Access to Power

by Robert Ellis

  The anxiousness was back in Mario’s voice and he looked terrified. Frank started for the door, trying to ignore it.

  “He can do it from his car, Mario. Just make sure he brings a camera.”

  Chapter 54

  The drive home only took twenty minutes. Frank heard thunder in the distance and saw an occasional flash of lighting. On the radio they were calling for more rain. Frank wouldn’t have cared if it snowed, wondering if you could overdose on adrenalin. RAVE had been responsible for the dirty tricks against Lou Kay’s campaign. He had the proof in his pocket—the check to Sylvia Kay for $250,000. But RAVE was also an independent expenditure, a special interest group. Depending on how Mario made out, if they could connect the dots to Merdock, then Merdock had broken the law and Lou Kay could drop the bomb at the debate tomorrow night in front of the TV cameras.

  It was a silver bullet, just as Frank had told Juliana.

  Mel Merdock would be forever branded as the greasy carpetbagger who would do anything to win. The check was big enough, the deceit rich enough, that the press would run with the story. Mel Merdock paid Lou Kay’s ex-wife a quarter million dollars to lie and then destroyed his innocent daughter’s life in a scandal at school. Merdock’s campaign would be finished, his name, poisoned. The cops would no longer have to worry about interfering in an election. The U.S. Attorney could work the murder investigation out in the open the moment the story broke.

  Frank pulled into the drive, spotting them on the porch instantly. Randolph sat on the steps smoking a cigarette. Grimes was on the porch swing, gliding back and forth. From the expressions on their faces, it looked as if they knew that he’d just committed a burglary. But that was impossible. Mario had rehung the door and they’d made it out of the building without being seen.

  “Where you been?” Randolph asked.

  Frank grabbed his briefcase and got out of the car, eyeing them carefully. “I thought you guys got kicked off the case,” he said.

  Randolph shrugged. “You know as well as we do D.C. doesn’t elect a district attorney, Frank. The U.S. Attorney is appointed by the president.” Randolph paused a moment to look at his cigarette before taking another drag. “Did I tell you that the U.S. Attorney’s building a new home on the Chesapeake?”

  “Are you saying there’s a problem?”

  Grimes laughed from the porch swing. “Yeah, there’s a problem. He’s a politician. He goes goo-goo for cash.”

  Randolph let it settle in a moment, looking past Frank to the street. “The U.S. Attorney didn’t come from money and he didn’t marry it. I couldn’t prove it. But it sure looks like he spends more than he makes.”

  The rain started. A light drizzle. Frank climbed the steps, resting his briefcase on the table and leaning against the porch rail.

  “Your fingerprints were found in Olson’s office,” Randolph said in a quieter voice. “You didn’t touch things here and there. You touched everything, Frank. Like maybe you were looking for something.”

  “I was there last week,” he said slowly.

  Randolph nodded. “The building super says the two of you talked. He says that you were impersonating a police officer. You see where we’re heading, right?”

  A long moment passed. Dark and heavy. Frank lowered his eyes, waiting for the detective to spell it out.

  “You’re in trouble,” Randolph said. “The U.S. Attorney doesn’t think a candidate for the U.S. Senate would kill four people to cover up an affair. He thinks Olson took those sex shots of your client with the girl. But he wasn’t blackmailing Merdock with them. He thinks that Olson was blackmailing you. That’s why you went over to his place last week. You were searching for the photos. Olson was out to get you. Everybody knows that. The U.S. Attorney thinks that you murdered him, Frank. You were there. You were alone with the body. You thought you could get away with it if you made it look like a suicide.”

  “What about Linda?”

  “Either she’s in it with you, or you staged the suicide and brought her over as a witness.”

  Randolph’s voice trailed off. Frank didn’t say anything. He watched the detective flick his cigarette onto the lawn. Another dead soldier falling on a field of wet grass.

  “Why did I kill Woody?” he heard himself whisper.

  The porch swing stopped. “He’s not sure yet,” Grimes said. “All the U.S. Attorney knows is that you had the opportunity.”

  “The president’s fund-raiser,” Randolph said. “That hour no one could find you. The photographer—Bobby what’s-his-name. He says you guys didn’t speak for more than a couple of minutes. You told us you went into the lobby to make phone calls. Only there’s no record of any calls being made on your cell phone that night. You could’ve done Woody and made it back in plenty of time.”

  It hung there as the rain picked up—Jake’s threat unveiled in toto like a black flower at the end of spring. Somehow they had found a way to the U.S. Attorney. From the little Frank knew about the man, he’d thought that he might be weak but hadn’t anticipated him being dirty. The U.S. Attorney had driven out to the Merdocks the night Olson was murdered, looked at their house and had probably seen an opportunity. Now everything they knew about the case had been skewed to fit his theory that Frank was the one. Anything that didn’t fit would be thrown out and ignored, the same way it was done in a political campaign.

  They had him. They owned him.

  “The president’s fund-raiser,” Randolph repeated. “You had the opportunity, Frank.”

  “Linda was with someone,” he said. “I didn’t want to see them together. I was sitting in the lobby. I think I went into the bar.”

  “Any truth to the rumor that you and Woody hadn’t been getting along?” Grimes asked.

  “We’d been partners for ten years.”

  Frank saw the two detectives trade looks like they knew all about being partners for ten years. Then Randolph got to his feet, stretching his legs and taking a step closer.

  “The U.S. Attorney’s looking for a motive, Frank. Money, jealousy—things like that. You got a lawyer?”

  Frank nodded, then remembered the article from the newspaper in Fort Worth that Linda had given him earlier in the day. Digging it out of his pocket, he unfolded the piece of paper and pointed to the photograph of Juliana and Mel Merdock, Sr. standing in front of their bodyguard. Grimes got off the porch swing and both detectives gave the man in the photo a close look. Thunder rumbled across the sky just over the house.

  “He’s changed,” Frank said. “His hair’s different, but that’s him. I saw him with Jake a couple hours ago.”

  Chapter 55

  It was safe to say that his life was in crisis. That to sugarcoat what had happened, to live in a fantasy world of false hope would only lead to his own destruction. As Frank pulled into the lot at his office, he saw Merdock’s Lincoln parked before the entrance. Norman sat behind the wheel with the windows closed. Juliana had seen him drive in and was waiting for him to park. Frank guessed that Merdock and Jake were already upstairs. In spite of everything, they had shown up on schedule thinking that Frank would prep Merdock for the debate tonight as if the river had been dry and no water had passed beneath the bridge.

  And Frank would. He’d deliver Merdock to Lou Kay and his consultant Stewart Brown. He’d do it with pleasure, even though he had to admit, he was riding on fear.

  He got out of the Chevy, glancing at Juliana as he approached her. She was wearing a light-colored blouse with buttons down the front, black stockings with high heeled shoes and a tight black skirt cut to the middle of her thighs. Her face was still and looked like it had aged, the smell of her perfume, both suffocating and toxic.

  “You haven’t been sleeping,” she said.

  “We’re less than a week out. How’s Mel doing?”

  “He’s nervous.”

  She was trying to read his face. She was trying to measure him. She stepped closer and took his hand, pressing it into her breast . Every instinct told him to
pull away, but he didn’t.

  “I like the time we’ve spent together,” she said. “I wish we could do it more often.”

  It was a veiled warning, of course. She was referring to the U.S. Attorney without saying it. Play ball, Frank, and we can spend more time together. Play ball, and you might not go to jail.

  He switched off his soul and managed a light smile. Walking her to the building, he opened the door for her and followed her up the stairs.

  They found Merdock and Jake in the conference room. Easing the tension, Tracy had brought in coffee and a cheese tray that included a variety of breads and sliced fruit. With his clients distracted, Frank set up the camcorder on the far side of the room and wheeled in a monitor on a stand. He was going through the motions. Feeling the strain and ignoring it because he knew that he had to.

  Two hours later, they were still at it. Merdock stood in front of the camcorder with Frank and Juliana sitting before the monitor. Jake kept his distance, slouched in a chair at the end of the table and tapping his pen on a scratch pad. Jake seemed quieter than usual, tight like a spring, and every few minutes he’d look through the glass into the war room. Frank followed his gaze, wondering what he was looking at. There were several hundred radio spots spread across the floor, and Tracy and the interns were helping the woman from Fedex get the packages into trash bags and out the door for shipping. Linda was in her office. She had a faraway look in her eyes and had just picked up the phone.

  “Are you okay, Frank?” Merdock asked. “You seem a little preoccupied today.”

  Frank turned back to the monitor. “Let’s try it again.”

  “I’m ready,” Merdock said, adjusting his tie.

  Frank gave him the nod. Merdock grabbed the podium and looked off camera. He was stiff and appeared drained.

  “I think it’s time,” Merdock said, stumbling over the words. “It’s time to put an end to politics. Politics as usual, I mean. I think everyone would agree. Everyone agrees it’s time to reclaim the values—”

  Merdock stopped to check his notes. Frank glanced at Jake and noticed him staring into the war room again.

  “You’re the front runner,” Frank said to his client. “You need to look like it, Mel. You need to act like it.”

  “Shouldn’t he be talking to the camera?” Juliana asked.

  Frank nodded. “He’s looking at himself on the monitor.”

  “Why is that woman staring?” Jake blurted out.

  Frank gave him a look and then noticed Linda crossing the war room.

  “She’s staring,” Jake repeated. “Tell her to stop.”

  “Or what?” Frank snapped back at him.

  Everyone in the room became quiet. Frank realized his mistake but didn’t care. It had been a long morning of trying to keep his nerves in check, trying to act like nothing had changed when everything had changed. He was tired of looking at Jake’s face. For most of the last hour, he’d been fighting the urge to grab him by the throat and launch him out the window into space.

  The door opened. It was Linda, straining to keep her eyes on Frank.

  “You’ve got a call,” she said. “Line two. It’s personal.”

  She backed out of the room. Frank picked up his file and followed her, closing the door behind them.

  “It’s Mario,” she said anxiously. “He’s faxing something.”

  “Get Lou Kay on the phone for me.”

  Her eyes sharpened and she nodded. Frank crossed the room to the fax machine. When he noticed the Merdocks staring at him through the glass, he picked up the phone and turned his back.

  “Where are they?” Mario asked.

  “In the conference room,” Frank said. “They’re watching.”

  “Can you see your fax machine?”

  Frank turned to the fax, picked up the document and started reading.

  “It’s a receipt for a wire transfer,” Mario said. “You were right. The dates and amounts match. So do the bank numbers. Two hundred and fifty grand went out of Merdock’s account the same day a fund-raiser on the Hill cut the check to Lou Kay’s ex-wife and sent it to RAVE. The money’s laundered, but there’s no doubt about it, Frank. Merdock paid the bitch to lie.”

  “Who’s they, Mario? Who’s RAVE?”

  “Someone in politics who knows what they’re doing.”

  “What about Eddie?”

  “He’s there and he’s got his camera. No one’s shown up yet.”

  Linda nodded at him from her desk. He saw the light blinking on the phone.

  “Lou Kay’s holding on the other line,” Frank said to Mario.

  “If you fax him a copy of that check to his ex-wife and the wire transfer, then Mel Merdock burns down in front of live TV audience tonight. He won’t know what hit him. Good luck, Frank.”

  Frank glanced at the conference room. Juliana and Jake were still watching him and seemed tense. Turning back to the phone, he hit the line button and opened his file to the photocopy of the check.

  “This is Frank Miles,” he said into the phone. “What’s your fax number, Lou?”

  Lou Kay hesitated a moment, then gave him the number.

  “Thanks,” Frank said, jotting it down. “I’m sending you something for the debate tonight. It’s what you guys have been looking for. Go stand by your fax machine.”

  He hung up without an explanation. As he turned to the fax machine, he saw Linda silently trying to warn him—Tracy and the interns staring at him wide-eyed from their desks.

  “Frank,” Juliana said.

  She was in the war room, moving in behind his back. Frank fed the papers into the fax machine.

  “What are you doing, Frank?”

  “I’ll be right with you,” he said.

  Frank entered the number and heard the fax connect. As the papers began rolling through the machine face down, he turned and saw Juliana eyeing them.

  “Jake was upset,” she said. “Mel’s worried about tonight. Let’s try it again.”

  “Mel keeps forgetting that it’s a TV audience. They don’t read. That’s why we’ve always gotta bring it back to crime.”

  She nodded, even smiled. The fax machine quieted. Frank returned the papers to his file folder. When the fax printed a record of the transmission that included the words Lou Kay for U.S. Senate in bold letters, he crumpled it up and threw the piece of paper in the trash. He was cool, calm, wiping the beads of sweat from his brow as he walked Juliana into the conference room and closed the door. It was time to get back to work. Time to prep his horse for the debate tonight and hope that he never reached the finish line.

  Chapter 56

  The Merdocks had left the office after lunch, and the debate wouldn’t be starting for another hour and a half. Frank poured a cup of coffee and took a sip. Through the glass he could see Tracy in the conference room, working with the new talk radio callers who had considered Merdock but were now voting for Lou Kay. Linda was at her desk, talking to someone on the phone. As he walked through the war room and finally reached Woody’s office, he stepped inside and closed the door.

  He sat on the couch, looking outside at the Capitol and what seemed like a beautiful evening. Lou Kay and Stewart Brown had everything they needed to bring Merdock down. If they played it right, it would be the only part of the debate to make the late night news. Then the story would mushroom, taking on a life of its own. By tomorrow morning, Lou Kay would no longer be seen as a wife beater. Everyone would know that Mel Merdock was the asshole politician who had paid Lou Kay’s ex-wife a quarter million dollars to face the press and tell a lie.

  It wasn’t the same as getting them for murder, but it was a start.

  Frank turned away from the window and looked at the pictures his partner had hung on the wall. There was a shot of Woody standing with Danny Garfield outside the congressman’s campaign office in Austin, Texas. Garfield had been a senior member of the House, a very powerful man, but had gotten into trouble for not supporting his party’s line. He was a free
thinker who had always said he never voted by consulting his party’s playbook, but listened to his conscience instead. His campaign for reelection had turned into an unexpectedly tight race, but Woody came through for him and they won by a slim margin. Frank remembered Garfield calling to thank Woody from the floor of the House after being sworn in. Frank had never heard of a client doing that before, particularly someone of Garfield’s stature. Even now, Frank couldn’t help but feel impressed.

  The door opened. Linda stepped into the room with his jacket.

  “You’re gonna be late,” she said in a quiet voice.

  “I’m leaving in a few minutes.”

  A moment passed, the two of them looking at each other. Then Frank finally got up off the couch and started to get into his jacket.

  “Did you talk to Stewart Brown?” she asked.

  Frank shook his head. “I couldn’t reach him. I’ll see him at the debate.”

  “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah, sure,” he said. “My client’s the rich guy who likes to ruin other people’s lives. It’ll be all over the news tonight. Everything’s great.”

  She flashed a worried smile at him. Then she stepped closer, fixing his shirt and straightening his tie. Frank looked at her face. Her lips were parted. Her eyes were bright and warm and she smelled good.

  * * *

  The debate was being held at a campus theater off Route 66 just west of the Beltway. By the time Frank arrived, Merdock and Kay were already standing before the TV cameras fielding questions.

  Only half the seats were filled. Frank sat down in the back, checking out the audience in the darkness. He could see Jake holding an empty seat directly before the stage, and looked for Juliana but didn’t see her. When he turned, he spotted Stewart Brown on the far side of the room heading up the aisle toward the lobby. His beady eyes were shifting back and forth on the carpet, his body swelling out of his suit like a balloon ready to pop. Stewart Brown was disgusting. In spite of all that had happened, Frank couldn’t believe that he was handing the dirtbag a win.