Murder on K Street (38 page)

“What is he trying to win?”

“A sense of justice for himself and the system. I don’t think I ever mentioned that Lyle brought pressure on Chief Johnson to get rid of Chang. The chief caved and told Morrie Crimley to transfer him to another unit. Crimley was boiling mad about it, but with retirement on the near horizon, he played good soldier. Chang quit the force and has brought a suit against MPD for racial discrimination.”

“You don’t think Lyle wanted him gone because he’s Asian, do you?”

“No. I think he didn’t like that this Chang refused to kowtow to him. Crimley says that Chang never did fit in and was tired of the way other detectives were treating him. According to Crimley, Chang has a master’s degree and is going after a Ph.D. He’s better off gone.”

Jeannette Simmons’s memorial service wasn’t the only funeral that Rotondi had elected to avoid during the past month.

Neil Simmons’s service was held in a small church near his home. According to Polly, it was sparsely attended: “His wife and kids seemed to hold up okay,” she reported during a call to Phil that afternoon.

“How are you doing, Polly?” he asked.

“Confused, so confused. God, Phil, poor Neil. He said in that note he left behind that he’d killed Mom by going to Marshalk and telling him of the damning information she had against them. All he wanted was for them to do the right thing and clean up their act. Mom. Camelia Watson. And now Neil. Marshalk sure left a trail of bodies, didn’t he?”

A vision of Neil Simmons sitting in his car in a closed garage, a hose from the exhaust pumping noxious, fatal fumes through a small opening in the window, flooded Rotondi. He willed the grim visual away. “How’s your dad?” he asked.

“Okay, I guess. I haven’t spoken much with him. He asked me to stay around D.C. until he makes his announcement about not running—for anything. I said I would. Have you spoken with him?”

“Yes, once.”

Rotondi hadn’t tried to contact Lyle, but had received a call from him just a few days before his announcement that he was abandoning politics.

“Hello, Philip,” Simmons had said, his voice strong. “How goes it?” “Just fine, Lyle. You?”

“Under the gun, but I’ll come out all right. Phil, the reason I’m calling is to see if you’d be interested in working with me on a committee I’m thinking of launching.”

“What sort of committee?”

“A private organization made up of concerned citizens who are fed up with the way lobbyists run the show in Congress. It’ll take outside pressure, I’m afraid, to force the House and Senate to come up with any meaningful legislation.” Simmons laughed. “I’m the perfect one to spearhead such a movement, don’t you agree? I’m trying to make something positive out of all this, Phil.”

“That’s good, Lyle. I’ll think about it.”

“Of course you will. Get back to me about it, Phil. We make a hell of a team. We always have. Stay in touch.”

Rotondi hadn’t stayed in touch but knew he would, not to become involved in any committee, but to maintain contact with his former college roommate and friend of so many years. Whether he’d ever see Polly again was pure conjecture. And Marlene? He doubted their paths would ever cross again, either.

The phone rang. It was Mac Smith.

“How are things?” Rotondi asked.

“Good. You?”

“We’re doing all right, Mac. How’s Jonell Marbury?”

“He’s landed a new job, White House liaison for a Wisconsin congressman.”

“Good for him. He deserves the best.”

“And he and Marla have set the date.”

“Nothing but positive news,” Rotondi said. “I like that.”

“Staying in Washington for a while, Phil?”

“As little as possible. Emma’s second-in-command is doing a bang-up job, so we can spend more time down at the shore.”

“That’s why I’m calling. Annabel and I are thinking of spending next weekend there—you know, some sun, sand, get our toes wet. We’d love to catch up with you and Emma.”

“It’s a date,” said Rotondi.

They promised to follow up with details later in the week.

“Time for Homer’s walk,” Rotondi said. He yelled the dog’s name, which awoke him from a deep, fidgety sleep. “Come on, buddy, time to fertilize the grass.”

As man and beast were about to go through the front door, Rotindi turned and said, “Do you know what I said the night Parish was here?”

“No, what?” Emma asked.

“When the cops arrived, they asked who the woman was being held inside the house.”

“And?”

“And—I said it was my fiancée.”

Emma laughed. “Remember our deal,” she said.

“I’m remembering,” he said, “only as I get older, my memory isn’t as good as it used to be. Back in a minute.”

She smiled and went to the kitchen to fill the dishwasher. As she did, she found herself singing, for no discernible reason, the old Doris Day hit, “Que Sera, Sera.”

“
Que sera, sera, whatever will be will be, the future’s not ours to see…
”

Come to think of it, her memory wasn’t what is used to be, either.

MARGARET TRUMAN
has won faithful readers with her works of biography and fiction, particularly her ongoing series of Capital Crimes mysteries. Her novels let us into the corridors of power and privilege, and poverty and pageantry, in the nation’s capital. She is the author of many nonfiction books, most recently The President’s House, in which she shares some of the secrets and history of the White House, where she once resided. She lives in Manhattan.