William Bernhardt - Capitol Murder

Christina stared at him, trying not to appear dubious. “You’re sure about that.”

He stared right back at her. “Believe me, Ms. McCall-if that woman had given me head on the floor of my office, I’d remember.”

“But you didn’t vote for the bill she wanted passed.”

“There never was any vote. I killed it in committee. Didn’t want to. I hate it when insurance companies play games to avoid giving treatment to people who need it. I would’ve loved to have helped that woman. But I have too many insurance companies making large contributions to my campaign coffers. There aren’t that many big businesses in my district, and most of them predictably support the Republicans. I can’t afford to alienate the insurance money. Sorry to be blunt about it, but that’s just the way it was.”

“And Delia Collins couldn’t change your mind?”

Glancy looked across the room at his administrative assistant, who was still whipping people into line over his cell phone. “Marshall Bressler couldn’t change my mind, and I’d do almost anything on earth for that man. He lobbied hard to get me to change my position. When he went through his auto accident, his insurance company didn’t pony up for half of the therapy he received, which they deemed either ‘optional’ or ‘nonmedical.’ If I hadn’t bankrolled his recovery, he might not have made it. So he was naturally sympathetic to this insurance reform bill. He’d mapped out an entire campaign detailing how we’d drum up enough popular support to replace the insurance money. ‘Let Delia Live’ was going to be the operation slogan. But it was just too risky. I couldn’t do it.” His head lowered, and when his voice returned, several moments later, it was considerably quieter than before. “I was greatly saddened a few months later to read that Delia Collins had died.”

“Well,” Ben said, trying to be consoling, “to be fair, most experimental or untested therapies don’t turn out to be worth much. Desperate people turn to desperate remedies.”

“I know. But still.”

Amanda Burton slammed down her phone. “Look, Kincaid, I’ve been trying to go easy on you, now that I know how sensitive you are and how easily intimidated you are by any woman with balls, but you’ve got to give me something.”

Ben blinked several times. “Could you… be more specific?”

“I need something to tell the press. They keep asking me for our take on the Shifty Shandy testimony. Who are we calling to launch our defense? What’s our story? They want to know. And I can’t give them satisfactory answers, because I don’t have any! I can’t tell them our story when I have no idea what it is!” She hunched across the table, poised on her fingertips, her blouse gaping. “I’m good, Todd. You know I am. But I can’t spin air!”

Ben tried to remain calm. “Tell them we have no comment at this time.”

“We might as well confess! The East Coast evening news cycle will start in twenty minutes. I can guarantee they’ll have more coverage of the Gospel According to Shandy. We need something to counter that.”

“As soon as we’ve made up our minds-”

“It will be too late!” She glared at her boss. “I’m not kidding here. If this goes unrefuted in the press, your career is over. I don’t care if you’re totally exonerated. I don’t care if the Pope himself declares you his next saint. Your career in politics will be extinguished.”

“Thank you for your concern,” Glancy said calmly. “I’m not sure, but I think everyone at the table understands your position.”

She turned toward Ben. “We’ve been paying that investigator of yours a fortune. What has he got for us?”

Ben coughed into his hand. “Well, none of this is verified as yet, but he believes that Veronica Cooper may have been involved with… um… how to say it? Involved with some occult figures.”

“Occult figures?” She was practically screaming. “What, like Casper the Friendly Ghost?”

Ben carefully scrutinized the grain of the tabletop. “No. More like… vampires.”

Amanda pressed the heel of her hand against the bridge of her nose. “You’re telling me Veronica Cooper was a vampire?”

“Of course we don’t mean to say that she really was a vampire,” Ben quickly added, hoping this sounded better to her than it did to him. “Just that she thought she was a vampire. Or… wanted to be a vampire. Or… something like that.”

“Loving is still working on it,” Christina added. “But one of Veronica’s friends-whom we believe was also involved in this group-has turned up dead. Strangled in her hospital bed.”

Amanda swore. “Fat lot of help she’s going to be.”

“The point is,” Ben said emphatically, “if someone felt the need to kill her, Loving must be onto something.”

“Yeah, he’s onto a bunch of crackpots. How do we know it has anything to do with this case? Listen to me, Kincaid-if you go into the courtroom with this vampire crap, they’ll laugh you all the way back to Oklahoma.”

“You’re out of line, Amanda,” Christina interjected. “Whether you appreciate it or not, Ben is handling this defense very well. Brilliantly, I’d say.”

“Look, Goldilocks, you may think your partner walks on water, but he’ll never be able to sell this vampire crock to a DC jury.”

“We weren’t planning to lead with the vampire crock. I mean-”

“What else have you got?”

“Well, numerous compurgators…”

“Character witnesses? You can’t lead with toady testimony!”

“We weren’t planning to lead with toad-I mean-”

“Then what were you planning to lead with?”

Christina cleared her throat. “Well, to tell you the truth, we haven’t decided.”

“What?” She clenched her fists again. “Todd, I begged you to hire DC counsel. I begged you.”

“Even if you had, they’d be telling you the same thing, if they had any sense.” Christina’s cheeks were flushing. “You should just tell the press ‘no comment,’ whether they like it or not. And let us get on with our work.”

“I know what you’re thinking, sweet cheeks,” Amanda said, drawing up to her full and considerable height. “I know what you’re all thinking. Amanda’s just a PR flak. A petty annoyance. Nothing to do with this case. But let me tell you something. I’ve got my finger on the pulse of the people. People just like the sixteen sequestered souls on your jury. If you don’t start listening to me-and if you don’t come up with something better than anything I’ve heard in here today-Senator Todd Glancy of Oklahoma is going to be convicted of murder in the first degree. That’s not a prediction. It’s a guarantee.”

“What the hell did you think you were doing!”

Lieutenant Albertson threw himself down into his desk chair. His office was not large, and with both Dr. Aljuwani and Loving’s considerable bulk in there, they were pressed close enough together to feel each other’s breath.

“He told me he was the girl’s father,” Dr. Aljuwani explained.

“Told me the same thing,” Loving said. “Even showed me his ID.”

Albertson tossed his hands up in the air. “Well let me give you a news flash. Three days ago, a DC traffic cop found a ’97 Jaguar coupe registered to Robert Daily on the side of I-349. It appeared to have been abandoned. Upon inspection, he found Robert Daily stuffed in the trunk. He’d been shot three times in the heart.”

“Jeez Louise.” Loving ran his fingers through his hair. “That’s how the creep got Daily’s wallet.”

“It gets worse. He appears to have been tortured-extensively-before he was killed.”

“The killer must’ve been trying to get information about Amber’s whereabouts,” Loving reasoned. “When he couldn’t get what he wanted from Daily, he killed him, stole his wallet, and masqueraded as his victim.”