Discretion Read online

  “It seems counterintuitive,” Eva said, “but you have to go through your attacker. Don’t run away until he’s disabled. Pull him tight to your chest, so he can’t get away when you kick his groin. He’ll bend over in pain, and you follow up with a knee to his head.”

  Eva had them practice on each other. Anna buddied up with Grace. To practice the groin kick, Grace pressed Anna against her, so they were chest to chest and hip to hip.

  “You should’ve at least bought me a drink first,” Anna whispered.

  They cracked up.

  “I’ll buy you a drink tonight.” Grace loosened her grip on Anna’s shoulders. “A bunch of us are going to Rosa Mexicano after this.”

  Anna shook her head with regret. The women from their section always had a great time swapping war stories over pomegranate margaritas. Sex-offense work was tough, and raucous happy hours were cheaper than therapy.

  “I can’t,” Anna said. “I promised to pick up dinner on the way home tonight.”

  “He’s got you on a tight leash, huh?” Grace was the only person who knew Anna had a boyfriend.

  “No.” Anna bristled. “We just have plans.”

  But there was a kernel of truth in Grace’s statement. The last time Anna came home at midnight with margaritas on her breath, her boyfriend had not been happy. He didn’t like her to go out drinking when he had to be home with his daughter. Anna didn’t want to mess up this relationship, so she hadn’t gone out in a while.

  Anna softened her tone. “Have a margarita for me.”

  “That’s what you said last time everyone went out,” Grace chided gently. “And the time before that.”

  Anna was surprised that her absence had been noted. She didn’t want to be one of those women who disappeared when she got a new boyfriend.

  Eva came over and eyed them disapprovingly. Anna and Grace were holding each other like two sixth-graders at a dance, hands on each other’s shoulders, standing an arm’s length apart.

  “What are you waiting for?” Eva asked Grace. “If this were an attack, your assailant would’ve dragged you to an alley by now.”

  “Right.” Grace pulled Anna against her again and performed a mock groin kick.

  Anna bent over in pretend agony just as a musical ringtone went off. The theme song from COPS: “Bad boys, bad boys, whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do when they come for you?” The entire class looked to the wall, where a dozen identical BlackBerries were lined up.

  “It’s mine,” Anna said, slipping out of Grace’s grasp and trotting over.

  “Coward!” Grace called.

  Anna picked up her phone. She used that ringtone only for calls from her boss, the chief of the Sex Crimes and Domestic Violence unit. But Carla Martinez was in South Carolina, teaching a course at the National Advocacy Center. Why would she be calling at almost nine o’clock at night?

  “Hi, Carla?”

  “Anna, hello.” Carla’s voice was harried but relieved. “I’ve been trying to reach you. I left you a message.”

  “I’m sorry, I’m at the gym.” The locker room was right next to the National Security section, where the lead-lined walls interfered with cell signals.

  “How quickly can you get to the Capitol Building?” Carla asked.

  Anna walked over to the tall window. She could see the top of the Capitol dome, eight blocks away.

  “I can be there in ten minutes.” So much for dinner plans.

  “Great. I’ll explain while you’re on your way. Get there as quickly as possible.” Carla cleared her throat. “Preferably before Jack Bailey shows up.”

  3

  Anna thought the Capitol illuminated at night was the single most impressive sight in a city full of impressive sights. Tonight, however, the landmark was trussed up like any other crime scene. Yellow police tape cordoned off the white marble steps, and a haphazard layer of TV vans and police cruisers jammed the street.

  The night air retained the scent of baked asphalt and the sultry heat of the August afternoon. Anna was flushed from speed-walking over, but she tried to appear calm and official as she squeezed through the bystanders. She was glad she’d changed out of her yoga clothes and into a spare black pantsuit she kept in her office. She held up her U.S. Attorney’s Office credentials, and an officer lifted the yellow tape. As she ducked under, a few reporters shouted questions at her back. She was not at liberty to answer them, even if she had the answers. She kept walking.

  The Capitol sat atop one of the biggest hills in the city, and the landscaping around it was like a wedding cake, all white, scalloped, and multitiered. A fountain separated two sets of marble steps. She jogged up the closest one.

  She reached the top just in time to see Jack Bailey crest the other set of stairs. Jack was a tall African-American man with a clean-shaven head and light green eyes. His work ethic and courtroom skills had propelled him up the ranks in the U.S. Attorney’s Office. Now, at only thirty-seven, he was the chief of the Homicide section, one of the most coveted positions in the largest U.S. Attorney’s Office in the country. He usually favored dark suits, but tonight he wore jeans and a navy T-shirt with the Department of Justice seal on the pocket. He’d been called here from home.

  So much for Carla’s hope that Anna get here first. Anna felt a rush of happiness to see Jack, though she was careful to project only the polite smile of a colleague. She greeted him in her most formal voice. “Hello, Jack.”

  Jack laughed and shook his head when he saw her. “Hello, Anna. Did Carla send you to stake a claim to this case?”

  “I was supposed to get here before you.”

  An MPD officer passed them and chuckled. “No fighting, you two. Flip a coin or something.” The ongoing turf war between Homicide and Sex Crimes was a joke to everyone outside the two sections.

  Anna and Jack walked to the Capitol’s long rectangular south wing, where dozens of officers clustered on the brightly lit marble terrace. She saw uniforms from the Metropolitan Police Department, Capitol Police, Park Police, Secret Service, and a few agencies she didn’t recognize. D.C. had more separate police forces than any other American city.

  She and Jack navigated through the outer layer of police personnel. The closer they got to the center, the quieter the people were. There was an open space in the middle of the crowd, like the eye of a hurricane. Anna wended her way into it.

  A woman lay on her side on the white marble terrace, her arms splayed one way, legs bent the other. A pool of dark blood spread under her blond hair. Her ivory skirt was hiked above her waist, revealing ivory garters. Ivory lace panties were bunched around her right knee. The panties had been ripped off her left leg and hung in tatters. The way her knees were angled, her bottom was bared to the onlookers. Anna wished she could cover the woman with a blanket.

  “They have to wait for the medicolegal investigator,” Jack said quietly. “They can’t move the body until she’s been pronounced dead.”

  Anna nodded. On the woman’s neck hung a delicate white-gold necklace with the name Sasha scrolled in cursive. Odd, Anna thought. One of the few facts Carla had been able to tell her was that the victim had checked in to the Capitol with a Georgetown student ID under the name of Caroline McBride.

  The young woman’s face was turned to the side. She had alabaster skin and the finely carved profile of a Greek statue. She was about the same age, hair color, and build as Anna’s little sister, Jody. Or Anna herself.

  Anna looked up at the balcony from which the woman had fallen. A Metropolitan Police Department officer was standing on it, looking down at the woman’s body. A few feet from Anna, an MPD crime-scene technician was taking photos of something glimmering near the woman’s head. A grayish-red dollop. Anna gagged and turned away, realizing it was a piece of the woman’s brain.

  She’d handled some gruesome cases: injuries inflicted with razor blades, bullets, boiling oil. Sex offenses committed on the most vulnerable victims. But this was the first time she’d seen a murder victim at the sc
ene. The muggy night seemed to press down on her; she felt unbearably hot and claustrophobic.

  Anna pushed her way back through the crowd. She made it to the railing at the edge of the terrace in time to retch over the side. She prayed she wasn’t contaminating the crime scene—and that no one was watching. When her convulsions stopped, she kept gripping the rail. Her legs were rubbery and her throat was raw, but mostly, she was mortified.

  The view ahead was beautiful. The Washington Monument shone like a beacon against the black sky, and beyond it, the Lincoln Memorial was a steady white square. Anna dug in her purse for one of the tissues she always carried; they were essential in a job where witnesses routinely broke into tears. Now that she needed one herself, she was out. She searched for a crumpled Starbucks napkin, a CVS receipt, anything. Her hands shook.

  “Anna.” Jack stood beside her, offering a folded handkerchief.

  “Thank you.”

  As he placed the handkerchief in her palm, he gently squeezed her hand. She closed her eyes and concentrated on his cool grip. It steadied her. She took a deep breath and reluctantly pulled her hand away. She blotted her cheeks and wiped her mouth with his handkerchief. The cloth smelled of fresh peppermint.

  “God, I’m so embarrassed,” she whispered. “Is anyone laughing at me?”

  “No.” His deep voice brokered no argument. “Everyone does that at their first homicide scene.”

  She doubted that was true, but at least it was comforting. Her hands stopped shaking enough for her to find a Life Saver in her purse. She sucked on the mint and willed her stomach to settle down. She checked her lapels to make sure she hadn’t spattered herself. She seemed clean.

  “Okay, let’s do this.” She turned back to the terrace and stuffed Jack’s handkerchief into her purse so she could wash it before returning it. Jack nodded, and they walked to an MPD officer standing at an arched marble entranceway.

  “Hi, Frank,” Jack said. “Can you show us where our victim fell from?”

  “Jack, hey!” The officer was obviously delighted to see him. Jack had a loyal following among law enforcement. “Follow me.”

  The officer led them through the arched entrance into the Capitol. They walked past a security vestibule and through a rabbit’s den of narrow white corridors. Compared to the mugginess outside, the intense air-conditioning in the building felt like the inside of a meat locker. Anna shivered.

  The officer pointed up a curving staircase. “Two flights up to the third floor. Turn left, the door’s on your right.”

  Jack thanked him, and the officer went back the way he’d come. Anna followed Jack up the empty stairwell. When they got to the second-floor landing, Jack stopped and turned to her. He lay a hand on her cheek. “You okay, sweetheart?” he whispered.

  For a moment, she leaned in to his touch. She still felt queasy from the sight of the young woman on the terrace. Part of her wanted to rest her head on his chest and let his solid form blot out what she’d seen. But anyone might see them. She pulled his hand away from her cheek. “I’m fine,” she said.

  “You’re pale.” He reached for her.

  She stepped back quickly and raised a hand. “Not here,” she whispered fiercely. No one besides Grace knew they were dating, and Anna intended to keep it that way.

  Jack sighed as he turned back to the stairs. “At least that put some color back into your cheeks.”

  They walked up the final flight of steps in silence. At the top, she pointed to a dark globe implanted in the ceiling.

  “Pull the video?” she said.

  Jack nodded. “McGee’s on it. He’s waiting for us.”

  They rounded a corner and walked down the hallway until they came to a crowded vestibule in front of a single door. Anna could see even more activity inside the sumptuous office beyond the door—Capitol Police officers securing it as a crime scene.

  In the vestibule was Tavon McGee, a huge, dark-skinned homicide detective from the Metropolitan Police Department. Anna had worked with him on her biggest case, a domestic-violence prosecution that led to a homicide. McGee loved flashy suits, chili cheese fries, and a good joke. He was also very good at his job.

  The detective stood next to a beautiful dark-haired woman in a pantsuit. Anna saw the gold badge clipped to the front of her belt and the slight bulge of her suit jacket over a firearm at her side. Some kind of federal agent.

  McGee and the female agent were interviewing an older African-American man who sported a mane of salt-and-pepper hair, a dark suit, and a gold lapel pin with the House of Representatives crest. Anna instantly recognized him: Emmett Lionel, the District’s Delegate to Congress for the last thirty-one years. Because D.C. wasn’t a state, Lionel didn’t have a vote in national matters. Technically, he was a “Delegate” rather than a full-blown “Congressman,” but everyone used the honorific. He was the city’s most powerful local politician.

  Detective McGee greeted Jack and Anna’s arrival with a gap-toothed grin. He excused himself from the Congressman, pocketed his little notebook, and walked over, putting his huge hands on both prosecutors’ shoulders. “The cavalry has arrived!” The homicide detective wore a beige five-button suit, a black shirt, and a tie with stripes of beige, black, and purple. A black fedora sat at a cocky angle on his head. McGee pointed his thumb at Congressman Lionel and shook his head in disbelief. “You know whose office this is? The Lion’s! He spoke at my Police Academy graduation twenty-two years ago.”

  Jack nodded. “What’s he saying?”

  “He was at some kinda reception downstairs, doesn’t know how a girl came to fall from his balcony. But he was found coming down the stairway near his hideaway by a Capitol Police officer running up to check it out.”

  A booming voice interrupted. “Congressman Lionel!”

  All heads turned to see a tall, dark-suited man striding up the hallway. Anna recognized Daniel Davenport, although she’d never met him. Every lawyer in D.C. had seen his silver hair and imperious gray eyes on the cover of bar journals and inside newspapers. At a thousand dollars an hour, Davenport had represented CEOs and elected officials in the country’s most notorious white-collar criminal cases. It was said that in thirty years, none of his clients had gone to jail—and his cases more often ended with the prosecutors facing charges for misconduct. If they got anything wrong tonight, Anna knew, Davenport would hammer them.

  Davenport walked between Congressman Lionel and the female agent and whispered something in Lionel’s ear. Lionel took a step away from the agent and pointed to two men in suits who were being interviewed by MPD officers.

  “Stanley. Brett. Come here,” Davenport commanded. The two men looked nervously from him to the police officers questioning them. “Right now!” The men complied like puppies being called to their owner.

  Jack walked toward Davenport, with Anna and McGee flanking him.

  “Hello, Daniel,” Jack said. “Nice to see you. What’s going on here?”

  “Good evening, Jack. I represent the Congressman. He and his staff would love to answer these officers’ questions, but I simply can’t allow that until I know more about what’s happened.”

  “You don’t represent the staffers,” Jack said, inclining his head toward the men in suits.

  “The Congressman’s office will be paying for their representation. I think you’ll find they will not consent to be interviewed outside the presence of their lawyers.”

  “They can speak for themselves.” Jack turned to the men, who stood a few feet behind Davenport. Both appeared to be in their forties but had little else in common.

  The shorter staffer stepped forward. He was African-American, fat, and bowlegged, with a chest puffed out with the pompousness of a miniature bulldog. His shirt was rumpled, and a spot that looked like ketchup marred his tie. He put his hands on his hips. “I’m Stanley Potter, Congressman Lionel’s Chief of Staff. As Mr. Davenport said, we’ll be happy to cooperate—once we’ve had a chance to talk to our lawyers.”

&n
bsp; Potter elbowed the taller white man standing next to him. The man said, “Brett Vale, Legislative Director. Ditto what Stanley said.” If Potter was a bulldog, Vale was a greyhound. Good-looking in a wonkish way, with a sharp face and the leanness of a daily runner. He wore an impeccably pressed gray suit and had slicked his prematurely gray hair back against his head. Stylish silver glasses framed blue eyes so light they seemed almost transparent.

  The Congressman himself didn’t say anything. His lawyer must have told him to keep his mouth shut. He stood there with his hands in his pockets, looking distinguished and contemplative. But Anna could see the sweat beading his salt-and-pepper hairline despite the arctic air-conditioning. She was disappointed in him. It was his right not to talk to the police, but she expected better from a public official.

  “You have their contact information, and here’s mine.” Davenport handed Jack his business card. “I’d ask that you let these men go home.”

  “Go home! They’re suspects in a criminal case,” said the female agent. She’d come over to stand next to Jack.

  The Chief of Staff puffed up his chest even further. The Legislative Director regarded her with icy disdain. The Congressman looked sick. Davenport took a step forward so that he was standing between them and the agent.

  “That’s precisely the reason they won’t consent to be interviewed,” Davenport said. “Unless you’re arresting them for something, you’ve got no grounds to keep them here. And I’m sorry, but you are who?”

  “Samantha Randazzo. FBI, Violent Crime squad.” The agent put her hands on her hips, which drew back her jacket and exposed the Glock holstered behind her badge. She was in her early thirties, slim and athletic. Her heels were a little higher—and her black pantsuit a little tighter—than the average cop’s. Curly black hair spiraled past her shoulders. She turned to Jack. “Any grounds to arrest them as material witnesses?”

  Anna shook her head and saw Jack doing the same. It would be convenient to haul everybody into the police station and force them to answer questions, but that wasn’t how the system worked. Without probable cause to believe that one of the men had committed a crime, or proof that they had material evidence and would flee to avoid testifying, there was no legal basis to detain them. The police could take the names of everyone in the building, but they couldn’t keep them locked in.