“Well, girl,” he said softly, “I’ve had to make some substitutions on the team. Since Hyattsville, things have gotten a little too hot for Lex, so I’ve benched him. Maybe permanently. Tonight will be Shane Stone’s turn again.” He smiled. “As we know, he’s every bit as good.”
He felt her flop against him, purring. He reached down, found and scratched her head. Sat there, thinking. Recalling the Vigilance for Victims meeting. Remembering the haunted faces.
Remembering his silent vow to them.
“You can’t walk away,” he repeated, aloud to himself. “You have to finish this. But there’s more to do, yet. A lot more.”
He felt the cat lick his hand with her sandpaper tongue. Felt himself smile in response.
“So, you still up for this?”
He heard a contented purr in the darkness.
“Glad you’re still on the team.”
*
He kept checking his illuminated watch. At nine minutes before ten, he rose, opened the door to the apartment, and checked outside. The hallway was clear. He slipped out, closing the door softly behind him, then moved quickly to the fire door onto the emergency stairwell. It took him a couple of minutes to descend to the garage level. From behind the door there, he peered outside. Watched an arriving couple get out of their car and walk toward the elevator. When its doors closed, he left the stairwell and walked without hurry over to the car.
It wasn’t the Forester, which remained in its spot on the other side of the garage. This one was a black 2007 BMW 7 Series High Security sedan. Dark-tinted windows and lots of useful toys. He got in, not worrying about the garage’s security cameras. Their tapes, if ever checked, would reveal the vehicle’s registered owner: the older, wealthy, seldom-seen occupant of unit 7D.
*
At two minutes before ten, Cronin nudged his partner. A vehicle’s headlights were visible inside the garage’s entrance.
They watched a sleek black BMW emerge. “Nice wheels,” he said.
“Not his, though,” Erskine answered.
“Don’t assume. Remember, he had that pizza truck in the garage over there across the street.”
Erskine pointed at the building and raised his binoculars. “Not him, though. I just saw his bedroom lights go off, this very second.”
Cronin looked. The bedroom window to his apartment, lit brightly just seconds ago, had gone almost dark; only the intermittent flickering of his television screen was visible through the linen curtains.
“See? He can’t be in two places at the same time. He’s up there watching TV, like he always does before he goes to sleep.”
At that moment, Cronin felt the vibration in his jacket pocket. He took out his cell and noticed the Caller ID. “It’s our girl,” he said, then flipped it open. “Ed Cronin here.”
“Sorry to bother you this late, Detective Cronin,” she said. Her voice sounded stressed.
“No bother at all, Ms. Woods. We’re watching his place. But you sound upset. Is everything all right?”
He heard her draw a deep breath. “I’m just calling to say that I can’t do this anymore.”
Erskine threw him a questioning look. Cronin put his finger to his lips, then put her on speaker, so his partner could listen in. “Tell me what’s the matter,” he said, keeping his voice gentle.
“He called tonight. Just a little while ago. We talked only briefly. But I could tell how hurt he was. He doesn’t think he can trust me.”
Erskine rolled his eyes.
“Ms. Woods, I understand you’re upset. But think about it. If he’s guilty of something, of course he would be angry if he thought he couldn’t continue to con you.”
“You didn’t hear me. I said hurt, not angry. Detective Cronin, I know him. And yes, I realize he’s not telling me everything about his past, and yes, some things still don’t add up. But I also know that he’s a decent man. And a compassionate one, in so many ways. He has the strongest code of personal honor of any man I’ve ever known. So I just can’t buy your theory about him. I don’t think he’s involved.”
“My theory doesn’t contradict anything you said, though. If I’m right, he’s probably the brains behind the vigilante team. He’s certainly intelligent enough. And as for his code of honor-Ms. Woods, have you ever heard the term ‘righteous slaughter’?”
“No. What’s that?”
“It’s when somebody kills a bunch of people because he’s convinced himself that they deserve it. You see it all the time with mass murderers-the guys who walk into some fast-food joint or post office and mow down everybody in sight. They always have some grand excuse for it, some grievance or injustice they think rationalizes their revenge. The people they shot all had it coming to them. Well, that’s not much different from the way vigilantes think, is it?”
“Except that in this case, the people getting shot really do deserve it.”
Erskine grinned and gave a thumb’s-up; Cronin scowled at him.
“Well, miss, that’s not for us to decide. We just can’t let individuals decide for themselves who lives and who dies, and for what reason. But you’re forgetting things. Like that pizza van you’re sure he was in. How do we explain things like that?”
“Detective, we both know he takes elaborate security precautions. He has to. That was probably part of it: something he does so that people can’t follow him. Have you asked yourself how much of his behavior can be explained by simple paranoia?”
“Fair point, I suppose. But why would he have to be paranoid about us? We’re on his side. But he’s not been fully honest, either with me or with you.”
“You know exactly why he’s not been open with you-he told you himself. He knows you’re associated with the people who want to silence him. And I know why he can’t trust me, either. It’s because I’ve been deceiving him, almost since the day we met. About important things that he has a right to know. I think he senses it. And I think that’s why he’s holding back. He has damned good reason not to trust me. Not to trust either of us, Detective. Maybe if we give him more reasons to believe in us, he’ll open up and tell us the things we need to know.”
He gave up. “Okay. So how did you leave it with him?”
“He said we probably both need a little break from each other. A couple of weeks. Then he wants to try to work things out.”
“Anything else?”
“Just that he was really beat tonight and wanted to turn in early.”
He glanced up at the window, watched the light from the TV moving on the curtain.
“Ms. Woods, I told you that I’d love to believe this guy. I really would. So you trust him, then.”
“With my life.”
TWENTY-NINE
Columbia Heights, Washington, D.C.
Thursday, November 27, 11:10 p.m.
From his vantage point in the SUV parked next to the kids’ playground, he could see into the rear yard behind the apartment buildings. At eleven-ten, an Hispanic kid in his early teens clambered down the steps of the building to his left, being dragged along by a big Doberman on a leash. The dog couldn’t wait to get out into the small yard the before lifting his leg against a bush.
During his recons the past few nights, he’d watched the kid walk the dog several times around eleven. He was relieved that the kid, and not his target, owned the dog: No way he’d break into an apartment and face down a guard dog. Still, even though the animal would be in another apartment, he might bark up a storm when he entered.
In addition, the target, Orlando Navarro, was obviously on guard, keeping out of sight for the most part, and staying close to other people whenever he emerged from his apartment. From all reports, Navarro-a beefy bodybuilder covered with gang tats-was no genius. But it didn’t take genius to figure out that murderers whose names appeared in the newspapers were vigilante targets.
And the fact that his old amigo, Tomas Cardenas, had been whacked must have scared the hell out of him. Navarro had gone into hiding immediately after Cardenas was killed, changing his residence, with permission of the court. However, he had a problem staying hidden. Though free on appeal for the killing of Tommy Banacek, he was still on the hook with his probation officer for past crimes. Navarro had to show up at the office once a week to check in with the Man and take a urine test. And his P.O. knew where he lived.