Murder at the Watergate by Margaret Truman Read Free Book Online Page B

of the city, including the prestigious, magnetic, curious complex known as the Watergate.
    The curtain was about to go up for everyone.

10
Suite 1216—The Watergate Hotel
    By the time Chris Hedras took the call from Elfie Dorrance that it was time for Aprile to make his appearance in the ballroom, the vice president had relaxed. He’d left the campaign office with jaw clenched and eyes narrowed. Now Mac saw that his friend’s previous tension had abated. Not that he was ever one to be called gregarious—jokes about Aprile’s reserved, poker-faced demeanor were abundant in Washington. Many of his supporters said, “It’s about time we had a straight arrow in the White House.” He now mixed easily with two dozen associates and friends in a presidential suite. It was one of a dozen such suites, each located on a different floor. Originally built as apartments by an Italian construction firm, with major funding from the Vatican, the Watergate Hotel’s suites were all oversize, with closets, bathrooms, and kitchens more appropriate to an apartment than a hotel room. Suite 1216 had been taken off the availability list three days earlier to allow the Secret Service to secure it for the veep’s pre-party gathering. Brochettes of smoked duck breast, Belgian endive with Boursincheese and toasted almonds, salmon mousse on pumpernickel bread, and assorted other hors d’oeuvres, and drinks, were served from the full kitchen by staff borrowed from the White House.
    “Time to head downstairs,” Hedras said.
    Aprile said, “Shame to break this up.”
    “We could just stay here,” Carole Aprile said to Annabel. She wasn’t her usual radiant self, Annabel decided. Her college chum, now the nation’s second lady, was known as a vivacious, ceaselessly cheerful woman with a glass-half-full personality, fond of bright colors, gospel music, and fattening cookies. But this night, although she seemed on the surface to be happy and involved, Annabel sensed an underlying solemnness that simply couldn’t be explained, considering the time, place, and circumstances. Annabel wished they could find a few minutes alone.
    “Not a chance,” Joe Aprile said. “If I have to suffer through another fund-raiser, so do you.”
    “Team Aprile,” Annabel said. “That’s sweet.”
    “Don’t encourage him.” Carole smiled.
    “Got the jokes down?” the veep’s policy advisor asked, laughing.
    “Did you hear the one about the vice president who got to his own fund-raiser on time?” Hedras said.
    “Coming back here?” an aide asked.
    “No,” Carole answered. “Straight home. But the place is yours for the evening. You’ll have to manage without the Secret Service.”
    Agents lined the hallway between the suite and the elevators. Spirits were high in the vice president’s group.
    “We get right in the car when it’s over?” Aprile asked Hedras.
    “Yes, sir, although you’ll have to stay around to shake as many hands as possible, photos, the usual. Elfie has the really heavy hitters prepped. She’ll keep the glad-handers to a minimum.”
    Aprile laughed. “Elfie Dorrance is incapable of keeping
anything
to a minimum,” he said. “She thrives on conspicuous overabundance.”
    Mac and Annabel were directly behind the nation’s second couple. Carole Aprile turned as they neared the elevators, said, “It’s the shaking hands that gets to me. I was thinking a minute ago that anyone with a germ phobia could never run for office.”
    “That rules out Donald Trump,” Mac said.
    “For more reasons than that,” a man behind them offered.
    The protocol for the entrance had been explained in the suite. Everyone except the VP, his wife, Hedras, and three top policy advisors would ride the large guest elevators to the lobby level, then be escorted by Secret Service down the winding staircase to where the Apriles and their party would arrive by the health club elevator. The Apriles would then lead the procession down the hallway to