Capitol Murder

by Phillip Margolin

  “I do happen to be free Thursday evening.”

  “Wonderful,” Koshani said as she handed Jack a business card with her name, a telephone number, and the word INVESTMENTS.

  “I’ve written my address on the back. Shall we say eight?”

  “I’ll be there.”

  Koshani smiled and walked away. Seconds later, Lucas Sharp was at the senator’s side. Physically, Lucas was everything Jack Carson was not. The African American was a shade over six feet tall, compact and muscular, with a smooth shaved skull that made him look dangerous. Lucas had wrestled and played football in high school, but he’d also had a near-perfect GPA. Brainpower was the bond that made Jack and Lucas best friends. Sharp would not tolerate a single word against his nerdy white friend and had protected him from bullies from elementary school through high school.

  The friendship had blossomed at Cornell, where Sharp’s intellect was valued above his wrestling skills and he could let his interest in computer science run free. While attending law school at Harvard, Sharp had made major contributions to the software Carson had developed in graduate school at MIT, and he’d shared in the financial windfall when the patent was sold to Microsoft. Though he didn’t need the money, Lucas worked as a Multnomah County district attorney for four years before quitting when Jack decided to run for Congress. Jack relished the spotlight, but Sharp preferred working behind the scenes.

  “What was that about?” Sharp asked when Koshani was out of earshot.

  “She wants to meet with me to discuss a major contribution to the campaign.”

  “Don’t take it,” Sharp warned.

  Carson frowned. “Why not?’

  “Do you know who that is?”

  “She said her name was Jessica Koshani.”

  Sharp nodded. “Koshani’s name came up more than once when I was in the DA’s office. She’s involved with a number of legitimate enterprises, but there was a suspicion that they were fronts for other not-so-legal ventures.”

  “Such as?”

  “Money laundering through some of the businesses.”

  “For who?”

  “Drug dealers, arms dealers, and she’s rumored to be the silent partner in a high-end escort service.”

  Carson kept his features blank, but he felt the stirring of an erection.

  “So there’s no solid proof that Ms. Koshani is doing anything illegal?”

  “No.”

  “Then I see no problem in meeting with her.”

  “There could be problems later, if Lang’s people start spreading rumors.”

  “We need the money, Luke. You’ve seen the polls. Lang has closed the gap. I started ten percentage points ahead, and it’s down to one. And it’s the damned TV ads he’s been running. If we don’t come up with enough money to run our own, I could lose.”

  “It’s not just the money I’m worried about.”

  “I’m a big boy, Luke. I can keep my zipper closed.”

  “History would suggest otherwise,” his friend answered. Carson blushed and broke eye contact.

  “When are you meeting?” Sharp asked.

  “Thursday evening.”

  “Damn, I’ll be in Medford.”

  “Look,” Carson said, his tone softening, “I appreciate the warning but you don’t have to babysit me. I’ll be okay.”

  Sharp started to say something, but caught himself when he saw Martha weaving her way toward them through the round tables that the waitstaff was starting to clear. He loved Jack Carson like a brother, and he worried about him. Jack was brilliant, but he could be very stupid when it came to women.

  Chapter Five

  Brad was enjoying his job as a legislative assistant to Senator Carson, but he soon found that the pace of work was much faster than the pace at the United States Supreme Court. There were two gears in Senator Carson’s office, fast and slow. When the Senate was not in session or the senator was not in D.C., Brad could dress casually and come to work a little later than usual, although he had so much work even in slow gear that he was at the office by eight and didn’t leave until six or seven. When the Senate was in session or the senator was in D.C., he was expected to dress in a suit and tie, everything ran at hyper speed, and he might not get home until after ten.

  Eating breakfast at home was a luxury Brad could not afford, no matter what the gear. Almost all of the staffers grabbed breakfast in one of the Capitol cafeterias and ate at their desks. Brad’s staple was orange juice, a toasted bagel, and coffee. While he ate, he was expected to digest not only food but the contents of the Oregonian, Portland’s daily paper, the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, and the Congressional Quarterly, a privately produced paper that covered every legislative action in Congress and that Brad found stacked at the entrance to the senator’s office every day.

  When he was hired, Brad had been assigned a portfolio heavy on legal issues. Lucas Sharp, the senator’s chief of staff, had told him to start each day by scanning publications for issues in his portfolio. Brad was expected to be up to speed on every issue in his portfolio so he could advise Senator Carson on whether to support, oppose, or try to modify a piece of legislation. Sharp had warned Brad that the worst thing that could happen to him was to field a call from his boss about an article he had not read. In addition to reading the papers, Brad learned about each subject by talking to the staffs of NGOs, lobbyists, concerned citizens, representatives of labor and business, and anyone else who had a view on an issue.

  Senators’ offices were located in three buildings: Russell, the oldest; Dirksen, the second oldest; and Hart, the new kid on the block. The party in power had first choice of offices and the senators chose in order of seniority. After an election, life in the Senate was like a game of musical chairs. When a party out of power gained a majority, the losing party’s senators had to move if the winners wanted their offices.

  Senator Carson’s office was in Dirksen. Hart was the building closest to Brad’s apartment, and he usually used its staff entrance so he could get inside as fast as possible. D.C. was freezing in winter and hot and humid in summer. A corridor in Hart led to the Dirksen building and was one of many corridors and underground tunnels that connected the office buildings to each other and the Capitol.

  Brad had convinced himself that there was no reason to worry about Clarence Little, but two days after reading about the reversal of Little’s convictions, Brad’s self-confidence evaporated. Brad rarely received personal mail at his Senate office, so he was surprised to find the plain white envelope with no return address sitting on his blotter when he got back from lunch. Then he recognized the handwriting on the envelope. It was identical to the writing on the envelope he had received on the evening of the presidential election. Brad’s mouth was dry, and he felt slightly nauseated as he opened the envelope and read the letter it contained.

  Dear Brad,

  I hope this letter finds you in good health and enjoying your exciting new job. There is plenty of excitement here on death row, too. My convictions have been reversed. I will soon have new trials, which I hope will end in “Not Guilty” verdicts and freedom. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if I could visit you and your lovely bride in our nation’s capital? And, speaking of Ginny, how is the love of your life? I hope things are still piping hot between you two.

  Your Friend,

  Clarence

  Who had smuggled this letter and the letter Clarence had sent him on the night Maureen Gaylord was elected president out of the penitentiary? Was it a guard Little had bribed or his attorney? Brad decided that it wasn’t worth his time to find out.

  Should he write Little and tell him to stop writing? No, that would just encourage the psychopath. Brad hadn’t answered Clarence’s first letter, and he decided that he wouldn’t answer this one.

  Brad thought about the new trials. After mentally reviewing everything he knew about the cases, he concluded that the chance of Little winning his freedom was small. The best that could happe
n if he got a top-flight attorney was a life sentence. When Brad calmed down, he started to crumple up the letter to use in a game of wastepaper basketball, but he stopped and put it in the lower drawer of his desk instead.

  Chapter Six

  A cold rain carrying the salty, seaweed scents of the ocean pelted Ali Bashar as he stood at the rail of the freighter.

  “America!” Ali said to the stocky, stone-faced man who stood beside him. His companion turned toward Ali for a second, then turned away. His dark, cold eyes showed none of the excitement Ali felt, as if passion for anything but his mission had been leached out of the man in the camp. Ali believed himself to be as dedicated as the others, but he still retained a sense of wonder.

  Ali’s dark complexion and milk-chocolate-colored eyes were common among the tribal people who grew up in the mountainous section of Pakistan where he had been born. His straight black hair was concealed beneath a knit watch cap, and he wore a heavy pea jacket as protection against weather that Manhattanites would consider uncomfortable but which chilled the blood of someone who had spent the last eight months in the desert. Ali was five feet eight and had been sick frequently when he was a child, so his constitution was frail. When he was young, he had been the butt of many jokes and the object of the cruelty that comes naturally to children. Ali was bright, was especially good with numbers, and had an excellent memory. These traits had helped him to excel in the classroom but often made his life outside of it difficult. His intelligence had finally been rewarded at the al-Qaeda camp in Somalia, but the physical part of the training had been difficult for him.

  Ali’s time in the camp and his brief stay in Karachi, where he had been smuggled aboard the freighter, were his only experiences in the world outside his village. As the freighter pulled into New York Harbor, he stared wide-eyed at the Statue of Liberty and New York’s skyline. Then he looked for the empty space in the skyline where the Twin Towers had stood, and he smiled. He had been shown the destruction of the Towers several times on a television in the camp. He didn’t know why he and his three companions were being smuggled into America, but he believed that he would soon be part of something that would make the self-absorbed, godless citizens of the United States forget about September 11.

  The freighter was registered in Liberia, but the captain was a Pakistani, as were many in the crew. Ali and the others had fit in, and they all had false papers and cover stories that would hold up under all but the most intense scrutiny. It was dusk when the freighter docked, and the pier was spotlighted when the crew began unloading the cargo. Ali and his companions mingled with the rest of the crew as they shifted crates containing machine parts from the ship to the dock, but they peeled off from the legitimate crew members when a nondescript taupe station wagon glided down the pier and pulled up next to a pallet piled high with wooden crates. They had been told about the station wagon just before they boarded the freighter.

  Ali slid into the passenger seat next to the driver, who wore a New York Yankees jacket and baseball cap.

  “I’m Steve, and I’m going to take you to a safe house near Washington, D.C.,” he said in perfect Urdu. “When we get to the gate, let me do the talking. If the guard asks you a question, I’ll tell him you don’t speak English and I’ll translate.”

  The man’s looks and accent convinced Ali that the driver was an American. This surprised him. He had met Americans sympathetic to the cause at the camp, but they had been blacks who had converted to Islam or young, disaffected Arab Americans. This American had blue eyes to go with the blond hair that crept out from beneath his cap.

  English was the second official language of Pakistan, and Ali was conversant in it. His stomach was in a knot when they pulled up to the gate, and he listened carefully when the driver spoke to the uniformed guards. He was expecting the guards to demand his papers and subject him to an interrogation he was not convinced he could withstand, but they let the station wagon through without any trouble. Ali wondered if a bribe had changed hands.

  Steve didn’t say much after they left the dock. Ali and his companions strained to see the sights as they passed through Manhattan, but they were exhausted, and all but Ali nodded off as soon as they were on the interstate headed south.

  “You are American?” Ali asked as soon as he got up the nerve to start a conversation.

  Steve nodded.

  “You are Muslim?”

  The driver nodded again.

  “Is that why you help us?”

  Steve turned his head toward Ali. When he was talking to the guards, Steve had looked like the star of an American sitcom Ali had been shown in the camp to help with his training; all smiles, joking about trivial matters. Now he looked dangerous.

  “The less you know about me, the better off you are, understood?” he asked in a hard, cold tone.

  “Of course,” Ali answered, backing off immediately. Fear of abuse had been nurtured in Ali since early childhood, and he never did well in physical confrontations.

  Ali turned away and closed his eyes, but he didn’t fall asleep immediately. To distract himself, he thought of all the possible targets in America’s capital. Which one would he destroy in the name of Allah? When he fell asleep, there was a contented smile on his lips.

  It was still dark when Ali woke up. He felt dull witted and spent a few moments rubbing sleep from his eyes. There was a sour taste in his mouth. The station wagon was driving down a dirt road in rural Maryland. Steve pulled into the driveway of a ranch-style house and woke up the sleeping men.

  “This is where you’ll be staying until we’re ready to act,” he said. “The refrigerator is fully stocked, and there’s cable television. I’ll make runs with groceries around this time, once a week. If there are problems, tell me then. I’ll give you a cell phone number, but it’s only for emergencies. Remember, the Americans can listen in on your calls. You’ll ask for pizza, and I’ll say you have the wrong number. Then I’ll come right over.

  “This house is pretty isolated. The nearest neighbors are a quarter mile away. You shouldn’t get visitors. If you do, tell them you’re students, and use the cover story you were given. Any questions?”

  Steve showed them around the house and got them set up. There were clothes in the closets in everyone’s size and food in the kitchen.

  “You’ll receive instructions soon,” Steve said before he left. “Be patient and trust in Allah. You will make history.”

  Despite the sleep he had gotten during the drive, Ali was logy when they arrived at the house. His initial elation in the harbor was gone. Before he’d gotten out of the car, he was beset by doubts that depressed him. Things could go wrong. They could fail. The CIA and FBI were not fools. What if they were caught?

  Steve’s last words elated Ali and erased his doubts. Allah was great, and he would see to their success. Steve closed the door behind him. Ali heard the car start. He looked through the slats in the Venetian blinds in the living room and watched the station wagon drive off. It had a Virginia license plate, and Ali memorized it when it passed beneath a streetlight. There was no reason for him to do it. He was just good with numbers and had an excellent memory, and the license plate number was filed away without much conscious thought.

  Chapter Seven

  The weather in Portland was unseasonably warm, and Jack Carson kept his window rolled down as he drove to Dunthorpe, eschewing air conditioning for the breeze that drifted off the Willamette River. In the distance, Mount Hood loomed, the setting sun tinting its snowy coat to a lovely rose color, but Jack was too on edge to take in the beauty of his surroundings. Normally, he would have had an aide drive him, but he’d given his staff the night off. He’d convinced himself that he’d done this because they’d been working hard and needed some downtime, but his subconscious was rife with images of Jessica Koshani naked and in bed, something he’d never see if a young staffer was waiting in his car or camping out in some part of Koshani’s house.

  Carson followed Koshani’s directio
ns and turned toward the river onto a narrow street that wound between large homes surrounded by expensively landscaped grounds. The house he was looking for was guarded by a gate that swung open moments after he announced himself through an intercom. Jack drove into a courtyard and parked near the front door of a house that was similar to Italian villas he’d seen during a family trip to Tuscany. Jessica Koshani was waiting for him at the front door, her jet black hair falling loosely across the shoulders of a yellow blouse that was tucked into tight jeans that emphasized her long legs.

  “I’m so glad you could make it,” she said when the senator got out of his car.

  “This is very nice,” he answered.

  “We’ll go around back to the patio. It looks out on the river. It’s wonderful being outdoors at this time of night. Can I get you something cool to drink? I make a mean martini, and I’ve got a full bar.”

  “Gin and tonic would be great.”

  “What brand of gin do you prefer?” she asked as she led him through a large living room toward French doors that opened onto a wide terra-cotta patio.

  Koshani left the senator with the view while she went inside to fix his drink. His heart rate was up and his mouth was dry. He tried to calm himself and hoped that the gin would help. Koshani walked out of the house with two drinks. His glass felt cold and damp against his hand. He took a quick sip and the cool lime taste chilled him.

  “This is a great spot,” Carson said.

  “As soon as the weather turns, I’m out here every chance I get.” Koshani smiled. “But you’re not here to talk about the view.”