House Secrets Read Online Free PDF Page B

in a dead-end job, Paul Morelli was going to be running for president.
    “Would you like a cup of coffee, Joe?” Morelli said, and when DeMarco said yes, Morelli glanced over at Burrows. Burrows frowned at being drafted as DeMarco’s waiter, but put the stack of papers aside and left to get the coffee.
    “John Mahoney asked me to see you tonight, Joe, but he wasn’t too clear on why. Do you work for John?”
    “No, sir, not directly,” DeMarco lied. “I’m just a lawyer who does odd jobs for Congress.” To deflect Morelli from asking more questions about who employed him and what he did, DeMarco said, “By the way, sir, my godfather’s done some work for you.”
    “Your godfather?”
    “Yes, sir. Harry Foster.”
    “Well, I’ll be darned,” Morelli said. “Harry’s a good man; I’ve known him for years.” Then Morelli asked DeMarco a question that he thought was odd: “Are you and Harry close, Joe?”
    “Uh, no, sir, not anymore. We were when I was a kid, but since I live here now and Harry lives in New York . . .”
    “I understand,” Morelli said. At that moment Burrows returned with coffee for DeMarco and the senator. Morelli thanked Burrows, took a sip from his cup, then said, “So, Joe, what can I do for you?”
    “Mr. Mahoney got a call from an old friend, an ex-congressman named Dick Finley who retired about ten years ago. Finley’s son just died and the police ruled the death as accidental, but Finley thinks his son may have been killed because of something he was working on.”
    “What did his son do?” Morelli asked.
    “He was a reporter. He worked for the
Washington Post
.”
    “Oh, that guy,” Burrows said.
    “You knew him, Abe?” Morelli said.
    “Yeah, I knew him,” Burrows said, then made a face that led DeMarco to conclude that Burrows wasn’t a Terry Finley fan.
    “What makes Mr. Finley think his son was killed?” Morelli said. DeMarco told him.
    “Hmm. Sounds rather speculative. But then, I imagine Mr. Finley is quite distraught by his son’s death. I assume he’s also a rather elderly gentleman.”
    “Yes, sir,” DeMarco said, but he was thinking that Morelli was very good. Without having said anything negative, he’d just implied that Dick Finley was not only out of his mind with grief but possibly senile.
    “At any rate,” Morelli said, “what does this have to do with me, Joe?” Before DeMarco could answer the question, the door to the den swung open and the senator’s wife entered the room.
    DeMarco had seen newspaper photos of Lydia Morelli posing at the senator’s side at various Washington galas, but the photos hadn’t captured her frailty. She was petite, no more than five-two, and painfully thin. DeMarco had read that she was five or six years older than her husband, but in the same room with him, their age difference appeared closer to a decade. Nonetheless, she was still an attractive woman with large, blue-gray eyes and blond hair cut in a style that framed good cheekbones. Unlike the senator, she wasn’t dressed casually. She was wearing a beige-colored pantsuit, a pink blouse with a wide collar, and high-heeled shoes.
    Lydia’s eyes widened momentarily in surprise when she saw DeMarco sitting in the den but she recovered quickly, smiled at him, and said to her husband, “I’m sorry, Paul. I didn’t know you had company.”
    “Hi,” Morelli said to his wife. “Where’ve you been?”
    Morelli had asked the question casually but DeMarco noticed a slight edge to his tone, as if he was annoyed that his wife had gone out or that she hadn’t told him where she was going.
    “Oh, I had dinner with an old sorority sister,” Lydia said. She then raised her right fist into the air in a halfhearted manner, muttered “Go Alpha Pi,” and walked over to an armoire on the far side of the room. When she opened the armoire, DeMarco could see that it was actually a liquor cabinet filled with bottles of booze, glasses, and decanters. “I’ll be out