Nik Kane Alaska Mystery - 02 - Capitol Offense by Mike Doogan Page A

there.
    “What you’ll do is very different,” Kane said. “You’ll do exactly what you’re told to do exactly when you’re told to do it. Eat, sleep, work, go to the bathroom. You’ll see the same people and the same rooms and the same walls. Over and over and over again.”
    He paused again.
    “There’s going to be a bail hearing,” Hope said. “I have a right to get out on bail. State law says so.”
    Kane looked at the other man for a long moment.
    “You get out on bail,” he said, “and you’ll think everything will be all right. You’ll lead an almost normal life, if you don’t think about it too hard. But then there will be a trial, and if you stick to this sorry story you just told me, the jury will convict you and you’ll spend the next twenty years or more doing exactly what you’re told to do exactly when you’re told to do it. And staring at the walls in between. Maybe you’re tough enough to take it. Maybe you’re not. Some people are. Lots aren’t. And maybe your people on the outside will wait and maybe they won’t. You married?”
    Hope’s gaze was steady, but Kane could see the pulse throbbing in his temple.
    “No, I’m not,” he said, “but I’ve got family, lots of family who would wait for me. But they won’t have to. I didn’t kill that woman.”
    Kane waited for him to continue, and when he didn’t said, “That’s it? That’s the best you’ve got? I didn’t do it?”
    Hope remained silent.
    “So are you going to tell me the truth now?” Kane said.
    The two men looked at each other for a long time.
    “I’ve told you what happened,” Hope said at last.
    Kane looked steadily at the other man, then shook his head.
    “You know,” he said, “for a politician, you’re a crappy liar.”
    He got to his feet and pushed the buzzer. The door behind Hope opened and the sandy-haired guard came in. Hope got to his feet and the two of them left. Without the distraction of talking to Hope, Kane could feel the room start to close in on him. The door to Kane’s room opened and the guard with the mullet came in.
    “Ready to go?” he asked.
    Kane nodded. He went through the door and down the hall, the guard behind him. The urge to start running was nearly irresistible, but he fought it down and concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other at a steady pace. He forced himself not to fidget while they waited for the guard in the booth to open one locked door, then another. When he reached the lobby, Kane continued straight across the reception area and out into the cold. He stood there for a long while, breathing in and out. Then he took out his cell phone and called Cocoa.
    “You can come and get me now,” he said. “I made my escape.”
    He stood outside, ignoring the cold, until Cocoa’s cab pulled up. He got in.
    “How was your visit?” the cabbie asked.
    “Piece of cake,” Kane said. “I could get out anytime I wanted.”

12
    There are no true friends in politics. We are all sharks circling, and waiting, for traces of blood to appear in the water.
    A LAN C LARK
    A laska’s Capitol is a U-shaped concrete building faced with bricks and slabs of limestone, a block long and half a block wide. The main entrance is on the front of the U, framed by four marble pillars, two stories tall, which support a small balcony of the sort that a queen might wave from.
    When it was built, before Alaska became a state, the building housed the federal bureaucrats who ran the territory, making it the only state capitol building in the United States that wasn’t built as a Capitol. Because it was built on the slope of a hill, the building has six stories at the front but only five at the back. The first floor is called the ground floor, the second floor is called the first floor, and so on.
    Perfect, Kane thought, folding the brochure titled “Facts About Alaska’s Capitol” and sliding it into a coat pocket. A building that follows its own rules full of people who make