by John Misak
I was pissed. There was no other way to put it. I saw the case starting to fall apart before me. I didn’t ask for this case, Rick did, he left me with one of the biggest interviews for the case. Like I said, I liked being left alone, but something made me feel exposed. I had no idea how right I was.
Twelve
I had to meet this informant at the Grand Deli by seven. The Grand Deli was a pretty famous place, located on Suffolk Street, right in the middle of Little Italy and Chinatown. Not the best neighborhood, with some rather seedy people running around, but tolerable. I’d been to the deli a few times when I lived closer to the area, and I have to say that I never understood its popularity. They cut the meat too thick, served it on hard, crusty bread, and the service was nothing to speak of. So, basically, it had all necessary ingredients for success.
It was 6:45 when I parked the car a few stores away. I couldn’t believe I found a spot. I took a walk toward Chinatown to kill some time. It was quiet, and no one was eating at the outside tables that seemed to be everywhere in that area. I hate to have people watching me eat, and sitting at those tables made me feel like I was in Macy’s window.
There were a few people inside the restaurants, eating that Asian shit that they thought was good for them. That’s all you have to do to make a pile of money; get people to think that what you are selling them is good for them. You see, people by nature treat their bodies like trashcans. No one wants to admit that, but it’s the truth. The Rick Calhills of the world are in the minority. So, you tell the majority that you are making something that is good for them, and they will eat it by the pound. Then, to show off to their friends how smart they are, they tell everyone they know that they are eating this new health food. That’s it. Just open up a place like, “John’s Tofu and Other Crap That Tastes Like Shit,” put a blurb on the menu that says how nutritional your food is, and you’re done. The idiots will come and beat down your door.
The weather was nice that night, hovering around fifty-five degrees, I would say, and I enjoyed taking in the air. Of course, filtered through a cigarette. It was perfect smoking weather. I hadn’t yet found bad smoking weather.
I walked back toward the Grand Deli, and walked inside. It was pretty busy, with people standing in line waiting for their dinner. The deli still operated the way old delis did, with meat hanging from the ceiling, and four men behind the counter taking orders. The showcases were packed with salads, desserts, and hot dinners, ranging from chicken cutlets up to baked ziti. I scanned the place, but didn’t see anyone standing out as my informant. Like I could tell.
I took a table by the window, surprised that one was open, and waited. Behind me were the soda cases. A Mountain Dew sounded nice. I got up, grabbed a 20oz bottle and opened it. One of the guys on the counter called out to me.
“Hey, you gonna pay for that?” Friendly guy. See what I meant about the service?
I flashed my badge, and said, “I’m not going anywhere.”
He nodded. Like a 30-year-old man in a suit is going to steal a two-dollar bottle of soda. I couldn’t believe I even had to flash the badge.
This scene caught the attention of a man sitting alone at a table three away from mine. He looked at me, got up, and started to walk over. He was about twenty-eight, with very short brown hair, combed forward in the style that everyone seemed to wear. He had glasses, and looked sort of nerdy, in that computer-geek fashion.
“Detective Keegan?” he asked.
“That’s me.”
“I’m the one who called.”
“You the one that spoke to Sondra too?”
“Yes. I understand you two have spoken about this.”
“What?” I asked. How did he know?
“I know she told you, went over everything with you,” the guy said in his mumbling voice.
“Who are you?” I asked. This guy spooked me out a bit. Something sure didn’t seem right, but I couldn’t put my finger on it.
“I’m the one that spoke to you on the phone.”
“What’s your name?”
“I can’t tell you that,” the guy said. Something wasn’t right about him, but most guys who did this sort of thing had some screws loose. Actually, all of their screws needed tightening.
“What do you want?”
“I came here to give you what we spoke about,” the guy said quickly, like he wanted it over and done with.
“Sit down,” I said. “Relax. Take a minute.”
“I can’t. I gotta get going,” the guy said.
“Well, then, tell me what you know.”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a white, legal sized envelope. “Everything we spoke about is in here,” he said, throwing the envelope in the table.
“Everything?” I said. We didn’t even talk about something specific, so I had no idea what he was talking about. He seemed overly nervous.
“Yes, everything.”
“Are you going to leave Mrs. Mullins alone now? You’ve shaken her up pretty bad.”
“This completes my involvement in all of this.”
“Okay.” I picked up the envelope, which felt pretty thick, and went to open it.
“Wait until I leave. I’m sure you’ll be happy with what I have given you.” The guy smirked when he said that.
I hoped I would. If it was, I would be able to get Agnelli off my back, and continue the investigation. Amazing that I had to force my boss to let me do my job. That should have told me something about the case.
“I better be.”
“Take care, Detective Keegan,” the man said.
“You never told me your name,” I said.
“All the information you need is in the envelope, trust me,” he said, and walked out the front door. I sat there for a moment, trying to figure out what the hell just happened. This guy wanted to meet me. Why didn’t he just drop off the envelope, or mail it?
I was about to find out why.
I walked up to the counter, placed two dollars in front of the clerk who had seen me, and walked out. I tucked the envelope in my jacket, deciding to read it when I got home. I didn’t want to read it in the deli, and I didn’t like to read in the car. I figured I would go home, grab some dinner, read what was in the envelope, and get some much-needed sleep.
I never got the chance.
It took about ten seconds after I got into my car to happen. I started the engine, took the envelope out of my jacket and placed it on the passenger seat. Just before I put the car in drive, I heard a police siren. I looked in my rear view mirror, and saw two squad cars, and about three unmarked cars. All of their lights were flashing. At first, I thought someone was hit by a car, or something like that. Then, I found out otherwise.
“Get out of the car,” one of them men said through a bullhorn.
I was dumbfounded. Were they talking to me?
A uniform walked up to the side of my car, and tapped on the glass.
“Open your door, throw out your gun, and get out of the car.”
Well, they were talking to me. I figured they must have gotten me confused with someone else. I opened up the door, took my badge out, and flashed it to him.
“I think you’ve made a mistake. I am Detective John Keegan, badge number 3467, ID number 124-57-8916.”
“Throw out your gun, Keegan. This is no mistake,” the uniform said to me.
Now I was really confused. I knew I hadn’t done anything wrong. But then, I worked on a big case, and such cluster fucks happen on big cases. Add my luck and you have the perfect recipe for disaster.
In compliance with my brothers in blue, I took my gun from my shoulder holster and placed in on the ground next to the car. I couldn’t believe what happened but tried to keep my wits about me. They were all I had at the moment.
“Now get out of the car, slowly.”
I did.
There were seven uniforms there, and two guys in suits. Four of the uniforms had their guns drawn. Were they kidding me?
; The guy by my car quickly grabbed me, and had me bent over the hood of the car. He went through the entire frisking process and, trust me, it didn’t feel good. My mind swirled in a million different directions, trying to somehow sort out what was going on? Did something happen to the informant that made it look like I did it? That made no sense. There was no way that the suits would have made it to me that quickly. Different scenarios ran through my mind, but couldn’t concentrate on any of them. The fear had gotten a hold of me. Then it hit me. Sondra. She had something to do with it. The informant had hinted that to me, when I thought about it.
One of the suits walked over when the frisking was done. I recognized him. It was Sergeant Peters.
“John Keegan,” he said, “You have the right to remain silent.”
“Wait a minute. What the hell are you charging me with?”
I hadn’t noticed that while I was being frisked, someone had gone into the car and grabbed the envelope from the front seat of the car. He handed it to Peters.
Peters showed me the envelope, and opened it. Wrapped in a single sheet of white paper was about twenty grand in cash. How could I not have noticed? Right then, I felt like a rookie, like an idiot.
“I think this explains it.”
“What the fuck?” I asked.
“Open the trunk,” Peters said to the uniform. He went inside the car, took the keys from the ignition, and went toward the trunk. He came back with a bank bag, and gave it to Peters. Inside was another envelope, this one bigger, and it had about twice the money in it.
“You’re a disgrace, Keegan. A real disgrace.”
“I never saw that bag before.”
“Sure you haven’t.”
“This is bullshit, Peters. Complete bullshit.”
“Cuff him,” Peters said.
The uniform grabbed his cuffs and slapped them on me. I thought about resisting, but there was nothing I could do. They had me. And, as the story goes, anything I said was certainly going to be used against me.
They took me down to the station in the back of a squad car. I’d been in a squad car many times, but never in the back. I felt dirty, like all that I had worked for in my life meant nothing. We called criminals perps, and now I was one of them. The guys in front didn’t say anything to me at all. They talked amongst themselves a little, but I couldn’t really make out what they were saying. I was alone back there. Alone to think about what was going to happen. Of course, I knew I wasn’t guilty. I had been framed, a victim of some elaborate scheme that involved people in my own department. The one person who stuck out in my mind was Rick. He had conveniently gotten sick. That didn’t seem right. If Rick was involved, then so was Geiger, in my opinion. Something was rotten, but I really had no way of finding that out.
I had complained about being a cop many times. It was a stressful job, but one that I identified with. You don’t work as a cop, you become one. You join a brotherhood, in a sense, but it appeared that my brothers were screwing me. I just couldn’t figure out why. Maybe it was Agnelli. To think that, however, I had to accept the fact that everyone was corrupted, from the uniforms, all the way to Agnelli, if not higher. Chapman came to mind as well, though I couldn’t quite fit him into the picture. Schemes like this just didn’t happen, I said to myself. But they did, and I needed to accept that soon.
They brought me in through the back, and took me to the offices on the main floor. The place was busy with detectives and uniforms running around. I worked the night shift when I was on a beat, and it was an exciting time to work. Criminals usually do their business at night. They sat me down at a table, still cuffed, and I had to wait for about ten minutes before anyone would come and talk to me.
Finally, a man in a suit came down. I had never met him before. He looked like a Fed. Feds just have a look. They generally try to dress nice, and they carry themselves like they think their shit doesn’t stink.
“Detective Keegan,” he said, in a voice that had a bit of southern drawl to it, “I am Inspector Graves, Internal Affairs.”
IA. Fuck. “Good evening,” I said. No cop ever wanted to hear those two words. Ever.
He looked at me, and noticed the cuffs.
“I don’t think you need those anymore,” he said. He motioned to a uniform nearby, who removed the cuffs from me. If you’ve never been put in handcuffs, at least not voluntarily, then it’s hard to appreciate the feeling you get when you have them on. You feel smothered, violated. When the uniform took them off, I felt relieved.
“Thank you,” I said.
“You’re in quite a situation here.”
Wasn’t I. “I see that.”
“Taking money from suspects to keep them from suspicion is quite a crime. I don’t know what you were thinking.”
“Give me a break. You know damn well I wasn’t doing that. This is just bullshit,” I said, trying to keep my voice calm.
“There’s no use arguing, Detective. We have the evidence, and we have you on tape with both the informant and Harold Chapman.”
That reminded me. I had taped the conversation with Chapman. My innocence was on my tape. “I taped that conversation.”
“We know. And we have already checked your tape against his. It’s the same.”
Of course it wasn’t. But that was the game they played with me. They wanted me to fold by thinking they told the truth. They work on your mind and you need to anchor yourself or it’s over.
“It does?” I asked.
He nodded.
“So, if only for entertainment purposes, would you mind telling me what you think is going on?” I didn’t try to hide my anger.
Graves shifted in his seat. Probably knew he was dirt for the job he did. “You’ve taken bribes from Mrs. Mullins to cover her involvement with the death of her husband. You have been trying to turn this case into a suicide so that she receives the large amount of money in her husband’s life insurance.”
“That’s ridiculous,” I said. “It’s so far from the truth.”
Graves laughed. “Listen Detective, you’re caught. Don’t make this any harder than it has to be.”
This was my life we talked about. I got set up, and the price I would pay would be my life, pretty much. I would to make it as hard as possible. “Who put you up to this? Chapman?”
“Harold Chapman? I work for Internal Affairs, Keegan, and the last time I checked, Harold Chapman had absolutely no involvement with us. Now, would you like to explain how we found you carrying money given to you by Mrs. Mullins?”
“I never saw that bag,” I insisted.
“It had a letter in it, written to you, outlining your plans to frame Mr. Chapman for murder.”
“Come on. You really believe all of this?” I asked.
“What? You’re denying what you’ve done?”
“Fucking A, I am. I’m innocent. Never did anything you’re accusing me of. It’s a setup. And I am sure you know it.”
“Mrs. Mullins paid you in two installments. She wanted the insurance money, valued at over fifty million dollars, and she wanted full control over the company. You were going to help her by framing Chapman with murder. It’s why you met Mrs. Mullins this afternoon, and why you went to Chapman’s office to threaten him into giving you more. You were playing both sides against the middle.”
“And how are you planning to prove all of this? I mean, did you even check this out before arresting me?” I asked.
“We knew what you were up to,” Graves said.
“That’s amazing, considering I didn’t.”
“We also know that you made a large deposit of cash into your account after visiting Mrs. Mullins. Not a good idea.”
I hadn’t been to the bank in over a month. This really started to look like a big setup. I just couldn’t understand why. What did they want me for? Whose cage had I rattled?
“Like Hell. I was at the dentist,” I said.
“What dentist would that be?”
“My father.”
&nbs
p; He jotted that down, seeming to take interest in the fact.
“You know damn well that my father is a dentist,” I said.
“We do. And we also know that family members are a horrible alibi. We have you caught, Keegan. All we want is for you to tell us that Sondra Mullins killed her husband. We really don’t want you. We want her. You can make all of this go away.” Graves looked at me, taking on a serious expression, as if the world teetered over this case.
So, that was what this was all about. They wanted to frame Sondra for her own husband’s murder. Chapman had to be involved with that. I instantly remembered the Lexus I saw out in front of the Techdata building, which meant that Agnelli was probably involved too. What a mess.
“You’re kidding, right?” I said. I had more on my mind but kept it to myself. Sometimes, only sometimes, I know when to keep my mouth shut.
“Listen, Keegan, I know she is an attractive woman, and I know that she can sound very convincing. But don’t let that cloud your vision and ruin your life. We know you have a thing for her. Calhill even told us that.”
So, they had gotten to Rick. That’s why he had suddenly become so ill. I wanted to choke the bastard but I couldn’t show anger right then. Had they gotten to Geiger too? He was my only chance at getting out of this, if there was a chance at all.
“She is very attractive. So are a lot of other women that I come into contact with. You want me to say I plotted with all of them?”
“This one got to you.” He leaned forward. “Listen, you’re not the offender here. We want her. Just tell us that she killed her husband, and we’ll let you go. We don’t want to press any charges on a fellow officer. We just want the truth.” Graves made it sound so simple, so much the right thing to do. Those IA guys got training in that sort of thing.
He wanted the truth and so did I. I always believed in getting to the bottom of things, finding out the truth. But truth was elusive. And I had this IA prick preaching to me. Of course he wanted to press charges on a cop. It was his job. And he was a dirt bag for doing it, too.
