Turn off the Light ch.21

According to Peter's cell phone, they have exactly forty-five minutes before they're supposed to meet the Captain and the Lieutenant back at the station to recap.

Peter sincerely hopes, as they walk through the front door of Maria Vasquez's downtown offices, that that will be enough.

The offices are buzzing with workers. Everyone is moving. Phones are ringing nonstop. It's all noise, motion, and madness. Peter and Leight stand just inside the door, observing, until a young woman comes up and stares at them impatiently.

"Sorry," she states testily, "but we're not open to the public today."

"Good things we're not the public, then," Leight responds with his signature smile. "Malcolm Leight and Dr. Peter Grayson, on behalf of the Philadelphia PD, homicide division. I believe Captain John Smith called to say we'd be coming."

"Oh," she mutters as she thumbs through the papers attached to her clipboard. "Oh. You're here to read through some of the death threats, yeah?"

"Not exactly." Leight turns up his smile a few watts.

"We'll take copies of the letters and transcripts of the calls with us, but while we're here, we'd like to speak with the widower," Leight pauses, sorting through the rolodex that is his mind, "Antonio Vasquez."

The aide frowns. "How did you know that he's—"

"Here? Lucky guess. Now, if you would be so kind as to point us in the right direction…."

"He said he didn't want to be disturbed."

"Police business, remember? That means we're legally allowed to disturb anyone we like."

"All right." She sighs and throws her hands up in the air in defeat. "He's in the conference room. It's the second door on the left."

"Thank you," Leight nods and immediately heads down the indicated hallway toward the second door on the left.

"Wait, Mal," Peter stops him with a ghost-light touch to the shoulder. "What the hell are we doing? Shouldn't we look at the threats? We work for the Captain, and he thinks it has to do with the legislation."

"Well," Leight says pointedly, "I don't." He looks over his shoulder. Something flickers in his eyes. "Trust me?"

Peter groans to himself because Leight isn't playing fair. So he gives Leight his best impression of the look and steps around him to knock on the door.

"Mr. Vasquez," he calls, "I'm sorry to disturb you, but we're here on police business." Police business—such a dirty phrase—even if it does get things done.

"Who are you?" a firm, masculine voice asks from behind the door.

"I'm Dr. Peter Grayson, here with Detective Malcolm Leight. We're here at the request of Captain John Smith of the Philadelphia PD, and—"

"We're coming in," Leight interjects, "whether you like it or not." He reaches past Peter to open the door.

The conference room is plain. The walls are some uninteresting neutral color. The only pieces of furniture are a large wood table and eight or ten black swivel chairs. The room's most interesting feature is large half moon window, which overlooks City Hall and Broad Street; it would almost make a pretty picture.

Seated at the head of the table with his back to the window is a graying, middle-aged, clean-cut, angry-looking man in a suit, who is presumably Antonio Vasquez. He glares at them with dark almond-shaped eyes.

"All I ask," he intones, his fingers templed, with cold anger, like water so hot it feels frigid, "is to be left alone."

"Jefferson Davis," Leight replies as he takes the seat at the opposite end of the table. "Clever, now, aren't you?"

Peter sits down next to Leight. He clasps his hands in his lap. He hasn't the slightest idea what Leight is playing at.

Vasquez scowls. "I don't know what you mean, Mr…."

"Leight, Malcolm Leight. Now if you don't mind, or even if you do, I have a few questions." He takes a moment to set the tone. "Were you and your wife planning to get a divorce?"

Rage simmers beneath Vasquez's countenance. "That's absurd."

"Is it?" Leight asks mildly. "Then perhaps you can explain why your wife wasn't wearing her wedding ring during the parade this morning."

There's a moment of silence, a bead of sweat on Vasquez's brow, and then a glimmer.

"It was a publicity gimmick," he says, just slightly too quickly. "She said she wouldn't wear her wedding ring again until marriage was legal for everyone."

Leight laughs—a robust, full-bodied laugh that isn't anywhere near appropriate for the circumstances. "Oh you really are clever—and quick about it, too. But I think you'll agree there's one fatal flaw in your reasoning, Mr. Vasquez. It would be a brilliant publicity ploy, yes, but she would have had to publicize it. Which she didn't."

"So I'm rather inclined to believe that this was about publicity of the other sort. Because of the Marriage Equality Act, you couldn't announce that you were planning to divorce. Too much erosion of the institution of marriage all at once. She would have needed bipartisan support for the legislation, and she wouldn't have had a chance if she looked like a hypocrite."

"Mr. Leight," Vasquez seethes, "I don't know what you're implying, but I can assure you that you are thoroughly and completely wrong."

"Let's see," Leight presses on without the slightest regard for his opponent's discomfort. "You wanted the divorce; she wanted to wait until after she was out of the spotlight. But then again," Leight frowns.

Stops.

Resets.

"What were your wife's political ambitions, Mr. Vasquez? Did she want to run for Congress? Governor? This legislation would make a brilliant launch point for any high-profile political career. But if those were her plans, then she must have wanted to put the divorce off indefinitely. Please tell me, Mr. Vasquez, if I'm wrong."

Vasquez continues to shoot daggers across the table with his eyes.

"So you knew," Leight goes on, "about your wife's frequent visits to the Pleasure Factory. You weren't happy about them, hence your desire for the divorce, but—that isn't it, is it? There's more to it."

He squints, examines the man across from him as he would a tissue sample under a microscope. "You were jealous."

"And what did I have to be jealous of, Mr. Leight?" Vasquez asks warily.

"That's the thing," Leight smiles in the slightest. "You weren't actually jealous of Aldrin. Coco, I mean, if that's the name you know your dead wife's dead escort by. No, you weren't jealous of him; I can see in your eyes that you weren't."

"You were angry, yes, but not jealous. You didn't care whom your wife was fucking. You did, however, care about her political plans," Leight stated.

There's the telltale flash in Vasquez's eyes—so clear that even Peter can see it.

"What about you, Mr. Vasquez? You're 45, a well-respected ADA, but how likely are you to ever win the election for DA?"

"I won't sit here to be taunted, Mr. Leight."

"I'm not taunting, Mr. Vasquez; on the contrary, I'm discussing. Now, you must have had political ambitions of your own, but they never came to anything. Your name is hardly known in Philadelphia, let alone anywhere else in the state or the country," Leight continues.

"Your wife, however, whom you already bore a great deal of anger and resentment, was well on her way to becoming a national household name. That must have irked you." He beams. "Surely you can admit that much, can't you, Mr. Vasquez?"

"Fine," Vasquez seethes, "it's a weak word, so if that's what you want, Mr. Leight, I'll give you that much. I was irked. Maria didn't deserve the acclaim and the hoopla she was about to receive. She didn't even want it. She really was sponsoring the Marriage Equality Act because she believed in the cause. She wasn't a politician; she was an activist. If any Vasquez deserved what she was about to get, it was me."

"Of course," Leight nods with false sympathy. "So you were irked—one might even go so far as to say you were bothered or frustrated or angry."

"The question is, what did you do about it? Did you decide to just be passive and do nothing to defend your own interests? Were you really going to sit back and let your wife seize the spotlight? She was a hypocrite, after all, a cheater, and a bleeding-heart wannabe do-gooder."

"Were you just going to let her win, or were you going to do something about it? Because surely, Mr. Vasquez, there was a plan to be hatched—a plan that would not only punish your wife but get her out of the way. It would also give you a certain tragic widower appeal, and you could use the opportunity to push your wife's agenda forward yourself."

"You could be the recipient of the acclaim and hoopla. And that was what you really wanted all along, wasn't it? It was a splendid motive, wasn't it, Mr. Vasquez?"

.

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