Kitty Goes to Washington

I told him the address.

He raised his brows. "You want me to take this car into that neighborhood?"

I smiled brightly. "You paid for damage coverage, didn't you?"

Long-suffering Luis rolled his eyes and put the car into gear.

I bit my lip. I was really going to have to do something nice to thank him later on tonight.

The address turned out to be a tenement building, about forty years old, in dire need of a coat of paint. Or maybe a wrecking ball. Flemming was waiting by the front door, arms crossed, looking around nervously.

His frown turned surly when we pulled up.

"I'm sure there's no need for this," he said as I hopped out of the car. Luis left the engine ru

"You're worried, too, or you wouldn't be here," I said.

"He's on the third floor."

The elevator didn't work, of course. I ran, quickly getting a full flight of stairs ahead of Flemming.

"What room?" I shouted behind me.

"Three-oh-six."

The door was unlocked. I pushed it open. The place smelled like it hadn't been cleaned in a long time: close, sweaty, dank. Too warm, like the heat was turned up too high. The door opened into a main room. Another door led to what must have been a bedroom; a kitchen counter was visible beyond that.

Stacks of newspapers lined all the walls, folded haphazardly, as if Fritz had read them all, front page to back, and had meant to throw them out but never gotten around to it. Some of the piles leaned precariously. In the middle of the room, an old sofa sat in front of a TV set that must have been thirty years old, complete with rabbit ears wrapped in tin foil. It sat in a corner, on a beat-up end table. A static-laden evening news program was playing.

Something was wrong. Something in the air smelled very wrong—coldness, illness.

Dr. Flemming entered the room behind me, then pushed past me. I'd stopped, unable to cross the last few feet to the sofa. Flemming rushed to it, knelt by it, and felt the pulse of the man lying there.

Fritz lay slumped against one arm of the sofa, staring at the television, perfectly relaxed. His face was expressionless, his eyes blank.

Flemming sat back on his heels and sighed. "If I had to make a guess, I'd say it was a heart attack."

"So he's—he's dead."

Flemming nodded. I closed my eyes and sighed. "It couldn't be something else, something someone did to him?"

"You said it yourself. He's old. Something like this was going to happen sooner or later."

"It's just when he called last night, he almost sounded like he knew something was going to happen to him."

The phone—a rotary, for crying out loud—sat on the table next to the TV. He'd hung up and put it back before this happened.

"Maybe he did." Flemming stared at Fritz's body, like he was trying to discover something, or memorize him. "I've seen stranger things happen in medicine."

I bet he had. He claimed he wanted his research to be public, but he sure wasn't sharing. My anger, the shock of finding Fritz, was too much. Words bubbled over.

"Which is it, Flemming? Medical applications or military applications? Do you have dreams of building a werewolf army like the Nazis did?"

"No—no. That isn't what I wanted, but—"

"But what? What are you doing in that lab?"

He turned away. "I'll call the coroner."

He went to the phone by the TV and made the call. That didn't mean he wasn't going to get a shot at his own autopsy as part of his research. I didn't like the idea of Fritz falling out of official cha

We returned to the street. Flemming said he'd wait for the coroner's van. There wasn't anything left for me to do, and Luis convinced me to leave with him.

As the car pulled away, I started crying.

Sunday morning, I was at Luis's apartment. I'd woken up before him, and lay awake in bed, staring at the ceiling, trying to think. Had Fritz really known his heart was about to give out?

I'd run into a wall. I didn't know what else I could learn about Flemming's research. Maybe there was nothing to learn, nothing but what Flemming had already said in the hearings. I was all worked up over nothing.

My cell phone rang. Luis shifted and mumbled, "Is that mine?"

"No." I retrieved my jeans and pulled the phone out of the pocket.

Caller ID said Mom. Her weekly Sunday call, but hours early. I sat up and pulled the blanket around me. Couldn't be naked, talking to Mom.

I answered the phone. "Hi."

"Hi, Kitty. We're having lunch at Cheryl's, so I wanted to make sure we talked before then. Is this a good time?"

As good as any. As in, not really. "It's okay, Mom."

"How is Washington? Dad's been taping the hearings—C-SPAN's been showing the whole thing, I think. I still haven't seen you in the audience, but he said he did, and he said that's not why he's taping them anyway. He thought you might want to have copies."

I had to smile. "That's cool. Thanks. I'm supposed to testify tomorrow, so tell him to have the VCR ready."

"Oh—good luck! I'm sure you'll do great."

"I just have to answer questions. It'll be fine."

Luis had propped himself on his elbow and was smirking at me.

"Have you had time to do much sightseeing? I visited there when I was in college, we got to see a session of Congress, but it was the House, I think, not the Senate, and—"

Her conversation was so ordinary. It was kind of nice. I made encouraging noises, and avoided saying anything that might make me sound frustrated or depressed. I didn't want her to worry.

Then again, she always knew when I was frustrated and depressed because I didn't say anything.

She actually brought the call to a close herself, almost before I was ready to hear her go. "We should get going. I think Cheryl's nervous about having us over, they've got the new house and I don't think she's got drapes up yet, and Jeffy's teething."

"Tell everyone I said hello."

"I will. Take care, Kitty."

"You, too, Mom. Bye."

"That sounded very suburban. Very American," Luis said, gri

And there but for the… something… of lycanthropy went I. "Heard the whole thing, did you?"

"I assume Cheryl is your sister? Which means you have a nephew named Jeffy?"

"And a three-year-old niece named Nicky." He was still smirking. As if I could help it that my sister had picked names straight out of a 1950s sitcom. "Are you making fun of my normal family?"

"Not at all. Not at all." He considered thoughtfully, then added, "Jeffy?"

I threw a pillow at him.

After spending all weekend with Luis, I found getting myself to the Senate office building Monday morning almost impossible. I called Ben.

"Hi, Ben? What would happen if I just didn't show up today?"

"When you're scheduled to testify?"

"Yeah."

"They might send federal marshals after you."

Oh. Well then.

I had to stop by Alette's for a change of clothes before heading to the hearings. I thought I might get there before dawn, in time to see Alette, but no such luck. The sun was up when I pulled into the driveway. Tom, the other driver/ MIB, was in the kitchen. He told me that she'd just retired for the day. Briefly, I wondered what exactly that meant. Coffins in the basement?

For once, I didn't ask.

Tom offered me a cup of coffee and said, "We spent the night checking on the vampires you saved from Smith."

"Saved? That's giving me too much credit," I said, muttering into my cup.