Margaret Truman's Internship in Murder Read online

  “Could be worse,” Brixton said. “I could be on a long flight sitting next to a congressman.”

  Smith smiled. He’d never heard Brixton say he was good, or fine, or feeling great. His response always bordered on the negative.

  * * *

  Robert Brixton’s decision to open his own private investigation agency in Washington, D.C., hadn’t been easy. How could it have been? It seemed that nothing good had ever happened to him in the nation’s capital.

  Born in Brooklyn, he’d ventured south to where cops were being hired, and spent four years in Washington as a uniformed officer. He’d also met and married his now ex-wife there. The marriage hadn’t been any more successful than his stint with the MPD had been. On the positive side were two precious daughters from his ill-fated, hormone-driven coupling with Marylee, and they’d grown into beautiful, albeit vastly different, young women.

  But an event occurred many years later that led to the death of his younger daughter, Janet, during his second unpleasant stint in Washington. It drove a stake into his heart and sent him back to Brooklyn.

  Washington, D.C.?

  You could take it and shove it, as far as Robert Brixton was concerned.

  But leaving D.C. for good following the tragedy of his daughter’s death wasn’t to be.

  He could thank (or blame) Mackensie Smith for that.

  * * *

  “Have a seat, Robert. Drink?”

  “Love one.”

  Smith opened a custom-built cherry cabinet and placed a glass on the drop-down shelf. “Gin?” he asked over his shoulder.

  “Got any brandy, or cognac?” Brixton asked.

  “Cognac,” Smith said, pulling out a snifter, pouring two fingers of Hennessey into the glass, and handing it to Brixton.

  “I’m drinking alone?” Brixton asked.

  “Looks like it,” said Smith. “I have a prospective client coming in an hour. How’s that case you’ve been working the past few weeks?”

  “Not too bad, but it barely covers the rent. I’m getting paid out of MPD’s informant fund.” Brixton sampled the drink. “Good stuff, Mac. About the case. I’ve had two sessions with the wife, who thinks she’s talking to a hit man. The wire works, the cops are happy.”

  “She wants her husband killed,” Smith said flatly. “Who was this fellow who put her in touch with you?”

  “Name’s Augie. He’s a street guy I used to get information from when I was a cop on the force. He’s older now but still a nut job, into drugs, petty theft, the usual. This wife meets him in a bar and starts talking about how she hates her husband and would like to see him gone. Can you imagine? This married lady who lives in a million-plus house, has kids, the works, tells a low-life like Augie, who she never met before, that she wants her hubby killed? Stupid, huh?”

  “That’s being kind.”

  “So Augie, who knows I’ve opened this agency, tells her that he’s got a friend who might be able to help.”

  “He thought that you might be a hit man?” Smith said, chuckling.

  “Do I look like a hit man?”

  Mac raised his eyebrows.

  “Don’t answer that. Anyway, she calls me and we meet. She claims that her hubby beats her now and then. I think she’s got a sweetie on the side and wants the old man out of the way so she can run off with the guy. ‘Get a divorce,’ I tell her. She says, ‘He’ll never give me one.’ I say, ‘Just leave.’ She says, ‘I’ll be broke. He’ll keep the bank accounts, the house, everything.’ I ask her why she hates the guy so much that she wants him dead. She tells me that he’s a moron who is cheap with money, is a lousy father, and his feet smell.”

  “His feet smell?”

  Brixton joined in Smith’s laughter. “I told her it’d be cheaper to buy him a lifetime supply of foot deodorant. That made her laugh. That’s the key to setups like this, Mac, keep it light.”

  Smith shook his head. “She is a foolish woman,” he said. “How much has she agreed to pay you?”

  “Depends on what she decides she wants done. For a couple of broken knees and a messed-up face, twenty grand, double to get rid of him.”

  “So you went to the police.”

  “An old buddy of mine at MPD. He meets with his superior and they decide I should wear a wire and get her on the record paying me to have her husband killed. ‘Wearing a wire.’ That’s old cop-speak, huh? I used to wear a wire when it was a bulky machine taped to your body. It was a Swiss recorder, a Nagra. The batteries generated heat, made you sweat, which wasn’t good when the guy you were recording was suspicious. Man, I remember taking that damn thing off. You pulled the tape and your chest or groin hair came off with it. Not pleasant. The so-called wire I wear now is about the size of a dime, fits into a shirt button, sends the signal back digitally to the guys recording the feed. Big difference. Anyway, I balked at first when they asked me to record her, but they upped the ante so I said okay.”

  Smith shook his head. “What’s her husband do for a living?”

  “He owns a garbage collection company.”

  “Mob connections?”

  “In Washington, D.C.? I thought J. Edgar claimed there was no Mafia in D.C.”

  “Hoover claimed a lot of things that weren’t true.”

  “Mafia connections? I don’t know, and I don’t give a damn. His murderous Mrs. and I haven’t gotten that chummy.”

  “What’s the next step?”

  “One more meet with her tonight, usual place, the parking lot in the Pentagon City Mall. They can’t haul her in until she actually hands over the down payment and it’s clear on the wire what it’s for. She’s supposed to have the cash with her tonight. After that, I’m done. They’ll have her on tape, they’ll arrest her, she’ll get an attorney, and the legal circus begins.”

  “As long as she doesn’t seek out this attorney,” Smith said.

  * * *

  Brixton’s relationship with Mackensie Smith and his wife, Annabel, had led to his decision to remain in Washington after the death of his daughter. Smith had announced that he was going back into private practice and assured Brixton that he could use his experience as a cop and private investigator, provided he became licensed in D.C. While he disliked Washington and its major industry—politics—he decided that Smith’s offer was too good to pass up. Smith advanced him the $5,000 for his PI bond and took enough space in his law practice to include a small suite for Brixton’s new agency. Brixton passed the mandatory FBI background check, renewed his license to carry a concealed weapon, his favorite Smith & Wesson 638 Airweight revolver, and settled into his office adjacent to Smith’s: ROBERT BRIXTON, PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR.

  * * *

  “You have anything for me?” Brixton asked Smith.

  “Check in with me tomorrow.”

  “You know how grateful I am for all you’ve done for me,” Brixton said.

  “When both parties benefit, it’s the definition of a good deal, Robert,” Smith said. “Say hello to Flo.”

  “Same to Annabel.”

  Brixton returned to his office, where Flo, his receptionist and paramour, was up on a ladder painting a red horizontal stripe on the gray wall in the reception area, using painter’s tape to define the line.

  “What are you doing?” Brixton asked.

  “Adding some color to this drab wall,” she said.

  “It looked nice just the way it was.”

  “It was dreary,” she said, returning to her task.

  “If you say so,” he said, and disappeared into his private office.

  A half hour later she poked her head in. “Finished!” she proclaimed. “It looks great.”

  “Yeah, I’m sure it does, but maybe you could paint a stripe on the floor in the hallway to lead a couple of paying clients in here.”

  “We’re doing fine,” she said. “Mac always has work for you, and you’re developing your own list of clients. It’s a lot better than it was in Savannah.”

  “I know, I know. You’
re right. Anything new on me getting hired to perform background checks on new government employees?”

  “Just the e-mail that arrived yesterday saying that they want to meet with you.”

  The government had gone on a hiring spree and was taking bids from private agencies to catch up on its backlog of investigations.

  “By the way, Will Sayers called. He wants to have dinner with you tonight.”

  Willis Sayers had been an editor and reporter on the Savannah Morning News when Brixton was on that city’s police force, and he had been reassigned to D.C. to run the paper’s Washington Bureau.

  “No can do. I have to meet up again with that loving wife whose husband’s feet smell.”

  “If that’s true, she has every right to kill him. What time are you meeting her?”

  “Eight. Shouldn’t take more than a half hour. We’ll have an early dinner, huh?”

  * * *

  Brixton and Flo Combes had met while he was with the Savannah, Georgia, police department. He put in twenty years as a cop in that quintessential Southern city, rising from patrolman to detective, the last six months tethered to a desk while his knee, which had taken a slug from a wanted felon, mended—sort of. He hadn’t found Savannah any more to his liking than Washington had been—everyone talked funny—but it had had its virtues. Meeting and falling in love with Flo Combes topped the list.

  Upon retirement from the Savannah PD he’d opened his private investigator agency there. But he had eventually had enough of the genteel South, and he and Flo hightailed it back to Brooklyn, where your worth wasn’t determined by the family into which you were born, and where people didn’t say “y’all” even if you were the only other person in the room.

  Their retreat to Brooklyn didn’t work out. Brixton fell into a cynical funk, which Flo found difficult to deal with. After a few volcanic blowups, she flipped him the bird and stormed out, leaving him alone, without much income, and lacking even her warm body to snuggle up against. But then he received the job offer from SITQUAL, a private agency augmenting State’s security apparatus, and traveled south to the city that he’d grown to detest, or at best mistrust. Flo had softened by then and rejoined him in the nation’s capital, where they were a couple again, lovers as well as colleagues.

  * * *

  They left the office at five, went to the Capitol Hill apartment that had been Brixton’s and that they now shared, enjoyed the baked chicken thighs and salad that she’d whipped up, and watched TV, switching between MSNBC and Fox News. “Equal opportunity cynics” was how Brixton described their political leanings. As Brixton was about to leave to meet the unhappy wife, Chris Matthews on MSNBC interviewed two congressmen, a Republican from Arizona, and Hal Gannon, Florida Democrat, who had just cosponsored a bill in the House calling for a cut in funding for unemployment benefits.

  “Who says there’s no bipartisanship in government?” Brixton mumbled as he adjusted the miniature transmitter he would wear that night. “Between them they’ll turn us into a banana republic.”

  “Congressman Gannon is gorgeous,” Flo commented.

  “Is he? I never noticed.”

  “His wife’s a knockout, too,” Flo said. “I’ve seen pictures.”

  “The beautiful people, huh? Guess that doesn’t hurt when you run for office.”

  “Be careful, okay?” she said, walking him to the door.

  “Piece a cake,” he said.

  “Just the same, be careful.”

  He kissed her, drove out of the apartment building’s underground garage, and headed for the Pentagon City Mall in Arlington, Virginia, across the Potomac River from the District. He parked in a predetermined spot, away from most cars but not so far that they would stand out. An unmarked police van with two plainclothes detectives was parked a hundred feet away. One manned a small camcorder with night vision through which he would document this, the final meeting between the wife and Brixton. Brixton’s conversation with the wife would be recorded on a digital recorder operated by the other detective.

  Ten minutes later she arrived in her metallic blue BMW and pulled into a spot next to Brixton. He gestured for her to get into his vehicle. She shook her head and motioned for him to get into her car. He shielded a smile. She was being cagey, didn’t want to talk in his car. He got out and slid onto her front passenger seat.

  “Hi,” she said.

  “Hi. Everything okay with you?”

  “I’m fine. You?”

  “I’m okay. So, we have a deal?”

  She nodded.

  His transmitter didn’t record nods.

  “You still want to go through with it?” he asked.

  She hesitated, and he feared that he might have caused her to be suspicious. But she said, “That’s right. I want the bastard six feet under.”

  “Okay,” he said. “You brought the money?”

  Another nod.

  “How much did you bring?”

  “Half, twenty thousand.”

  “So you want your husband gone, not just beat up. You want him dead.”

  “That’s right. When will you do it?”

  Brixton shrugged. “A coupla days. I’ve got what you gave me about him, the photos, his schedule.”

  “How will you do it?” she asked.

  He forced a laugh. “Trade secret,” he said.

  “I don’t want it to be too messy,” she said. “There’ll be the funeral and—”

  “I’ll try to be neat,” he said. “Where’d you get the money?”

  “My mother.”

  “Your—?”

  “I told her it was for a business I want to start.”

  Brixton had to struggle to not say aloud what he was thinking: You’re not only stupid, you’re vile.

  “Anything else you want to tell me?” he asked.

  “No.”

  “Then we go our separate ways, never met each other, right, except when you pay me the second twenty grand?”

  “Right.”

  “You leave first,” he said. “I’ll wait until you’re gone.”

  It happened quickly. She leaned over, kissed him on the cheek, and her hand went to his crotch. “You’re really a pretty nice guy,” she said. “I mean, for somebody who does what you do for a living.”

  “Yeah, thanks,” he said, removing her hand. “Let’s keep it strictly business. You still have to pay me the rest of the money.”

  She laughed. “Whatever you say. Don’t worry. The money will be there for you.”

  “I just don’t want to get stiffed on the second payment.”

  “You won’t be. Just kill the bastard.”

  “It’ll be done just the way you want it. Good luck to you.”

  After she’d driven from the lot, he walked over to the police van.

  “Got it all?” he asked one of the detectives, who replied with a thumbs-up.

  Brixton removed his jacket and undid the transmitter, handed it to the detectives. “She’s nailed to the cross on this,” he said. He also handed them the money she’d given him.

  “Nice job.”

  Brixton looked at him as though he’d just said something blasphemous. “I know what I’m doing,” he said. “I’ll come by tomorrow to give a written statement. You guys take care. It’s been a pleasure doing business with you.”

  * * *

  “How did it go?” Flo asked when he returned home.

  “Good, smooth, real smooth. Never underestimate how dumb people can be. Drink?”

  “Love one.”

  They toasted his success that evening.

  “When will they arrest her?” Flo asked.

  “Any day now. Her lawyer will claim entrapment. Lotsa luck. I never led her, never encouraged her to go through with it. The DA’s got a solid case.”

  “Why didn’t she just get a divorce?”

  “Like I said, she’s a moron. She came on to me, kissed my cheek and grabbed my crotch.”

  “Bitch!”

  Brixton laughe
d. “She’s not bad-looking.”

  She playfully swatted him with the back of her hand. “What’s on tap for tomorrow?” she asked.

  “A meeting about the background check contract, and I want to track down Augie. Augie’s all right, but I want him to know that if he sends anybody else to me as a hit man, I’ll put out a hit on him.”

  “You’ll get paid.”

  “Not worth it. You know, lowlifes like Augie are sometimes more trustworthy than so-called pillars of society. I learned that from the Mafia types back in Brooklyn. They’re bad people, but when they promise you something you can pretty well count on it, not like the politicians who promise whatever you want to hear and then screw you. Let’s watch a movie.”

  Before starting the movie on the TV, an old Bogart flick, they changed into pajamas, slippers, and robes, refreshed their drinks, made a bowl of popcorn, cuddled on the couch, and settled in for another evening of domestic bliss in the nation’s capital, about which President Harry Truman once said, “If you want a friend in Washington, get a dog.”

  CHAPTER

  3

  Florida Congressman Hal Gannon caught an early-morning flight to Tampa to attend a fund-raising luncheon hosted by attorney Lucas Bennett. It was held at the famous Columbia Restaurant, one of the oldest restaurants in the United States, a bastion of Cuban food in Ybor City, Tampa’s Cuban neighborhood, which was once the world’s cigar-manufacturing center.

  The Red Room, one of fifteen dining rooms, was packed with Gannon supporters, many from the city’s Cuban-American population. His success at straddling the political fence—a Democrat with right-wing leanings—had worked for him. Although his true political bent was conservative—he more often sided with his Republican House colleagues than with his Democratic caucus—people assumed that he represented true bipartisanship in wretchedly partisan Washington, a voice of reason, they said, a man who is able to put politics aside for the good of the nation.

  His after-luncheon speech reinforced that image to the wealthy backers eager to add to his reelection coffers. Along with his bipartisan reputation, he was viewed as a family man with solid moral values. His stunning wife, Charlene, sat at the head table and beamed up at him as he told the crowd what it wanted to hear. At the end of the event, a number of men and women approached and pressed checks into his hand.