Death of a Washington Madame
Read Death of a Washington Madame Online
Authors: Warren Adler
Tags: #Detective and Mystery Stories, FitzGerald; Fiona (Fictitious Character), Fiction, Washington (D.C.), Women Detectives - Washington (D.C.), Women Detectives, General, Mystery and Detective, Women Sleuths
BOOKS BY WARREN ADLER
Banquet Before Dawn
Blood Ties
Cult
Death of a Washington Madame
Empty Treasures
Flanagan's Dolls
Funny Boys
Madeline's Miracles
Mourning Glory
Natural Enemies
Private Lies
Random Hearts
Residue
The Casanova Embrace
The Children of the Roses
The David Embrace
The Henderson Equation
The Housewife Blues
The War of the Roses
The Womanizer
Trans-Siberian Express
Twilight Child
Undertow
We Are Holding the President
Hostage
SHORT STORIES
Jackson Hole, Uneasy Eden
Never Too Late For Love
New York Echoes
New York Echoes 2
The Sunset Gang
MYSTERIES
American Sextet
American Quartet
Immaculate Deception
Senator Love
The Ties That Bind
The Witch of Watergate
Copyright ©
2005
by Warren Adler.
ISBN 978-1-59006-086-5
All rights reserved. This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced
in any form without permission. This novel is a work of fiction.
Names, characters, places, incidents are either the product
of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously.
Inquiries: WarrenAdler.com
STONEHOUSE PRESS
"Oh to be in Washington now that April's here,"
Fiona said, sniffing the newly washed air, pungent with delicate cherry blossom
aroma, the orange glow of sunrise rising above the glistening marble sheen of
Memorial Bridge where beams of golden light bounced off the glazed haunches of
the bronze horses that guarded its entrances.
She leaned against Hal Perry's tall hard form, his arms
enveloping her as she caressed his hands. His breath felt cool on her cheek.
Her glance roamed the spectacular sight of the cherry blossoms in full pink
bloom along the rim of the Tidal Basin from the steps of the Jefferson
Memorial. At that hour the tourists had not yet begun to arrive and the area
was deserted.
Drinking in the beauty of the lush cherry blossoms was
certainly contrasting, an antithesis of the violence to which she bore witness
on her daily rounds as a homicide detective. From where they stood, they could
see the former home of Robert E. Lee on its hillside overlooking the serene
Arlington resting place of valiant soldiers and northward the creamy plantation
home of the sitting President.
It was impossible to believe that this hallowed place with
its spectacular view of the Capital's wedding cake Greco-roman buildings, its
stunning obelisk memorial to the father of the country, and the two temples
that anchored the giant stone images of the great Jefferson and the martyred
Lincoln, could exist side by side with the bloody horrors that took place
within it's diamond shaped boundaries.
"In a week, they'll only be a memory," Fiona
said, meaning the cherry blossoms.
"And pop again in another year," Hal said,
tightening his arms around her. "Let's not knock renewal, Fi."
"I'm renewal's biggest fan," Fiona sighed;
certain he would get the sexual implication. Except for the dinner party at
Daisy Hodges house, they had spent the past three days making love. No, she
corrected, being in love, which was also renewal in a psychic sense. She had
been on such a journey before and had tasted its ecstasy and betrayal. She was
hoping this one was a "keeper."
After a few moments more observing the horticultural
display, Fiona reversed herself in his arms and they kissed deeply. When they
parted, he grasped her elbow and moved her gently forward.
"As green as an Irish Spring," he said, stooping
suddenly, pausing again to study the color of her eyes, hazel but deep green
now in this bright morning light.
"Only in the early sunglow," she laughed.
"But still not the mesmerizing iridescent violet of dear Madeline Newton's
orbs. I think she can create that color at will and make you men all go gaga.
And not just the eyes' color. She can also inflate you with that practiced
contrived look."
He shook his head and smiled.
"Didn't do a thing for me," he chuckled.
"You drooled over that gorgeous display of
boobery." Fiona said, squeezing his hand. "She totally commanded your
attention."
"You don't command a three-star General," he
snickered. "Even a retired one."
"Alright then, a captain of industry."
"She's Madeline Newton, Fi, for crying out loud,"
he said going along. "She's an icon. She's been in our face for forty odd
years, ever since she was a kid. She's been paid plenty of loot for those
violet eyes and luscious breastworks. I kind of liked meeting her in the flesh."
"Much of it revealed. You appeared inspired by
it." Fiona paused and let out a mock growl. "Both of them."
He lifted his head in a silent laugh.
"She's a movie star, Fi. Everybody loves to see movie
stars in person. And she's a super star."
"An aging super movie star," Fiona corrected,
then quickly amending the remark. "Now that was unkind."
"I'm also fifty-something, Fi," he reminded her
gently.
"Ah, but you are a chronological miracle. No surgeon's
knife nipped and tucked you to preserve that youthful look. Besides, you have a
teenage libido. I'll sign papers on that." She moved closer to him as they
walked and reached up to kiss his cheek. He was darkly handsome in that craggy
way of athletic men, tanned, muscular, a focused lover, virile, exciting. He
was also every inch the General, as they say, ramrod straight, a man of
authority and charisma.
"And from what I hear she is supposed to be quite
artful in that category," Fiona continued, deliberately rumor mongering,
suddenly feeling herself move into darker emotional territory, from teasing
satire to petulance.
"I wouldn't know."
"Or wish?"
"Not remotely."
"What did you talk about?"
"Politics. Mostly she asked my opinion on various
subjects. You know ... where is the country going internationally. Are we
losing our edge in the new world disorder? She did call it disorder. Oh yes ...
she asked if all that treasure dispensed for compassion had worked?"
"And you answered?"
"Disorder is the natural political condition of man
and dependency debilitates motivation."
"How profound. That's her expertise, making men feel
important by asking them the "big" questions. Batting her violets,
flapping her lashes, exhibiting her mounds."
"Mounds? That's a candy bar."
"Exactly."
"Bet she hung on every word. Showed you what a great
listener she was."
"She seemed quite intelligent for a...."
"...big boobed superstar. And no movie talk, right?
Too trivial for her new role as political hustler, trying to get her man into
that mansion across the pond."
"In Washington everyone has an agenda," he
sighed.
"Just so long as it doesn't include you," she
said finally. Her jealousy was partly sincere, but it deflected attention from
what he often called "the matter at hand," meaning his matrimonial
pursuit.
"You're my agenda, Fi."
She had been on too many agendas to take the remark
seriously. It had been a game of banter between them since Daisy's dinner
party, where he had been seated next to the super star. Fiona had drawn
Madeline Newton's husband as her dinner partner, William Shipley, Jr. the sitting
Governor of Virginia. She remembered when he was merely Billy Shipley, only son
of Deb Shipley, Washington's once hostess with the mostest in the days when
Fiona's father was the powerful senior Senator from New York.
When Billy Shipley was a Marine, his mother's connections
had got him to be a White House "walker", one of those handsome young
uniforms on hand at State social occasions to escort and dance with the
unaccompanied ladies, one of whom, a rich one, he eventually married and divorced.
He had once, very briefly, escorted Fiona up the spiral marble staircase to the
State Dining room at a White House event when she was sixteen.
"Of course, I remember," Shipley had told her as
he dipped into the soup course. Fiona doubted his allegation of memory. It was
a knee-jerk reaction of blatant cynicism. She invariably doubted politicians,
to whom election and re-election were, in her mind, their only real priorities.
"I certainly remember your father."
"And I remember your mother," she had countered.
How could one forget Deb Shipley who dominated an era and played hostess to the
world's elite in her mansion off 16th Street? Invitations to her parties were
the only real validation that one had finally arrived into the cozy club of America's movers and shakers. Apparently she had dropped out of sight years ago.
"Mother doesn't go out these days," he had said,
as if to preempt what might be coming next. "Does she still live in that
grand house?" "Unfortunately."
Fiona knew what he meant. The neighborhood had changed
significantly since the days of Deb Shipley's greatest glory. Her grand house,
still an impressive landmark, was the centerpiece of a neighborhood in decay, a
haven for drug dealers, prostitutes, crack houses and killers.
"Is she well?"
"Health-wise yes. She's still the Grande dame,"
he replied. "A bit arthritic, but her mind's still razor sharp."
"What does she do with her time?" Fiona asked,
conscious suddenly of allowing her professional bent for interrogation cross
the line of polite conversation.
"Prays mostly. She's become a Catholic."
He shrugged, as if in resignation, a discreet signal that
further interrogation was not welcome.
"She did have her moment on the stage," Fiona
said, an appropriate exit line.
"That she did," Shipley had replied.
"Now you're having yours," Fiona said.
"You might say that."
"And it's not over."
"You might say that, too."
She was struck by his boyish charm and the polished
pleasantness of his evasion.
It was no secret that William Shipley's political ambitions
went much further than the Richmond statehouse. With his high profile world
renowned film star wife by his side, a fact that had raised his celebrity
status a hundred fold, he was a good bet to throw his hat in the ring for a
Presidential run, still one year away. For Shipley and his wife, Fiona
observed, becoming President was perfect casting, Camelot revisited.
With his tall slim figure and sandy hair peppered with
flattering gray, his easy white-toothed smile and crinkles at the edges of his
sky blue eyes, he could stir nostalgic memories of the martyred young
President. Of all the Governor's in America, he was, thanks to Madeline Newton,
the best known, most photographed and talked about politician in America.
Daisy Hodges, who Fiona had known when they were both the
terrors of the Mount Vernon School for Girls, was unabashedly working to become
one of Washington's premier hostesses, knew the media drawing power of the
Shipleys and was willing to exploit it to the fullest. Her father had been a
member of the Nixon cabinet and her husband had made a fortune in real estate
giving her both the cachet and wherewithal to ply her ambitions.
"What else can I do?" she had confided to Fiona,
who loved her self-deprecating disarming charm, an asset that had served her well
in her drive for social dominance. She could make every remark she uttered
sound like a private confidence meant solely for the recipient. "I can't
cook worth a damn. I'm rarely inspired in the sack and I don't play golf,
tennis or bridge. The only thing I do well is give good party."
Fiona agreed and liked to be included in Daisy's events
when the press of chasing murderers allowed, especially when she had a new man
in tow. Despite her profession as a Homicide Detective with MPD, Fiona enjoyed
and continued to foster the social life she had always known.
All her old friends characterized her career as a kind of
exotic anomaly, a distorted form of Joan of Arcism, a call from God to don a
blue collar and 38 instead of sword and armor and do battle with the infidels.
Most agreed it was, despite nearly ten years of service, merely a temporary
stage she was going through. Her new friends and associates in police circles,
light years away from the others, came to a remarkably similar conclusion.
None of these opinions mattered to her. She had stubbornly
opposed the pacifism of her adored father, a factor which tumbled his career.
Evil, she had argued, had to be confronted, fought and conquered by force, if
necessary. In Fiona's hawkish mindset, crime was a vicious war and, as a
homicide cop, she was a soldier in the bloody trenches. How she chose to fight
the concept and stand by her principles, however aberrational it appeared to
others of her social realm, was her own business, militantly defended.
"You make such an exotic guest," Daisy told her
often. "That gun you carry. I love it. And the thing you call it. A piece.
So sexy." Daisy was not reticent to advertise to her guests what Fiona
did, pointing out that they had better behave because she was armed, ready for
combat and had the power of arrest.
Hal Perry, although obviously enjoying the event, had made
her promise that they would leave early. During coffee and after dinner drinks
in the parlor, they discreetly made their exit.
"I'm working in a tight time frame," Fiona told
Daisy in a farewell embrace.
"Horny bitch," Daisy had whispered, then turning
to Hal.
"Rub her in the right places and a genie will
emerge," she said, tapping Fiona on the shoulder.
"Daisy!" Fiona cried in mock rebuke.
"It already has," Hal said, his arm around Fiona,
pulling her closer.
"Well then, children," Daisy said. "Attend
to your business."
They went back to Fiona's bedroom and attended to it.
Repeatedly.
Still on the subject of Madeline Newton, mostly an obvious
ploy to avoid the more serious subject that hung between them, Fiona's car
headed out of the Jefferson Memorial parking lot and turned into the highway
leading to the Fourteenth street Bridge, heading toward the airport where Hal's
company jet was waiting.
"She's absolutely perfect for the part," Fiona
persisted. "Don't you think?"
"Good casting," he nodded.
"Playing her role as Governor's wife to the hilt, a
role created by an unfortunate accident that befell the competition."
Fiona paused and shook her head. "That, too, was unkind."
"Yes it was," he said patiently as she headed the
car to the airport turnoff.
She had referred to the unfortunate plane crash that had
killed the front-runner in the Virginia Gubernatorial election. Experts had
investigated and ruled that the crash that took place on a stormy night was
accidental. Naturally, those wags that believed in conspiracies thought
otherwise and whispered about Madeline Newton's secret pact with the devil to
make her husband President of the United States.
But as they neared the airport, there was no escaping the
subject of their relationship and its future.
"I'm sorry Hal. I get jealous and bitchy when you
leave."
"That's correctable, Fi," he muttered. His MO on
their periodic parting was to get morose.