by Joseph Flynn
“You’re not under arrest yet, Congressman,” DeWitt said, “but you might be if you refuse to talk to the attorney general.”
“There’s room to deal?” Rutledge asked.
DeWitt and Benjamin kept smiles off their faces.
“That would be up to Attorney General Jaworsky,” DeWitt said.
Just as they put Rutledge into the back seat of their car DeWitt’s phone sounded.
Leo Levy was calling.
“Mr. Deputy Director, the boss asked me to call. He’d like you and your ten best men to get over here to Falls Church right quick.”
Leo gave DeWitt the address.
The deputy director asked Benjamin to drop him off on the way to taking Rutledge in.
Benjamin gave him a curt nod, unhappy about not being in on whatever McGill was doing.
She also wasn’t pleased with Leo’s choice of words.
“Bring your ten best men?” Benjamin said. “That guy’s a chauvinist.”
FirePower America — Falls Church, Virginia
The entrance to Auric Ludwig’s office suite fell under the scrutiny of a surveillance camera. Jerry Nerón had thought the building might have such a security measure and wore a fedora for the occasion. The brim shadowed the upper half of his face, and the hat matched his suit perfectly. Over his shoulder hung a soft black Italian leather attaché case that carried the tools of his trade and completed his ensemble.
The security guard in the lobby had let him sign in — F. Castro — and proceed to the elevator bank without a moment’s hesitation. The man clearly knew a great suit when he saw one. Felt well-dressed people were to be trusted.
Jerry tapped the button next to the door of FirePower America’s suite with a knuckle, heard a buzz from inside.
“Yeah?” a deep male voice responded.
Pitching his voice higher than normal and affecting an effeminate tone, Jerry said, “I’m Mr. Ludwig’s three o’clock.”
For a brief moment there was no reply. Then the door to the suite produced a click and Jerry pushed it open. He stepped inside and saw a raw-boned man of about forty. His hair looked as if it had been cut with a hedge trimmer and his suit was clearly off the bargain rack. The bulge under the left side of his coat clearly suggested that was where he carried his gun.
He had to be Ludwig’s bodyguard.
Jerry wasn’t disturbed to see him; he was relieved.
He thought Ludwig might have a secretary. The idea of having to kill a woman, something he’d never done before, was the only trepidation he’d felt about coming to Ludwig’s office. Dealing with this cabrón —
“Open the bag,” the bodyguard told him.
Jerry complied. He put the bag down on the desk in the anteroom. Two framed photos also resided there: a smiling fortyish couple in one, two cherubic girls under five in the other. So there was a secretary who worked for Ludwig. Maybe she was out for the day or possibly just doing an errand for the boss and would return shortly.
Jerry wouldn’t have time to dally.
“Empty the bag,” the bodyguard said.
Jerry did as he was told. He took out his measuring tape, the folded length of white paper stock on which he’d normally do the blueprint for a suit, a small square of what looked to be tailor’s chalk and a pair of sheathed shears. It was only the last item that drew the bodyguard’s attention.
“What’s with the scissors?” the man asked.
Jerry extended the index and middle fingers of his right hand. Opened and closed them, mimicking the motion of cutting something.
“They are the tools of my trade. I take measurements with the tape, draw them on the paper, cut it just so and make the suit from that. Cutting the cloth, too, you see?”
The bodyguard nodded, as if he understood.
“You do the sewing, too?”
The guy’s tone implied, “You really that much of a pussy?”
Jerry was only too happy to have him think that.
“Yes, of course.”
“Where are your needles and thread then?”
Jerry smiled. “I do that part in my shop.”
The answer seemed to satisfy the bodyguard. He was growing bored.
“Okay. One last thing. Take the cover off the scissors so I can get a better look.”
Jerry removed the plastic sheath. Stepped closer to offer a better view. Turned the shears this way and that. The overhead light gleamed off the polished metal. The bodyguard smiled, as if he could appreciate the craftsmanship that went into making the shears. It was only at the very last moment that he realized how close Jerry had come to him.
Now, he got a good look at Jerry’s eyes, too.
This guy was no sissy, he thought. He was —
A killer, as proved by the powerful thrust of the shears into the bodyguard’s body. Slicing through the upper abdominal muscles and piercing the heart. A tailor, after all, had to know human anatomy. And having learned from slicing Galtero Blanco’s throat, all those years ago, this method was far less likely to splatter blood on him.
A single grunt was the bodyguard’s response. Jerry shoved him into the secretary’s chair. Wiped his shears on the man’s cheap suit coat. Saw the bodyguard’s handgun. Wondered for just a second if he should use that on Ludwig. Decided, no, look what happened when he used Abel Mays’ weapon.
Jerry opened the door to the CEO’s office.
He said, “Mr. Ludwig? I’m the man you’ve been dying to meet.”
The same security guard who had admitted Jerry Nerón to the tower where FirePower America had its offices without any fuss stopped McGill and Deke. Well, delayed them a moment anyway. Deke flashed both his badge and his Uzi.
Told the security guy, “One of your tenants, Auric Ludwig, is about to be murdered. You can come with us if you want, but we’re going up.”
McGill had gone to check the building directory and rolled his eyes.
“Suite 1776,” he said. “Let’s go.”
The guard said, “I’ll stay here, call the cops.”
“You do that,” Deke replied. “Tell them the FBI is on the way, too.”
McGill was already on the elevator when Deke caught up with him.
He hit the button for the seventeenth floor and the car rose quickly.
Deke told McGill, “You get in trouble, I’m blowing this guy up.”
“Right, but only if I’m in trouble.”
“I don’t care what Holly G. says afterward. You’re not dying while I’m here.”
“Absolutely. Don’t let him shoot you either.”
“Don’t worry about me, damnit.”
“Never do. But if there’s room for me to work, let me have it.”
“Sonofabitch.”
Deke might have said more but the doors opened and McGill was first out.
A violation of protocol right from the start.
“Jerry Nerón?” Ludwig asked. He got up and stepped to one side of his desk. Looked around Jerry. “Isn’t Marvin out there? He’s supposed to show you in.”
“Marvin’s resting.”
“What? I thought I heard his voice just now.”
“He has nothing more to say.”
Ludwig got the uneasy feeling something wasn’t quite right.
He yelled, “Marvin. Get your ass in here.”
Jerry let the lack of response speak for itself.
Ludwig started to sidle back behind his desk, until Jerry shook his head.
“No, no, no,” Jerry said. “You invited me here. I expect to be treated with courtesy.”
“I don’t want any of your damn suits. Keep them and get out.”
Ludwig was scared, but he was also getting pissed off.
He couldn’t help himself; that was just who he was.
Jerry remained unruffled. “All right. We’ll forget the suits. I’ll just take the two million dollar reward you’ve offered to meet me.”
Ludwig blinked furiously, as if his eyes were sending semaphore messages
to his brain.
“You?” he asked.
Jerry halved the distance between them. “Me. You’ve caused me a great deal of bother, Mr. Ludwig. I like to do my work and disappear, but you keep offering people money to find me. That has to stop, and now it will.”
Jerry set his attaché case down on Ludwig’s desk and unsheathed his shears. He saw there were still traces of Marvin’s blood on the blades. Damn cheap suits with their synthetic fabrics. They didn’t even qualify as decent swabbing cloth. Ludwig noticed the blood, too. His eyes went wide and stayed that way.
“You killed Marvin with those things?” Ludwig asked.
His tone was both incredulous and indignant.
What kind of American didn’t use a gun to do his dirty work?
Jerry laughed at him, interpreting his pique accurately.
“Oh, these shears will get the job done. They’re sharper than Damascus steel. Just ask Marvin. No, I’m sorry. He really can’t speak anymore. But allow me to demonstrate.”
Ludwig wanted to scream, only his constricted throat wouldn’t allow it.
He couldn’t squeeze out a peep, and that pleased Jerry.
He was less than happy, though, when he saw Ludwig’s face sag in relief.
A voice behind Jerry told him, “Far enough. We’ve already heard what we need to.”
Judging Ludwig to be no threat, Jerry turned to see two men had entered the office behind him. One he knew immediately. His face was nationally known. James J. McGill, the president’s husband. The other man was a stranger, but with an Uzi pointed at Jerry he was compelling nonetheless.
“Would you care to make things easy?” McGill asked.
“To hell with that,” Ludwig growled. “He killed Marvin and he was going to kill me.”
If only they’d arrived a minute or two later, McGill thought.
Well, that and sparing the life of the guy in the outer office.
McGill kept his sentiments to himself.
Saying only, “But now he can’t kill you. So he gets a chance to surrender.”
McGill distracted both Jerry and Deke by plucking the Virginia flag on his right from its stand. He rotated the pole until the banner was furled around it. Giving himself a longstaff. Testing the weight and balance of his new weapon, McGill asked, “What’s it going to be, Mr. Nerón?”
“You’re really going to do this?” Deke asked McGill.
Keeping his eyes on Jerry, McGill replied, “You can see what Mr. Nerón is thinking, right?”
“Shit, yeah, I see it. Suicide by cop. Thing is, I don’t mind obliging him.”
McGill started to say, “Under other circum —”
Jerry sprang forward, lunging with his shears pointed at McGill, hoping to draw Deke’s fire. He really didn’t want to be taken alive. McGill had been waiting for the move, though, and was ready to parry the attack.
He brought up the butt end of the flagpole and drove it forward. His weapon had by far the greater reach. He delivered a sharp blow to Jerry’s gut, and took a quick step back bringing the pole with him.
Jerry tried to grab it, but missed. The fact that he wasn’t doubled over and landed flat on his ass told McGill that Jerry was one tough SOB. Jerry took a step back, too, rubbing his bruised middle with his free hand. Trying to work out what he’d do next.
Out of the corner of one eye, McGill saw Ludwig taking something off the wall behind his desk. The distraction was enough for McGill to miss seeing Jerry sticking his free hand in one of his coat pockets, but he saw it come back out. Problem was, he couldn’t tell what Jerry was holding. It was too small, mostly obscured by his fingers and thumb.
Jerry made a feint in McGill’s direction, maybe hoping to get McGill to commit with a swing of the pole and open himself to being stabbed in the back. McGill didn’t buy the fake. When he held his position, Jerry whirled and slashed at Ludwig who was trying to creep up from behind, holding an museum-piece musket he’d taken off the wall.
Damn thing looked like it might still be functional.
And Ludwig was enough of a loon to leave it loaded.
McGill brought the flag pole around in a sweeping arc and cut Jerry’s legs out from under him at the ankle. The tailor crashed to the floor with a bang, leaving McGill staring down the barrel of Ludwig’s musket. Biggest caliber weapon he’d ever seen. The damn thing made a .357 Magnum look like a pea-shooter.
He swept the barrel of the weapon aside with a swing of the flagpole and then drove the butt end into Ludwig’s gut. The lobbyist went down exactly the way McGill had hoped Jerry would. He landed on his ass, curled into a ball and began mewing in pain.
A sharper cry came from behind McGill. He pivoted to see Deke stepping on Jerry’s hand, the one he’d stuck in his pocket. A glance showed McGill the shears were already out of the tailor’s reach. Deke rolled Jerry over and put a knee down on the small of his back. He secured the tailor’s wrists with plastic handcuffs.
Then Deke picked up a small square object.
Held it up on the palm of his hand.
“Look at this,” Deke said. “He was going for it.”
“Looks like tailor’s chalk,” McGill said.
“Yeah? Feel it.” He dropped the object in McGill’s hand.
“Metal.” Lightly thumbing the edge, he added. “Damn sharp metal.”
Deke said, “He couldn’t get me to kill him, so …”
“Yeah. Given no other choice, he was going to open one of his own veins. Someone’s going to have fun questioning this guy. Glad it won’t be me.”
“Does that mean I have to?”
McGill and Deke turned to see that DeWitt had arrived.
With a passel of feds and local cops in tow.
McGill said. “You or somebody else. I just make deliveries.”
DeWitt decided to delegate the interrogation to Benjamin. She could question this guy after she got Congressman Rutledge’s confession. Earn her promotion. The deputy director felt much better about his new approach to his work.
He rode back to Washington in the Chevy with McGill to get the story of what he’d missed. Leo started things off by asking McGill, “Good guys win another round, boss?”
“More or less.”
It had occurred to McGill by then that the antique rifle Ludwig had pointed at him was probably non-functional. In the heat of the moment, though … ah, to hell with it, he couldn’t worry about that prick. He and Deke had saved Ludwig’s life and —
Deke told McGill, “So you were right. Somebody left a longstaff, or the next best thing, lying around. But what if they hadn’t?”
McGill took his switchblade out of a pocket, clicked it open.
“Would’ve been a knife fight,” he said.
“No,” Deke told him, “I would have shot that asshole first.”
McGill put the knife away and turned to DeWitt.
“You have trouble with your people, too?” he asked.
Chapter 32
Kalorama Circle — Washington, DC
After dropping DeWitt at the Hoover Building to take charge of his minions, McGill had Leo drive him to Zara Gilford’s house. Celsus Crogher opened the front door for him. He looked like he hadn’t gotten ten hours of sleep all week long.
“You holding up okay?” McGill asked.
Indulging a moment of pique, he’d left Deke in the car with Leo.
Saying he and Celsus, together, could fend off the Mongol hordes.
“I’m fine,” Celsus said. He saw Deke had been left behind, but didn’t say anything about it. That was no longer his worry. “I’ll just plug in for a few hours tonight.”
McGill smiled as Celsus closed the door behind him.
“So … everything good?” Celsus asked.
“Far from everything, but there’s been some resolution.”
Zara came downstairs from the second floor. “I thought I heard voices. Do you have news, Mr. McGill?” Off his nod, she suggested they have coffee in the kitchen. At her insi
stence, Celsus stayed to hear the story.
McGill told them what had happened at FirePower America, playing down his part and sparing Zara the detail of how Marvin the bodyguard had died.
“Special Agent Ky and I didn’t overhear Jerry Nerón admit to killing Mr. Gilford, but I’d bet the farm that the hair follicle found in the car that was parked next to Abel Mays’ SUV will be a DNA match for Nerón.”
“So this man will spend the rest of his life in prison?” Zara asked.
McGill would have liked to say yes without equivocation.
Only he knew that prosecutors at both the federal and state levels had let killers go with a slap on the wrist if they provided evidence to convict bigger fish.
That was what McGill told her, adding, “I will talk with the president and raise holy hell with anyone else in the government who tries to offer Jerry Nerón a deal for anything less than life without parole. But this kind of case could carry over into the next administration. None of us knows who that president will be, but it’s certain I’ll have less influence then. My suggestion is you get a good lawyer and a great public relations firm to make sure it becomes politically impossible for anyone to cut your husband’s killer a break.”
Tears welled in Zara’s eyes as she nodded. “I’ll do just that, Mr. McGill. Fortunately, Jordan left me all the money I need to see that he gets justice.” She gave McGill’s hand a gentle squeeze. “Thank you so much.”
Before things got too sappy, Celsus nudged Zara and told her, “Tell him your idea.”
She brightened immediately. “Oh, yes! I’d like to speak with your son, Kenneth, if that would be all right with you.”
“Speak with Kenny? About what?”
“Well, Celsus and I have done quite a bit of talking. I said I was so terribly sad about losing Jordan, and my heart ached all the more for the families at the Winstead School and all the people around the country who have lost loved ones to shootings. I said there had to be something we could do. Then one night, almost as if I could hear Jordan speaking to me, I got this idea: Start a whistle-blower program.”
She looked at Celsus, handing off the narrative.