The Brothers

by Michael Bronte

  Chapter 24… Convergence In Cambridge

  Sally set up the online conference and texted out the link and access code for everyone to join in. One by one, the brothers logged in and the plan looked like it was going to work. Everyone was live and after a couple of minutes of figuring out how to deal with the background noise, the group was looking at a street map of the surrounding area broken out into zones. The Hutchinson house at 91 Clifton Street was ground zero. The first point of order was who was going to direct the brothers’ movements.

  Harry opened the conference by bellowing, “What do you mean, I shouldn’t be the one to run this setup? I’ve been living and breathing this investigation since the night Hutch was killed—and, may I remind you, I was pretty much alone on this most of the way.”

  “Harry, listen—” Ducky began.

  “Don’t Harry me, Ducky. Most of you thought I’d gone off the deep end and now you want to take this away from me? Fuck that shit.”

  Ducky tried again. “Harry, nobody is trying to take anything away from you. Hell, if it wasn’t for you, Hutch’s killers would be getting off scot-free.”

  “No shit, and I’m still a target here, Ducky.”

  Raising his voice in return, Ducky bellowed back, “That’s right, Harry, and do you think maybe Hutch was aware that he was a target also? Knowing Hutch, I’d bet he tried to handle it all himself just like you’re trying to do, and look what happened to him.” Harry didn’t respond. “You’ve got to concentrate on protecting yourself, Harry. You should not be distracted from that by trying to direct this operation.”

  “Then who should be directing it?”

  “Ah, guys, this is Al. Can I jump in here? Harry, with all due respect, I think that should be Fish.” Utter silence blanketed the call until Al said, “Fish?”

  More silence. “Fish, are you there?” said Ducky.

  “I’m here,” Fish croaked. He cleared his throat and said, “Al, are you serious about this?”

  “You’ve always been the smartest guy in the room,” said Al, “and I think we need someone like you who can look at things objectively and figure out what’s happening, like, really quickly. You’re that guy, Fish.”

  Ducky said, “Harry, what do you think?”

  Hesitantly, Harry said, “Fish?”

  Fish replied, “First off, I appreciate the confidence. Second, if I say yes, does that mean we can stop flapping our gums? It’s already nine-thirty and we need to get everyone in place.”

  It took a moment but finally Harry said, “There you go giving orders already. I guess you’re our boy, Fish. How do you think we should go about this?”

  Fish said, “Okay, the house is ground zero. The way I see it, the three teams from Providence should form an outer surveillance ring. Can everyone see Zone One that is opposite the house and runs along Clifton Street? I think one of the Providence teams should monitor what’s happening around the athletic fields and up and down the street. If it were me, I would assume the bad guys are going to set up opposite surveillance so you need to be creative about how you watch for them while they’re watching for you.”

  Zen Master said, “Bones and I can take that. That okay with you, Bones?”

  “No problem,” Bones replied.

  “Great,” said Fish. “Now let’s do the same thing for Zone Two to the north, which you can see runs along Harvey Street, and also for Zone Three to the south along Rindge Avenue. Who wants to take those?”

  “This is Stokes. Doc, how about we take Zone Two?”

  “Okay with me.”

  “That leaves Bapple and Spike for Zone Three,” said Fish. “Is there any problem with that?”

  Bapple said, “Okay with me as long as Spike stops asking about penis enlargement.” A couple of nervous chuckles floated out.

  “This is Al again. Maybe I shouldn’t be asking this but I don’t believe in being naive. Are any of you guys carrying any weapons?”

  The tension was palpable. “I am,” Harry said ominously. “Denise is as well. Three people are dead because of these guys and I intend to protect myself.”

  Ducky didn’t say anything about Monica’s Smith and Wesson.

  * * * * *

  Pruitt passed the interchange for I-495 on the Mass Pike when her cell phone rang. She figured it was either Caruso calling her to make sure she was on her way back to Northampton, or, if she was lucky, it was Lopez calling because he’d managed to get more time on the stakeout. It was neither.

  “Catherine, it’s Monica Brimton. Sorry to bother you on a holiday.”

  “No bother,” said Pruitt, wondering if she should be cagey with the ADA or hit her between the eyes and ask what she was doing the previous day walking that big brown dog past Suzanne Hutchinson’s house in North Cambridge. She decided to be half cagey to see if Monica brought it up. It didn’t take long.

  “Listen, Catherine, there’s big trouble brewing on the Hutchinson case.”

  Oh, no kidding, Pruitt thought to herself, but she gave Monica some rope. “How so?” she asked, a wide open question, wide enough for Monica to maneuver around until she got to the point.

  “I know you’ve been away from the case since that disaster with Officer Nekel back in Wallingham last week....”

  How did she know about that, Pruitt wondered.

  “... but the situation has escalated—in a big way,” Monica added on.

  “What’s going on?”

  “Harry... Curlander,” Monica clarified, “has managed to organize his fraternity brothers to run a sting operation aimed at revealing the identities of Hutchinson’s killers and where they are located.”

  “Uh-huh,” Pruitt shot curtly, thinking: and what’s your part in this? “And how exactly are they planning on doing that?”

  “You remember the laptop you got from Suzanne, don’t you, the one that belonged to Hutch?”

  “Of course,”

  “They’ve arranged for someone that they suspect is not from the bank to come to the Hutchinson residence to pick it up today at noon. Then they intend to follow whoever picks it up to see where it’s delivered.”

  “And they figure that’s the location of Hutchinson’s killers,” Pruitt presumed. “So Mister Curlander is going through with his plan to use himself as bait.”

  “Right. How do you know that?”

  Evading, wanting to keep Monica talking, Pruitt said, “That’s not important. You keep saying they. I assume they refers to your husband and the other two fraternity brothers who were present at that Slick’s bar in Wallingham last week.”

  “It’s much more than that,” said Monica. “There are another six brothers who’ve come in to participate in this crazy scheme.”

  Pruitt paused to consider what could happen when ten unpracticed, gung-ho, testosterone-enhanced amateurs went up against real criminals who had already killed people in perpetrating their crime. The picture that formed in her head wasn’t pretty. “I assume your husband is still involved of this,” she presumed.

  “He is,” Monica admitted. “And I think he’s in danger.”

  “Then you need to get him out of there. Is he in Cambridge now?”

  “Yes, but I don’t think he’s going to listen to me. I’ve tried to reason with him but it’s no use. Actually, if something were to happen to him, I think I’d be partly responsible.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Because I let him have my gun, and I wouldn’t be surprised if some of the other brothers might be arming themselves.”

  Pruitt slammed on her brakes and pulled into the left emergency lane. “Hold on,” she hollered into the phone. She flipped on her flashers and began looking for one of the emergency vehicle turnarounds that dotted the Mass Pike every few miles. “Listen to me,” she snapped into the phone. “Get hold of your husband and get out of Cambridge right away.”

  “Wait. How did you know I was in Cambridge?”

&nbs
p; “Never mind that. Just do what I said.”

  “I can’t. I’m not in Cambridge. I mean, I was, but he sent me away and told me to go home. He said he didn’t want me anywhere near there in case things got hairy.”

  “That’s just wonderful,” said Pruitt. “Listen, I’m less than an hour outside Cambridge and I think there’s someone I can call at the local PD to maybe stop whatever is about to happen. Is all this centered around the Hutchinson house on Clifton Street?”

  “I think so,” said Monica, “but I’m not exactly sure that’s where Ducky is going to be.”

  “Then call him and tell him the police are on the way. And tell him if he’s found to be carrying that firearm illegally, he’s going to jail.” Pruitt ended the call abruptly hoping she’d scared Monica enough to do what she’d instructed. Not seeing a turnaround, she barreled across the median strip and hoped she wouldn’t get stuck. Reaching the eastbound side of the Pike, she tried to call Lopez but it went to voicemail. Swerving violently back into traffic, she hit the siren and pounded the accelerator, but the burst of speed didn’t last long. It was only ten o’clock in the morning but Memorial Day traffic heading back toward Boston was a bitch.

  * * * * *

  “Is everyone in place?” Fish asked.

  The three outer surveillance teams all answered in the affirmative. At the moment, Zen Master was standing off Clifton Street on the north end next to Russell Field, and Bones was in his car at the south end near where Clifton Street dead ended into Rindge Avenue. There the cars were forced to turn left or right and it was easy to notice any repetitive action.

  To the north the team of Stokes and Doc were watching what was happening along Harvey Street, which was also a one-way street making it easy to detect any repeat travelers there also. To the south the third team of Bapple and Spike were scoping things out from outside bagel shop near the corner of Rindge and Jackson Street with Spike’s minivan parked only twenty feet away. Ducky, who had no car because Monica had taken it, took Denise’s Audi from its location on Jackson Street and was parked a hundred yards north of the Hutchinson residence on Clifton Street. In the center console next to him was Monica’s Smith and Wesson M&P automatic.

  Fighting Al asked if he could take a post inside Russell Field. While Zen Master and Bones were monitoring what was happening on Clifton Street, he wanted a more direct view of the house. The feeling was that if the BMW showed up—of which it was consensus that it probably would if the bad guys were convinced that Harry was in the house—he wanted a clear view of it. When the topic of watching for the BMW came up, Al simply said, “Let me take that. I’ll find out who this motherfucker is.” No one objected and so it went, but Ducky took Al’s advice and didn’t tell anyone that Al didn’t come to the soirée alone.

  Harry and Denise were inside the house, guns loaded, and Hutch’s Mercedes was in the driveway unlocked and facing forward so that a quick exit wouldn’t be a problem should it become necessary. Two miles away, Fish and Sally were in their hotel room using the hotel’s free Wi-Fi to host the conference call.

  “Remember,” said Fish, “the goal here is to find out where that laptop ends up. Both Ducky and Al have a direct view of the house and should be able to tell us what kind of car the perpetrators will be driving. Harry will let us know when he’s handed over the laptop so we can follow them. Clifton Street is one way, so the car will go south and turn either left or right on Rindge. Bapple and Spike will be the first team to pick up the car from there. Zen Master and Bones will catch up and will be the second team to follow once they are in place. As soon as we get another team behind them, Zen Master and Bones will peel off and the third team will take their place. With Ducky and Al, we’ve got four, possibly five vehicles available to follow the laptop to its destination.”

  “What do we do then?” someone asked.

  Sally jumped into the call and said, “Give us the address. There are a couple of ways we can find out who is at that location.”

  To this point, Harry hadn’t said a word. “That isn’t going to work,” he said.

  “Why not?” said Fish.

  “Because the laptop is secondary. Whoever shows up will be here to kill me. They also think Suzanne will be here, so they will probably be prepared to kill her too so as to not have any witnesses. There’s no way they’re going to leave with that laptop before we’re dead.”

  “Let’s not think that,” said Fish.

  * * * * *

  Harry picked up his Sig Sauer P320 and hefted it as if it was the first time it had ever been in his hand. He’d put a few hundred rounds through it on the range and knew the gun was more accurate than he was. Denise was watching him. “What?” he said.

  “I was about to ask you a stupid question.”

  “Which is?”

  “What did we do to get into this mess?”

  The cell phone was between them on the kitchen table and the conference call was live, meaning that everyone could hear them. Harry reached over and pushed the number six button, putting it on mute. “We were just living our lives, darling. I don’t think we did anything.”

  “Oh, but we did,” said Denise. “We got involved.”

  Harry knew exactly what she was driving at. “It doesn’t matter. If we had walked away from Hutch’s death like everyone else was prepared to do, we’d be in a worse situation. Those killers think Hutch gave me the account information before he died. If we hadn’t gotten involved we would have had no idea that they were after us. We wouldn’t even have had a chance to protect ourselves.” She was looking him right in the eye and he looked her right back. “I don’t regret what I did.”

  She shook her head and said, “I knew you were trouble from day one. That nice guy exterior was all show.”

  “It worked, didn’t it? I got you to go out with me.”

  She smiled and came to him. “I never would have if I’d known how arrogant you are.”

  Harry held her and reached over to the cell phone at the same time, taking it off mute.

  “Harry... Harry are you there?” It was Ducky’s voice.

  “Yeah Ducky, I’m here. What’s up?”

  “You know the cell phone you had inside Denise’s car?”

  “What about it?”

  “The battery was just about dead and I figured it might be good to put it on the charger, so I did.”

  “So?”

  “So it’s been ringing.”

  Harry looked at Denise and said, “Jesus, Ducky. So answer it.”

  “I did.”

  “So who called?”

  “CIA Special Agent Breckenridge. He said you should call him.”

  * * * * *

  “Let me have your cell phone.” Denise handed it over and Harry dialed the number he’d just gotten from Ducky. Not knowing what Breckenridge wanted to say, he went into another room so the brothers on the conference call wouldn’t hear.

  “Hello.”

  Harry noticed that his hand was shaking. “This is Harry Curlander.”

  “Where the hell are you?” Breckenridge asked, not so nice-like.

  Remembering Denise’s distrust of the man, Harry said, “Why do you want to know?”

  “Listen, Mister Curlander, I don’t know what you’re trying to do here, but I’m trying to protect you.”

  “You have a funny way of showing it. I don’t like it when people try to screw me over, Breckenridge. Why didn’t you tell me it was you talking to Hutch just before he died? Were you trying to protect him just like you’re trying to protect me now?”

  “Actually, yes,” Breckenridge asserted. “We knew they were after Hutchinson, and we became aware of the plot to murder him, but we couldn’t deploy assets quickly enough to prevent it. My call was to warn him, to tell him to get himself out of sight.”

  Harry did a mental double take and his mind raced to digest what Breckenridge had just said. “Are you saying you
told him he was about to be killed?”

  “I did. I don’t know if he didn’t believe me or if he was just being macho, but he said he’d had plans for that evening for the last six months and he wasn’t about to cancel them.”

  The reunion, thought Harry. The reality that Hutch died because he wanted to be with his fraternity brothers hit Harry like a brick to the head. “Did he know who you were? I mean, that you were with the CIA?”

  “Of course. We’d had several conversations up to that point after we found out he was working with the FinCEN people. That investigation crossed paths with ours when we discovered that the plans needed to build the radio frequency weapon that killed him had been stolen, and that the weapons were actually being used.”

  Recalling the information Doc had given him from Doctor Kadam as well as his conversation with Walter inside Slick’s bar, Harry asked, “How the hell did they get hold of that technology? I happen to know it was all top secret stuff.”

  “I don’t know how or what you know, Curlander, but in this business nothing is top secret forever. Money talks, unfortunately, and these terrorists got plenty of it right now.”

  “You’re a real prick, Breckenridge. It sounds like you were letting me be bait so you could lure Hutch’s killers out into the open. It also sounds like maybe you fucked up and did the same thing with him so you could solve your weapons case.”

  “You’re wrong, Curlander. I would never do that. I told you, I was trying to protect him once we discovered that the terrorists knew about the FinCEN investigation. Personally, I think they had someone working inside the bank who was feeding them information.”

  “How did you know they were going to use one of those weapons on Hutch that night?”

  “Listen, Curlander, I don’t have time to go into every detail, and I certainly don’t want to discuss that over the phone. All you need to know is that we have assets in Qatar that have been monitoring this terrorist group at that end for months. That’s how we became aware that Hutchinson was going to be hit that night, and it’s the same way we know they’re coming after you now.” Breckenridge paused but resumed when Harry didn’t say anything to refute him. “That night, when Hutchinson went back to his car, I think I finally convinced him to get out of there, or maybe he saw them coming. I’m not sure which it was but I was too late by only a few seconds. I don’t want the same thing to happen with you. Now, tell me where you’re located and we’ll get someone out there as soon as possible.”

  Harry considered the situation and the lives of his wife and his Zeta Chi brothers. Could he risk their lives any further? “I’m in North Cambridge,” he said.

  “Cambridge? You’re not in Jersey?”

  “No, I’m at the Hutchinson residence.”

  “Shit,” said Breckenridge. “I’m in our Boston field office. What’s the address there?”

  “91 Clifton Street.”

  “Sit tight, Curlander. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  Harry walked back into the kitchen and put Denise’s cell phone on the table next to his own, which was still carrying the conference call. He looked at Denise and said, “That was Breckenridge.”

  Denise said, “I know. You know I don’t trust that man.”

  Having heard their voices come through on the conference call, Ducky asked, “Harry, what happened with Breckenridge?”

  Harry didn’t get a chance to answer due to the fact that Stokes’ voice cut sharply into the call. “Uh, guys, this is Stokes. I think something is happening.”

  As if the air itself was suddenly electrified, Fish came back on. “Okay, everyone stay cool. Stokes, tell us what you see.”

  “Uh, I don’t know who this Breckenridge is or whether that’s important, but Doc and I are up on Harvey Street and there’s a white van coming past us for the third time now. Harvey Street dead ends into Clifton Street and it should be making a left there in about ten seconds.”

  “I see it,” Zen Master cried out from his position in Russell Field. “It’s coming around the corner right now.”

  “Stay calm,” said Fish. “Ducky, that van is right up the block from you and it should be coming past you next.”

  “Right,” said Ducky. A moment later he said, “I see it now.” The conference call went completely silent as he watched the van come toward him in his side view mirror. Seconds seemed like hours. Inside the Audi, Ducky folded himself down low, below the window line and waited until the white van rolled by, bumping along over the filled in potholes. “It just passed me,” he whispered into his phone. “It’s going right by the house now.”

  “Harry, can you see it from inside?” Fish called out.

  Harry was already peeking through the blinds on the front window. “I just barely caught the back end of it as it passed. Who is stationed at the lower end of Clifton Street?”

  “This is Bones, and that would be me. I can barely make out a white van in the distance but I think it’s coming toward me. Yes, here it comes. Sit tight for a minute.” Again, the conference call went completely silent. “It’s getting close,” said Bones.

  “Can you see inside?” Fish asked. “Can you see people?”

  Excitedly, Bones said, “I see two guys. It’s passing right by me, making a left onto Rindge Avenue. Wait, there’s a sign on the door, looks like one of those magnetic signs. It says John’s Carpet Cleaning on it.”

  “Maybe they’re looking for an address,” one of the brothers said without identifying himself.

  “This is Al. How many carpet cleaning businesses work on Memorial Day?”

  “This is Sally. Is there an address or phone number on the sign? If so, I can find out if the business is legit.”

  “No, definitely not,” said Bones. “Just John’s Carpet Cleaning and nothing else.”

  “What kind of business doesn’t put a phone number on their sign?” Sally asked.

  “Yeah,” said Al. “What’s wrong with that picture?”

  * * * * *

  Harry looked at the carrot clock noting that it was five after eleven. If all went according to plan, whoever was coming to pick up the laptop would be there in less than an hour. Pacing back and forth, thinking about his conversation with Breckenridge, he figured it might be a good idea to stay away from the windows. His hands sweating, he wiped them on his pants and put his pistol on the kitchen table. Maybe setting himself up as the mouse rather than the cat wasn’t such a good idea. Denise was in the other room playing solitaire on Suzanne’s computer—her way of dealing with the situation.

  After a long period of silence, Fish said, “Everyone check their phones to make sure you’re not running out of juice. You might want to use a charger if you have one.”

  “Are we just gonna sit around and wait?” someone asked. “Maybe we should track down that van and see who’s inside.”

  “Don’t,” said Al. “Whoever is in that van was doing reconnaissance. If they spot you nosing around you’ll spook them and that could scare off whoever is coming to pick up the laptop.”

  “I think Al is right,” said Fish, “but how do we know that we haven’t been detected already?”

  “Bob,” said Harry.

  “What about Bob?” Fish questioned.

  “He spotted the BMW Saturday morning when he was walking his dog. Bob is part of the neighborhood; he belongs here. We should ask him to take a long walk with the dog again and see what he might pick up. Isn’t that what you said, Fish? Be creative about how we watch them because they could be watching us?”

  “Something like that, yeah.”

  Al said, “Who the fuck is Bob?”

  “Hutch’s neighbor,” Harry replied. “He’ll be the guy with the Boston College hat walking a big brown Lab dog. He’s one of us.”

  “Really? We’re gonna use a Boston College guy?”

  Five minutes later Bob and Snickers were walking west on Dudley Street where they entered Russ
ell Field and disappeared. At eleven thirty-one, having returned from his recon mission with Snickers and being careful to not be seen from the street, Bob walked across his back yard, through the hedgerow to the Hutchinson house where he knocked softly on the patio door. Harry opened it and Bob said, “The BMW is back, and the white van with the carpet cleaning sign is parked up on Harvey Street with four guys hanging around it smoking cigarettes. They don’t look like any carpet cleaning guys I’ve ever seen.”

  * * * * *

  “This is Zen Master. Harry, I think you’ve got company coming your way.”

  Harry looked at the carrot clock. It was five after twelve noon.

  He didn’t say anything, but Fish said, “What d’ya got, Zen?”

  “Two cars, one dude in each car. No wait, one of the dudes is a woman. They’re looking around like they’re searching for something. Not what a resident would do. Oh-oh.... Shit!”

  “Zen Master, what’s the matter?”

  “One of the cars is stopping and the guy is looking right fucking at me. What do I do, man?”

  Quickly, Fish said, “Doc, Stokes, are you guys still up on Harvey Street? Get in your car and get onto Clifton Street and pick up Zen Master. Everyone be cool. Zen, just get in the car when they get there like you were waiting for a ride.”

  “This is Doc. Sixty seconds, Zen Master. Be ready.”

  Zen Master stepped to the curb and looked up Clifton Street with his phone to his ear the whole time. “The bastard is still looking at me,” he said as he saw Stokes’ car coming toward him at a brisk pace.

  “Just get in the car and see if he follows you,” Fish instructed. “What happened to the car with the woman in it?”

  “It kept going down Clifton Street.”

  “Fish, this is Ducky and I’m still in the Audi. I think it just passed me. I can’t see it anymore so it must have pulled into a parking spot up ahead of me.”

  Harry said, “Suzanne mentioned that the person who originally called her about picking up the laptop was a woman. This could be it.”

  “Okay, all you outer teams remember the plan. We’ve got to find out where that laptop ends up. Are you guys ready to follow that car?”

  “This is Spike. Me and Doc will go to Clifton and Rindge and we’ll be waiting for it.”

  “This is Bones. I’ll meet up with Spike at the same location.”

  Fish said, “Stokes, why don’t you do likewise and all three teams can wait there. As soon as that laptop is picked up, that car will be heading south Clifton and making a turn onto Rindge. Ducky, what kind of car are they looking for?”

  “It was a grey Chevy, plain looking. Wait, looks like someone is walking toward the house now.”

  “Denise,” Harry called out, but she was already by his side. Per the email he’d sent to Jerry Brennan two days earlier, Suzanne was also supposed to be present and Denise would play the part. The laptop was sitting on the kitchen table next to his Sig Sauer and her Walther PPK pistols. Denise put the Walther into her handbag on the kitchen table and took a seat. Harry put his Sig Sauer into his waistband at the small of his back and covered it with his shirt. He took a deep breath and waited for the doorbell to ring, which it did seconds later. Cautiously, he reached back and put his right hand on the butt of his pistol and opened the door with his left. He didn’t know what to expect, but this wasn’t it.

  “Hello Mister Curlander,” said Detective Pruitt. “May I come in?”

  * * * * *

  Pruitt said, “You’re risking innocent lives, Mister Curlander, including your wife’s.”

  Harry glanced at Denise, knowing she wasn’t going anywhere regardless of what Pruitt said. “How do you know anyone else is involved?” he asked, trying to be sly, but it didn’t work very well.

  “I got a call from Monica Brimton. She told me what you and your foolish friends are up to and she’s worried about her husband. Can’t say as I blame her.”

  “Yeah, got that,” Harry snapped out. “If you guys had investigated Hutch’s death like you should have, we wouldn’t be sitting here having this pleasant little conversation.”

  “That’s a low blow, Mister Curlander, and you know it.”

  Glancing again in Denise’s direction, his eyes landed on the cell phone sitting on the table in front of her and he wondered how much of the conversation was getting out to the rest of the brothers. As if she was reading his mind, Denise picked it up and took it off speaker. With the guilt eating at him like acid, remembering the conversation he’d had with Breckenridge earlier, Harry called to her, “No, let them hear. They have a right to know what’s happening.”

  Denise came to him and gave him the phone as she shot a defiant look at Pruitt. “This is Harry,” he said to the brothers. “The woman who came to the house is Detective Pruitt of the state police and she wants us to disband immediately.” No one said anything. Seeing Pruitt’s curiosity, Harry said to her, “We’re all on a conference call together.”

  “Very clever,” said Pruitt. “How many of you are there?”

  “It’s all the brothers you talked to at the reunion the night Hutch was killed,” said Harry, “plus a couple of other people who are helping out.”

  “Can I talk to them?”

  “If you like.” He handed her the phone.

  “This is Detective Catherine Pruitt. This is not like TV, people, and you need to stop trying to be heroes. Not only are you putting your lives at risk, you are interfering in an official investigation.”

  “Official investigation—when did that happen?” one of the brothers asked without identifying himself.

  “I’m ordering you to stop what you’re doing,” said Pruitt. “Outside of the fact that some of you are probably carrying firearms illegally, as of right now no other laws have been broken and I’m willing to look the other way on that as long as you all just get in your cars and go home. I promise that I will investigate this case until those responsible for your friend’s death are brought to justice.” She looked at Harry.

  He took a moment and looked at the carrot clock on the wall, noting that it was now ten after twelve. “You know,” he said to Pruitt, “that’s all we wanted from the very beginning.”

  “I know,” she said. “I’ll find Hutch’s killers and they’ll pay for what they did.”

  It was the first time he’d ever heard Pruitt refer to Hutch by that name as opposed to Mister Hutchinson. Maybe now it was getting personal for her too. Taking the cell phone back, he said to her, “Someone pretending to be from Hutch’s workplace was scheduled to come here ten minutes ago to pick up his laptop. We figured we’d follow them to see where they delivered it. Our thinking is that’s where Hutch’s killers are located.”

  “I know that,” said Pruitt. “ADA Brimton has filled me in on the plan and I’ve got a detective from the Cambridge police department positioned to take the place of your fraternity brothers to do the same thing. We’d probably be better at it than you,” she added smartly.

  Harry smiled cynically and said into the phone, “What do you guys think?”

  There was some hesitation until Fish said, “This is Fish. I think what you said is right, Harry. Getting the police to investigate was our original intent. If what the detective said is true, then we’ve succeeded in our mission. I guess the cavalry has arrived.”

  In the background Sally cried out, “Damn, and this was just gettin’ good.”

  Harry said, “I can’t ask you guys to do any more than what you’ve already done. Why don’t you all find a place nearby where you can raise a glass in Hutch’s honor. I’ll stay here with the detective until the laptop is picked up and I’ll meet up with you later.”

  “Ah, guys, this is Ducky. I hate to spoil your plans but I don’t think you’re going to have time for that.”

  Knowing Ducky as well as he did, Harry could hear the stress in his voice. “Ducky, what’s going on?”
r />   “I’m still parked on Clifton Street and the carpet cleaning van just shot past me. I got a bad feeling about this, Harry.”

  Quickly, Harry went to the window and parted the mini blinds. “I see it. It’s stopping.”

  “Oh shit!” Ducky screamed. “They got guns, man! They’re coming at you, Harry!”

  The first burst of three shots ripped right through the door handle on the front door, annihilating it. Pruitt was the first to react, shouting, “Down, down!” Whatever else she might have said was drowned out by the sound of a battering ram crashing into the door, all but knocking it off its hinges. Harry hit the floor immediately, his first thought being to protect Denise. In a split second, he glanced at the spot where she’d been sitting at the kitchen table, but the chair was already empty. Having no choice but to direct his attention to the front door now, he instinctively pulled his Sig Sauer from the small of his back but Pruitt was already in the process of pumping four rounds into the open doorway. The sound of her weapon was incredibly loud, unlike the muffled shots that destroyed the door lock. Those sounded like apples smashing on the sidewalk.

  Pruitt moved toward the door rather than away from it, lumbering rather than gliding, crashing herself into the wall right next to the door. By the time Harry figured out what she was doing, he spotted the body of one of the attackers that had fallen in the doorway at her invitation. Pruitt was right next to the door now, parallel to it and not in the direct line of sight of whoever might be coming through next. All that happened in seconds, and Harry could see another attacker, his weapon shouldered, charging over the fallen body lying in his way. The attacker pulled the trigger on his silenced weapon as he rushed in, spraying two three-round bursts indiscriminately at anything in front of him. Harry and Pruitt fired at the same time, his bullet blasting the man’s right kneecap almost off his leg, hers piercing a lung from the side. The man fell in a wriggling heap right in front of Harry, coughing blood at him.

  “Denise! Denise!” Harry screamed as he struggled to get up, but there was no response. With his weapon still pointed at the front door, he moved to one knee and collapsed immediately as pain knifed through him from his leg to his spine. Looking down, he was surprised to see his pants red with blood and a pool of it forming beneath him. He could hear gunfire from outside the house now, not close, followed immediately by more sickening three-round bursts. Expecting another attacker to come through the door, he forced himself up and moved out of direct line of sight of the entrance, dragging his useless leg as if it was a sack of mud.

  Seeing him, Pruitt made a move toward him just as unheard bullets ripped through the woodwork near her sending splinters flying like shrapnel. It was hard to tell if she dove or fell, but she began to crawl across the floor toward him just as a barrage of gunfire sounded from outside the house, three shots, then two, then several more, all perceptibly different weapons. A dozen bullets plinked into the house in rapid succession like rain.

  The result was a frantic exchange of voices from just outside the front door. The attackers were yelling at each other, not in English, their words punctuated by bursts from their automatic weapons and followed by yet more return fire from further out. Two of their comrades were down and now they were caught in between a crossfire from inside and outside the house.

  Harry heard Pruitt scream, “Get away!” and she strained to pull herself to her feet to come to him. Her back to the front door now, she was vulnerable, and her eyes were on him.

  “No! There’s more of them,” Harry yelled back, remembering Bob’s report that he’d seen four guys standing around the van when he’d spotted it on Harvey Street. The gunfire from outside the house actually intensified and he could hear more bullets peppering the area around the front door. “Drop your weapons,” someone shouted, but the call was returned by more bursts from the attackers’ weapons and Harry knew instinctively what would happen next.

  “Turn around!” he screamed at Pruitt as he tried to raise his weapon, but she didn’t do it fast enough, and neither did he. The attacker was inside the door before he had his Sig Sauer to eye level and three hiccups from the scumbag’s weapon sounded before Harry could get a shot off. The bullets strafed the wall next to Pruitt as she turned and rolled, and the wild-eyed attacker drew down on her for another burst. In a millisecond, before he could pull the trigger, two high-pitched pops from Denise’s Walther PPK sounded almost simultaneously. The bullets penetrated his chest as his expression went from extreme anger to panic. In an instant she put another bullet into his neck and proceeded to empty the rest of her seven-round magazine into what was behind him. A moment later the fourth assailant fell dead on top of the first one that Pruitt had dropped in the doorway.