Silence. Now more afraid than ever, she returned to the bed. For the first time, she noticed a little table in the corner. She made her way over to it. She found the note addressed to her: You have everything you need. You’re going to be here for a while.
PROLOGUE
Undated
HE DIDN’T THINK HE was a bad person. But he acknowledged how that could be open to debate. How others might disagree. Maybe it all comes down to the definition of “bad.”
The window shades were drawn. What scant light there was came from a single lamp sitting on the desk.
It was quiet. Just the two of them. In the one room. He wondered how the prowler had missed him, sitting right there at the desk? His desk. It is my desk, damn it. In my room. Looking at my computer. Right there. The words I had chosen to read right there on my computer. How could this trespasser be so fucking brazen? So damn impudent?
A lesson needed to be taught. For sure. And he would be the teacher. Starting right now.
Without warning, the man stood and charged the intruder. Startled, certainly now aware of the man’s presence, if he hadn’t been before, his adversary seemed surprised now and hurriedly sought to withdraw. Realizing there was no avenue of escape, the interloper turned and confronted the man. Mano a mano.
They stared at each other. This was not going to take long. It was not going to be a happy ending. Not for the villain it wasn’t. The man edged forward, backing his foe into the corner. Now perched on one leg, the other elevated, ala the black belt expert that he was. Poised like a rattle snake ready to strike.
Trapped, sensing the misfortune about to find its mark, the invader made one last desperate attempt to dart away, beyond the man’s reach. But it was too late. The blow squarely found its target. A second assault would not be necessary.
These insufferable parasites just don’t get it. Understand there’s a price to be paid. A lesson to be learned. Right from wrong. I will be the one to teach them. Someone has to do it. Now. And as often as required.
The man bent down, grasped the smashed cockroach between his thumb and finger, and deposited it in the wastebasket. His wastebasket.
No. Everyone might not agree. But he didn’t think he was a bad person. Not at all.
THERE WERE 117 ACTIVE trial court judges comprising the Washington, D.C., Superior Court infrastructure. Their primary task was to impartially assure a fair and balanced system of justice, the kind of justice that was supposed to be at the heart of every civilized society.
In the criminal courtroom, “fair” generally meant the avoidance of surprises. And “balanced” meant equal respect for the interests of all concerned, the accused, the victim, and the public. Without “impartiality,” the ability to distinguish between accused and victim often proved unclear. As did maintaining the civilized character of our society.
Judge Cyrus Brooks always thought of himself as among the best of them. Those 117 active D.C. trial court judges charged with dispensing a fair and balanced judiciary. Lately, however, he was beginning to wonder whether he was still up to the task.
If a man was arrested for robbing a convenience store, it was clear who the accused was, who the victim was, and that what the public craved was upholding peace and order. Simple and straightforward. Easy for any disciplined and competent judge to impartially manage his courtroom to achieve the “correct” outcome. Right?
But what if the accused had been down on his luck? Destitute? Try as he had, not able to find a job. What if all he had been doing when caught was stealing a loaf of bread and a carton of milk to feed his kids? After he had already exhausted his food stamps for the month? He wasn’t carrying a weapon when he had entered the convenience store, but the store proprietor was. And hadn’t hesitated to use it.
Once upon a time, if you were unhappy about things, you wrote your congressman. If he ignored you, then you didn’t vote for him the next time around. You voted for the other guy. Maybe, you even campaigned for the other guy.
But what if the problem you were unhappy about was your congressman? What if you thought he wasn’t doing his job? Worse. What if you thought he was on the take? Corrupt? And what if the other guy was just as bad? Then what?
Brooks knew you couldn’t just take matters into your own hands. Go out and shoot someone just because you were unhappy. Let alone shoot a bunch of people. People you didn’t even know.
Or could you?
More and more, there were those today who seemed quite willing to do precisely that. To kill complete strangers just … because.
That was the crux of what had been troubling Brooks of late. What if one of those killers was arrested, and assigned for trial to his courtroom? Could he still—today—assure the accused, the families of the victim—or victims—and the people of Washington, D.C., that he remained able to impartially administer a fair and balanced trial? Could he genuinely suppress his personal views in the face of everything going on in our society today? Easy to frame the questions, right? But not so easy to answer them.
Once upon a time, Brooks had no trouble doing precisely that, remaining impartial and objective at all costs and under all circumstances, subordinating his own personal views when inside his courtroom. No matter what. Of late, however, he was finding it more and more difficult to achieve that vital impartiality.
Brooks wondered if his recent doubts and concerns meant it was time for him to step down. To retire. To pass the baton to someone else.
But he waited too long.
BOOK ONE
THE CRIMINALS
FEBRUARY 5–8
CHAPTER 1
Thursday, February 5, 7:20 p.m.
U.S. SENATOR JANE WELLS had been wondering whether tonight might be the night.
Her last two companions had been disappointing, downright boring, in every respect. Almost as boring as her political constituents, and having to pretend that she actually cared about them.
Being single again definitely had its benefits. No longer back home in dull, sedate Kansas—first the wife and then the widow of former U.S. Senator Arthur Wells—but things were still pretty boring. Maybe she had just found it more exciting sampling the other merchandise when still married. She hoped tonight would prove more fulfilling.
Wells glanced in the mirror opposite her desk, making sure everything was in order. Not too bad for a fifty-year-old strawberry blonde in a bottle. Well, admittedly with a little help from Dr. Nip N’ Tuck. Looks had never been her problem. Or maybe that was her problem. Tall and curvaceous, she still managed to fill out her power suit in all the right places. Wells closed her briefcase and walked from her oversized private office into the also spacious and well-appointed reception area. She carried herself in a way that was not easy for anyone to miss.
“Night, Jimmy,” Wells said to her Chief of Staff, boyishly good-looking James Ayres. When her husband had died suddenly, most Kansas locals had expected Ayres, her husband’s Chief of Staff, to be tapped to fill her husband’s remaining term. But the Kansas Governor had concluded that picking the distraught, martyred widow made more political sense. For him. It was rumored that it made more personal sense for him as well. Disappointed, Ayres nevertheless agreed to stay on as her Chief of Staff.
Wells considered Ayres’s sandy brown locks and piercing hazel eyes—kind of a younger, chiseled version of Robert Redford—imagining for more than just a second what a frolic in the hay with Ayres might be like. Probably a lot more virile than my somewhat more successful, but also older, recent partners. Hard not to visualize that hard body of Ayres gliding back and forth across mine. Certainly one way to get better acquainted with the staff! She’d had no luck with her not so subtle outreaches to date, but she still kept that image tucked away in the recesses of her mind. For further consideration.
Wells’s mind drifted unintentionally from Ayres to her parents, how disappointed they would be if they knew her real interest—like that of most of the other members of the Senate Wall Street Oversight Committee
—was not to manage Wall Street, but to be rewarded by Wall Street for not really managing it at all. She also couldn’t help but wonder how her parents would feel if they also knew about her fast and loose lifestyle. Actually, she didn’t really wonder at all. She knew precisely how they’d feel. She didn’t feel much better about herself.
“Goodnight, Senator,” Ayres replied, bringing Wells back into the moment. He summoned the elevator for her. “Robert’s here to drive you home. He’ll pick you up again in the morning at nine o’clock and get you to the WSOC hearings on time.” Wells nodded absent-mindedly and stepped into the elevator.
AYRES STOOD THERE, STARING at the closing elevator door. He had agreed to stay on as Chief of Staff to the new Senator Wells following her selection. He just couldn’t fathom how a low-life empty suit like Wells had been chosen over him to succeed the real Senator Wells. He quietly shook his head in dismay, turned away from the elevator bank, and walked back into his office.
AS ALWAYS, GOOD OLD dependable Robert Grant was right there, waiting for Wells as the elevator deposited her into the underground parking garage. “Evening, Senator. How are you tonight?”
“Okay, Robert, bit of a long day. You?”
“Fine, Senator. Thanks for asking. Let’s get you home, then.”
That was pretty much how it was with Grant every night, just a warm and fuzzy ride home, someone harmless with whom to make small talk. Wells had occasionally confided in Grant about her dates, but he just listened; didn’t judge.
Riding home, Wells thought about tomorrow’s hearings, to consider whether possible Wall Street malfeasance had contributed to the country’s economic collapse. She knew the hearings were not going to be any fun. With increasing pressure and hostility from both the media and various public interest groups, it was becoming more difficult to keep up appearances without actually doing much of anything. Lately, she felt as if it were she—rather than Wall Street—who was under the microscope and being scrutinized.
The job was taking a greater toll on Wells every day. What do people expect of me? Why are they so damn naïve? Life was a lot easier when she was just a Midwestern farmer’s daughter looking to find herself a rich husband and settle down. Maybe that simple life was not so bad after all. Maybe I should return to that after my term is up.
Wells’ mind returned to the present. She had a premonition that someone was watching her. She glanced back over her shoulder but saw nothing out of the ordinary. Just a lot of cars on the road. Nothing unusual about that on the crowded D.C. roadways.
Wells tried to convince herself that she was just being silly, imagining that someone was following her. But she couldn’t help herself. Her anxiety wasn’t a matter of logic. It was what it was. Her heart was beating faster, and her breathing was becoming more labored. She’d take an Ativan when she got home. That always did the trip.
A few minutes later, Grant pulled his car into the rotunda outside the townhouse project where Wells lived. “Here we are, Senator. Let me walk you to your townhouse.”
Somewhat calmer, Wells resisted giving into her anxiety any further. She was far more worried about the awkwardness that would ensue if Grant saw her guest for the evening, possibly already waiting at her front door. “No need, Robert,” she said as she slid out of the limo. “I’m good, thanks. See you in the morning.”
GRANT WATCHED WELLS WALK off through the outside lobby entrance to the townhouse project. He shrugged, and peeked at his watch. Still time to make it home before the Lakers–Wizards game comes on.
HE WATCHED WELLS ENTER the lobby, punch her identification code in the interior lobby security door, pass through the released door and start down the attractively landscaped path toward her individual townhouse unit. He wasted no time.
Being a former engineer had its advantages. One tap on the device in his hand and an alert on the lobby security console built into the security desk sounded. The security guard glanced at the console, and swiftly headed outside to find whatever it was that had set off the alarm.
The man smiled at the security guard’s anticipated reaction. Two more taps on the device and the network of surveillance cameras immobilized and the interior lobby security door lock was deactivated. The man rapidly passed through the disabled door and briskly moved down the path he knew led toward Wells’s townhouse.
He watched Wells enter her townhouse and close the door behind her. He carefully surveyed the surrounding environs as he inconspicuously approached her unit. He didn’t see anyone.
Outside the entrance to her unit, the man paused and removed a pair of latex surgical gloves from his shoulder bag and snapped them onto his hands. He tried the door. Locked. No surprise there. He hurriedly withdrew a tiny instrument from his pant pocket and inserted it in the door lock. In a few seconds he had the door unlocked.
He tried again to see if he could open the door. Still no luck. It opened a little, but was held fast by a chain lock. The man was becoming agitated. Every second he remained outside the unit increased the likelihood of someone coming along the path and bearing witness to his presence.
He had to get inside the unit. Now.
He grasped the gun and attached suppressor from inside his shoulder bag, removed the safety catch, inhaled, and let fly a desperate kick at the door. He wasn’t sure which would give way first, the chain lock, the door itself, or perhaps neither. But he had no choice. He had to try. He had to break this impasse. If not his foot as well. He couldn’t risk standing around outside the unit any longer.
FORTUNATELY, THE CHAIN LOCK proved less sturdy than the door. And his foot. He was inside the unit. And had closed the undamaged door.
Hearing the noise, Wells rushed into the entryway of her townhouse when she heard the loud noise of the man’s foot meeting the door. She looked right at him. She appeared momentarily confused. “What the hell? I thought …”
Before Wells could finish her exclamation, two bullets only partially muffled by the suppressor attached to the man’s gun screamed through her chest. Cutting off any chance for her to scream. She involuntarily reached for her chest, where the blood was already spreading, but it was too late. She collapsed to the floor.
He checked for a pulse. There wasn’t any. No reason to fire any more shots.
He lifted the body, carried it into the bedroom, and spread it out on the bed, face up, stripped it naked, and scattered the articles of clothing on the floor. He then opened his shoulder bag, removed a tube of Crazy Glue and a Monopoly make believe $100 bill. He applied an ample amount of Crazy Glue to the entire back side of the Monopoly bill and pressed it firmly against the forehead of the dead body. Let the shrinks figure out the meaning of that signature marker.
Despite the brief delay in gaining access to the unit, the man was quite pleased with the scene—his constructed body art as it were—and how smoothly things had generally gone. He allowed himself a moment to gloat over how well he had executed this first step in his plans. Just the first step. More to follow. Soon. Very soon. Until they learn. Until I teach them. I will prevail. I must prevail.
He quietly left the townhouse unit—intentionally choosing not to lock the door on the way out—and discreetly made his way back nearby the glass security door separating the townhouse grounds from the lobby. He paused the stopwatch feature of the smart phone clipped to his pants. Less than eleven minutes had transpired since he had first passed through the security door.
The security guard was back at his desk in the lobby. The man clicked the device in his hand. He watched the security guard momentarily stare at his console in apparent disbelief, utter something the man couldn’t quite make out, and leave his post unattended for the second time in less than fifteen minutes, no doubt in search of whatever was setting off the repeated false fire alarms.
The man waited another minute for good measure. He then entered and walked through the lobby and back out into the world desperately in need of his services. He clicked on his device once more to reset the securit
y feature on the interior lobby door. He didn’t reset the surveillance cameras. There was no reason to leave a roadmap as to when the cameras had not been working. That would not be an issue with the security door lock.
Once again, the man reflected on how well things had gone.
AND HE WOULD HAVE been right, if not for the pair of eyes that had peered out at him from the nearby shadows as he had exited Wells’s townhouse.
CHAPTER 2
Friday, February 6, 5:30 a.m.
FRANK LOTELLO WAS ALREADY awake when the alarm went off. He had not been sleeping well since that day, almost six months ago, when he lost his wife, Beth, to the carelessness of a drunk driver. Beth was his love, his best friend. She was the person Lotello had always discussed his cases with, every one of them, large or small, simple or complicated.
On extended bereavement leave, the department shrink they made him see said to be patient. Give it time, he said. The ache would lessen, he said. Hey, I know I need to get past this. I do. But the thing is, I’m not sure I want to. Without you, Beth, I don’t know who I am. What I am. I can’t touch you—hold you, hug you—anymore. I can’t feel you—hear you—anymore. It’s even becoming harder for me to remember what you look like. I’m so afraid the ache is all I have left of you. If I let go of the ache, I’m afraid you’ll disappear completely. Then what?
Lotello’s bereavement leave was now officially over, but he had not yet been assigned any new work through his on-call rotation. He wondered how much longer they would continue coddling him. Without saying as much, his homicide department was unofficially cutting him as much slack—and additional time—as they could.
He had spent years working his way up to homicide. Watching the needle on the scale and the inches on the tape measure climb as he put in the time. At least he still had an enviable full head of hair.
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