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Simmons…yes, I know…thank you…it’s devastated all of us…my dad?…holding up as well as can be expected…my sister, Polly, is flying in today from California, I need a quiet suite for her…sure, that would be fine…let’s keep it under wraps, okay? She doesn’t need a bunch of reporters camping out there…oh, right, you don’t need that, either…thanks, Harry, I really appreciate this.”
    He dialed McTeague’s cell. “We’re doing okay, Walter,” he said in response to the question. “Look, there’s been a change of plan. Polly’s not coming here to the house. I’ve got her a suite at the Hotel George on Fifteenth Street, Northwest. Take her there. She’ll probably complain, but ignore her. Tell her I’ll explain when I see her. I’d call now but she’s in the air. Thanks, Walter.”
    He considered telling Alexandra that she wouldn’t have to play hostess to Polly after all, but decided not to.
Let her stew
. He also didn’t bother to tell her he was leaving. He didn’t need another rant on his way out the door.
    The press had been quiet as they maintained their stakeout. At the sight of him exiting the house, they sprang into action, shouting questions, cameramen and still photographers scrambling to get their equipment into place and rolling. He waved them off with a forced smile, clicked open the overhead garage door, climbed into his red Lexus, and carefully backed out to the street, mindful that to run over a member of the Fourth Estate would be efficient but not prudent. One female reporter screamed at him through the window, her face distorted with anger at his refusal to engage her. He managed another smile, thought of Alexandra, and pulled away, tempted to extend his middle finger but thinking better of it.
That’s all Dad needs
, he thought,
a front-page picture in
The Washington Post
of his son, president of a leading lobbying firm, flipping the bird at a female reporter just hours after his mother’s murder
.
    As a young child, he’d been infatuated with the big, strong, sweaty men who picked up the family’s garbage each week, and aspired to one day join their ranks.
    Maybe I should have
, he thought as he headed for the highway leading to downtown D.C.
     
     
     

CHAPTER   FIVE
     
     
    “W ell, well, well, look who’s here. The crusading prosecutor.”
    Morris Crimley, chief of the Washington MPD’s detective division, looked up as Rotondi entered his cluttered office. During his years as an assistant U.S. attorney in Baltimore, Rotondi had served with Crimley on committees looking into crime prevention, and they’d forged a friendship outside those confabs, becoming fierce racquetball opponents and equally committed handball competitors. The physical aspect of their relationship ended, of course, after Rotondi’s injury.
    “Hello, Morrie,” Rotondi said. “I’m still crusading, only now it’s against irresponsible dog owners who don’t pick up after their pooches.” There was no hypocrisy involved in the comment. He’d picked up after Homer that morning. “Mind if I push stuff off a chair and sit down, or will that foul up your filing system?”
    “I never argue with a man with a cane. Push away. How’s the leg?”
    “Lousy.” Rotondi picked up a pile of file folders from a chair, plopped them on top of another pile on another chair, removed his blazer and added that to the mound, and sat. Although he knew he didn’t have to wear a jacket and tie, he usually did when visiting Simmons’s office, which he intended to do after leaving police headquarters. When in Rome…
    “I hear there’s a crime wave in D.C.,” Rotondi said.
    “It’s the heat, Phil. The crime rate always goes up along with the temperature. Hell, you know that. “
    “Simple solution. AC the city.”
    “I’ll pass that along. You’re here because your friend the senator is suddenly a widower.”
    Rotondi nodded. “Any progress?” he asked.
    “Sure. That’s for public