by Matthew Iden
“What do you mean?”
“I’m almost certain she was instrumental in planning a massive development project meant to evict and relocate an entire low-income neighborhood in order to flip it into a multimillion-dollar renovation. The development shoved almost a thousand people out of their homes and turned a community into a ghost town.”
Gerson backed up to the brick wall next to the door and leaned against it. “That’s distasteful, but there’s nothing illegal about that.”
“Illegal? No, unfortunately not. Unethical? Yes.”
He crossed his arms and scowled, the gesture oddly childish. “If everyone who did something unethical in this city were arrested, there wouldn’t be anyone left. Is that all?”
“The development is currently in limbo because of one woman who wouldn’t sell out.”
“What’s this got to do with Wendy?”
“The people she was dealing with were both more experienced and less scrupulous than she was. When your sister couldn’t get this woman to sell, she called her associates in the deal, who sent two goons to change the woman’s mind. According to Wendy’s own notes, the two guys met with the woman that night. She was found dead the next day. A heart attack. Or so the coroner said. My former partner is going over the autopsy report now and I have a feeling that heart attack is not going be the final determination when he digs a little deeper.”
Gerson didn’t say anything.
“This woman was the last obstacle, now removed. Or so they thought. The only reason the development still hasn’t gone anywhere is that it turned out the property wasn’t actually in the woman’s name. But you understand that’s not the important part, right? If what I think happened, happened, then your sister precipitated this woman’s murder. Your sister had someone killed for money.”
As I’d spoken, Gerson’s head had dipped lower and lower until it now almost rested on his chest, his arms still folded. My last words died and we stood, silent. Around us, the city’s night sounds found their way down the alley. The honk of cars, raised voices from the street, the closing and opening of doors. Failing spotlights lit the alley in weak splashes. A rat, one of the city’s million, raced across the top of one slick black garbage bag to another.
Gerson took a deep breath and raised his head. “Are you telling me something or asking me something?”
Good. Gerson understood why I was here now. “Both.”
He paused, then said, “I need you to finish this. I want whoever killed Wendy caught, prosecuted, and punished. That part’s not going to change, no matter what gets revealed.”
I nodded.
“If, in the process, you discover things I’d rather I hadn’t known, I have to accept that. I hired you because you’re the kind of investigator that’s going to see that part through. Just do me the courtesy of bringing things to me first so I can do some damage control, if I can, all right?”
I thought about it. Damage control, in most cases, meant cover up. “As long as we’re not talking about sweeping murders under the rug, or giving crooks like Jeremy Rheinsfeld or Toby Waites a pass.”
“I couldn’t care less about them,” he said. “I only want to protect my parents.”
“Okay.”
He rubbed the back of his neck. “Do you think Wendy’s murder and this…deal…she was involved with are connected?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “They may be more than just connected. She might’ve been killed precisely because she knew about this woman’s murder. It would fit, as would Alex Montero’s killing. Pushing hard on this might unearth something you don’t want to know about Wendy, but it might also be exactly what gives us her killer.”
“You’d push on this no matter what I said,” he said. It wasn’t a question. “You just wanted to know where I stood.”
“You hired me to do a job and I’ll do it,” I said. “But leaving this unfinished isn’t an option.”
“Is it the notion of the spike that appeals, Singer?” he asked in the mocking tone he’d used when we’d first met. “A lone hero, holding out against the forces of corruption and evil? A solitary figure railing against the darkness?”
I shrugged.
He was silent for another long moment, then pushed himself away from the wall. “I’ve got to get back. The shift ends at nine. Keep me posted.”
“Okay.”
He pulled out the fly swatter and opened the door, then stopped to look back at me. “My only other warning would be to make sure you have the evidence to prove what you’re saying. A DC councilman and the CEO of a major real estate enterprise are two people you don’t want to anger, but if you drag Wendy’s name through something she didn’t do, my family will skin you alive.”
Gerson went inside, leaving me to find my way out of the darkened alley on my own.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
I gave Michael Denton a buzz early the next day.
“I may be on to something,” I began as soon as he answered, “that might give Atlantic Union more than a black eye. In fact, it might be big and bad enough to land Rheinsfeld and Waites in court.”
“You’ve got my attention.”
“Problem is, I need help running down some of the info that might help build a case against them.”
“And PoP might have the data you need.”
“Something like that, yeah.” I went on to explain what I knew about how it was Wendy’s involvement in the Quarters project that had gotten her killed and how I was leaning towards Rheinsfeld’s goons as doing the killing. “The question, though, is exactly what about her involvement was it? Was she killed because she screwed up and the development stalled? Or because she knew about this woman Tonya Jackson getting killed—had essentially set it in motion?”
Denton was quiet for a moment, then said, “Those kinds of questions sound more like your specialty.”
“They are, but the one thing that might help is something PoP is good at. Namely, there’s still the question of who owns this spike piece.”
Denton grunted. “Is that relevant? If Rheinsfeld or Waites had her killed like you say, then it wasn’t who owned the spike, just the fact that it was there. You should be looking at how and when they killed this woman Jackson.”
“Maybe so. But more information is always better than less. If you find the owner’s name, there might be a missing link somewhere that hooks into the other questions. If nothing else, it would be nice to find out who was willing to pass on the money just to tell Atlantic Union to shove it.”
“All right. I’ll put one of my staff on it, see what they can find out.”
“Thanks, Denton. It might be a brick in the wall we build around Rheinsfeld and his goons.”
He promised to get me anything his intrepid PoP volunteers found, then we hung up and I got dressed to go downtown. Denton was just my first salvo.
I came prepared this time, armed with two steaming, sixteen-ounce paper cups of Earl Grey along with a blueberry tart, a sticky bun, and a slice of lemon chess pie. It had seemed to work wonders last time.
“Oh, Mary! Come out here,” Charlotte said. “Mr. Singer’s back and he’s brought treats.”
I put on a smile worthy of any toothpaste commercial. “I thought you two ladies might enjoy a warm beverage and a few sugary delights on a slow afternoon at the office.”
“Those look so fattening,” Mary said, eyeing the sticky bun. The woman weighed marginally more than my cat.
“I won’t tell if you don’t,” I said, and bit into the bear claw I’d brought for myself. Combined with a twenty-ounce French roast, it was a slice of indulgent, over-caffeinated heaven.
“Why do I get the feeling that these are a preamble to another document search?” Charlotte asked as she smiled and reached for the blueberry tart.
“Can’t a guy just drop by with a couple of drinks and some empty calories?” I asked. Both of the women shot me looks. “Okay, hopefully this isn’t anything
too strenuous. There’s a single, lonely plot in the new Quarters redevelopment whose owner won’t sell. I was hoping I could find out from you who this mysterious person might be.”
“Is this part of the work you were doing before?”
“Yes.”
“Does this make us your snitches?” Mary asked, seeming excited by the prospect. “Are we confidential informants now?”
“Ah…not as such,” I said diplomatically. “You’re more like expert witnesses. Though if I can bribe you with tea and crumpets every time, you’ll be cheaper than any expert witness or snitch ever hired.”
We got into the down and dirty of my search. Mary started typing on her computer before I was even done describing what I needed. She hummed and tapped her cheek with a finger as she worked. “The parcel itself is easy enough to find in the tax records,” she began, “but it looks like it’s owned by a holding company. So we’ll have to run down the incorporation records and charter for that company and, if we’re lucky, we’ll get a list of officers’ names.”
“Let’s say whoever bought this plot didn’t want to be found, so they used a fake name and personal information. What’re the odds of being able to find that someone?”
Mary tsked. “Not great. There’s got to be a mailing address, but it can be a P.O. box or dummy address, of course. And the rules are rather lax in all other regards. The states don’t mind taking the fees and leaving it at that.”
“No background checks?” I asked. “No unwarranted inspections?”
“Not that I’ve ever seen.” She looked at me. “Does that mean we have to give the pastries back?”
“No, consider that payment for service rendered. Would you mind digging a little longer, though, just to make sure? I’ll buy you a year’s supply of Earl Grey if you don’t make me go online and do it myself.”
That got a couple smirks. They told me it could take a while, which I took as a signal to leave them alone. I bade them adieu and walked out of the Office of Records and down the steps to my car. I was wearing a smile I didn’t really feel, since I was back to waiting to hear from sources instead of acting on real intel. It was nice to toss a few irons in the fire, but it wasn’t quite the same as racing to a murder scene or leaning on a witness. Hurry-up-and-wait had never been my favorite pastime.
I started the car and snapped on the radio, hoping to catch the weather. Instead of a forecast, however, I got my wish for direct action, because the nice news man on the radio interrupted the weather guy to announce, breathlessly, that Toby Waites had been shot in his own home.
Tourists driving by the scene in front of the councilman’s expansive manse would’ve been forgiven thinking that a nuclear bomb had been found on the manicured green lawn. No fewer than fifteen MPDC cruisers, plainclothes cars, ambulances, and other official vehicles surrounded the home. They were pulled up on sidewalks, parked in the driveway, and arrayed along scenic Fox Chapel Road north of Georgetown, blocking traffic. Three local TV station vans and a national news network truck were pulled over illegally on the gravel shoulder. I recognized one of the field reporters from the press conference a few days before, the smoker. She was smoking now, in fact, and arguing with a woman wearing a cream-colored jogging suit in the front of a gated drive—apparently an irate, if well-to-do, homeowner who didn’t appreciate the hubbub hubbubbing itself all over her front drive.
I had parked five gates down, wary of the circus—if it was still like this, two or three hours after the shooting had been reported, it must’ve been serious bedlam right after it happened. Taking my time, I sauntered along the road, catching glimpses of the ongoing mess on the other side through the wrought-iron fence.
The real work could only be done by one or two detectives, maybe a handful of badges searching the scene, an M.E. who was probably already gone, and a forensics crew to go over the whole thing. At least a dozen people milling about were unnecessary, unneeded, and unwelcome from an investigative standpoint, but that’s the way it went in a high-profile, politically explosive case.
Aides, reporters, staff, and PR folks were clamoring to get inside the fence so they could ruin the detective’s day with inane questions and meaningless demands. City politics made sure there were three times as many cops on the scene than it needed, yet—despite being bored out of their skulls—they couldn’t seem lazy sitting on the hoods of their cars or smoking a cigarette, so they’d wander the grounds and the house, getting in the way and destroying the integrity of the scene. And if the chief herself weren’t already standing on the front porch with her hands on her hips, demanding an update and threatening to knock all the officers and detectives down to beat cops and the badges down to Southeast sewer patrol, the mayor was going to want to know why. Speaking of which, if the mayor thought he could score some points in the next election—or just snag a decent photo op—he’d be here in a few minutes, too, growling into the chief’s ear and suggesting she might find gainful employment in another city, preferably in another time zone, maybe even another continent, if she screwed the pooch on this one.
With all this in mind, I watched from across the street and planned my approach carefully. If I tried to waltz in as former detective Marty Singer, I’d get a boot up my ass from one of the patrolmen itching for something to do. So some discretion and observation was in order. I took a spot across the street, not far from where the field reporter and the irascible homeowner had been arguing when I’d driven by.
I watched the all-too-familiar scene. Gaudier than most that I’d been part of, but still unremarkable at its core. Frankly, despite the bright lights and ongoing sense of drama, it was boring. To pass the time, I took out my phone and thumbed my way through screens until I got to the voice mail box. I tapped on the last one I’d received, just like I’d tapped on it ten times already. There was a click, then a cough.
“It’s me,” Julie said. “I…I just wanted to say I’m sorry. What I said at FirstStep, it was thoughtless. You aren’t lucky, Marty. You’re tough. Resourceful. Bullheaded, yes. But that’s what’s gotten you through this. I guess when I said lucky, what I really meant to say was exceptional. My mother had all those qualities, but she didn’t make it. And I just wanted to say…I’m glad you did.”
There was a long pause.
“Let’s try again. Your call where and when. We’ll talk about football this time.”
I turned off the phone. There hadn’t been time to call her. Actually, there had, but I hadn’t felt like it. Putting things back together with Julie, so important a few days ago, seemed like a lot of work now. I poked and prodded how I felt about our situation, but no answers popped out for me. Maybe it was time to let this fade into the distance.
“I don’t care who you’re with, I want your goddamn van out of my front yard,” a loud voice said, interrupting my musing.
I turned. The irascible homeowner I’d seen wrangling with the reporter was giving it another go. When I’d first walked up, she’d retreated to the shelter of her garage to fume, but hadn’t gone inside her palace. She’d apparently gotten her second wind. The reporter, weary, turned and faced off with her.
“Lady, I told you. A man got shot four times this morning in the house across the street,” the station reporter said, then took a drag from her cigarette. She pointed with it as she exhaled. “And when that man happens to be Toby Waites, it’s news.”
“Who?”
“Toby Waites,” the reporter said. “The DC city councilman?”
That seemed to give the woman pause, but she soldiered on. “That doesn’t change the fact that you’re going to have to move that van somewhere else. Park on his lawn.”
“Are you married?”
“What does that have to do anything? Yes, I’m married.”
“Does your husband own WXPI?”
“No.”
“Then the van stays where it is,” the reporter said, took a last pull from the cigarette, and flicked the butt over the lady
’s fence and into her yard. “We’ll be out of your hair in a couple of hours.”
“You bitch! I’m calling the cops,” the woman screeched, balling her hands into fists.
The reporter had already turned to walk away, but she gestured towards the morass of police around Waites’s house. “Let me know how it works out.”
The lady shook like she was going to spontaneously combust…then she wheeled in my direction. “You! Who the hell are you?”
“Time to go,” I said under my breath, then headed across Fox Chapel. I’d rather jump through a dozen fiery hoops to get to Dods than stand and listen to a millionaire’s bored housewife heap abuse on me. I pushed my way through the mess in front of the gate, getting a couple of glares along the way. An MPDC badge—big and tired of telling reporters and muckety-mucks to go away—held up a hand before I got within ten feet.
“Sir, no one’s being allowed on the scene. I’m going to—”
“—have to ask me to step away,” I finished for him. I reached carefully into a breast pocket and brought out my old MPDC card and handed it over. “I understand, officer. Detective Davidovitch asked me to come down and lend him a hand.”
The badge glanced down at the card, looking confused and torn, then my heart sank when he seemed to be leaning towards the beat cop mantra, When in doubt, say no. I was getting ready to make a second pitch when, from the side of the gate, I heard a laugh and my name being called. The beat cop and I both turned to see a middle-aged black guy in sergeant’s stripes walk over to us, a big smile on his face.
“Patches,” I said, grinning back and shaking his hand as he came up to me.
“Marty the man,” he said. The badge at the gate took a step back.
“How’d you get pulled in on this?” I asked. “You’re supposed to be telling tourists where the White House is and making sure all the bars on M Street are stocked.”