The Strategist (22 page)

Richmond looked at Solomon. “Well, we can never take the African-American vote for granted, can we?” Then he looked at Sarah. “Is she in the lobby?”

“Yep. She’s standing by the entrance.”

“Well let’s go say hello, make her feel at home.”

Sarah turned toward the lobby while Richmond and Solomon followed. Richmond saw the woman first. “Hello there,” he said in what was probably his standard ass-kissing voice. “Welcome to our little operation.”

By the time Solomon looked up to see that the woman getting her ass kissed was Camille Grisham, Richmond was already shaking her hand.

He instinctively reached inside his coat for his gun, but stopped short of pulling it out. Even though the move was subtle, it was enough to get her attention. When she glanced at him, the smile that she was putting on for Richmond went away.

She knew. Somehow, she knew.

“And this is Solomon Gates,” Sarah said as she put a hand on Solomon’s elbow. “He’s another one of our supporters.

Camille nodded, though she didn’t extend her hand. “Naomi Stephens. Pleasure.”

Naomi Stephens? Today was certainly the day for aliases. “Likewise,” Solomon answered as he tried to fake his way through a smile. The agent didn’t even bother trying. “Well Elliott, I have to run,” he said, squeezing Richmond’s shoulder. “I’m sure we’ll catch up again very soon.”

“You can count on it, Mr. Gates,” Richmond answered confidently.

Solomon looked back at Camille. The look in her eye hadn’t changed. It was obvious that Richmond didn’t know who she was, and he wanted to warn him. But there was no reasonable way to do that. So he silently wished him luck and walked out the door.

“Have a good day Solomon,” Camille Grisham called out. Her tone was flat and lifeless. And it scared the hell out of him.

“You do the same, Naomi,” he said, trying to match her tone. Unlike him, she didn’t look the least bit afraid.

But she soon would be.

CHAPTER 35

The Elliott Richmond that Camille stood less than two feet away from looked nothing like the monster she saw on the video. In real life he didn’t have nearly the physical stature that his on camera behavior would have suggested. Camille would even go so far as to call him unimpressive. He looked and acted more like a used car salesman than the wealthy, politically-connected murderer that he actually was.

Solomon Gates, on the other hand, was formidable in the way she expected Elliott Richmond to be. Standing well over six feet, with a stature befitting the average Roman gladiator, Gates was a darkly handsome man, with a thick mane of bla
ck hair and an angular, sharply-chiseled face. His presence cast a shadow over all of them that made her leery. Something about him also felt familiar. In the case of most people, familiar is good. In his case, it was not.

Whatever her feelings about Solomon Gates, she couldn’t let them distract her from the real reason she was here.

“So Naomi, Sarah tells me that you’re a member of an organization?” Richmond asked with an inflated smile.

The nice girl who escorted her in was still standing nearby, half listening to the conversation. Camille would have to maintain some semblance of decorum as long as she was around. So she ground her teeth, clenched her jaw, and manufactured a smile that matched Richmond’s in its absurdity. “An organization? Not exactly. Let’s just say I represent an influential block of people who are tired of the same old business as usual.” She had once heard that line in a movie.

“I would say that you and I already have something rather significant in common. The status quo is something we can no longer tolerate. Mayor Richmond is determined to change things. With like-minded people like yourself on board, that change is going to come faster than people realize.”

Camille continued to play along as the girl suddenly became distracted by her cell phone. “I believe the mayor can change a lot of things, Mr. Richmond. That’s why I’m here.”

Richmond put a hand on her shoulder. “Please, I insist you call me Elliott.” Camille had to resist the urge to snatch his measly paw off her shoulder and bend it ninety degrees backward.

The
first thought that entered her mind was what could Julia have possibly seen in him? The second thought was how easy it would be to beat the living shit out of him if she had to. She didn’t anticipate it coming down to that. But then again, the meeting had just gotten started.

“Fair enough, Elliott,” she answered with the last ounce of levity she could muster.

When the girl was finally finished with her phone call, she walked over to Camille and Richmond. “That was the mayor. I didn’t want to interrupt your meeting so I went ahead and took the call for you.”

“That’s perfectly okay, Sarah. What did she need?”

“She wanted to let you know that she is going to be about twenty minutes late to the Chamber luncheon. The Five Points town hall meeting ran over a bit and she hit a snarl in traffic.”

Richmond sighed. “I guess we could have predicted that one, huh? Thanks for letting me know.”

She smiled. “You’re welcome. Nice to meet you, Naomi.”

Camille returned her smile. “Nice to meet you too.” She suddenly felt afraid for the girl. She obviously had no idea who she was working for, and if he hadn’t already tried to have his way with her, he was certainly thinking about it. She wanted to warn her, just like she want
ed to warn everyone else here.

“We’ll be sure to hold things down while you’re gone,” Sarah said as she walked out of the lobby.

“I have no doubt you will,” Richmond answered, his eyes lingering on the girl until she disappeared behind the door. After she was gone he put his hand back on Camille’s shoulder. “The Chamber of Commerce is honoring the mayor with an award this afternoon and as usual she’s running late. She jokes that when she’s elected senator she’s going to be late to the swearing-in and they’re going to take her seat away before she even gets the chance to sit in it.”

With no one left to put on a show for, Camille didn’t even attempt to smile. “I take it you’re the punctual one in the family?”

Richmond shrugged his shoulders, genuinely perplexed by Camille’s question. “I may be only slightly better about it than she is. Speaking of which, I’m afraid I’m going to have to cut this short. If I don’t get going I may not make it at all.”

“I can appreciate that you’re busy, Elliot. I happen to be kind of busy myself. In fact, this has probably been the longest, most emotionally hellish week of my entire life. And when you’ve had the life I’ve had, that’s really saying something. To be honest, I’m lucky to have made it here at all. If I’m not careful, I may have a complete nervous breakdown right here in this office. So for both our sakes, I’ll be as quick as I can.” Camille maintained a steady measure in her voice
that made Richmond visibly nervous. That was the whole idea.

“I’m not sure I follow.”

“Do we really have to discuss this out here?”

Richmond began slowly backpedaling his way toward the lobby door. “I don’t know what you’re referring to. But as I said, I’m running late, and I don’t think I
really have time to–”

“Because my best friend was murdered a week ago,” Camille interrupted, her voice losing some of its measure. “And I’d rather not talk about the specifics of it in this very public room. When you hear what I have to say, you’re not going to want to talk here either.”

Camille’s words stopped Richmond cold. “What on earth are you talking about?” he bellowed in a manner that was supposed to mask the obvious distress painted all over his face.

Camille said nothing as she pulled out a silver flash disk and tossed it to him. He fumbled trying to catch it and it fell to the ground.

“Don’t worry if you broke that one. I have copies.”

Richmond looked at her with pitiful eyes as he bent down to pick up the disk. Camille wanted to bask in the sight of this pathetic man in his tailored suit crouching on the ground like the dog that he was, but she suddenly felt weak and light-headed. This nightmare of a day was starting to catch up to her, just like her father warned it would.

“What is this?” Richmond
asked as he held up the disk.

“A
lmost a thousand Excel and Word documents on that disk related to the Schumann Investment Group and Springwell Technologies. Do either of those names ring a bell? From what I’m beginning to learn, you’re pretty familiar with both. There’s also a PowerPoint presentation for the Schumann Board of Directors detailing a number of risky investments that Schumann entered into, using the retirement income of state employees as collateral. There are three other PowerPoints which detail income losses as a result of collapsed stock prices and a plan for affected board members to recoup their losses. Once again, at the expense of state employees. And then there’s the interesting bit about Springwell Technologies and the online voting project that they were spearheading. Funny that you would have an involvement in something like that, considering your wife is dependent on those very votes to win her senate seat. Personally, I don’t know anything about this stuff, so most of it is Greek to me. But I do recognize criminal activity when I see it. And what I saw in those documents looked pretty damn criminal.” Camille had to pause to stop herself from shaking. “But the best part is the video.”

Richmond’s face suddenly turned to stone. “That’s enough.”

“So you know what I’m talking about? I’m glad I don’t have to explain any further.

“I said that’s eno–”

“Did you honestly think you could say the things that you said on that video and actually get away with it? You had to know that it was eventually going to come out. Did Julia tell you she was going to make it public? Is that why you did it?” Camille was talking much louder than she needed to, but at this point she didn’t care if anyone heard her.

“For God sake, keep your voice down,” Richmond said in an angry whisper.

“If it’s really that much of a concern, maybe we should find someplace a little more private to talk this out.”

“I have an e
ven better idea. Get the hell out of here before I have you thrown out.”

Richmond took a step toward Camille, and her mind instantly flashed back to an image of him doing the same thing to Julia. If his finger came anywhere near her face, she was fully prepared to break it.

“If you need a cop to escort me out, you should consider calling Detective Walter Graham in homicide. He’s pretty busy with Julia’s case, but I’m sure he’d drop everything and rush right over if you asked him to. Thinks the world of you. When I took this disk to him, he got so angry I thought he was going to shoot me on the spot. We should all have someone in the world who thinks that highly of us. Makes me think the two of you are buddies or something. Anyway, it’s fortunate for me that Graham isn’t the only cop in town. Something tells me they won’t all react as strongly as he did.”

Richmond nodded as his face suddenly lit up with recognition. “I personally think Naomi is a much prettier name than Camille. You should really think about having it changed.”

“I don’t think my father would be too happy with that, considering he was the one who named me. You know how stubborn cops can be.”

“They’re a lot like former FBI agents. They don’t always know when to quit.”

Camille felt her hand curl up in a tight fist. “Enough with the banter, Elliott. I came here to ask you a very simple question.”

Richmond’s posture became rigid. “What question is that?”

“Are you going to do the right thing?”

A hint of
a smile came across his face. “Is this on the record or off?”

“This isn’t a fucking newspaper interview,” Camille answered briskly. “Besides, I already have you on video.
I don’t need you on tape too.”

“Right. Well, as I said in that video you keep referring to, I don’t take kindly to being threatened.”

“Believe me, I know. You usually kill people who threaten you. But in my case, I figured I had nothing to lose, so why not take the chance?”

“You really are funny, Camille. Or should I say Agent Grisham. But I didn’t kill Julia. I may have done other things that I shouldn’t have. But I didn’t kill her.”

Camille shook her head. “I’m going to ask you one more time. Are you going to do the right thing? So far your answer seems to be no. I want to give you the opportunity to reevaluate that before I leave.”

“Maybe you should reevaluate what’s going to happen
after
you leave.”

Camille opened her mouth to respond, but the look in Richmond’s eyes stopped her. She caught her first glimpse of the monster. It was a fleeting appearance, but the fear that it instilled in her lingered. She did her best to push it back. “I know exactly what’s going to happen after I leave.”

“Do you really?” 

“Since you’ve made it clear that you’re not going to do the right thing, and since both of us are so pressed for time, I’m only going to say one more thing.” She reached into her pocket, pulled out another flash disk, and threw it to Richmond. This time he caught it. “That one is for your wife. Give her my regards.”

Without saying another word, Camille stormed out of the lobby and through the front door. She made it as far as the sidewalk before she doubled over in tears. Her breaths were coming faster than she could control them and she began to hyperventilate. A teenage boy in a Chicago White Sox baseball cap and sagging blue jeans looked at Camille with surprising concern and slowly began to walk toward her. But before he could reach her, she made it to her car, opened the door, and hurled herself inside. Her breathing still out of control, Camille scanned the inside of the car until she found a plastic 7-Eleven bag in the backseat. She put it up to her mouth and began taking long, slow pulls. After a few seconds her breathing finally slowed down and she lowered the bag.

Her father was right. Pursing Richmond now was more than she could handle. Every second she was in his presence felt like an eternity. All she could see when she looked in his face was Julia. No matter how inexplicable her reasons may have been, Julia loved him. And she was blinded by that love to the point that it got her killed. She had literally given up everything for him: her career, her happiness, her family, her friendships, and ultimately her self-respect. As Camille stood in the presence of that weasel of a human being, she not only saw the man who ended Julia’s life, she saw the man who ruined any chance that Julia had of being happy while she was still alive. And that, above everything else that had happened today, was the straw that finally broke her.

She furiously wiped the tears from her eyes, but they kept coming. Sickened by the thought that Richmond could be watching, she tried to start the car to drive away, but her trembling hand could not line the key up with the ignition. So she sat back in the seat and kept her mind and body as still as possible. After a few minutes, the flood of emotions that had nearly submerged her finally began to recede. The heaviness in her chest was gone, the keys in her hand were steady, and the fog that had shrouded her mind was starting to clear. When she looked back at Richmond’s building, he wasn’t standing in the doorway staring at her like she had feared and she breathed a deep sigh of relief.