Chapter 4
Thursday, July 17
New York City
The bump on McKenna’s head had subsided
to the point where he felt it was hardly noticeable, and it had been a nice
flight, so he and Cisco were feeling good and eager to get to work. Inspector
Dennis Sheeran, the CO of the Major Case Squad, ignored the small bandage on
McKenna’s head when he gave him the expected message as soon as they arrived
at the office: The police commissioner wanted to see him.
“He doesn’t want to see me?” Cisco asked.
“Definitely not, and I’d say it’s a good thing
for you,” Sheeran replied. “He’s not in a great mood, and I don’t think you
and your antics would go over too well right now.”
Cisco appeared to be surprised at Sheeran’s assessment,
which surprised McKenna. Doesn’t this guy realize how annoying he can be? McKenna
wondered as he went up upstairs to Brunette’s office on the fourteenth floor
of One Police Plaza.
Brunette’s secretary, Camilla Wright, told McKenna
that the PC was waiting for him, and he went right in. Brunette was seated behind
Teddy Roosevelt’s big desk, taking notes while he talked on the phone. He smiled
at McKenna, and indicated with a wave of his hand that he should sit in the
chair facing his desk. McKenna did, and while waiting for Brunette to finish
his conversation, he noticed that his friend was finally beginning to show his
years.
Brunette was a tall, handsome man in good shape,
and although he was ten years older than McKenna, his jet black hair, his straight
posture, his ready smile, and his energetic manner had always made them appear
to be about the same age. However, now there were new lines at the corners of
Brunette’s eyes, his sideburns had a gray in them McKenna hadn’t noticed before,
and his shoulders were drooping. To McKenna, he appeared to be tired and worried.
Judging from the files he had faxed them on Cruz,
De Sales, and Ramsey, McKenna and Cisco figured that Brunette had a lot to worry
him. De Sales and Ramsey had been bad enough characters—DeSales was the top
drug dealer in Brooklyn, and Ramsey was the sharpshooter suspected in the sniper-murders
of three of De Sales’s rival dealers—but it was the newcomer on the scene, Gaston
Cruz, who presented the biggest problem for Brunette.
Cruz had been born rich, the son of a Colombian
aristocrat whose family had owned vast farms since the time of the conquistadors.
After his father died, Cruz apparently decided that farming and the traditional
lifestyle wasn’t for him. He sold his ancestral lands and bought an air transport
service in Panama. He spent ten years there, attracting some official notice
as he built an elaborate drug transportation network, and then moved to New
York to expand his operation into the distribution end of the drug trade. After
two years spent supplying a superior product to major drug dealers, and eliminating
most of his competition by one means or another, it was suspected that Cruz
had made himself the top heroin and cocaine distributor on the East Coast. The
NYPD, the DEA, and the FBI had all investigated him, at one point executing
search warrants for his Malba mansion and his Exito Seguros company office that
turned up nothing. On the surface, at least, Cruz was clean, a man without a
criminal record.
But Brunette’s biggest problem was internal. A
DEA informant had reported that Cruz had a mole in one of the agencies who kept
him informed and one step ahead of their ongoing investigations into his operations.
Besides keeping himself safe, the speculation was that Cruz used information
gathered by all the agencies to identify and target his business rivals.
Despite intensive internal investigations by the
FBI’s Office of Professional Responsibility and the NYPD’s Internal Affairs
Bureau, the source of the leaks hadn’t been uncovered—and, while the agencies
targeting him where running in circles, it was suspected that Cruz had further
solidified his position. Two NYPD informants had disappeared, and a third, the
DEA informant, had turned up dead in Sheepshead Bay, burned in a line from his
chest to his crotch.
“Okay, Phil. Thanks for the heads up. Brian just
came in, so he’ll be over to get it and fill you in,” Brunette said, and then
hung up. He took a minute to read his notes over before tuning his attention
to McKenna. “Good to see you, Buddy, and thanks for coming back. We have a real
problem shaping up here,” he said. “This guy’s killing people, and acting like
he’s on our side. And now we’re not gonna be able to keep a lid on this.”
“He’s been busy again?” McKenna asked.
“Sent a letter to the Post, addressed to Phil
Messing. Gave him a description and the location of a house just outside of
Kingston, says that’s where De Sales processed his cocaine into crack. Also
gave him a list of the dates, amounts, and prices of De Sales’s wholesale drug
buys from Cruz, and the name and address of Ramsey’s girlfriend. Says she’s
holding the rifle Ramsey used to shoot De Sales’s competition.”
“Were any rounds recovered when Ramsey shot those
folks?”
“Two, including the round that went through the
drug dealer’s head.”
“So our killer’s helping out the Brooklyn North
Homicide Squad. Match the rifle to the spent slugs, and they’ve cleared a homicide
and two other shootings.”
“Yeah. He’s a real nice guy.”
“Who you gonna send for the rifle?”
“One guy I’m sure who’ll get it. Steve Chmil.
Don’t know yet if that Ramsey shooting was one of his cases, but it is now.”
Good choice, and a wise decision, McKenna thought.
“But here’s the worst part,” Brunette continued
with a grimace. “Justice.”
“Justice?”
“That’s the name he’s given himself. Signed it
at the bottom of the note he sent Messing. The press is really gonna run with
that.”
Justice? They sure will, and Ray is in a bind,
McKenna thought. Killing drug dealers, and then publicizing just how bad his
prey was by giving Messing a story he couldn’t—and certainly wouldn’t—sit on.
For some reason, the killer had made Messing his minister of information, and
that’ll be a big boost for Messing’s career. “Where’s Messing now?” McKenna
asked. “His office?”
“Yeah, but he doesn’t want to meet you there.
He’s got a big scoop he’s not ready to share yet with his editor and nosy pals.
He’ll be at The Wicked Wolf in an hour,” Brunette said, and then he took an
envelope from the top drawer of his desk and passed it to McKenna.
“The hotel notes?” McKenna asked.
“Copies. Since the killer made Messing his spokesman,
we have no choice but to keep him well informed.”
“How much should I tell him?”
“As much as you think you have to.”
“What’s my role going to be in this case?”
“For now, case coordinator, the guy helping out
Chmil and MacFarlane with your thoughts.”
“And if it gets worse?”
“Just worse? Then it’s still their cases. But
if it gets much worse, I’ll assign the whole shooting match to you.”
“Chmil and MacFarlane won’t like that, and I don’t
blame them,” McKenna said. “They’re both good men, and they’ll look at this
as a slap in the face.”
“So would I, if I were in their shoes, so I’ll
talk to them and lay it on the line. I’m gonna be getting pressure from the
press and the mayor to give it the department’s glamour boy, the one with the
proven track record on big cases—and that’s you,” Brunette said. “The longer
this goes on, the more pressure I’ll get, so I’m gonna save myself some trouble
and cave in before it comes to a boil.”
“Is Cisco in this with me?”
“You want him?”
“He’s been driving me crazy with this case, but
yes, I want him,” McKenna said. “Matter of fact, I’ll go one better. I’ll say
I need him.”
“Then you have him.”
“You have any idea on what Justice is up to?”
McKenna asked, then noticed that Brunette grimaced again at the mention of the
name. He decided it would be better to call him the killer, not Justice, whenever
Brunette was around.
“Got a few ideas, but I’d like to hear your opinion
first,” Brunette said.
“I don’t have a theory I can go with yet,” McKenna
admitted. “All we know is that this guy had so much information on Cruz, Montoya,
De Sales, and Ramsey that he has to be an insider in the drug trade.”
“You think he knew them personally?”
“What else is there to think? Let’s look at the
Cruz case first. Knew about the alarm system, the dog, the safe, the layout
of the house, and enough about Montoya to torture him the same way Montoya tortured
others for information. That’s pretty detailed knowledge, so I’d say he’s known
Cruz for years, and must’ve visited him at home.”
“That’s what MacFarlane thinks, too,” Brunette
said. “Thinks the key to this is delving deep into Cruz’s life, but we have
a problem.”
“We don’t know much about his life?”
“Or his organization. Don’t know who his friends
are, so finding out who his enemies are will be even harder.”
“Then there’s a lot of legwork to be done.”
“Starting where?” Brunette asked.
“Lela Cruz. She’s a victim, but she can’t be permitted
to lie to us through her tears any more.”
“How are you going to handle her?”
“Don’t know yet, but we have some homework to
do before we confront her. Has any work been done on Exito Seguros yet?”
“Big job, but we have copies of the company books
from the case the Narcotics Division was working. MacFarlane has Gary Bessmer
going over them now.”
The perfect choice, McKenna thought. Bessmer was
an FBI agent assigned to the Joint Organized Crime Task Force. He was their
top forensic accountant, and the legend was that he could tell if a set of books
was cooked just by touching them. “Is he making any progress?”
“He says that, so far, the books look legit. The
company’s well-funded, making a nice profit, and paying its taxes.”
“So he’s looking at the wrong set of books,” McKenna
ventured. “Exito Seguros has nothing to do with Cruz’s drug business, he just
set it up to make himself appear a legitimate businessman.”
“That’s what Bessmer says.”
“And we’re not gonna find the books we really
need until we catch the killer.”
“The safe?”
“Yeah, Cruz’s safe,” McKenna said. “The killer
has the real set of books. That’s how he knew all about Cruz’s drug sales to
De Sales, dates, amounts, and prices.”
“And then he beat the rest of the information
from De Sales and Ramsey?”
“Yeah, a bonus for us,” McKenna said. “He sure
gave them a tough time—and a surprise. They apparently thought they were going
to a meeting to do another wholesale drug buy,” Brunette offered.
“I’d say.”
“How did he arrange that?”
“Can’t say for sure. Either he has somebody on
the inside in Cruz’s operation, or he was the inside man himself.”
“Motive?”
“You’re not going with the vigilante theory?”
McKenna asked.
“Not unless I’m left no choice, only because it’s
the worst possible scenario for me. I’d much rather have a running drug war
than a vigilante running loose.”
So he’s hoping the notes are just a cover for
a very competent man inside Cruz’s operation who’s turned himself into a hired
assassin, McKenna thought. Don’t think so, but Ray’s the boss—and his wishes
have to be addressed. “If this is a drug war we’re seeing, then who’s this killer
working for?” he asked. “Cruz’s competition?”
“Presumably. Maybe somebody still operating in
town, or maybe somebody who isn’t happy in retirement.”
“Then why the helpful information to Messing—which
is really meant for us—on Ramsey’s gun and De Sales’s crack factory? Why leave
money for the Classon Hotel management to pay for damages? Why leave money to
the hotel guard to pay for his embarrassment? Why let Cruz’s dog live? Why all
the bizarre pranks? Seems to me this guy’s looking for good publicity as he
proceeds in his mission—whatever it is. You ever see a drug war before where
the assassins want their work played out on the front pages?”
It seemed to McKenna that his rapid-fire questions
had the effect intended. Brunette didn’t answer right away, but McKenna hadn’t
expected him to. Before his eyes, Brunette snapped out of his malaise as he
pondered each of the questions in turn. Then he smiled. “No more wishful thinking?”
“Can’t afford any, because this is only going
to get worse.”
“Okay. We have a vigilante.”
“Doing what?”
“Killing drug dealers.”
“How?”
“Pain and torture, with a few chuckles thrown
in.”
“That’s true, but that’s not what I mean. How
is he able to do it?”
“Inside information.”
“And why’s he doing it?”
Brunette pondered that question for only a moment
before bouncing it back. “I don’t know, so why don’t you tell me.”
“I don’t know, either,” McKenna admitted. “But
that’s one of the three keys to catching him.”
“And the other two?”
“Is how is he getting his inside information?
Tough question to answer, so I’d start working hard on the third key first.
Who’s the pilot who dropped him over Malba?”
“The pilot? He skydived onto the Cruz place?”
Brunette asked.
“That’s what we figure. Beat the alarm system
by skydiving onto the garage roof.”
Brunette accepted the theory at face value. “Then
the pilot’s a good place to start,” he said, “because this guy has to know the
killer.”
“Of course he does, and you can list him as an
accomplice. Nobody would drop a skydiver over a Queens neighborhood in the middle
of the night without a good reason.”
“And his reason is that he knows exactly what’s
going on?”
“Good assumption.”
“Then I’ll get MacFarlane working on that angle
right away—if he isn’t working on it already.”
“MacFarlane’s sharp enough, but I don’t know if
he figured out the skydiver angle. He’d need some experience in that sport to
know whether or not it’s possible to land on a garage roof in the middle of
the night, and I’ve got Cisco to tell me it is possible.”
“Could Cisco do it?”
“I’m sure he can, given the same conditions. No
wind and a lighted house,” McKenna said. “I’ve watched him jump three or four
times, and he always lands right next to me.”
Brunette looked at his hands as he thought that
over for a moment, and then he looked at McKenna with a smile. “You feeling
confident?”
“We answer those three questions, and the rest
is just routine police work before we throw the irons on him and get him out
of your hair.”
It appeared that Brunette liked McKenna’s scenario,
and then the smile left his face. “And you’ll answer all those questions of
yours?”
“Eventually.”
“Before he kills again?”
What do I say to that? McKenna wondered, but only
for a moment. He knew his friend was in for some tough times, so he should be
ready to face it with the correct scorecard. To do that, he needed the plain
truth. “Probably not. He has a carefully planned agenda, and he’s working fast.
The press is gonna have your feet to the fire, and they’re gonna be bright red
before this is over.”
“But not charred?” Brunette asked, and the smile
returned.
“Maybe charred, even, but we’ll have the last
laugh. He’s got a head start, but we’ll get him. Now, for the record, say it
again.”
“For the record?”
“Our killer had put Messing in the loop, so there
will be no lying to him. Might as well get used to it, your feet start steaming
with the morning edition. So say it to me, for the record, and I’ll repeat it
to Messing for you.” McKenna took out his notepad and pen, ready to write.
“Okay. For the record, and official,” Brunette
said, and then he stood up to make his speech. “For reasons we don’t yet understand,
over the past couple of days a very competent killer has been targeting drug
dealers in our city. While those lowlifes won’t be missed much, murder is murder,
and it’s not allowed while I’m the police commissioner. He’ll probably kill
again before we get him, but we will get him.”
Brunette sat back down, placed his hands in front
of him, and waited for McKenna to finish writing. “How’s that for a statement?”
“Concise, but lowlifes? How about I say victims
instead?” McKenna asked.
“Only if you can say poor, misguided victims.”
“I can’t.”
“Then lowlifes it is. Give my best to Phil.”
