George Pelecanos (30 page)

"Perfect!"
said Ricki.

"Picture
it, Senator," said Joel. "You do the usual interview sit-down they want to film
this afternoon, wait for the right moment...then pull the white sack out of your
suit jacket pocket. That gives them action and the illusion of a gotchya--news
film is all about gotchyas. You'll be anointed a caring, crusading hero on
network TV."

Ricki
said: "So where's this sack?"

The
three aides looked at the Senator. Who said: "Ahh...
"

Joel
snapped: "Don't tell me you lost it."

The
Senator said: "Thing creeped
me--
wait! It's on the pile
to get auctioned off at a fundraiser or shipped to the state university's
archives. The sack's at my house."

Joel
said: "The interview's in three hours. You've got Agriculture mark-up in
twenty-five minutes. You can cut out early. Dick, do that commitment letter
now. Get him out of the Committee meeting with plenty of time for you two to
get to his place, get the sack,
come
back. I like the
idea of you two walking: You'll roughen up for the camera."

Seventeen
minutes later, Dick showed Joel the commitment letter.

"Z-Systems
it is," said Joel. "Make him sign it, run copies, and bring it all to me."

As
soon as he was alone, Joel dialed the disposable cell phone.

"Yeah?"
said the bulldog who answered Joel's call.

"Yeah,"
said Joel.
"Now what about the rest of your end?"

"Ninety
minutes.
Your house."
He hung up before Joel could say
no.

Joel
punched in a second phone number. When Lena answered her cell, he asked: "Where
are you?"

"Your place.
Where
else."

"Get
out of there. The bulldog is on his way."

Knock,
on Joel's office door, and Dick came in: "Our boss signed on the line."

"I'll
walk you two over." Joel put the signed letter and copies in his suit pocket.

Dick's
frown said he thought that was peculiar, but hey: they were on the move.

Joel
made sure they entered the right hearing room,
then
hurried outside.

An
ocean of gray clouds rolled over the Capitol dome. Wind flapped Joel's suit
jacket as he walked past Hill cops, past tourists who were realizing that
visiting this site was like hiking to a kabuki play but not understanding
Japanese. An orange public school bus crammed with inner-city D.C. kids passed
him on the way to their classroom that had a hole in its ceiling the size of a
coffin.

He
found Lena in his living room.

"I
won't let you do this alone," she said. "Why is he coming here?"

"To
show me he knows where I live."

"Can
we get away?"

"Sure,"
he said. "Anywhere you want to go."

"Here,"
she said, nuzzling his chest. "I want to go right here."

"After
this, it can be just us."

He
felt her nod. "I can be somebody else. I can dye my hair."

The
doorbell rang.

Rain
drops spit at Joel when he let the bulldog in his house.

The
lobbyist stared at them. "You two make a helluva pair."

"Don't
you talk about
us.
" Lena hugged her arms across her
chest.

Frank
Greene shrugged. "What do you got for me?"

Joel
handed him a photocopy. As the bulldog studied that piece of paper, Joel heard
the clatter of wind and rain storming against his living room windows.

"Our
turn," said Lena.

"About that."
The bulldog tossed a thick
envelope to Lena.
"Tough luck."

"What
do you mean?" said Joel.

"Changing
circumstances require compromises. Means that your appropriation is cut fifty
percent
to fifty thou
."

"You
can't screw us," said Lena.

"Fifty
K is way more than you've been paid for screwing before." The lobbyist turned
to the Senate aide.
Shrugged in a fashion that an amateur
might mistake for an apology.
"This town.
What
can you do?"

"I
didn't sign on for this," said Joel.

"You
signed up for everything the moment you let her in your car."

"Stop
it!" screamed Lena.

The
bulldog thrust his finger at her. "You don't give orders."

Joel
pushed the lobbyist's arm away from Lena.

"What
are you going to do?" growled the bulldog. "You got what I gave you."

Joel
replied: "And all you've got for sure is a piece of paper."

"Oh,
you think so?" The bulldog snapped at Lena. "You think so, too?"

"Shut
up!" She shook the envelope in Greene's face. "You think I did it for this?"

Lena
threw the envelope away. It landed on the couch by her bulky cloth purse.

"Why
you did whatever is your problem."

Joel
said: "Leave her alone."

"Oh,
come
on." said the bulldog. "Don't you get it?"

Joel
said: "I get that we've only gotten half of what was promised."

"You
sure you want the rest?"

"Shut
up!" Lena lunged toward the couch, her purse, the money envelope. "You can't
fuck us like this!"

"Babe,
getting fucked is your whole life."

"Not
now!" Lena cradled the envelope and her clunky purse. "Not for us."

Whoa,
stop the way the world's been working, 'cause suddenly you decided you got
yourself
an us
? Let's see."

"No.
Don't!"

Like
a mad dog, the lobbyist whirled to Joel. "You want it all?"

"Shut
up." said Lena.
"Stop!"

The
bulldog surged toward her Joel, growled: "You want what you really got?"

Out
of her purse jerked Lena's hand holding a snub-nosed revolver Bam

Window
panes flashed and vibrated with the gunshot.

From
outside, it seemed only like the storm.

Joel
knew he must have heard the bang, seen the gunshot flash, but he felt like he
had fallen back into himself after being far away. Now, suddenly, he was right
here, in his living room, Lena holding a pistol, Frank Greene clutching his
left side.

"You
bitch!" yelled Frank. "Gonna kill you."

Frank
staggered toward her.

Bam!
Bam

Frank
crumpled to the maroon rug. Window panes rattled.

Lena
whispered: "It shot him."

Joel
crouched to touch the lobbyist's motionless neck. Then Joel's hand shook and
wouldn't stop. His whole body trembled.

Lena
pulled him up to her embrace. "I'll call the police," she said. "Tell them the
truth."

"What
good would that do?"

"Even
you can't fix this."

"But
it can be managed."

"Joel, no.
What he did, said, what he
was going to--"

"What
matters is what happens right now," Joel told her.

He
filled her eyes as she told him: "I never thought it would go this way. I love
you."

"Yeah.
But now that's not enough."

He
pocketed the gun.
Had her help him roll the dead man up in
the maroon rug.

Joel
put on a hooded raincoat.
Ran outside in the storm.
Drove his car into the alley, parked by his trash cans.
Lena
let him in the back door. Helped him shoulder the rolled-up maroon rug, stagger
through the rain, cram it into his car's trunk.

Inside
his house, water dripped off them to tap on the bare wood floor.

"Take
the money." He stuffed the envelope in her cloth purse. "Go home. You weren't
here. Barely know me. I'll call when it's safe."

He
drove her to nearby Union Station.
Stopped where the few
people running past them had eyes only for their own escape from the storm.

"Go,"
he told her crying eyes. "I'll call as soon as I can."

She
hugged him so tight he almost died.
Ran from his car toward
the subway escalator.
Turned to look back at him
through gray sheets of driving rain.
He memorized her standing there
washed by all the tears in town.

The
escalator fed her to the underground.

Go
he told himself. No speeding tickets. No accidents. Off the Hill: Virginia?
Maryland?
A country road.
A quarry filled by a dead
lake.
A ditch with rocks that could be rolled.
Wipe
the gun. Throw the wallet, cell phones--cell phones: what is it about--never mind
Ditch evidence everywhere but on the Hill.

Ring!
His cell phone, not the disposable he'd need to dump.

Can't
not

Dick's
voice in his ear: "Joel, where the hell are you?"

Sell
the truth when you can: "In my car.
On the Hill.
Got places to go."

"Yeah,"
said Dick, "like here to the boss' house, pron-to."

"Why?"

"Because of the rain, man.
It's like a hurricane."

"But--"

"No
buts,
or our butts are in a sling. We got here just as
it started spitting. Finding the white sack took awhile. Now we gotta get back
to the Capitol in time for the interview in the TV press gallery. Looking rough
for a good TV Q is cool, but looking like a drowned rat blows, so you need to
swing by here and give us a ride."

"What
about the Senator's car?"

"In
the shop, and in this storm, no way can we get a taxi. If you don't come get
us, we'll lose the chance to get the Sudan bill on TV and spin the PR we need
to win."

Rain
drummed the roof of Joel's car.
Flooded his wind-shield.

"Yeah,"
he said into the cell phone, "Ness's got to take this ride."

Joel
double-parked in front of the Senator's town house.

Two
men hurried through the rain to his car. The Senator wore a trenchcoat, jumped
in the front seat. Dick tumbled into the back.

"Where's
your umbrella?" said Joel.

"Somebody
else always has one," said the Senator.

"Go!"
said Dick. "We're going to be late."

Joel
stepped on the gas.

Ca-lump.

Dick
said: "What was that?"

The
rearview mirror showed Dick turning to look toward the car's trunk.

"D.C.
streets," blurted Joel.
"Roughest roads around."

Joel
steered his car into a right-turn-on-red.
Water wooshed under
his tires.
Potholes slammed the wheels. The wipers went whump whump.

"Turn
on
the defrost
," ordered the Senator. "You can barely
see."

The
engine fan
whirred
an invisible wind up the fogged
windshield.

"Look
out!" yelled Dick.

A
yellow smear slid past their surging car.

"You
almost hit that cop!" said Dick.

A
neon red starburst filled Joel's windshield.

"What
the hell?" said Dick as Joel slammed on the
brakes.

Three
Capitol Hill cops in yellow rain slickers blocked the road. One cop stabbed a
popped flare into the wet mirror blacktop. Two others stalked toward the halted
vehicle.

Joel
lowered his window. Spray from the storm wet his face.

"Sir,
shut off your vehicle!" yelled the older cop, while the younger one kept his
right hand thrust inside his yellow slicker.
"Now!"

A
laser dot of red light refracted through the windshield to kiss Joel's chest.

Joel
shifted to park and killed his engine. The red dot danced on Joel's chest as
two cops moved to his side of the

"Sir!"
yelled the lead cop. "The officer back there ordered you to halt."

"I
didn't see him. I'm driving Senator Ness."

The
older cop snapped a flashlight beam on the Senator's face.

Gonna
be all right, thought Joel. Gonna make it now

"He's
him," said the cop's younger partner.

"Sorry
Senator," said the ranking officer, "I didn't see you, but...Doesn't matter.
Homeland Security just bumped us up to ORANGE Alert."

"Fuck
Homeland Security!" yelled the Senator. "This is Capitol Hill, I'm a Senator,
we're in charge, let us pass."