A Vote for Murder by Jessica Fletcher; Donald Bain; Peter S. Fischer

Author:Jessica Fletcher; Donald Bain; Peter S. Fischer
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Washington (D.C.), Women Politicians, Detective and Mystery Stories, Mystery & Detective, Radio and Television Novels, Crimes Against, General, Women Politicians - Crimes Against, Literacy Programs, Mystery Fiction, Women Sleuths, Fiction, Women Novelists, Jessica (Fictitious Character), Fletcher
ISBN: 9780451216311
Publisher: Signet
Published: 2004-01-02T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eleven

Security at the Dirksen Building had been beefed up considerably compared to earlier that morning. There were twice as many security guards on duty, and bags and briefcases were thoroughly searched. We eventually passed inspection and rode the elevator to the floor on which Warren Nebel’s suite was located.

The office was a beehive of activity when we entered. I saw through the open door to Sandy Teller’s office that he had two phones in his hands, one pressed to each ear. Richard Carraway was hunched over a computer, his eyes focused on the screen. A half dozen young staffers seemed to be in perpetual motion in the large outer office, answering phones, working at computers, their expressions promising that the fate of the free world rested with them.

The senator’s personal secretary, who manned a desk just outside his private office, greeted me. “Good morning Mrs. Fletcher,” she said. “Back so soon?”

“Good morning,” I said. “This is Inspector George Sutherland, of Scotland Yard.”

“Good morning to you, sir.”

“Is the senator available?” I asked.

She nodded toward the closed door. “He’s in there with investigators from the Capitol Police, and detectives from the Metropolitan Police Department.”

“Do you expect he’ll be with them long?” I asked.

“Hard to say. I’ll let him know you’re here.”

She buzzed his office and announced we were waiting to see him. She hung up the phone and said, “He said he didn’t think he’d be much longer. Have a seat.”

George and I sat in orange plastic chairs near her desk and continued to take in the activity around us. George seemed especially interested in Carraway, probably because I’d told him during the cab ride that the Senate aide gave me the impression during dinner that he was not particularly fond of his boss, Nikki Farlow. Not that that meant he’d murdered her. Lots of people dislike their bosses but don’t go to the extent of killing them. Still, when someone has been murdered, certain groups of people become prime suspects, beginning with spouses or lovers, followed closely by those who’ve expressed or were known to have a particular dislike for the victim.

Based upon my brief encounter with people at the dinner party, I’d tried to come up with my own shortlist of those who might have had a motive to kill Nikki. Besides Carraway, there was the senator himself. If he’d been having an affair with her—and was being blackmailed to keep the affair quiet—his anger, coupled with the threat she posed to his reelection bid, might be sufficient to have prompted him to take drastic action.

Too, as much as I hated to admit it, the hurt that Nebel’s alleged affair had inflicted upon his wife, Patricia, could well have brought her to the brink of wanting to see Nikki dead.

Of course, anyone present at the Nebel house the night Nikki died had to be considered a suspect, unless she’d been killed by someone with no apparent connection to the senator and his guests. I doubted that was the case.

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