I took my time, needing the moment. “For the record,” I said evenly, “you’re a complete jackass.”
“Braying, you said.” He settled across from me, easing back into the chair with a careless grace.
“How can you not expect blowback?”
“Afraid I’m not following.”
“You know, for how cleverly you dispatched Ian. No evidence for an arrest warrant? No problem. News has neither due process nor burden of proof. Just leak your so-called investigative theory to a producer who trusted you as an investigator if not as a man, and throw in some fancy forensic talk from the medical examiner to corroborate your theory of Ian as this so-called person of interest. Said producer breaks the exclusive, so she’s happy, right?” I leaned forward on my elbows, about as angry as I’d ever been, and said: “Too bad the story’s not true. I wonder if you ever suspected Ian at all.”
“You reported he was a person of interest,” he said pleasantly. He lifted his glass in toast. “At the time I was interested. So you’re good. No worries.”
My face grew hot. “I’m . . . good?”
“To use your parlance, you’re accurate. Mr. Chase still hasn’t been cleared. He has no alibi.” He held out his hand and ticked off with each finger: “Two, he has a history of being, shall we say, overly physical with his sexual partners. Violent might be a better word. Three, he has motive, the pregnancy—”
“On further consideration, I find that debatable. Most men are thrilled to have children. Has Ian given you any reason to believe otherwise?”
He ticked off another finger. “Four, he admittedly planned to meet Evelyn that night. We believe she did meet him. That’s called opportunity.”
“Does Ian Chase own a motorcycle?”
He gave me a look of pure arrogance, and then: “You know, any other reporter would be kissing my ass for information instead of reaming me a new one. I find myself very close to cutting you off.”
“Funny how I’ve arrived at the same conclusion about you. To my way of thinking, a lying source is no source at all.”
“I’m . . . lying?” He laughed. “Careful now. That’s a pretty strong accusation.”
“That raw video of Evelyn at the community meeting in Rock Creek?” I said. “The one where she first met Ian? I found it.”
“Excellent. Where’s my copy you promised?”
“One of the exterior shots shows an unmarked cruiser parked outside the meeting. That cruiser has a dent in the front quarter-panel, exactly like the dent in the car you drive, the one that carried me to the correspondents dinner.”
“I’m uncertain if it’s the narrow streets or the traffic,” he said, scratching the stubble on his jaw thoughtfully. “If I had a dollar for every banged-up cruiser in our fleet, I wouldn’t need my pension.”
“You’re saying you weren’t at that meeting with Evelyn?”
“I attend more meetings than I’d ever thought possible as a starry-eyed detective dreaming of the climb up the ladder to officialdom, and no, I do not specifically recall that meeting.” With that, he took a long swallow of his Guinness. He smacked his lips with satisfaction.
“Would it help if I showed the video of you in a dark corner with Evelyn Carney?” I said.
He didn’t blink. His face remained expressionless. No hint of worry or guilt, no anger that I’d caught him. Not even a concession that he was caught.
“Before the camera panned away,” I went on, “you reached over and touched her waist. It was an intimate gesture, Michael.”
He pulled out his phone and scrolled through his messages, as if bored. He talked down to his phone, frowning. “Your camera caught me groping a woman. Big deal.”
“Were you intimate with Evelyn Carney?” I said. “Did you come clean to the chief? Has anyone asked for your alibi?”
“Be serious, would you? Do you have any idea how many people recognize me and start up a conversation, wanting to know about this or that case or whatever. She’s just one of those people who used to hang around the Hill—”
“Evelyn?”
“Sure. I’d run into her time to time, once with her colleague Paige. She asked me about jobs at Justice, that kind of work. She thought it was all very glamorous—poor deluded girl—and wondered if I’d introduce her to certain people who might help her.”
“She wanted you to get her a job?”
“That was her suggestion.”
“And let me guess. You helped her?” Help, up in air quotes.
“Of course not. But she was okay to talk to, easier to look at. That’s all that happened.”
“So why not say so from the beginning?” I said.
He gave me a hard look. “Now that has got to be the stupidest question you’ve ever asked. You know what people would say. That’s why you’re not going to pursue it.”
“I’m not?”
“No.”
“I shouldn’t ask what kind of relationship you had with the victim whose murder is being investigated by your detectives? Or how that relationship impacts your investigation? Did you okay the surveillance of Evelyn Carney?”
“What? No. That’s nuts.”
“Maybe you stalked her. Were you obsessed with her?”
“Get real . . . stalk a woman.” He let out a harsh laugh. “That would risk my job. I’ve never cared that much about anyone.”
That at least had the ring of truth.
“Seriously, this is a waste of your time,” he said smugly, and then explained: the chief had requested him specifically to oversee the investigation because he was the best she had, simple as that. She was aware the decedent was a person known to him, but that sort of thing happened in a city so small, more often than you’d think. Throughout the investigation, he made certain the chief and the mayor were consulted and that his superiors green-lighted each avenue pursued and all information released.
Besides, he told me, the only reputation injured by a rumor of relationship would be Evelyn’s. If people caught wind of a scandal, they’d believe the worst of her, and the worst would be everywhere. After all, dead women sold stories. Add to that the unfounded allegations of a love triangle involving a cop and a prosecutor, and every smarmy television executive and newspaper editor would pump the story onto Web pages and cable stations 24/7, as though it were somehow true or relevant to the investigation. And Evelyn Carney would become the face of gruesome fantasy for predators and perverts to indulge in while passing their twisted judgment: sexy girls and girls who like sex got what they deserved, and sometimes that’s death.
“A message that sells a million ads,” he said, “but I don’t see you unleashing it.”
It was a stirring speech from a surprising source, and I really didn’t think he believed a word of it. But that was Michael’s genius. Everybody else in this city bought or bullied you into thinking their way. Not Michael. He figured out your fear and worked it against you.
I leaned forward on my elbows, staring him down. “You don’t get to tell my news division what’s worthy of our air. We make our own determinations of importance and relevance and yes, factor in sensitivity to the victim, independent of your preferences and those of other government officials.” I paused. “Consider that fair warning, Michael. Don’t get complacent.”
“Back at you, love,” he said with a grim smile. “Try not to forget that old saying about curiosity.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
WHILE I WAS spinning my wheels with Michael Ledger, Ben was charming the owner of a Georgetown gift shop into handing over her store’s surveillance video. The shop was on M Street at the base of the Key Bridge, and its video came from the camera over the front door that recorded movement on the street. The video, date stamped the night Evelyn Carney was killed, showed a woman who appeared to be Evelyn as she walked past the store and waited at a traffic light to cross M Street. Clips from a few minutes later showed an empty sidewalk, but in the background, Ben could make out a motorcycle waiting at the light.
He wa
s telling me this over the phone as I sped across town.
“Detectives wanted the original,” Ben said, “but the owner only gave up a copy. She’s not into what she calls the police state. Not sure if that’s politics or paranoia, but lucky for us, she’s a huge fan of the Fourth Estate, and thinks I—Ben Pearce—am her best defense against unlimited state power. So she gave me a copy, too. Cool, huh?”
“I’ll start writing soon as I get there,” I said into the speakerphone. “The surveillance video should go at the top of the script.”
“Yep. Already called for it after the lead-in.”
“You wrote the script already?” I said, and then: “Read it to me.”
It was terrific, easily the best he’d ever written, and it gave me an uneasy feeling. Basically, Ben was born for television news, with the exception of his writing. That had been his Achilles heel. If that struggle was over, he needed no one. Not even me. Which was good, right?
“Well done, Ben.”
He snorted. “Try not to sound as surprised as I was. What’s your ETA, anyhow?”
————
Twenty minutes later I was rolling up on our satellite truck parked the wrong way on a cobblestone street at the corner of M. The truck, which blocked a loading zone, also took up two premier parking spots. The manager of the condominium that owned those spots was screaming and pointing at our truck operator, George. For just such occasions, George wore earbuds. If he listened to people shouting at him, he’d never find a place to put a truck that size.
I climbed out of my car into sheer chaos: Ben pleading with the condo manager screaming at George, who was bobbing his head to whatever music blasted in his earbuds as he worked the controls that lifted the satellite dish. Nelson scampered around them, running cables from the truck to his camera. The truck’s motor thundered as the satellite dish went up with its weird pings and metallic groans.
“That woman whose body was found in the Potomac?” Ben was shouting over the sound of the motor. “She was last seen here. We can only be live from here.”
“Not using my parking spaces,” the manager said.
“There’s important new information we have to report. Pictures that could identify the killer of a woman who walked right past your condominium.”
The manager threated to have us towed.
I popped my trunk where my secret stash was kept and scooped an armful of sweatshirts embossed with our network’s logo. What the hell, a stack of baseball caps, too. I carried it all to Ben and dumped it wordlessly in his arms.
Ben offered the armful to the manager, who soon began nodding about this great misunderstanding. Wasn’t it terrible what happened to the young woman? Sure we could stay, as long as we left the minute the show was over. Sending one last poisonous glare at George, the manager took the shirts and hats and stomped off.
Station swag. Worked every time.
“Come see the surveillance,” Ben said, waving for me to follow him to the truck.
The video was black and white, and it jumped as Evelyn—or a woman who appeared to be Evelyn—moved quickly through the frames. She was swathed in a dark coat and her face was so pixelated that I couldn’t make out her features, let alone her expression. We played with the zoom, but it only got worse.
“Video’s terribly degraded,” I said.
“Yeah,” he sighed. “It’s the copy of an original that wasn’t great to begin with. But it’s her, right? I mean, look at her.”
“I can’t see how it’d be anyone else. The location and the time stamp matches what Lil’ Bit told us. But I think we need the ID to come from authorities.”
“All right. Who works them? You or me?”
We batted the question around for a bit. The complication was this: investigators always released this kind of video to the media, and yet they’d been sitting on this for a week. We didn’t want to run into an official telling us not to use it.
“Question is, why didn’t the police put the video out to the public?” Ben said. “You think they’re burying evidence?”
Certainly Michael had chosen not to tell me about the video. It was becoming increasingly clear that Michael had been feeding me just enough information to get what he wanted reported on air, while diverting my attention from Lil’ Bit’s motorcycle sighting, and now, from his acquaintance with Evelyn—or whatever the relationship was. What else was he hiding?
“It’d be interesting to know if MPD investigators shared this video with the prosecutor’s office,” I mused aloud. “Show me the other video.”
The motorcycle was shot from too great a distance. You could tell it was a motorcycle with a rider, and you could watch the motorcycle move out of the frame, and that was all.
Nelson bounced over to us. “Director wants you in front of the camera,” he told Ben. “Live tease at top of the hour.”
“Be right there,” Ben said, and then to me: “Do we use the motorcycle or not?”
We talked it out. I’d promised not to report the motorcycle leaving the professor’s homicide scene. Now it was true, Michael Ledger was a lying jackass, but my promise was a promise, and a journalist who couldn’t keep her promise was a hack. So we agreed the motorcycle was out of bounds for me and for reporting the professor’s crime scene, but the surveillance of M Street that Ben had gotten from the shop owner? As long as he could get a confirmation from the prosecutor’s office, it could be used.
I thought of one of Ben’s lovelies: “That girl from the US Attorney’s still crushing on you?” I teased.
“She’s a source,” he said, frowning. “Not a girl.”
“Oh, right, sorry.” It was the kind of dumb joke we used to make before that night in my office. Now it was poor taste. “Ignore me. Not my business anyway.”
“It most certainly is.”
I waved my hand for silence. “So this video—”
“Virginia, stop.”
He was looking at me with warm dark eyes that crinkled in the corners, and his skin was burnished gold in the last of the day’s sun. Memories flickered from the night of the correspondents dinner, how I’d kissed him in my office and wrapped myself around his bulk and whispered those wild, needy words.
His smile spread slowly.
Nelson came up behind us. “If you’d stop making eyes at the talent,” he complained to me, “maybe I could get him in front of the camera. Earth to Ben.”
“Plenty of time,” he said, still looking at me, and repeated: “I’m making it your business. You have the right to ask me about any relationship, and after we dig our way out of this story, I’m going to ask for that right in return. We’re going to talk this out.”
Terrifying thought.
“There’s an open mike not five feet away,” Nelson hissed.
Ben ignored him. “You owe me a talk, Virginia.”
“I know it.”
“As in, the control room can hear you,” Nelson said. “Now get in front of the damn camera.”
Ben made a face. “Let me knock out this tease, then I’ll make my strictly professional call.”
He sauntered over to the camera and bent down, checking his hair in the lens, before he straightened again, giving his usual greeting, “Ben here, howdy,” to the control room, and then he was on air. After the tease, he pulled off his microphone and draped it over the top of the camera and walked back to me, talking animatedly with his cell phone to his ear.
Ben’s source at the prosecutor’s office confirmed the motorcycle sighting on M Street but was unaware of any surveillance video. She was troubled that her office hadn’t been told of what seemed a crucial piece of evidence, and promised to get answers from police officials as soon as she got off the phone. Soon, Ben’s cell phone was ringing. One of his best police sources wanted Ben to hold off on reporting the motorcycle. When Ben asked for a valid investigatory or public safety reason, he got threats from someone he’d once considered a drinking buddy. Ben, who was always calm, was red-faced when he hung up th
e phone.
“Put the motorcycle video on air,” he said curtly.
————
After the live shot in Georgetown was clear, I drove home to find a man camped out on my goddamn porch again. This time it was J. Thomas Winthrop, attorney for Ian Chase, sitting on my Adirondack chair as if it belonged to him. What did dudes not get about how uncool it was to jump out at night at a woman who lived alone?
I grabbed the Maglite under my driver’s seat and got out to confront my visitor. “Did I miss your call?” I said. “Seriously, how hard is it to give a girl a head’s-up that you’re dropping by?”
He rose from the chair with great dignity. “I have information, on background for now. If you can corroborate, this interview could be used as the second source. You interested?”
“Who am I interviewing? You?”
“Do you have your phone on you?”
“Why?”
“Get rid of it or I walk.”
I unlocked my front door and made a big show of dropping the phone on the entry table before resetting the alarm system and locking the door. When I turned back, my hands were up. “Afraid I’ll record you?”
“Let’s go.” He escorted me down the walkway to a black Escalade parked at the corner and opened the door to the backseat, telling me to get in. The dome light was turned off, but in the gloom, I picked out blond hair, a proud tilt of a head. Ian Chase waited for me.
“Please,” he said. “Can we talk?”
Winthrop slammed my door and rounded the Escalade to the driver’s seat. We pulled from the curb in an awkward silence. When the Escalade turned onto Rock Creek Parkway, Ian began talking in a low, formal voice. “I know your source is well placed and you trust him, but please believe me, I’ve never struck a woman in my life. I’m not into—what your source told you. I never hit Evie. Not even accidentally.”
“But you had a sexual relationship with Evelyn Carney?”
“Yes. I was in love with her.”
The Escalade was taking the parkway curves at high speeds, and every now and again, we’d round a corner and the headlight from an oncoming car would fill the windshield and illuminate Ian’s pallor before we were plunged in darkness again.
The Cutaway Page 21