Free Immaculate Deception by Warren Adler Page B

set. He watched the images for a moment and, she had
suspected, he was salivating over the possibilities for his own exposure on the
tube. After a while, he had turned and looked sternly at Fiona and Cates.
"But you're right. No shooting from the hip. It's political to the core.
What I want here is textbook thoroughness, hear? You're on it full-time,
overtime and prime time. And nothing, nothing goes without me being
apprised. (Apprahzed.) The boys upstairs will be nervous as grasshoppers and
the mayor will have a piss hemorrhage if we make a wrong move but he sure will
love the leverage against those self-righteous Congressional bastards. Only
we've got to walk on eggshells. Those congressmen get very touchy we start
mucking about in their shit."
    "Very sensible," Fiona had agreed, exchanging
glances with Cates, who had nodded his understanding.
    "And you can dispense with that patronizing
bullshit," the Eggplant snapped, reverting to character. He had shot them
a snarl, walked back to his chair, picked up the People magazine, relit
his panatela and lifted his feet to the desk signaling an end to the interview.
Cates had risen, but Fiona had continued to sit there watching him. It was a
long time before he reacted. He looked over the magazine and took a long drag
on his panatela.
    "I want to know something, chief."
    "So?" A stream of smoke had poured out of his
mouth.
    "From the beginning..." She remembered feeling
suddenly embarrassed and had again cut a glance at Cates. Would he think she
was toadying? Such conduct was considered sinful. It was a subject beyond race
and rank. She shrugged it off, had to know. "You seemed so dead certain it
wasn't suicide..." She had stumbled for a moment. Cates had ascribed it to
pure gluttony for publicity. But that was a given, a constant. This was sixth
sense, an inborn talent. One of the great challenges of the job was to best him,
cut him down to size. On a number of occasions, she had actually done it,
albeit without his public ackowledgment. Surely, inside of himself, he had
acknowledged her victory.
    He had smiled. More smoke had poured from his nose.
    "Women," he told her, shaking his head, offering
his favorite smile signifying derision and sarcasm. "I've been studying
them since I was eleven."
    "What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Fiona
had snapped, tossing another glance at Cates, hoping the sudden outburst had
redeemed her in his eyes. It was important to show them that she could give as
much as she got, another ritual for gaining respect.
    "You call yourself a detective," the Eggplant had
said, sighing derisively. "Never yet met a woman who greased her face
without a genuine desire to wake up in the morning."
    Embarrassment had registered profoundly on Fiona. She stood
up absorbing the rebuke. She had missed it. No question. Touché. Her face had
grown hot with her blush of shame. Cates, somewhat less moved, had lowered his
eyes.
    "Happens," the Eggplant had said sighing
theatrically, hiding his face discreetly behind the People magazine,
relieving her of having to watch his smugness.
    "Could have been habit," Cates told her.
"She may have wanted to look good for St. Peter."
    "Jesus," Fiona had replied.
    "Him, too," Cates had said, offering not the
shred of a smile.
    The service in the rotunda had taken all of an hour and the
crowd, losing some of its solemnity, began to mill about. A knot of mourners
surrounded McGuire and his children offering condolences, shaking hands or
embracing them depending on the levels of intimacy.
    Charles Rome and, Fiona assumed, his wife Barbara, spoke
briefly with McGuire and his children, then moved through the crowd like
royalty. Rome had all the bearing and demeanor of a "man of power."
She knew the type well. Her father had been a quintessential example, smiling,
eye-engaging, erect, commanding, judicious in laying on of hands to manipulate,
comfort and charm.
    Barbara, the equally quintessential politician's wife, easy
in her role as