“Still no weapon,” said the detective abruptly, fixing his strange, pale eyes on Jake. “We’ve got tissue and blood under the congressman’s fingernails. And hair in his fist. A dozen strands, six to eight inches long. Color, medium brown. The blood on his head wasn’t just his. All the samples have gone to the lab for DNA work. We’re interviewing the hotel staff. Most have alibis. We’re following up with a few who don’t or who we haven’t found yet.”
“Fingerprints turn up anything?”
“It’s only noon.”
Jake glared at him.
“Have a few matches already. Colin McDowell. A New York real estate mogul with friends in Colombia. Akira Makihata. He’s in Tokyo now, but comes through Las Vegas about once a month. Businessman. He’s been linked to the Yakuza.” Cooper flicked some buttons on his computer and continued. “Steven Chasen was in the Peace Corps, that’s why his prints were in the database. He owns hotels in Oregon now.”
“High rollers?”
“It’s a VIP suite.” Cooper typed some more. “This was a strange one. Natalie St. Clair. Picked up on shoplifting ten years ago.”
“A maid?”
“We checked that. No one by that name on staff.”
“Any aliases?”
“Nothing on record.”
“What does she look like?”
Cooper turned his computer monitor so Jake could see the image. A young girl, about thirteen or fourteen, stared out sulkily from the screen. Her hair was as black and shiny as shoe polish and hung down straight on both sides of her pale face. Her eyes were outlined with thick black makeup, and her red lips looked swollen.
“You have anything more recent?”
“Nope,” said Cooper, swinging the monitor back.
“What else have you got?”
“Nothing on the wig. The hairs are at the lab.”
Jake thought a moment, remembering the singer at the club. He dismissed the idea immediately. How many Marilyn wigs were there in Las Vegas? A hundred? A thousand? Ten thousand?
“Those two over there are going over security tapes.” Cooper pointed across the room to a man and a woman, each seated in front of a monitor. They were moving through the video, frame by frame. “The camera is positioned over the elevator. We’ve watched everything from four p.m. to six a.m. Lots of people going in and out, but no blonde wig going up. It could have been part of some ritual or act inside the room, so we’re focusing on all the women who go up or down.”
Jake felt his blood pressure rise again, his anger at a slow boil. “You planning on coming up with something soon?”
The pair going through the videotape stopped mid-toggle and looked over. Then Jake heard a voice over his shoulder.
“Jake?”
Suzanne Garrett, Porter’s widow, glided into the room. She was, as usual, sleek and icy. Her blonde hair sliced down each side of her face as though her hairdresser had used a paper cutter. She put her arms out to hug Jake, but embraced the air between them instead. Though her eyes were red, the rest of her—from her snugly fitted, camel-colored Chanel pantsuit to her flawless manicure—betrayed nothing about what her inner state might be.
“How are you holding up?” murmured Jake.
“Well, you know,” whispered Suzanne vaguely.
She was accompanied by Alana Sutter, who was also impeccably dressed—in a dark skirt suit and a blue French blouse. Attractive and tall, with short auburn hair, Sutter was brilliant as a political strategist, but her personality was too restrained for Jake’s taste. He tried to picture her wearing a platinum blonde wig. It didn’t help.
“Gentlemen,” Suzanne said in a loud voice, addressing the room as if she were at a public library benefit. “And ladies,” she continued, pointedly staring at several of the female officers. “I appreciate all your hard work so far on this case. As I’m sure you can understand, this is a very difficult time for us, and it means the utmost to my family that we bring the congressman’s killer to justice.”
Jake noticed the blank stares on the cops’ faces, but a few of them nodded politely.
Gesturing toward him, Suzanne went on. “I wanted to make sure all of you know that Jake Brooks is being retained as my personal counsel in this case and, as such, is to be offered every”—she lowered her voice in emphasis—“privilege and access he needs in order to fulfill that duty. I would like to ask each and every one of you to afford him every courtesy you would extend to me or my husband. My … late husband.”
Jake could practically feel the tension radiating off Cooper. Jake himself was annoyed by Suzanne’s patrician manner, though he had learned through years of hard practice when to keep his ego out of things.
Suzanne’s eyes roamed the room, staring down the cops’ machismo attitude. When she got to Cooper, she turned on the charm. “Detective, thank you for your diligence. I know I can count on you to help us in any way you can.”
“Yes, ma’am,” the veteran cop answered with a deference Jake knew he didn’t feel.
Suzanne turned to Jake. “I’ll be at Porter’s office. When you’re finished here, could you come by?”
Jake nodded, but as he did so, he noticed Suzanne’s eyes harden.
“What are you doing with that?” she spat, pointing to the corner of the room.
The blonde wig, arranged on a stand as if on a head, stood covered by clear plastic on a table.
Cooper answered. “We found it in the room. We think maybe the murderer or someone else—”
Suzanne cut him off. “That’s my wig.”
Cooper was speechless. He stuttered, “We … we found it in the room, Mrs. Garrett.”
“I don’t care where you found it. That’s my wig.”
“We found it there this morning. Where were you last night?”
“At a fund-raiser in California. I left it here the night before.” Suzanne strode over to the wig stand.
Cooper leaped to her side. “And you left it here?” he asked, incredulous.
“Are you interrogating me?” she snarled.
“Ma’am. It’s evidence.”
“I want my property back,” insisted Suzanne.
“Mrs. Garrett,” pleaded Cooper.
Jake knew Cooper didn’t want to insult the congressman’s widow. He saw his chance. “Suzanne,” he said softly. “Let these people do their job. When they realize it’s not evidence, they’ll give it back to you.”
Suzanne’s stare was full of hatred, but she acquiesced. As she left the room, her words came out through gritted teeth. “I’ll see you in Porter’s office as soon as you possibly can, Jake.” Sutter stayed behind.
Jake received his gratitude from Cooper in the form of a curt nod. It wasn’t much, but you never knew when that sort of thing could be useful. Jake decided to see whether it would already come in handy.
“Anything else you don’t want to tell me before I go?”
Cooper rolled his eyes, but lowered his voice so that Jake had to lean forward to hear. “You want to know about the pubic hair we got out of his throat?”
Jake pressed his lips together. He tried to think. So Porter had been with some girl. Big deal. But Jake knew that if Porter had been cheating on his wife, it was a big deal, especially at this point in the campaign. It meant a long-term affair. Porter never would have risked a one-night stand.
Still, Jake concealed his surprise and glanced at Alana Sutter. The woman was ashen. She opened her mouth as if to say something, then clenched it tight.
“Alana?” Jake started. She shook her head.
Jake sank his coffee cup in Cooper’s trash can. “The minute you know something, I want to know it,” he growled. “I’m going to see what Suzanne wants. Get this over with.”
He turned to walk out with Alana Sutter, but the strategist had disappeared.
* * *
Jake ducked under more yellow police tape to enter Porter Garrett’s office. He moved to sit on the familiar white couch where he’d lounged hundreds of times bef
ore. Suzanne sat behind Porter’s desk, muttering into a cell phone. She held up a finger, leaving Jake waiting awkwardly.
He looked around the office. It seemed deflated now without Porter’s big presence. The wide desk was still covered with papers; family photographs stood on a corner. More photos decorated the filing cabinets and bookcases that ran along the wall, too—Ian and Anna, Porter and Suzanne’s children, riding horses, sailing, camping.
On the wall opposite the windows hung Porter’s collection of Sidney Randolph Maurer paintings. The bold, dynamic depiction of movie stars was classically beautiful; Maurer’s uniquely colorful strokes, with many shades of gray, brought sensuality and glamour to Hollywood’s biggest celebrities. Porter owned six, four of them instantly recognizable classics: Rita Hayworth, Brigitte Bardot, Humphrey Bogart, and Marilyn Monroe. The other two were of starlets from the 1940s whom Jake had never heard of or seen. The two unknowns had the same sense of drama and were just as beautiful as the stars who had endured. Jake thought about the fickleness of celebrity.
The paintings were hung so that one of the unknown sirens was between Hayworth and Bardot and the other between Bogart and Monroe. Jake wondered why Porter had chosen that arrangement. Maybe it was chronological. Porter had had a knack for arranging things; in the earlier days of his marriage and career, he had been in charge of all the seating plans at dinner functions. Porter had enjoyed the intricate social puzzle of bringing certain people together while meticulously keeping others apart.
“Coffee?” purred Suzanne, snapping her phone shut.
“I’m alright,” said Jake.
“You are a dear for being here like this.”
Where else would I be? wondered Jake.
Suzanne came around the desk and settled on the sofa, crossing her legs tidily. She fiddled with the hem of her jacket, then smoothed her hair. “Could you believe the trouble they were giving me over that wig? I mean, really …” She laughed out of sheer avoidance, a forced bark that fell flat in the room.
Jake stared at her. He felt her sense of guilt, aware that anything he would say could be misunderstood.
“It’s none of their business what it’s doing there,” she continued, “if you know what I mean.”
Jake rubbed his eyes with his right hand.
“Oh, relax, Jake, for God’s sake. You look awful.”
Jake looked closely at Suzanne. In his opinion, she didn’t look awful enough.
She continued, “You know, I was talking with Glen this morning …”
Glen Green. The governor of Nevada and an old friend of Suzanne and Porter’s. Suddenly it clicked for Jake. When a congressman dies during an election, his wife is often asked by the party to run for the seat. Name recognition alone can pull a victory. Come to think of it, even dead politicians had won seats when the public voted for a familiar name instead of the warm body. Given Suzanne’s friendship with the governor, his support would be almost guaranteed. Why hadn’t Jake thought of that before? It also explained Suzanne’s cozy new relationship with Alana Sutter.
Suzanne seemed to notice the shift in Jake’s eyes. “So you see, all this wig nonsense is really quite silly, and I’m going to need your help to convince those … those gumshoes in there.”
Typical Suzanne. Distract with charm and then go straight for the jugular. It was both her most endearing and her most irritating trait, depending on which side of it you were on. Jake had done plenty of rearranging facts and calculated overlooking of evidence in his career, but this was another story. This was a plea to suppress evidence in a federal murder case. The murder of his best friend, and her husband.
“I’ll take that coffee after all,” vamped Jake.
“There isn’t any coffee,” said Suzanne.
“I know.” Jake sank onto the couch. He decided to test how serious she was. “You know, they found blonde hairs in the wig.”
Suzanne wheeled toward him, her face stormy. Then, in an instant, her features rearranged themselves into a smile. She pointed to her hair. “Blonde,” she said.
“Long blonde hairs,” pressed Jake.
Suddenly Suzanne was standing over him, like a hawk on a mouse.
“Listen,” she hissed. “I am not going to have it come out that Porter was with a hooker. Even if she did kill him. Even if it means his murder goes unsolved. He’s gone—but I’m still here. Do you understand what I’m saying?”
Jake was surprised to feel a wave of pity for Suzanne. The wig was the least of her problems. Claiming it was hers just complicated matters and made her look like a liar. But he’d faced much more formidable pressure from clients, and he was not going to be intimidated. He laughed.
“Oh, Suzanne” was all he said. He watched as she straightened up, searching his face. As quickly as she had become a bird of prey, she returned to her Blanche DuBois routine.
“It’s so hard being left with two children. They’re devoted to him, you know.” She glided in front of Jake. “Tell me you didn’t know,” she whispered, resting a hip on the arm of the couch.
“Of course I know they’re devoted to him.” Jake sat back. He realized that wasn’t what she meant, but evading the question was easier than trying to answer it. Besides, he was wrestling with his own feelings of betrayal and didn’t feel like getting mired in Suzanne’s as well. But there was no getting out of it.
“You’re avoiding my question, Guv.”
Jake winced to hear the nickname Porter had given him in the earliest days of their friendship.
“Was I the only one in the fucking dark?” she asked.
Jake took a breath. “He never said anything to me, either.”
Suzanne’s eyes glazed and she turned toward the Maurers, holding a handkerchief to her face.
“You know, they say a wife always knows. But I didn’t. I had no fucking clue.” For a second Jake glimpsed, in the slight droop of her shoulders and hands, the vulnerability she’d had when the three of them had first met. Over the years she had hardened so much that Jake had been unable to remember what she was like in the first place—and why Porter had married her.
Suzanne patted her mouth with the handkerchief, leaving a ghostly imprint of her lips. “I don’t know why, but it helps to know that you were in the dark too,” she said sincerely.
Jake nodded. He knew what she meant but still didn’t want to become her new best friend—if that were even possible with her. He was, if anything, more loyal to Porter now than ever. Porter must have been shut out by her to even contemplate an affair in the middle of a campaign.
Suddenly Suzanne tacked again. “Say something, Jake. It sounds to me like you’re protecting someone. An adulterer? A liar? A bitch who knew he had a family?”
They were both silenced by the severity of her words, which hung in the room like a nuclear cloud. Suzanne was fishing; Jake knew that. But he didn’t even try to reassure her. He just sat and waited.
Finally she cleared her throat. “We’re going to do the service in LA. He was okay with that,” she said, somewhat defensively. “I wanted to ask if you would give the eulogy.”
“Of course.” There was another long silence.
“What’s with that fucking wig?” Suzanne spat out suddenly. “Was she a stripper? A hooker? Because I don’t know what’s worse …” Suzanne brought her hand to her mouth. Her shoulders convulsed once.
Stiffly, Jake put a hand on her arm. “No idea,” he said, honestly. But there it was again, the wig and a flash to the night before. The triumphant look in the singer’s eyes when she’d pulled off the crown of platinum blonde.
Abruptly, Suzanne stepped away. “I’m going back to LA tonight. I’ll call you before the service, make sure we’re on the same page.”
“Are Ian and Anna coming with you?”
“They’re meeting me at home.” She paused.
For lack of anything better to say, Jake mumbled, “It’s going to be okay.”
“Sure it is, Guv,” replied Suzanne, the sarcasm twisti
ng her mouth. “Maybe when I’ve got a seat on the appropriations committee and every lobbyist in Washington is standing in line to kiss my ass, I’ll thank that hooker. But at the moment what it is”—she took a deep breath—“what it is, is humiliating and dirty and selfish.” Before she could see Jake’s reaction, she retreated to the bathroom, blotting her eyes.
On his way out, Jake closed the door as quietly as he could.
* * *
Jake had been in the meeting for only three minutes and already he knew it was going to end badly. Cooper was bad enough, with his provincial thinking and hostility. Plus, Jake couldn’t imagine a dimmer pair of FBI agents than the ones assigned to Porter’s case.
Brewer was a beefy man with a chin that tapered to a rounded point like the end of a baseball bat. He had gone around the room handing out his business cards, flicking each one out of the stack like a magician, offering them with his first two fingers, cigarette-style.
Norris was a thin, weaselly man in a turtleneck and blazer, a style Jake loathed for its Gallic pretentiousness. He had a thin, bristly mustache and combed-back hair.
The two spent twenty minutes pissing around the corners of the investigation, alternately bullying and confusing Cooper as they tried to establish their dominance. Once Brewer, the more obvious bully, had that down, Norris took over as the talker.
“What we’re probably looking for is some kind of loner. Working alone. Probably a right-wing extremist. Possibly a white supremacist.”
Jake groaned. Everyone turned in his direction as he said, “You’ve gotta be shitting me. That’s what you’ve got? You’re here to tell us that?”
Brewer grunted. “Last I checked, you were an ambulance chaser with an important friend. Are you a detective now?”
“No,” Jake answered evenly. “It’s just that I was hoping this case, the murder of a member of the U.S. Congress, would be assigned to competent investigators. I wasn’t expecting Washington to send out Frick and Frack, waving invisible-ink pens and decoder rings.”
Cooper held up two pale hands. “Gentlemen, please. We’re on the same side.”
“Except we have badges and he doesn’t,” said Norris pointedly, his Adam’s apple bulging through his turtleneck.
The Gray Zone Page 4