“I was just with the governor. I don’t feel I’m in trouble with him at all.” I say this and at the same time find it curious. If Mitchell knows I am being investigated by a special grand jury, and I know he must, then why didn’t he accept my resignation and thank God to be rid of me and my messy life?
“She also put Marino’s career in jeopardy because he is your sidekick,” Anna goes on.
The only thought that flashes is Marino would not appreciate being called my sidekick. As if on cue, the intercom blares, announcing that he is at the front gates.
“Sabotaging your career, in other words.” Anna gets up. “Correct? Isn’t that what you have told me?” She pushes a button on a console on the wall, suddenly energized. Anger burns off her depression. “Yes? Who is it?” she snaps into the speaker.
“Me, baby.” The rude sounds of Marino and his truck fill the living room.
“Oh, he calls me baby again I will kill him.” Anna throws her hands up in the air.
She goes to the door, and then Marino is walking into the living room. He left his house in such a hurry he didn’t bother with a coat, only a gray sweat suit and tennis shoes. He is
dumbstruck when he sees McGovern sitting by the fire, looking up at him from her Indian-style position on the floor.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” Marino says. “Look what the cat drug in.”
“Great to see you, too, Marino,” McGovern replies.
“Someone want to tell me what the hell’s going on?” He moves a wing chair closer to the fire and sits, going from one face to the other, trying to read the situation, acting obtuse, as if he doesn’t already know. I believe he knows. Oh yes, now it is clear why he has been acting so strange.
We get into it. Anna continues to unravel what happened in the days preceding Jaime Berger’s coming to Richmond. Berger continues to dominate, as if she is sitting in our midst. I don’t trust her. And at the same time, I feel my life may very well be in her hands. I try to remember where I was on December 14, moving backward from today, December 23, until I land on that Tuesday. I was in Lyon, France, at Interpol’s headquarters, where I met Jay Talley for the first time. I run through that encounter, reconstructing the two of us alone at a table in Interpol’s cafeteria. Marino took an instant dislike to Jay and stalked off. During lunch, I told Jay about Diane Bray, about my problems with her and that she was doing all she could to persecute Marino, including throwing him back into uniform and on midnight shift. What was it Jay called her? Toxic waste in tight clothes. Apparently, the two of them had run-ins when she was with the D.C. police and he was briefly assigned to ATF headquarters. He seemed to know all about her. Can it be coincidence that the very day I discussed her with him, Righter called Anna and questioned her about my relationship with Bray and made implications about my mental health?
“I wasn’t going to tell you this,” Anna continues in a hard voice. “I shouldn’t tell you this, but now that I am clearly going to be used against you…”
“What do you mean, used against her?” Marino butts in.
“Originally, I was hoping to guide you, to help allay these allegations about your mental health,” Anna says to me. “I did not believe it. And if I had any doubt, and maybe there was
just a slight doubt because I had not seen you in so long, then
I wanted to talk to you anyway, out of concern. You are my friend. Buford assured me that anything I could find out was not something he planned to do anything with. Our conversa- tions were supposed to be private, his and mine. He said nothing, absolutely nothing, about accusing you.”
“Righter?” Marino scowls. “He ask you to be some kind of fucking snitch?”
Anna shakes her head. “A guide.” She uses that word again.