Wasn’t it fascinating what money could buy, I thought for not the first time since I’d met Mena.
“I don’t understand. I thought Mr. Treese ultimately decided not to run for office in Maryland. Are you telling me he was actually threatened?”
“He decided not to run in Maryland because he was courted for a much bigger office.” Officer Bruce passed a plastic bag to me across the desk. I picked up the bag and crooked my head to see a crumbled note with cutout magazine letters spelling out, “If you run, you will be sorry.” I shook off a chill. The letter was addressed in typed letters to a Mr. Dominic Treese, at the address I recognized as Mena’s childhood home. She’d shared the location with me in connection with her Franklin Street shelter stories.
“Several years ago, the Republican party was going to put Mr. Treese forward as a Presidential candidate. Threats on Mr. Treese’s life—such as this—caused him to back out of that campaign. Philomena brought her suspicions to us about who was at the helm of those threats—very well-founded suspicions—but because we didn’t have any jurisdiction, we couldn’t proceed.”
I wondered why Mena didn’t take her accusations to another police force—one that did have jurisdiction over death threats. In seeming answer to my thoughts, Mena chimed in silently, “And no one else in any local police force would give me the time of day. Too many other more significant actual crimes to deal with. No time for politics, said the Maryland police force. So, I had to wait for Jude to actually get elected and be under the jurisdiction of the one force that has actually paid attention to me.”
Well, that’s an odd reason to support a candidate, I thought. Could Mena really have been patiently waiting for Jude to be elected just so she could get the Capitol Police involved in her father’s case? And how on earth could she know that Jude would be threatened? Suspicions I wasn’t proud of rose up like stifling heat in the room. I felt warm and started to shed my cardigan to the seat back behind me.
“Now, we believe the same person who made the death threats against Mr. Treese is at work against your husband. And since his election, he is indeed under our jurisdiction, and we have commenced a full-scale investigation into the suspect.”
“Wait. Does my husband know about this? Does he know about the threats?” I shuddered to think that Jude was receiving death threats and not telling me. Did he keep something from me, not wanting me to be afraid for him?
“We have several taped conversations supporting our case. Between your husband and the suspect.”
“Taped? Is his phone tapped? Is mine?” I grew nervous, replaying my conversations with Monica. It had never occurred to me that my cell phone conversations might be recorded. Maybe Monica was right. Maybe I was naïve.
“All phone conversations at the Capitol are taped. The suspect has been brazen enough to call Representative Birch at his new office. And has made a credible death threat.”
“Oh my God. Ok. Well, if you have this threat taped, isn’t there enough to shut this down? Throw them in jail? Why did you have to pull me over under the cloak of darkness to try to get more information?”
I felt sick. To think Jude was fielding all this alone and not sharing it with me was frightening. I knew he was probably just protecting me, but I felt sickened with guilt and fear and worry. And here I was acting like a jealous teenager over Laila Rogers while Jude was receiving death threats.
“Here’s the thing, Aby.” It was Mena now. She was the good cop to Officer Bruce, I finally realized. There’d be no others.
“Jude is protecting this person. He is not reporting it. The Capitol Police wouldn’t even know about the death threats if they hadn’t heard Jude talking to her himself.”
“Her?” I was embarrassed that my feminist sensibilities would immediately imagine a male threat, and further embarrassed that the newly discovered gender of my husband’s threat actually reassured me.
The reassurance—and the embarrassment—was short-lived.
“Aby, Jude’s being threatened by the same person who threatened my father back in 2015—Laila Rogers.”
Laila.
My mind flipped to a thousand unpleasant memories over the last years. All the times the hairs on the back of my neck went up. All those times I begged Jude to get rid of her, but he wouldn’t. All the reasons I had not to trust her. So maybe she wasn’t having an affair with my husband, but she was threatening him? I could trust my instincts after all. The realization was oddly reassuring.
So that’s why Mena was patient with me working on the campaign? She knew Laila was up to no good. And she hoped I’d help her get Laila when Jude was an actual elected official.
She had bet correctly.
“What is it you want me to do?”
In that moment, sinking Laila Rogers became as appealing as sinking Rafe Wilson had once been. I had screwed that one up completely; I wouldn’t screw this one up.
I refrained from saying what I was really thinking. Whatever you need on her, I’ll give you everything you need. I’ll say whatever you want me to say, even if it’s not true.
“Would you consider taping a conversation with her? We know you and she worked together on the Out The Bullies angle of the campaign. And surprisingly, she trusts you. She trusts few people, but we have reason to believe she trusts you.”
I wondered—not for the first time—whether anything I’d done during the campaign was illegal. Was this really a way of getting me, rather than Laila?
Officer Bruce seemed to read my apprehension. For the first time his expression softened somewhat. “Look, Aby, this is D.C. We know you’re a bit conflicted about conversations you and Laila had about Out The Bullies. The truth is, there may very well have been campaign finance violations, but we’re not focusing on those right now. And we know you’re hiding things from your past with Jude. We’re not here to play marriage counselors. We’re just here to get the bad guys.”
I laughed again—the way I had at the second floor button on the elevator. But still I paused to process all this new information, and the pivot that my knowledge base had taken. I thought Laila and I were on the same side of the table. I thought Laila and Jude were also on the same side of the table. It was Jude and me I hadn’t been too sure about recently.
I might be in trouble, I realized. I might be in real trouble
Officer Bruce interrupted my considerations as he fiddled with the iPad on his desk and then said to me, “I want you to hear something.”
He pressed a button, and Jude’s voice came out of the iPad speaker. He sounded sad as he said, “Laila, why are you calling me?”
“Just wanted to wish you luck now that you’re officially moved into your new office. You have everything now, don’t you? You’re the big winner.” Laila sounded like she was slurring. She sounded drunk, and angry.
“Laila, I’m super appreciative of everything you did. Really. Aren’t we even now? You got your last check for fees, yes? Can’t we just move on? Go on with our respective lives? We won. We beat Kylie Rutter, and we beat Innovative Media. We even beat Dominic Treese. Isn’t that what this was all about for you? Dear God, you even went behind my back with Aby and Out The Bullies, and I looked past it. Can’t this just be over now?”
“Well, sure. You’d love that.”
“I would, Laila, I really would.” There was that unfamiliar sadness threaded through his voice again.
“Well, I’m sorry, Jude Birch, but it’s not that easy for me. And it better not be that easy for you, either. I’m not done with you yet.”
“Laila, I’m sorry. But I am done with you now.”
“Jude Birch, how dare you.” The hiss that came through the iPad speaker was barely recognizable as Laila’s voice. I thought back to the time I overhead them arguing behind closed doors while hot lattes poured over my arms and tears spilled out of my eyes. I thought too about the day not too long ago that I’d walked in on Jude holding her in the empty campaign office and she’d told me to be careful. I still
knew little about their history. But I knew how angry it made her. She was even more angry now. I heard her voice strangle out its final warning.
“If you hang up on me, Jude Birch, I swear to fucking God I will kill you.”
And then I heard Jude whisper one last sad, “Goodbye, Laila,” before a click and then an ear-splitting silence. I sat in stony fear across from Officer Birch.
The three of us sat for a few moments as I pondered the same question I’d been wondering for some time now—what in the hell did Jude do to that woman?
It was probably my desire to find out the answer to that question once and for all in addition to my fervent desire to get rid of Laila Rogers from my life, that prompted me to break the silence.
“Sure. I’ll wear your wire. Whatever you need.”
It turned out that I didn’t need to “wear a wire.” Once again, my Law & Order binge sessions had only served to confuse what was actually being asked of me. Officer Bruce gave me a tiny microphone that he said I merely needed to attach to my cell phone like a pop socket and it would tape any conversations within a three-foot radius. I had to sign it out with his front office like a library book.
“So, do you need a deposit?” I joked to the woman who handed me the piece of hardware. She didn’t bat an eye. She merely said, “Nope. But you’ll owe the federal taxpayers $2,500 if you lose it or drop it into the toilet. So don’t.” I hoped she was returning my joke with her own but she didn’t seem to be.
I turned to Officer Bruce. “So what do you want me to tape her saying?” Officer Bruce suggested I get Laila talking about Jude. And the sooner the better. He seemed to think she was freshly angry enough to blurt out all sorts of things to me. The taped conversation had happened merely 24 hours earlier, and they’d recorded several hang-ups from her number in the hours since then.
“We merely want to stop her before she tries anything desperate in anger. She trusts you. Meet her for coffee. Ask her how she’s feeling now that the campaign is over. See if you can get her talking about Jude at all. Things you think might not be important just might be. So whatever she ends up saying on mic, bring back to us. Don’t assume any of it is irrelevant.”
The next day, I put the microphone in my purse and headed into Georgetown. I went to a couple of coffee shops. I even took the subway to the Capitol area and ducked my head into Pete’s. I realized that now that I wasn’t seeing Laila every day at the campaign office, it was actually going to be difficult to run into her. I’d have to reach out to her. As much as I didn’t relish the idea, I’d need to initiate contact with her—on safe grounds. I got an idea.
Hey, how about a celebratory drink tonight? I’d love to thank you for everything with a glass of pinot?
Three dots popped up almost immediately. I was nervous, and then: Sure. I have a meeting near McPherson Square. How about Catch 15 at 6?
It’s a date.
I arrived a few minutes late. Maybe subconsciously, my earnestness was starting to evaporate. I was starting to fear that I’d screw this whole thing up, the way I’d screwed up with Rafe. It had taken another five years to put him away after I’d been caught lying about Rafe in the library. And he’d nearly killed someone in the meantime.
I didn’t want to think about what might happen if I screwed things up with Laila.
I didn’t have much time for second thoughts because as I arrived, there she was on the corner, with her back to me on her cell phone. She was wearing a bright red rain jacket cinched at the waist, even though there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. I glanced upward ominously and wondered—not for the first time—what she knew that I didn’t.
I was about to call out to her, but I saw her gesturing wildly, and I held back, not wanting to interrupt the conversation. I wondered briefly who she was talking to. Then I heard pieces of her conversation float over the still air to me. “I’m busy now. I have an appointment actually, but it’ll give me an excuse to leave early. I’ll meet you there in an hour. Sound good?”
She turned around then and greeted me with as false a smile as I’d ever seen plastered on her face. “Aby. What a nice invitation. Been looking forward to this all day.”
I knew, just by looking at her, who she’d been talking to. And I wondered where exactly she was meeting my husband in an hour.
The wine toast was strictly perfunctory and filled with tension. Laila was clearly anxious to leave, and not angry or ready to blurt anything out to me. I thought about that time I’d overheard that she’d love to tell me what Jude had once done and see how angry it would make me. I thought about asking her point blank, but I couldn’t muster the courage.
I had the microphone on in my purse, I wasn’t sure it was even picking up our conversation, and we certainly didn’t seem to be saying anything that was going to help Officer Bruce, or even Mena.
Could you really make good on a death threat? I let my mind wander as we sipped our pinot. I wondered how many it would take to get Laila drunk and slurring the way she had been on the taped call with Jude. I wondered what drunk Laila would say to me if we had enough time to get there. But we didn’t because she was in a hurry.
She finished off her wine in record time, and threw some cash down on the table. “Drinks are on me, Aby. It’s been a fun year. Wishing you nothing but luck from here on out.”
I pushed her bills back to her with one finger like they were dirty. “Oh no, I offered to take you out. I insist.”
She shrugged and took her money back, and then gave me a quick awkward hug while I was still seated and said, “I have to run. Thanks again. For everything.” She practically knocked her chair over in the hurry to get out of it, while I pulled some bills out of my own purse.
I gave her a 60-second head start. Then I followed her.
Laila glanced over her shoulder one time as she descended into the McPherson Square subway. I followed behind her at a safe distance, feeling a little like a deputized officer, and wondering if Officer Bruce would be impressed that I was taking my civilian duty so seriously and carrying it out so well. The D.C. Metro crowd made it easy to blend and still watch Laila ahead in that conspicuous red jacket. I watched her get into a subway car and I jumped into the car attached to it. I situated myself in the middle of the car where I could see the crowd in the car coupled to mine through the dirty window that separated the two cars. I could see that red jacket bobbing with the motion of the train and I kept my eye on it every time we stopped along the way.
After three stops, I was feeling impatient, and felt my eyes get a little drowsy from monotony as I stood on the train gripping the filthy silver bar that ran vertically down the backside of the train car. When I realized my eyes were closing, I blinked them open hard and tried to refocus on the red jacket.
It was gone.
The door chimes on my own car were blaring a warning at the L’Enfant Plaza Stop.
I stared at the closing doors for a nanosecond in a frozen trance before overcoming my own inertia and jumping toward the doors, leapfrogging a backpack and a woman with her small child. I barely made it out the doors, but my purse didn’t. Out the corner of my eye, I saw Laila’s red jacket disappear from view on the seemingly mile high Metro escalator heading for the Plaza exit. I wanted to run after her, but I was stuck on the platform attached to the train by my purse.
Certain I was now going to be dragged to my death, by the speeding train, I screamed wildly, banging on the train doors.
I needn’t have screamed so wildly, I realized a second later, as the conductor leaned his head out of the car ahead of mine and yelled out, “Relax lady. The doors open automatically when someone gets stuck.”
While I was banging, the doors opened under my rapping knuckles and I fell backward, my life and purse intact.
From my undignified position on the floor, I could barely make out the top of the high escalator and a red swatch of material darting away, oblivious of my plight. Which was a relief. I could still continue to follow Laila without being
spotted.
If I didn’t lose sight of her.
I jumped onto the escalator and ran up the moving stairs, taking them two at a time, playing a game of frogger with the commuters who were inconsistently following escalator etiquette of “walk left, stand right.”
At the top, I ran full speed through the turn style and took the exit steps two at a time. There was no sign of the red cinched rain jacket, and I stopped and clutched my stinging side, trying to grab back the breath sucked out of me. All I could see were masses of people on their way to their lives. One of them somewhere was my husband and one of them was Laila, but that was all I knew. I couldn’t see them. I could just feel them.
I was about to give up, head back down the subway escalator, when I smelled something familiar. Laila’s almond scent wafting over the smell of stale coffee and urine—the permeating smell outside the Metro turn styles.
I walked toward the scent which took me outside the entrance onto the street and around the corner. I saw her then. Standing on a nearby corner, she was scrolling through her phone, stopped on the corner just long enough to let me catch up.
I was relieved and then instantly angry again, as she looked up from her phone at the changing “Walk” signal, and hopped across the road on her way to her clandestine meeting.
I followed behind her, both eyes on the ridiculous rain jacket, under an unseasonably blue sky. I was still thinking about her odd fashion choices, when I saw her walk up the steps and through the open door of a small white brick-faced boutique on Maryland Avenue.
The mannequins in the window were in various stages of dress in the latest runway fashions, and I couldn’t stop staring. Why in God’s name would Jude meet her here?
I didn’t have long to wonder, as I saw Laila hug a tall thin woman behind the mannequins. The windows must have been cleaned recently for the new display, as they were clear as air, and even though I’d only met her in person two times earlier, I knew her face and her sense of style well. There was no doubt who the woman was on the other side of both the window and Laila’s hug.
Why We Lie Page 21