Final judgment

THIRTY-ONE

The Westin Hotel was part of the Crown Center complex stretching from Twenty-seventh Street north to Pershing, filling the blocks between Main Street on the west and McGee on the east. Crown Center had been the brainchild of Hallmark Cards, one of Kansas City’s homegrown success stories. The company headquarters were already there so it had made perfect sense to develop the surrounding area into an office, hotel, and retail center. It was a solid pocket of commerce between downtown and the Country Club Plaza. The nearby Union Station and the lofts and art galleries of the Crossroads District provided eclectic neighbors.

The hotel was massive and upscale, geared to conventions and other large gatherings. Its signature feature was a three-story indoor waterfall cascading through a faux rainforest. The Missouri Republican Party had booked four adjoining ballrooms on the third floor for its Lincoln Day lovefest. The undulating perimeter of the expansive foyer outside the ballrooms overlooked the indoor Amazon. Escalators rose from the lobby to the ballrooms, cross-cutting the tropical landscape.

It was still early when Mason and Abby arrived ahead of the guests and dignitaries. Her counterparts on the staffs of the state Republican Party and the other elected officials scurried about tending to last-minute details. Servers dressed in white waist-cut formal jackets stood in a half-moon circle listening to final instructions from their supervisors. In a far corner, a Dixieland band tuned up.

Abby looked elegant in a shimmering black dress woven with flecks of silver. She pushed back the three-quarter-length sleeves.

“Duty calls. I’ll catch up to you in a bit,” she said and power walked toward a cluster of her compatriots.

Half a dozen bars had been assembled along the outskirts of the foyer. Three long tables dressed in patriotic bunting were aligned end-to-tend in front of the ballrooms. A team of attractive young women, evenly divided between blondes and brunettes, all possessing brightly bleached teeth, sparkling eyes, and distracting cleavage, waited behind the tables ready to dispense name tags that included the guests’ names, company affiliations, political offices, or other designations of their station in life.

Mason checked the name tags beginning with the letter M, not surprised when he didn’t find one with his name on it. Abby hadn’t invited him until earlier that day and he was glad she wasn’t so confident that she had ordered a name tag for him. He declined the offer of a Magic Marker and a blank tag, preferring anonymity.

He peeked into the ballrooms. Tables for ten were crammed together. Doing a quick count, he estimated there would be close to a thousand people. Satisfied it was a crowd he could easily get lost in, he found a bartender with a ready smile who twisted the cap off a bottle of beer like he was glad to do it. Mason parked himself within an arm’s reach of his new best friend, gripped the icy bottle, and took a measured sip. It was going to be a long night.

The foyer gradually filled until it was a sea of men in black tuxes and women wearing designer gowns, the air filled with no-contact kisses and firm handshakes. Conversation buzzed around Mason, punctuated by laughs too loud for the jokes being told but perfect for the money being contributed. Such were the privileges of membership in the club.

Mason always voted but rarely contributed to campaigns, telling Claire it was risky enough to trust a candidate with his vote, let alone his money. Claire was a straight-ticket Democrat and chided Mason for failing to have any real convictions. He told her that he’d seen too many politicians with criminal convictions to put much faith in the political variety.

After a while, he abandoned his post and went to look for Abby. The place was thick with lawyers, more than a few throwing their arms over his shoulder telling him they were glad that he was there and that the party could use his support. He spun free of their grasp, telling them that he was freeloading and that no political party could long survive with him as a member. He saw no sign of Abby and gave up for the moment, making his way back to his friendly bartender.

“Mason! You’re about the last person I expected to see here,” someone said before he could get to the bar.

The voice came from behind him, though he had no trouble recognizing it. He turned around. It was Patrick Ortiz. Dressed in his tux, Ortiz had the clothes for the high rollers but couldn’t shake the rumpled look that juries loved. He tugged at his bow tie, ill at ease in his outfit and his surroundings.

He was with a woman Mason assumed to be his wife. She was short, coppery skinned with bright eyes and dark hair. Her arm was wrapped comfortably over his, a plain gold band on her left hand.

“Business is slow. What better place to meet people likely to be charged with a crime than at a political fund-raiser?” He nodded to the woman, extending his hand. “I’m Lou Mason.”

“I know,” she said. “I’m Maggie Ortiz.”

“My campaign manager,” Ortiz said. “She makes me come to all these events.”

“I tell him he can stay home if he doesn’t want to run again,” she said. “He loves to prosecute, but he hates to politick.”

“But I’m getting used to it. There’s the governor,” he said, looking past Mason. “We better go say hello.”

They were gone before Mason could buttonhole Ortiz and ask him if there was anything new on Rockley’s murder. He didn’t expect Ortiz to tell him, but he might learn something from Ortiz’s denial. No didn’t always mean no. The way it was said and the body language that went with it were like radio traffic and troop movements-intelligence to be analyzed.

The crowd surrounding Mason melted away as if the tide had gone out, the current depositing a cluster of fresh faces. One of them belonged to a man who looked to be in his early fifties, though his hair was too dark to be natural. His eyes flicked across the crowd, his long face a barely lined serpentine mask. The skin beneath his chin was loose, his neck weathered, the contrast exposing that he’d had a facelift that had taken ten years off his appearance if you didn’t look too closely.

He was bony through the shoulders and sleek through the middle like a distance runner without the healthy glow; his skin was a subnormal chalk. His hands and fingers were elongated, as if he had stretched them while reaching for something-perfect for surgeons and stranglers. He ignored Mason, who read the man’s name tag- Al Webb, General Manager, Galaxy Casino.