by Brian Shea
"Time’s a ticking. Suit up and be downstairs," Sutherland said, walking out the door and into the main space containing the cubicles of the thirty-eight detectives assigned to Homicide.
Gray remained in the doorway. "For what it’s worth, I’m glad to be part of the team and I'll do whatever I can to help. Hopefully, there's no hard feelings."
Barnes and Mainelli got up, almost in unison. They shook Gray’s hand, exchanging brief introductions and pleasantries before heading out of the room.
"Well, welcome to the show," Kelly said, eyeing the screen image of the X on the priest’s hand.
6
The first floor of the Boston Police Department had a room set aside for press conferences. News of the dead priest had spread like wildfire, and the room was packed with reporters, all vying to get their questions heard and hoping to break a new detail in the story.
Kelly had been through enough high-interest cases in his time as a city police officer to know somebody somewhere in the department had probably already leaked some of the case facts. This was usually done for the teller’s personal benefit, whether financial or positional. On the street, the saying was “snitches get stitches,” but the joke around the department was a play on those words: “snitches get promotions.” In a city as politically charged as Boston, somebody was always jockeying to get the upper hand, to see their name in print, to control the outcome of a case, or to make themselves look more favorable.
These were the aspects of law enforcement Kelly hated most of all. He liked the simplicity of the not-so-simple crimes. He preferred to deal with things on the street level. Under no circumstances could he see himself working to be promoted beyond his current rank and position. Detective was as far up the ladder as he’d hoped to climb. Beyond his personal motivation to remain an investigator, Kelly had zero interest in standing at a podium fielding questions and speaking in front of the cameras while hundreds of onlookers jotted notes.
No, that was not the life for Michael Kelly. His work was predominantly done behind the scenes, and he liked it that way. Being called now to stand by while the brass took the podium drove him mad. These few wasted minutes, pressing flesh and making comments and standing pretty for the cameras, was time taken away from the investigation, time that would be better served in search of the killer. Few people truly understood the dynamics of a homicide investigation and how rapidly the tide could shift. Substantial leads could dissipate as quickly as morning rain striking the pavement on a hot summer's day.
Sergeant Dale Sutherland led his entourage toward the podium, where Superintendent Juan Carlos Acevedo was standing ready. Acevedo was the poster child for the department and a potential candidate to be the next chief. His polyester uniform was sharply pressed, his jet-black hair meticulously combed underneath his eight-point hat. He was the epitome of professionalism in looks and appearance.
Kelly didn't mind the man. He saw him for what he was, a politician in a policeman’s uniform. Over the years, Kelly had dealt with the superintendent on too few occasions to form an opinion of him. Although the fact that he was Detective Tony Acevedo's father did cast him in a slightly dimmer light, since, in Kelly’s opinion, the biproduct of his loins was substandard as both a person and a cop.
Sutherland walked up and greeted Superintendent Acevedo with a firm handshake.
"Sergeant Sutherland, good to see you and your team here. Although from what I hear, your team wasn't originally assigned this case. Isn't there a certain order to how things operate down in Homicide? Or have they changed that much since I worked there?"
Sutherland threw up his hands in a gruff, disgruntled manner. "Hey, Superintendent. You don't like the way I do business, feel free to expedite my disability claim and I'll be happy to be out of your hair."
“Don’t get yourself all worked up, Dale,” Acevedo said through gritted teeth.
The superintendent then gave a disingenuous smile before losing interest in the banter and turning his gaze to Kelly. The fake smile vanished instantly. Great. I can add Acevedo Senior to my fan club too, Kelly thought as he met the superintendent’s stare. Kelly cracked a slight smile and considered adding a wink just to piss him off further but decided not to push his luck.
The superintendent turned his attention back to the sea of reporters and prepared himself for the upcoming briefing, looking down at the notecards resting on the slanted wood of the podium.
Mainelli whispered in his ear, "Jeez, Mikey, he looks pissed."
"Strange. I thought he looked quite happy to see me. Maybe it's you?"
Barnes, positioned between them, jabbed each of them in a subtle gesture reminding them to shut up and prepare for the cameras.
Agent Sterling Gray stood nearby, close but not too close to the four-man detective unit assigned to handle this homicide. Gray was an integral part of this briefing, and Kelly knew it. The FBI needed to be seen with them, but at this point, after only the brief introduction minutes ago, there wasn’t any kinship. Kelly noted Gray did his best to present himself as if he were a member of the team: chin held high, body straight, posture rigid as if standing at attention. To Kelly, Gray looked like a prep-school boy preparing to meet with the headmaster.
All were wearing a shirt and tie, except for Barnes, who’d changed into a blouse. Sterling Gray was a notch above with his navy-blue sports coat. Kelly had thrown on his blazer, the same one he’d worn earlier while working the scene. His Boston PD emblem was visible, but his badge remained tucked in. No need to display his shield in the room full of reporters. Mainelli looked as though his shirt and tie had been pulled out from a crumpled heap in his locker, because it had been. Looking back at his disheveled coworker, Kelly noticed a yellowish stain, most likely mustard, prominently centered on the silk paisley design.
"You might want to stand behind me a little bit," Kelly said to Mainelli, poking his finger on the stain.
The heavyset Italian detective began his innate resistance to suggestion, until he looked down to see the blotch. Mainelli dipped in behind Barnes, using her to block his unkempt appearance.
Lieutenant Jack Rosario, the department's brand-new public affairs officer, or PAO, stepped in front of the superintendent and adjusted the microphone, causing an awkward squelching sound. He, too, was clean-cut, well-groomed, and in full dress attire. Under normal circumstances, Rosario would be giving the daily briefing, but as this was a much higher-profile case than normal, the superintendent would take the lead. Politics in policing.
"The briefing will begin shortly," he announced. "Please take your seats and set your cell phones to silent if you haven't done so already. For those who don’t know me, I’m Lieutenant Rosario and have recently been appointed as Boston PD’s PAO. I will remain your point of contact within the department, but today’s briefing will be handled by Superintendent Juan Carlos Acevedo. We will begin shortly with the superintendent's remarks. Please hold all questions until the end. We will not get to all of your questions, but hopefully by the time this briefing is over, we'll have given you everything that we have at this time.
"I want to remind you that this is an active investigation and the things we say now may dynamically change in the hours and days to come. Please bear in mind the information we will provide tonight will be an overview of what we have thus far, and there will be no information as to the particulars of the case. This is done to keep from compromising the ongoing investigation being conducted by these fine detectives behind me here. Without further ado, may I introduce Superintendent Juan Carlos Acevedo."
The lieutenant stepped down from the platform and onto the maroon carpeting. He backed away and stood next to an American flag posted near the rear wall.
Kelly and his team, coupled with Sterling Gray, were staggered to the superintendent’s left. Kelly was doing his best to keep his head slightly down and out of the line of cameras. There was no telling whose image would make the front page of the local papers, and he wanted to minimize the likelihood of
his face being plastered beside an unflattering headline. Kelly wouldn’t be one of those cops with a box full of clippings when he retired. He hoped when the day came to turn in his badge, his memory of the awful things he had witnessed during his career would go with it. Doubtful, he knew.
He tried to tuck himself away, wedging between Sutherland’s girth and Barnes’s slender frame. Kelly felt his hand brush against hers. The contact jolted him, instantly transporting him away. He wanted nothing more than to reach out and hold her hand. Although they spent copious amounts of time together on the job, it was not the kind of quality time either hoped for. Being in her presence on a near constant basis left him longing for the private time they rarely got, whether due to her schedule or his, his time with Embry, or just the daunting caseload they continually worked.
So Kelly took these unexpected moments of contact, brief and benign, and made them his escape to normalcy.
Since the budding of their relationship, it had been quite difficult to create a normal most people would have accepted. He took this opportunity—the brief glancing touch of his pinky finger against her hand—as a moment of connectedness to her on a personal level, even though it was under professional circumstances. He wondered if she felt the same. He hoped so. Maybe if time permitted, tonight he would ask her.
The superintendent’s clear, perfectly enunciated voice interrupted Kelly’s thought process, taking him back to the here and now and away from his momentary slip from his investigator role.
"Good evening. As the lieutenant said, I'm Superintendent Acevedo, head of the Bureau of Investigative Affairs, and I'll be handling tonight's briefing. As many of you know, this morning we had a tragic incident occur in our Dorchester neighborhood. Father Benjamin Tomlin, who worked at Saint Peter's Catholic Church on Bowdoin Street, was shot and killed shortly after Mass.
"As of now, we are actively investigating the case. Any leads and information generated at this point will be held from release so as not to interfere with those who are pursuing justice. I can tell you this—this tragic circumstance is of the utmost importance to the Boston Police Department. We will bring the full investigative strength of the Criminal Investigation Division to bear on this.
"We've solicited the support of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and they have readily supplied us with Agent Sterling Gray, who will be acting in a supporting role to our detective unit, and in particular our homicide investigators. I can tell you we welcome the resources the FBI brings to the Boston Police. Although we are quite adept at handling cases of all shapes and sizes, this one obviously carries with it a significant concern. I know that the people of this city, and in particular the neighborhood of Dorchester, are heartbroken at the news of losing one of their parish's own. I will tell you right now, we have some of the department's best and brightest working on this case, and they will not rest until they find the person or persons responsible for this murder."
Disregarding the lieutenant's initial order about holding questions to the end, several reporters, upon hearing the word "murder," shot up their hands.
Superintendent Acevedo scanned the crowd. "We're going to answer very few questions regarding this case. This is an active investigation, and the reason for the press conference is simple: we are asking anybody watching this broadcast who has information relevant to the case, please do not hesitate to contact the Boston Police Department. You can do it anonymously or in person. We have detectives and officers standing by to talk to you.
"At the bottom of the screen, for those of you who are watching this at home, we have provided a number for our tip line where you can remain completely anonymous when giving any information you think would benefit this investigation. With that being said, I can see several reporters in the audience have questions. Let me start by taking..."
"Colleen Maxwell from the Herald." Colleen was a tall redhead with a feisty temper and a tenacious investigative journalistic reputation.
Hearing her voice above the others, Kelly raised his head and eyed her. She had dragged him through the mud after the Baxter Green shooting death. She destroyed him in the paper in the initial wake of that case, adding insult to the injury of the circumstances leading to the young boy’s death. Most of what she had initially reported had been incorrect, filled with half-truths taken out of context from whoever her point of contact was within the police department. Seeing that Superintendent Acevedo picked her first, he now wondered if he had been that source, a tit for tat, some favor, something owed. Politics in policing at work.
It left a bitter taste in Kelly's mouth. The shooting death of Baxter Green had been traumatic enough for him. Having his name bashed for all to read had worsened his ability to process it. Even though she later printed a retraction, a corrective piece in which she highlighted his efforts to bring about a resolution and the sound tactics used to do so, it had come a year later. A year of anguish for Kelly, a lifetime of frustration. She had waited until the internal investigation had closed and all wrongs had been cleared before making any effort to try to clear his name in the paper.
But as with everything, a year was a long time. In that same year, Kelly had lost his wife to divorce and his job had become burdensome. When she printed her second version of the incident, it was barely a blip in the world of newspaper journalism and had little effect. Seeing her getting the first question worried him. What would she have to say about this case before she had all the facts?
Kelly had learned long ago not to spend much time looking at the paper. It rarely, if ever, helped to follow any articles revolving around active criminal investigations. More likely it would only infuriate him when facts and details laid out in arrest affidavits and police reports were either incorrectly cited in the abridgement, miscommunicated, or flat-out disregarded. Best to turn a blind eye to it altogether.
"From what I understand, your department has ruled out any chance that this was a self-inflicted gunshot wound?"
Kelly held back from rolling his eyes. With his luck, that would be when the camera was pointed in his direction. Somebody had leaked to her about the gunshot wound, which went against everything they were working toward. Zero details, just the death of a priest, that's what Sutherland had advised would be said: a quick briefing to let the public know they were on the case and all efforts were being made to bring about a resolution. A briefing designed to put people's minds at ease and buy them time. Details released, like "single gunshot wound to the head," would skew any caller information that came in. It would taint any witness accounts.
"Thank you for the question, Colleen. Yes, we are ruling this a homicide. We have no evidence at this point in the investigation to indicate it was a suicide. And unless something changes, we will continue to investigate it as such."
She followed up and Acevedo let her speak again, much to the chagrin of the other reporters competing for the opportunity to have their questions heard.
"A single gunshot wound to the head? Any details on what type of gun was used? Any surveillance cameras, any suspect possibilities, things that we in the general public can be on the lookout for?"
How much information had she been fed?
"I'm not at liberty to discuss anything further with regard to the details of the case. It’s an active homicide investigation, and we will update you as soon as we have anything further."
Another reporter, a heavyset man seated near the front row, spoke without being called upon. "Do you have anything on a motive? I mean, who would kill a priest? In a church, at that? I mean, do we have any history with this priest? Any open investigations about impropriety involving Tomlin? I know Boston has got a long history as far as clergymen go."
Acevedo sighed audibly, his breath striking the microphone’s foam padding and making a hissing sound as he narrowed his eyes at the man. "Like I said, we are not getting into a motive or potential motive, the method in which the crime was committed, or any other factors that may hamper or hinder the investigation, as it is a
current and ongoing one. What I will reaffirm to everyone here in this room and who may be watching at home on TV right now is this: the Boston Police Department’s finest are on the case. They are working hand-in-hand with the FBI. And we will bring about a resolution."
Acevedo shot a glance toward Sterling Gray, giving him a half-smile and nod before turning back to the cameras.
"Everything at our disposal will be put forth to bringing to justice the people or person responsible for this heinous crime. Thank you very much for your time. There'll be another briefing tomorrow morning at 8:00 a.m. Lieutenant Rosario will be handling that one. Hopefully, less than twelve hours from now, we’ll have more information to give you.
"As of right now, I say to those of you watching, if you have any information that can help, please don’t hesitate to contact our department. Thank you for your understanding. Good night."
A roar came from the crowd as other reporters leaned forward, trying to have their voices heard before the termination of the briefing. Hands were raised and questions were hurled as the superintendent and lieutenant moved off stage and out the side door, marked Authorized Personnel Only.
Colleen Maxwell gave Kelly a smile. Her green eyes flickered. He couldn't tell if she was taunting him or trying to be genuine. Either way, he didn't like it and offered nothing in return.
He turned and walked away, following his team, this time with Sterling Gray at the lead. There was a lot of work to be done, especially if the department planned to give another press conference twelve hours from now. It looked like sleep would not be coming tonight.
"Well, that went famously," Barnes whispered as they moved into the hallway.
"Yeah, right?" Kelly said. "I mean, every Tom, Dick, and Harry is going to be calling in what they now think they know. Our workload has just tripled, so whoever leaked the fact about it being a single gunshot wound screwed us. We have our work cut out for us now. We’ve got to get ahead of it."