Page 58 of Capitol Matters

It was unsettling to have him lurking over my shoulder, refusing to sit and face me. It left me vulnerable and open to attack, though that was the least likely thing a man like Maximus would do.

“You want an ear?” I asked. “A finger? Or the whole kit and caboodle?”

A check of Maximus’s expression found it scathing.

“I’ll leave that to your discretion,” he said. “But I do want it to be identifiable.”

Which ruled out the nonlethal options.

I’d all but granted the remaining four people areprieve. Time to revisit my notes and decide which of them I liked the least. Surely there was a wife beater or sexual predator on the list. Politicians got up to all sorts of scandal. I could deliver vigilante justice and feel good about myself until I had to set up a clean room and buy a chainsaw.

“Yeah,” I said at length. “I can do that.”

Maximus dipped his head. “Then that will be all, Mister Farrow.”

I left Maximus’s office only to be nabbed by Jacoby Thatcher a few dozen feet down the hall. He had his own office that he pushed me into, then closed and locked the door behind.

This room was modest, speaking volumes about Thatcher’s position near the top of the Capitol’s food chain, but still falling short. It must have eaten Grimm alive seeing the lavish spread in Maximus’s private chambers, then be relegated to this mediocre space.

It was decorated, which was more than could be said about Holland’s sterile space. But, like his home, Thatcher’s office lacked personality. It had the token desk and chairs and a large television mounted on the opposite wall. A few faux plants and a standing lamp were scattered about.

Tugging on the sleeves of his plaid suit jacket, Grimm—Thatcher—faced me.

Considering that he had not approached me once in the two weeks I’d been at the Capitol, this aberration caught me by surprise. Even more jarring was being dressed down by a geeky guy with an actual pocket protector who spoke in Jacoby’s reedy voice whileaffecting Grimm’s stoic demeanor.

“I know what Maximus asked of you, and I’ve prepared for it,” he said.

Did he prowl around the department eavesdropping? Or was Maximus loose lipped around his most trusted confidant? Despite my doubts about Grimm’s choice to illusion himself as a personal assistant, he had managed to make the most of his newfound position.

“We can’t afford to lose more votes,” he explained, “so you needn’t kill anyone else.”

“Not when they can kill themselves, right?”

My sarcasm caused his expression to droop wearily.

“You hold onto things better let go,” he said after a long breath. “I think you’d find yourself a happier man if you weren’t so intent on spiting others for situations outside your control.”

My eyes narrowed. “I didn’t realize therapy sessions were part of your job description, Mister Thatcher.”

It was Grimm’s turn to snap back, “And you aren’t half as amusing as you think you are.” He rounded the desk and sat more heavily than should have been possible for his slight frame. “Go to the morgue,” he commanded. “Talk to Vinton.”

I snorted. “No.”

Sure, Vinton had access to bodies, but they were the wrong bodies. And Maximus’s sole request was that the victim had to be identifiable. The gang’s resident necromancer could work literal magic with a cadaver, but he couldn’t change its identity. That was closer to Grimm’s forte, and I didn’t hear him offering assistance.

I folded my arms as Grimm glowered at me.

“Do you want to try that again?” he asked. What should have been a menacing sneer looked awkward on Thatcher’s weaselly face.

“I’d rather chop up a body than get help from that brown-nosing dick,” I said.

Huffing a breath, Grimm waved a hand. “Chop up a body if it suits you, but not one of the politicians. We need their votes.”

“I know. I know.”

He’d started and ended this conversation with the same sentiment. The eight people enumerated on Maximus’s hit list had only as much value as their usefulness, and I knew too well how that felt.

The morgue occupied the musty basement of the Capitol building. It was down the hall from the archives, where the smell of old paper and decay hung thickly in the air. Even as kids, Donovan and I avoided this area. Endless bland hallways and limited employees might have made it an ideal playground, but it was too eerie to be fun.

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