False Front (2 page)

The draperies around the window of the sitting area matched the plaid of the bedspread. A chair and a recliner upholstered in dark green leather with brass brads sat at broad angles in front of the window. A primitive bent twig table sat betwixt them – a bottle of Jack Daniels, an ice bucket and two glasses on its surface.

Through the doorway to the bathroom, Lucinda spotted a slate-tiled walk-in shower big enough to sluice down a whole football team. A small walk-in Jacuzzi sat in a corner, flanked by windows. Rustic wood formed the vanity, its surface covered with a thick pane of glass. Two copper basins sat on top of that. Behind a chest-high wall were a urinal and a water closet.

Through the closet door, Lucinda found the same meticulous, personalized attention to detail in the storage design. This closet, however, was filled with male clothing exclusively. There was even an alcove built to the correct dimensions to hold a pair of the waist-high waders that trout fishermen wear. The door on the other side opened into the bedroom. It seemed apparent that the couple had not shared a bedroom. Did that mean they had not shared a sex life?

Lucinda went back downstairs and scanned the front yard until she caught Robin Colter’s eye. She raised her chin and Robin cut off her conversation with a patrolman and came inside. ‘Is the husband in the back of a car?’ Lucinda asked.

‘Yes. He threatened to leave since no one would listen to him. He tried to barrel his way through the officers at the front door. We ended up putting him in cuffs to get him in the patrol vehicle. Once there, though, he calmed down. I took off the cuffs and he swore he would not attempt to leave the car until the detective in charge talked to him. He even said he was willing to spend the night there if he had to do so, as if it was his idea to climb into the car.’

‘Makes you wonder if he bullied his wife, too,’ Lucinda said.

‘He does seem used to getting what he wants, when he wants it. The last time I talked to him, he was demanding a timetable. He said he didn’t mind waiting, but he needed some parameters.’

Their conversation was interrupted by Doc Sam. ‘Pierce, you better take a look at this.’ He held up a clear plastic sleeve with an open piece of paper inside it.

Lucinda read the letter out loud and handed it back to Doc Sam. ‘Perhaps the husband is right after all. Someone did murder his wife.’ She looked out to the patrol car holding the husband, raised her hand and pointed her finger like a gun. ‘Tag, you’re it, Frank Eagleton.’

TWO

F
BI Special Agent in Charge Jake Lovett sat at his desk studying the man across from him. Behind him, the blinds were drawn to eliminate the distraction of the cityscape from his visitor. A long bookcase ran from wall-to-wall below the window. Stacks of files with protruding multicolored Post-it notes littered the top of it. An open laptop sat on the right-hand side of his desk, a telephone, framed photograph of his parents and a bobbing woodpecker on the left. In front of him a legal pad and pen lay waiting.

In the chair opposite the agent, a man shifted from side to side as he twisted a baseball cap in his hands. He covered his balding head in a peculiar comb-over style reminiscent of Donald Trump. Jake wondered how anyone could look at the financial mogul on television and think, ‘Hey, that’s just the look for me.’ He appeared to be about fifty – a worn-out fifty – with bags under his eyes, large pores across his nose and gray bristles sprinkled along his jawline, giving the appearance that he shaved in the dark.

‘Nothing you are saying is making much sense,’ Jake said. ‘As I said, without your name, the nature of the crime and the identity of the person who is threatening you, I don’t know what I can possibly do to help you.’

‘You have to help me or I’m a dead man,’ the man pleaded.

‘I appreciate that you have concerns about your personal safety but you still have told me nothing that explains why you are here at the FBI instead of a local law enforcement office.’

‘I did. I told you. There’s a federal connection.’

‘Yes, you did say that. But you have given me no indication of how there is a federal connection. Does it involve a federal employee?’

‘I don’t know if that’s the correct way to put it or not but maybe.’

‘Did the crime happen on federal property?’

‘I don’t know. There was one meeting at the Lincoln Memorial. Does that count?’

‘It might if I knew what happened at the monument.’

The man exhaled loudly. ‘I can’t tell you until I know I won’t be prosecuted.’

‘So you were involved in a crime that might be a federal crime?’

‘Actually, there are two crimes,’ he said and flashed a grin.

‘Two crimes? Are either of them federal?’

‘I’m not sure. I don’t think the first one is but I might be wrong about the property lines when it comes to my part of the thing. And the second one, well, I thought it might be because someone who might become a federal employee is involved.’

Jake bent his head down and scratched the nape of his neck. ‘We are going nowhere here. I think this is a waste of time. You told me that it was a matter of national security. You told me it involved a high-level person in the government. You told me it could damage the President of the United States. But since you walked into my office you have told me nothing to substantiate those claims. I believe it’s time you left,’ Jake said as he rose to his feet.

The man jumped up. ‘No. No. You can’t send me out there without protection. I was followed here. I know it. If I walk out that door I’m a dead man. They’ll know I’ve been in your office.’

‘Sir, please.’ Jake placed a hand on the man’s shoulder and applied minimum pressure to maneuver him towards the door. ‘You go on home and think about this a little more. If you decide to be more forthcoming with your information, you are more than welcome to return.’

The man dropped to the floor, crossed his legs, and wrapped a hand around the arm of the chair. ‘No. No. You can’t make me. I’ll tell you everything. But I have to have some guarantees. I have to know you will keep me safe. I have to know I won’t be prosecuted.’

Jake was now convinced he had a nutcase in his office. ‘OK, sir. Calm down.’ He leaned back against his desk and crossed his arms. ‘You’ve gotta spill something if you want my help. Explain what you said about the property lines.’

‘I’m not sure whether the body was buried inside the Thomas Jefferson National Forest or just outside of it.’

‘Body? Are you saying someone was murdered?’

‘Yeah. But I didn’t do that. I just dug the hole and helped throw it in.’

‘Who was murdered?’

‘I’m not sure. The body was wrapped in a blanket. The only thing that I could see was a little bit of hair that stuck out at one end. Looked like a woman’s hair.’

‘When did this happen?’

‘Oh, ’bout thirty years ago.’

‘Thirty years ago?’

‘Yep. But that’s just the first crime I know about.’

‘What’s the second crime?’ Jake asked.

‘A death threat.’

‘To you?’

‘Now why would I threaten myself?’

Jake shook his head. ‘So you made the death threat?’

‘Sort of.’

‘Sort of? What the heck does that mean?’

‘I said the words the other person standing next to me told me to say.’

‘Who was standing next to you?’

The man sighed. ‘C’mon, man. Aren’t you paying any attention? The individual who killed that woman thirty years ago.’

‘OK. So who did you threaten?’

‘It was that person’s threat really . . .’

‘Right. Who was threatened?’

‘A woman.’

‘Oh, for God’s sake! What woman?’ Jake said, leaning forward with his hands on his hips.

‘I don’t know.’ The man shrugged.

‘You don’t know? You—’ An incoming call interrupted Jake. He lifted the receiver and said, ‘Lovett.’

‘OK. Face recognition software gave us some possibilities and we narrowed it down from there. We believe you are speaking to Charles David Rowland, currently residing in Norfolk, Virginia, previously a resident of Trenton, New Jersey. A lot of arrests. No felony convictions.’

‘Thank you,’ Jake said and disconnected the call. ‘Why don’t you get up off the floor, Mr Rowland, and have a seat in the chair.’

The man started to rise with a smile on his face but froze in place halfway in his ascent. His smile disintegrated as he said, ‘Excuse me?’

‘Drop the act, Mr Rowland. How long since you’ve paid a visit to Trenton?’

The man rose to his full height and took two steps backward.

‘Sir, have a seat.’

‘You’ll regret this,’ he said and bolted for the door.

Jake followed him into the hall but saw no sign of him. He opened the door to the stairwell but heard no sound of footsteps. He looked at the elevator. The screen indicated that it had stopped one floor below him. He stabbed at the button and swore under his breath as it continued its descent.

Jake pulled out his cell and called down to the security desk in the lobby. The officer answered but had difficulty understanding him because of the high level of noise. ‘What is going on down there?’ Jake screamed into the mouthpiece.

‘Senator Fowler and a flock of media,’ the officer shouted back.

‘Stop the man coming off the elevator. He’s about—’

‘What?’

Jake looked at the digital screen. The elevator was already on the ground floor. ‘The man coming out of the elevator—’

‘What about him?’

‘Stop him, damn it.’

‘The guy in the ball cap?’

‘Yes.’

‘He’s already gone.’

Jake disconnected from the call. He rushed back into his office and pulled up the blinds. He thought he saw a glimpse of someone dart behind the building next door but wasn’t sure if it was Rowland. He slumped down in his chair and picked up the receiver on his desk and dialed the local police department to request a BOLO (Be On the Look-Out) for Charles David Rowland.

He didn’t know what Rowland’s game was but his curiosity had been piqued. It might be inconsequential but then again, the mention of the President raised the stakes. The man’s talk of the White House occupant threw the investigation into Secret Service territory. He made a note to call and brief them on his strange encounter after he filed a report for his own agency.

THREE

L
ucinda sent Robin to inform Eagleton that he was being transported to the justice center downtown. She stood in the doorway to watch his reaction. Robin opened the back door of the vehicle and leaned forward. A moment later she staggered backward as Eagleton erupted from the car. A patrolman rushed over and helped Robin get him cuffed once again and shoved back inside. Lucinda could hear the bellows of Eagleton’s voice but could not decipher the words.

She went upstairs again. If there was dirt under Candace’s fingernails – if she was murdered – there should be signs of a struggle somewhere. She’d seen nothing obvious on her last examination. This time, she’d look closer. Her nose nearly pressed against the outside frame of the door, she peered at every inch up one side and down the other.

Moving inside the room, she repeated the process. Midway down the unhinged side, she saw light scratch marks in the paint on the wall and tiny grooves in the woodwork. She stuck a red sticker next to the barely perceptible scars.

She got down on her hands and knees and crawled across the bedroom floor. When she reached the wall, she turned around, moved over a foot, and headed back in the opposite direction. She repeated this process several times until she reached the bottom of the bed. She ran her finger around the indentation that circled one leg, and then crawled forward until she reached the second one. There her finger hit a small, solid object. The shadows of the bed covering made it necessary to pull out her flashlight to see what her finger found.

She saw one green stone bead and then another. How long had they rested there? Had it been days, weeks, months? Or did they land there earlier that day? The stones appeared to match the jewelry the victim was wearing when she was found. Had she worn a bracelet that morning? Was it broken by force when someone attacked her? Did the perp try to pick up all the pieces and missed these two? Or was it all just a coincidence? Lucinda’s nose involuntarily crinkled with distaste at the latter possibility.

Lucinda continued her search of the floor. She was still on all fours when she heard Marguerite Spellman call her name. Lucinda leaned back on her heels and spotted the forensic specialist standing in the door frame, her hands gloved, her body covered in a blue Tyvec suit from the booties on her feet to the hood over her head.

‘Glad to see you, Spellman,’ Lucinda said.

‘Have you found anything?’ Marguerite asked.

‘Take a step inside and look at the spot on and near the frame that I marked. What does it look like to you?’

Marguerite peered at it without saying a word. She pulled a portable light and a magnifying glass out of her kit bag. She examined the area even more closely. ‘Possibly fingernail scratches but it could have been caused by something else.’