks. "Who's that?"

  If she was faking it, she was doing a darn good job. Then again, if she'd managed to keep her affair with her husband's father a secret from her husband, she must have been good at faking things.

  I thought back to the corpse I'd just had the pleasure of meeting. Now I'm no expert on morbidity, lividity, and all the other gross stuff that forensics experts use to figure out the time of death. But judging by the dryness of the blood, Zzyp had been killed before this morning. On the other hand, judging by the relative pleasantness of the blood smell and the unrottenness of the body, I figured Zzyp hadn't been dead for longer than a day. So that put the estimated—very estimated—time of death as yesterday. Which was a Sunday.

  Why had Zzyp come into his office on a Sunday? Did he put in a call to Susan's house, and then wait in his office for someone to show up?

  "Where were you yesterday?" I asked.

  "Why?"

  "Humor me."

  She shrugged. "I'm doing all the stuff Jack scheduled for his own campaign. Yesterday I had breakfast at the Glens Falls Rotary Club, then lunch at the Silver Bay Elks, then something in Saranac Lake. I don't remember it all, it's just one thing after another." She checked her watch. "Right now I'm supposed to be in Ballston Spa at noon. My new campaign manager is already there, he's gonna kill me. I should've left ten minutes ago."

  "So you were gone from home all day yesterday?"

  She gave me a belligerent but bewildered look. "Yeah. So what?"

  "Who was at your house?"

  "George. He was taking care of Sean."

  "You left them alone together all day? Even though George's health is so bad?"

  "Oscar stopped by to help out."

  "Oscar?"

  "The guy who let you in just now."

  "Oh." Oscar the Oxymoron. Had a nice ring to it.

  "Look, I don't understand all these questions you're asking, and I really do have to go." She stood up and, with an airy toss of her head, said, "If you're so horrible and sleazy that you have to tell the whole world about my love life, go ahead. But in the meantime I have a campaign to run."

  I didn't say anything. I was trying to square this feisty campaigner with the frightened waif who stayed silent while her husband beat her.

  She tapped her foot impatiently. "You speak English? I'm saying scram."

  I stood up, too. Then it hit me that with all the hot sex and other excitement going on, I'd forgotten to pursue the lead that Geronimo Owens had given me.

  "One more thing," I said. "Before I go, I need a copy of the opening statement Jack was going to make at that debate, the night he got killed."

  "Why?"

  "Come on, the quicker you give it to me, the quicker you can get to your stupid Chamber of Commerce lunch or whatever."

  "Yeah, but I don't know where a copy would be. Jack did his speechwriting at the office—along with everything else he did there," she added sourly, probably a reference to his shenanigans with Linda Medwick.

  I couldn't resist one final question. "Why didn't you leave him?" I asked.

  "Why don't you get out of my face," she answered, and stalked out.

  I guess she knew I wouldn't really understand.

  I got back in my Toyota, and drove far enough away from the house that I wouldn't have to worry about Oscar the Oxymoron jumping me. Then I parked the car, leaned my head against the seat, and collected my thoughts.

  Zzyp called Susan's house yesterday. Then he got killed. Had that phone call set his murder in motion? And why did he call Susan's house in the first place?

  Wait a minute. Maybe Zzyp was trying to sell Pierce's photo to Susan, the same way I figured he'd sold it to the Hack. Then Susan could use it to scare Pierce out of the race.

  But why would Susan—or her faithful henchmen, Hack Sr. and Oxymoron—want to kill Zzyp, if he was just trying to sell them useful information?

  I snapped my fingers. Was it possible that Pierce somehow got wind of Zzyp's plans? What if Zzyp called Pierce before calling Susan, and hit him up for hush money?

  And then Pierce decided that instead of paying Zzyp to hush, he'd be better off killing him . . .

  I was so excited by this new theory that I almost flooded the car when I started her up. I guess the old girl felt she had already done enough zooming in one day, thank you very much. It took some gentle sweet talking and careful gas pedal fluttering before she would consent to go anywhere.

  After the car and I got our relationship straightened out, I realized I had a problem: I didn't know where I was going. According to the morning papers, Pierce was spending today campaigning in Lake Placid, two hours north. If you look at a map of the 22nd Congressional District, it resembles a giant lizard. The legislature gerrymandered it that way to keep out all those nasty urban voters from Albany and create a nice, safe Congressional seat for Republicans. It's highly convenient for them, but highly annoying for amateur sleuths who have to run all around the district trying to solve a murder.

  I decided to call Pierce tonight and schedule another rendezvous at his house. For right now, maybe I should try to find out once and for all what that opening statement of the Hack's was going to be. Like Geronimo told me, that was an avenue I should have followed a long time ago. Ah, well. Did Philip Marlowe ever feel as incompetent as I often did?

  Who knows, maybe that's why he drank.

  Susan said the Hack did his writing at work
, so maybe his old computer at the State House would still contain his statement. I pointed my Camry toward Albany, and fifty minutes later found myself inside the Capitol building.

  As I climbed up the Million-Dollar Staircase to the third floor and walked down the corridor past all the marble sculptures and gilt-framed portraits of dead politicians, I wondered if the Hack's old office would be open. Would the blonde bombshell still be at her desk, even though her old boss was dead and her new boss was yet to be named?

  The office, as it turned out, was locked. When I knocked on the door, no one answered.

  Well, hell, that's what AAA cards were for. I took mine out of my wallet and waited for a break in the pedestrian hallway traffic, then set to work.

  The time I'd put in training Andrea had been well spent. My card went through that fifty-year-old lock like a knife through butter. I opened the door, stepped inside—

  And gasped. Holy tamale.

  My gasp gave way to a grin. Linda Medwick was in flagrante delicto—I believe that's the expression—on the office desk with none other than Robert Pierce.

  Wow. I'd now barged in on one dead body and two hot sex scenes in less than twenty-four hours. That must be some kind of record.

  Watching these two paramours reminded me that having sex on top of a desk had long been a special fantasy of mine. My first college girlfriend once promised that for my twentieth birthday we'd make love on the front desk in the science lecture hall. But tragically, we broke up two weeks before my birthday. I should chat with Andrea about this unfulfilled fantasy—

  Linda rather rudely broke into my thoughts. "Would you mind?” she asked, sounding annoyed but not the least bit embarrassed. I had to admire her coolness. I guess those generous endowments of hers, now strutting their stuff in full view, had also endowed her with generous self-esteem—at least as regards her impact on men.

  For his part, though, Pierce looked like he wanted to do the bug thing and crawl under a rug. His "private parts," as Bernie would call them, were shrinking right before my very eyes.

  "No, I don't mind," I said to Linda, feigning casualness. "I'll look the other way while you get yourselves together."

  I turned around and folded my arms as, behind me, Linda screeched, "Kindly have the decency to leave!”

  "Sorry, I'm not going anywhere," I said. "So forget about cooking up a cover story together. I'll talk to you alone, then I'll talk to him alone."

  Naked and shrunken though he was, Pierce had regained some of his dignity. "I refuse to discuss anything with you."

  The door to the hallway was still open. Three guys in navy blue sport jackets were wandering by. "Excuse me, sirs," I called out. "There's something I'd like to show you in Mr. Tamarack's office."

  The men hesitated, then one of them gave an amused half-grin and said, "Sure." They headed my way. Little did they know the thrill they were in for.

  But Linda yelled out, "All right! We'll talk!"

  So I barred the doorway to the three men. "Sorry, fellas. Change of plans," I said, as I shut the door on them.

  Linda and Pierce put their clothes back on. I told Pierce to leave the office for fifteen minutes, then come back.

  "You can't order me around," Pierce said hotly, some of his natural arrogance returning along with his clothes.

  "Sure, I can order you around all I want," I said. "Knowledge is power, and I'm a Robert Pierce expert. See you in fifteen."

  Pierce glowered at me, looking like he wanted to wring my neck. But he didn't say anything, just stalked out. As he headed off, I couldn't resist a parting shot. "And you better not let me catch you in the hallway eavesdropping," I warned him. "Go take a cold shower."

  Then I turned to Linda. The low-cut neckline of her slinky yellow dress was askew, and one of her assets was popping out. I figured she did that on purpose to distract me, so I determinedly ignored it, forcing my eyes to focus on her face instead.

  "Okay, bombshell," I said cheerfully. "Spill it."

  13

  "You pathetic private eye wannabe," Linda spit out, but I stopped her.

  "So what's up with you and Pierce and the Hack?" I asked. "You guys do threesomes?"

  She smashed the desktop, hard, with her fist. Then she did a strange thing. She leaned against the desk, threw back her head, and laughed so hard her breasts jiggled. There wasn't much joy in that laughter, though, just irony and disgust.

  Finally I asked, "You almost through?"

  "Yeah, I'm through, all right," she said acidly. "Just my luck, I come along after Bill and Monica. Now every pissant politician in America is scared the voters'll find out he's not a model of Christian purity."

  "So Pierce is scared?"

  "You kidding? You're all scared shitless, all of you. Men." Her lips curled. "If I could do it over again, I'd can the bombshell routine, go to law school instead. Worst thing ever happened to me was these stupid boobs." With that she stuffed her wayward left breast back into her skimpy dress.

  "Why don't we get back to the facts."

  "Yeah, sure, facts. What the hell is a fact?"

  This lady would be perfect as a Jerry Springer guest. "How long have you been sleeping with Pierce?" I asked.

  "Hey, I don't need to talk to you. I don't have a political career for you to ruin."

  "But you do have a family that could be ruined," I reminded her, and instantly felt like a real asshole.

  I expected her to scream at me, but I guess she decided it wouldn't do any good. Instead she said, "How the hell should I know when I started fucking him? When did that old Congressman die—Mo Wilson?"

  That seemed like a non sequitur, but I humored her. "Last May."

  "Then the answer's May. I took Robert to bed a week later."

  Something clicked. "Was there a connection between Congressman Wilson dying and your taking Pierce to bed?"

  "Hell, yes. My sonufabitch husband, Ducky, was too much of a wimp to run for Congress. He likes being a big duck in a small pond. Said he's too old to go to Washington and start over."

  "But you wanted to go."

  Linda's face twisted with outrage. "I'm not too old to start over! What does Ducky expect me to do, spend the rest of my life in that lousy house in the most boring suburb in the universe? I want to have fun! I'm not ready to die just yet, thank you very much!"

  "And you figured Pierce was gonna run for Congress," I prodded.

  She eyed me challengingly, like she was trying to shock me, and said harshly, "Right. So I made up an excuse to go in his office. Talk about a pushover. Took me five minutes tops before I was fucking his brains out. I will say one thing for him, though, at least he can get it up. Unlike Ducky, who refuses to take Viagra because he's afraid he'll get a heart attack."

  This was way more detail than I needed. Although it did occur to me that after a decade plus of being married to a predatory shark like Linda, I might have trouble getting it up myself.

  "So you and Pierce became lovers. And you were hoping, what, he gets elected, and then you divorce Ducky, marry Pierce, and go to Washington?"

  Linda nodded. "Why not? This Congressional seat is so safe, I figured Robert could survive a tiny little sexual scandal and still get reelected. We'd just have to be discreet, that's all. I'd wait a few months after divorcing Ducky before I married Robert. Then it's good-bye Clifton Park, hello Washington. Party with the big boys while I still have my looks."

  "Did Robert know you were planning to marry him?"

  "Are you kidding? He was talking marriage the first day."

  I eyed her skeptically. She shrugged. "I'm very good in bed," she said matter-of-factly.

  I was tempted to ask her, if she was so good in bed, then why was Ducky having trouble getting it up? Instead I said, "But Robert didn't run for Congress after all."

  She frowned bitterly. "No. He said he would, but then the bastard double-crossed me."

  "Why?"

  For the first time her hazel eyes showed uncertainty. "I don't know
."

  "Come on, why'd he change his mind about running? You must have some idea."

  "He wouldn't tell me. Believe me, I tried everything. I screamed, I sweet-talked, I gave blow jobs, I threatened to leave him, but nothing worked."

  "Was he being blackmailed?"

  "About our affair? No, nobody knew. We were so careful it was ridiculous."

  "What if he was being blackmailed about something else?"

  She cocked her head at me. "Maybe. But he would have told me. Why, is there something you know about?"

  I sidestepped her question and tried out Pierce's own explanation on her. "Maybe he felt guilty asking Ducky to push him for Congress, when here he was doing the boogie woogie with Ducky's wife."

  She shook her head in exasperation, her Farrah Fawcett do flying around her shoulders. "Why don't you ask him? I really don't know. I was so pissed off I split up with him."

  "He said it was the other way around."

  "In his dreams." She gave a sardonic grin. "I told him I loved him, but I couldn't deal with cheating on my husband anymore."

  Her story sounded more real than Pierce's. I was beginning to get a feel for this lady's modus operandi. "But then, after the Hack died, and Pierce decided to run for Congress after all…"

  "...I called him up and said I'd been missing him unbearably all these lonely months, and I was desperate to see him again and caress his gorgeous body."

  "I take it he didn't need much convincing."

  "No."

  "Even though this could destroy his campaign."

  "Hey, men aren't the smartest creatures in the world."

  "When did you call him up to get back together?"

  "Last night. You just broke up our big oh-God-I-missed-you-so-much fuck."

  "Wait a minute. You're lying. You were already sleeping with Pierce last week."

  "What gives you that idea?"

  "Your husband told me."

  "You talked to Ducky?" I didn't answer. Linda looked puzzled. "Look, I don't know why Ducky would lie about this. But it's Jack I was sleeping with last week, not Pierce. I ought to remember who I sleep with. I'm not that big of a slut."

  I felt hopelessly befuddled. Was there some magic P.I. technique I was missing? I shifted gears. "Okay, back up a few months. When Pierce refused to run, and Jack got the nomination instead . . ."