George Pelecanos: DC Noir

Including several on the final page where the burly man in black-leather chaps was sodomizing him.

In the harsh light of the monitor, Port sat with his mouth hung open. His mind raced as he stared at the images.

He jumped when his cell phone in his pocket rang.

The same man who’d called earlier said, “Make it right on Larry King and the site comes down. Fuck up and the password comes off.”

Anxious, distraught, Port arrived at the CNN offices on First Avenue for the interview. A hard-driving storm pounded the city since dawn and though it had passed, he wore a Burberry trenchcoat over his suit, shirt, and tie. He wanted to give the impression that he spent the day running from meeting to meeting, but in truth he hadn’t left his apartment, answering the door only for the CNN messenger.

When the interview ended, he planned to stay at the Dupont 5 Cinema for as long as they’d allow, dodging calls by watching movies, hiding in the dark, preparing to flee by train to New York.

The segment producer, a young Asian woman in a khaki crewneck sweater and ill-fitting cargo slacks, met him at Security.

“What are you doing here?” She held a silver clipboard. “You’re cancelled.”

Port frowned. “No, I—”

“The ACCC called,” she said. “You’re not feeling well, you’re under some kind of stress…”

Port tried to smile. “I’m right here, Hisa.”

She touched his coat sleeve. “You look awful, Jordie.”

She was right: dread, a second sleepless night; listening to footsteps in the apartment above, cars on Riggs Place…“

But I can do it, Hisa.” He bucked up, thrusting out his chest. “Raring to go. Dependable as always.”

She looked at him. Agitated, fidgeting in place…

Her boss told her the pages he sent were an incoherent rant.

He saw confusion and sympathy on her face.

“Yeah, I’d better go,” he said, sagging. “I don’t know. This flu…”

“Rest easy, Jordie,” she told him, as she turned to scurry back to the elevator.

Five hours and two films later, Jordie arrived home.

The password no longer worked on the S&M site, and he permitted himself to think they’d taken the photos down. The thought lasted seconds.

He had several emails, but one immediately caught his eye. The subject line read, Urgent ! From Ana Mendes via her home AOL e-address.

“Jordie,” she wrote, “I must see you. News! Meet me at the Bombay Club, Sunday, 1 p.m. Happy, happy.” It was signed, AM

The signature and the “ Happy, happy ” made it real for Port.

Years and years ago, he ran into Mendes at an Editor & Publisher conference in Chicago. Drinks, sentiment, more drinks; two people alone, despite the glad-handing at the banquet and bar. He wanted her — the embrace mattered, the affection — and she thought, Why not ? Up to her room, and afterwards, as he lay with his head on her sweat-soaked shoulder, she asked, “Happy?”

“Happy, happy,” he replied.

Port stared at the email, and he permitted himself to think she had spoken to her boss, who somehow got to Douglas Weil Sr. at ACCC. A book promoting Ronald Reagan and his ideals was what America needed now. We ought to pull away from these guys, Mr. Weil. They’ve only got a couple of years left anyway, and the country’s not going to keep tacking right…

The thought lasted seconds.

It took Port less than three minutes to hustle through the early-afternoon chill to the St. Regis, and another two to reach the fifth floor. Room 523 was in the center of the long, rose-carpeted corridor that was lined with white floral-pattern wallpaper.

Not once did he ask himself why Mendes wanted to meet in a hotel when she had a town house in Georgetown.

Port knocked on the unlocked door. Then he stepped inside.

He saw the red bedspread had been tossed aside, and the bed was in shambles. On the off-white wall beyond the bed was an array of blood spatter. Blood was smeared from the center of the stains to the floor where Mendes lay. A dime-sized hole was above her right eye.

Port retreated in shock, stumbling against the desk chair, his arms flailing. He stopped when he hit the closet door.

Bringing his hands to his mouth, Port shuddered and he felt weak, and he understood.

Standing in a silence broken only by the hum of the heating system, he tried to remember what he had touched and who had seen him in the lobby or on 16th Street. Then he went over and looked at Mendes, a friend who had tried to warn him.

She wore a black chemise and was naked below the waist.

In death, she seemed terrified. Ana Mendes, the most self-possessed woman he’d ever known.

As he turned from her, he saw on the desk an almost-empty bottle of wine, a 2001 Viognier from a Virginia winery. There were two glasses, a mouthful of golden wine remaining in each, and he was sure one of the glasses wore his finger-prints, gathered days earlier at Off the Record.

Port hurried to the bathroom, grabbed a hand towel, and—

The front door opened, and Port was joined by the Indian busboy and the black man from valet parking.

The black man spoke with cool assurance, as the man from India barred the door.

“You have no possibility of escape,” said the black man. “But you are left with a choice.”

Port’s mouth had dried and he struggled to speak. “I didn’t—”

“Your call, Mr. Port.”

Port noticed they were both wearing latex gloves.

“First choice: You killed her in a fit of rage brought on by the depression that’s been responsible for your erratic behavior.”

“I didn’t — I wasn’t angry with Ana. I—”

“You argued at Red Sage. Several people noticed that she left when you took a phone call.”

“That’s not—”

“Dozens of threatening emails to her from your ACCC computer. Calls from your ACCC cell phone.”

The Indian man stepped next to his associate. “You quarreled because you learned Ms. Mendes had written a book about you.”

“About me?” he asked, his voice cracking.

The man counted on his thin fingers. “Your attempt to blackmail Douglas Weil and the ACCC with your latest manuscript. Your mental decline. Your troubled childhood. Your reputation at the newspaper. The sadomasochism…”

The black man now had a gun in his hand. With the silencer, the barrel seemed more than a foot long.

“I’ve read this book by Ms. Mendes,” said the Indian man. “Fascinating. Who would’ve known? This will surely profit Patriot Publishing.”

Said the black man, “If I shoot you from here, it’s the second choice: You were killed with Ms. Mendes when your tryst was interrupted. A jealous ex, a robbery? Someone with an obsession…”

“An obsession,” the Indian man repeated.

“Or I step up, put the gun to your temple, and make it look like murder-suicide. If so, Ms. Mendes’s manuscript is released, the S&M website… Your psychological records. Anecdotes. Your name will become synonymous with a spokesman gone mad.

Said the Indian man, “A Jordan Port is a pig looking for a new trough.”

Port’s mind reeled. He could see it unfolding — the headlines, the patter on talk radio, schadenfreude , the mounting disgrace; reporters invading Davenport to interview his step-mother, neighbors and high-school teachers to track down rumors fed them by Doug Weil’s PR machine.

“But I don’t deserve… I don’t want to die,” he said meekly, his voice dripping resignation.

“Mr. Port,” said the Indian man, “you are already dead. It’s a matter now of how you are remembered.”

The black man raised his arm.

“Take off your clothes, Mr. Port. Let’s do it right.”