“And Russell thought he was going to get in trouble,” Rosalind said. “But then Riley threw it back on the desk and walked away.”
Now the emptiness engulfed her.
“I’m so sorry,” Rosalind said, and then her eyes filled with tears. “I wish I hadn’t done that. I feel dirty. And I feel dirty telling you. But I couldn’t keep it to myself.”
Millie came to Rosalind and put her arm around her. “No, don’t. You wanted to help me. That means more to me than anything.”
Rosalind wiped at her eyes. “What’s going to happen to us?”
“I don’t know,” Millie whispered.
5
Anne could not shake the feeling that the walls were closing in. Was it just a panic attack?
She hadn’t heard from Levering, hadn’t been able to track him down. Where was he? Off in an alcoholic stupor? It wasn’t like him to be so far removed from communication. That had to be part of it.
Then there was Ambrosi. He was going to do something, and she didn’t know what. That wasn’t like him, either. It meant something big. She’d get caught up in it, maybe that was the thing. He was going to bring her down with him.
But there was something else, worse than mere professional anxiety. It was a deep disquiet of some kind, a big black hole inside her, swirling, sucking up galaxies.
Self-analysis was not something she was into. No money in it. No time for it. She usually dealt with uneasiness through action. Planning things, twisting arms. Even shopping. But this was something worse. She knew it wasn’t going to shake loose with a few purchases from Saks.
So what was this?
It felt like something calling to her. Searching for her.
The knock on her apartment door jarred her back into the present. She was startled to see that detective, Markey, through her peephole.
“What is it?” she said through the door.
“Ms. Deveraux, open the door, please.”
It was official-speak. She had no choice. Not to open would be like an admission of guilt.
She let him in.
“I’m sorry, Ms. Deveraux, but you’ll have to come with me now,” Don Markey said.
“Whoa, whoa,” she said. “Not now. I’ve got a meeting in ten – ”
“You don’t understand. You are under arrest.”
Her skin started to climb upward. “Arrest?”
“For complicity in the murder of Tad Levering.”
“Look,” she said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about, but you’re way off base.”
“You have the right to remain silent,” he said.
“Wait a second, hold it. Can’t you explain all this?”
“You have the right to an attorney – ”
“This is ridiculous.”
“Are you waiving your right to an attorney?”
“I’m not waiving anything.”
“Then come with me and we’ll talk about things at the station.”
“Things?”
“Unless you want to talk right now, tell me the whole thing. Corroborate what the senator said.”
Anne tried to keep her face from twitching. “Senator?”
“Levering. He’s told us quite a tale.”
Anne’s face did not cooperate. She felt her cheeks go into weird gyrations. He knew. The guy knew it all. She could see it in his eyes. And he knew she knew. It was all over, baby. She could almost hear Ambrosi’s voice telling her that.
With a swift precision honed over many years, Anne’s mind clicked and calculated in her moment of deepest crisis. Survival mode she sometimes called it. When the chips were down, you had to find the best way out.
The detective just waited, as if he knew what she was going to say.
“What kind of deal can we work out here?” she said.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
1
Now, at last, her moment had come.
Millie walked out of her chambers, Rosalind by her side, and proceeded through the Great Hall. Bill Bonassi was waiting for them just outside the doors.
“You ready?” he asked.
“As I’ll ever be,” Millie said. She clutched a card that had notes for her statement. It would be respectful, but forceful. Every politician, every citizen, would know that she would stand against the onslaught. The question was whether she could hide the whirlwind inside her. She had thought peace would come with her moment. It had not.
“Then let’s go.” Bonassi took her arm and started down the great stone steps toward the snarl of reporters below. A clump of microphones was set up on the first level, with half a dozen television cameras placed at strategic locations and angles. Behind the reporters a large crowd of the curious thrust forward, kept at bay by four uniformed D.C. police officers.
Just before her final descent, Millie paused to look back at the Court building. The same marble figures flanked the portico, and the same immortal words, Equal Justice Under Law, moved her with their majesty. When she had first seen them she thought they had come from the mind of man. Now she knew they could only have come from the God who gave mankind the very capacity to be just.
At the knot of microphones, Bill Bonassi put his hand up to silence the few shouted questions.
“We have a statement to make,” he said. Cameras flashed and snapped, like hungry piranhas.
“It’s been a long time since I’ve stood here,” Bonassi said. “It was back in 1953 I first climbed these steps to make an argument before the Court. It was a free speech case. I argued on behalf of a school teacher from Nebraska. I argued that the Constitution gives every citizen the right to think and express
