Final Justice

by W. E. B Griffin

  Matt’s seat turned out to be beside Monsignor Schneider.

  “Are you all right, son? You look a little pale.”

  “A little indigestion, sir. I’m afraid I gulped the omelet.”

  “If I may have your attention,” a natty, intense-looking man in a dark suit said, waited until everyone was looking at him, and then went on. “I think it might be a good idea if we all knew each other. I’ll start with me. My name is Rogers Kennedy, and I’m a senior vice president of Global Artists Management, heading up GAM’s New York office. Let me say that I’m delighted to be here, and it’s my intention to see that Mr. Colt’s activities here raise just as much money as possible for West Catholic High School, which is really dear to Mr. Colt’s heart, and to see that that’s done in such a manner that Mr. Colt will look back on the experience fondly. To make sure that any bumps in the road, so to speak, are smoothed out beforehand, or that the best possible detour is set up.

  “This lovely young lady, who is living proof that there is such a thing as the opposite of the dumb blonde of fame and legend, is Miss Terry Davis, of GAM’s West Coast Division. Vice President Davis has been charged with the hands-on management of Mr. Colt’s visit. . . .”

  1005 head gam man is rogers kennedy senior vp from nyc terry davis gam vp from la is hands-on boss

  “. . . and this is Larry Robards,” Rogers Kennedy went on, indicating the young man with the other laptop, “my administrative executive, who takes things down so we don’t forget anything.”

  Mr. Robards smiled around the table.

  “Administrative executive”? What the hell is that?

  larry robards is kennedy’s ‘administrative executive’ read male secretary

  “Monsignor?” Kennedy asked.

  “I’m Monsignor Schneider,” Schneider said, smiling but not standing up. “The archbishop has asked me to handle Stanley’s visit and the fund-raising events . . .”

  Stanley? Is that Stan Colt’s real name—Stanley?

  “. . . and this is Father Venno, who is under my orders to make himself available to Stanley from the moment he gets off the plane until he gets back on,” Monsignor Schneider said.

  Venno smiled around the table.

  mons. schneider representing archbishop father venno his surrogate . . . available to colt around the clock while he’s here.

  “I’m Lieutenant McGuire,” McGuire said, getting to his feet. “I command the Dignitary Protection Unit. This is Sergeant Al Nevins, who will handle the paperwork. Both of us—all of the Philadelphia police department—are determined to make Stan Colt’s time in Philadelphia, to use your phrase, Mr. Kennedy, as bump-free as possible. Let me assure you that you will have our complete cooperation.”

  He sat down.

  lieut gerry mcguire for dignitary protection

  “Thank you, Captain, that’s good to hear,” Kennedy said, and added: “Mr. Colt will have his own security, of course. Wachenhut, I believe, Terry?”

  “Wachenhut Security Services, right,” Terry Davis confirmed.

  “I’ll have them liaise with you, Lieutenant McGuire, as soon as possible.”

  “Yes, sir,” McGuire said.

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  Kennedy looked around the table, and smiled at Matt.

  “And this gentleman?”

  “My name is Payne, Mr. Kennedy. I’m with Special Operations. ”

  “I don’t think I quite understand.”

  “We’re going to provide the detectives, and Highway Patrol officers—and just about whatever else Lieutenant McGuire asks for. I’m here to get a preliminary idea of what that might be.”

  “You’re with the police department?” Kennedy sounded surprised.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Detective Payne, Mr. Kennedy,” Monsignor Schneider said, “if I may put it this way, is one of the finest of Philadelphia’s finest . . .”

  Jesus, where did that come from?

  “Detective Payne?” Terry Davis asked in surprise.

  “. . . whose real-life exploits could really serve as the basis for one of Stanley’s films,” the monsignor went on. “I’m delighted the police department has assigned him to this project.”

  Hey, I’m not assigned to this “project.”

  “No offense intended, certainly, Detective,” Kennedy said. “We’re delighted to have you.”

  I think I have just been had. And I really don’t want to baby-sit a movie actor.

  Matt looked at Lieutenant Gerry McGuire, who, smiling at Matt’s discomfort, sarcastically gave him a hidden-behind-his -hand thumbs-up gesture. Matt returned it with a hidden-behind -his-hand gesture of his own, the index finger of his balled fist held upright. Lieutenant McGuire smiled even more broadly.

  “If you’ll open the folder before you,” Rogers Kennedy went on, “you’ll find the tentative schedule we have worked out for Mr. Colt’s visit, and I think it would be a good idea to go over it now, to see if there are any potential bumps in Stan’s road we may have missed.”

  Matt opened the folder.

  Wohl’s going to want at least three copies of this. I can take it to the office and xerox it. Better yet, scan it into the computer, so when the inevitable changes are made to it, they won’t have to be written on it, and the whole thing rexeroxed. Or I can type it into the laptop now, and skip the scanning.

  He immediately began to type, and was finished long before Rogers Kennedy, Monsignor Schneider, and Lieutenant McGuire had worked their way through it, item by item. When he looked up, he saw that Terry Davis was looking at him. When he smiled at her, she looked away.

  Think about this, Matthew: If your life was really over when that sonofabitch Chenowith killed Susan, would you now be wondering what Vice President Davis looks like in her birthday suit? Or considering the possibilities of getting her into that condition?

  Peter Wohl said, Dad said, Amy said, just about everybody —including the second-rate shrink with the bad breath they made me go see—told me that it would take time, but I would get over Susan.

  If that is the case—and Jesus, that would be great—then why, when Father Venno “placed” me in “that unfortunate incident,” was I instantly back in that goddamned Crossroads Diner parking lot, with Susan’s blood sticky on my hands? Followed, as usual, with the cold-sweat-and-nausea business?

  He looked across the table at Terry Davis again.

  As if sensing his eyes on her, she looked at him.

  Are you going to be the salvation of M. M. Payne, you stunning, long-legged blonde goddess? Or have I already slipped over the border into LaLa Land?

  He winked at her.

  She looked away, shaking her head, but he could see she was smiling.

  He walked up to her when the meeting was over.

  “Well, I guess we’ll be seeing more of one another,” she said. “Is there anything I can do for you?”

  “You mean in connection with this?” he asked.

  “Yes, of course.”

  “I don’t think that’s going to happen,” he said. “The only reason I was here was because my boss had other things to do.”

  “And didn’t want to come in the first place?”

  “You said that, not me,” Matt said. “But there is something you can do for me.”

  “Name it.”

  “Have dinner with me.”

  “No.”

  “That’s getting right to the point, isn’t it?” he said. “You didn’t leave yourself any wriggle room.”

  “I’m on a red-eye back to the Coast at twelve-thirty,” she said. “And between now and then I’m going to go make the appropriate noises over a girlfriend from college’s toddler I’ve never seen.”

  “Dare I hope that changes your response from ‘hell, no’ to ‘maybe some other time’?”

  “We’ll be working together. I’m sure we’ll take some meals together.”

  “Matt,” Lieutenant Gerry McGuire called, “I’ve got to get back to work.”


  He looked at her and shrugged, then walked out of the suite.

  THREE

  [ONE]

  Matt Payne dropped Lieutenant McGuire and Sergeant Nevins at the Roundhouse, and then—after thinking it over for a moment at the parking lot exit—headed back toward Center City rather than toward the Delaware River and Interstate 95, which would have taken him to Special Operations headquarters.

  Inspector Wohl would expect him to come to the Arsenal—still called that, although the U.S. Army was long gone—directly from the meeting with Dignitary Protection, but that couldn’t be helped. He needed a quick shower and a change of linen. The cold sweat he had experienced had been a bad one, and had produced an offensive smell. Sometimes, the cold sweats just left him clammily uncomfortable, but sometimes they were accompanied by an unpleasant odor, which he thought was caused by something he had eaten. He hoped that was the reason; he didn’t want to think of other unpleasant possibilities.

  He went over to Spruce Street, and west on it past Broad Street to Nineteenth, where he turned right and then right and right again onto Manning. Manning was more of an alley than a street, but it gave access to the parking garage beneath the brownstone mansion on Rittenhouse Square that housed the Delaware Valley Cancer Society.

  The 150-year-old building had been converted several years before to office space, which, as the owner of the building had frequently commented, had proven twice as expensive as tearing the building down and starting from scratch would have been.

  Inside, the building—with the exception of a tiny apartment in the garret—was now modern office space, with all the amenities, including an elevator and parking space for Cancer Society executives in the basement. Outside, the building preserved the dignity of Rittenhouse Square, thought by many to be the most attractive of Philadelphia’s squares.

  When the owner—the building had been in his family since it was built—had authorized the expense of converting the garret, not suitable for use as offices, he thought the tiny rooms could probably be rented to an elderly couple, perhaps, or a widow or widower, someone of limited means who worked downtown, perhaps in the Franklin Institute or the Free Public Library, and who would be willing to put up with the inconvenience of access and the slanting walls and limited space because it was convenient, cheap, and was protected around-the-clock by the Wachenhut Security Service.

  It was instead occupied by a single bachelor, the owner’s son, Matthew M. Payne, because the City of Philadelphia requires that its employees live within the city limits, and the Payne residence in Wallingford, a suburb, did not qualify.

  The owner of the building had decreed that two parking spaces in the underground garage be reserved for him. Both his wife and his daughter, he thought, would appreciate having their own parking spaces in downtown Philadelphia, and it was, after all, his building.

  Matt Payne pulled the unmarked Crown Victoria into one of the two reserved parking spots. The second reserved parking spot held a silver Porsche 911 Carrera, which had been his graduation present when he had finished his undergraduate work at the University of Pennsylvania.

  He carefully locked the car, then trotted to the elevator, which was standing with its door open. He pressed 3, the door closed, and the elevator started to move. Once he was past the ground floor, he pulled his necktie loose and began to open his shirt. The buttons were open nearly to his belt when the door opened, and he started to step out onto what he expected to be the third floor.

  It was instead the second. Two female employees of the Delaware County Cancer Society had summoned the elevator to take them to the third floor, which was occupied by the various machines necessary to keep track of contributors, and the technicians—all of whom were male—and was seldom visited by anyone not connected with the machines.

  The ladies recoiled at the unexpected sight of a partially dressed male—obviously in the act of undressing even further, and from whose shoulder was slung a rather large pistol—coming out of the elevator at them.

  “Sorry,” Matt Payne said, gathering his shirt together with both hands, and indicating with a nod of his head that they were welcome to join him in the elevator.

  The ladies smiled somewhat weakly and indicated they would just as soon wait for the next elevator, thank you just the same.

  He pushed 3 again, and the elevator rose one more floor.

  When the door opened, there was no one in sight. Matt crossed the small foyer quickly, pushed the keys on a combination lock on a door, shoved it open, and went up the stairs to his apartment two at a time.

  Not quite ninety seconds later, he was in his shower—a small stall shower; there wasn’t room for a bathtub—when his cell phone went off.

  He stuck his head and one arm out from behind the shower curtain.

  “Payne.”

  There was no direct response to that. Instead, Matt heard a familiar voice say, somewhat triumphantly, “Got him, Inspector!”

  A mental picture of police officer Paul T. O’Mara came to Payne’s mind. Officer O’Mara, a very neat, very wholesome-looking young officer in an immaculate, well-fitting uniform, was sitting at his desk in the outer office of the commanding officer of Special Operations. Officer O’Mara was Inspector Wohl’s administrative assistant.

  He had assumed that duty when the incumbent—Officer M. M. Payne—had been promoted to detective.

  Officer O’Mara, like Inspector Wohl, was from a police family. His father was a captain, who commanded the Twenty-fifth District. His brother was a sergeant in Civil Affairs. His grandfather, like Peter Wohl’s father and grandfather, had retired from the Philadelphia police department.

  More important, his father was a friend of both Deputy Commissioner Dennis V. Coughlin and Chief Inspector (Retired) Augustus Wohl. When Officer O’Mara, who had five years on the job in the Traffic Division, had failed, for the second time, to pass the examination for corporal, both Commissioner Coughlin and Chief Wohl had had a private word with Inspector Wohl.

  They had pointed out to him that just because someone has a little trouble with promotion examinations doesn’t mean he’s not a good cop, with potential. It just means that he has trouble passing examinations.

  Not like you, Peter, or, for that matter, Matt, the inference had been. You’re not really all that smart; you’re just good at taking examinations.

  One or the other or both of them had suggested that what Officer O’Mara needed was a little broader experience than he was getting in the Traffic Division, such as he might get if it could be arranged to have Personnel, with your approval, of course, assign him to Special Operations as your administrative assistant, now that Matty got himself promoted, and the job’s open.

  Officer O’Mara’s performance as Wohl’s administrative assistant had been satisfactory. He was immensely loyal, hard-working, and reliable. The trouble with Officer O’Mara, as Detective Jesus Martinez had often pointed out, was that he had been at the end of the line when brains were passed out, and an original thought and a cold drink of water would probably kill him.

  Inspector Wohl came on the line a moment later.

  “When’s the meeting going to be over?” he asked without any preliminaries.

  “It’s over, sir.”

  “You’re en route here?”

  “Actually, sir, I’m in the shower.”

  “You had planned to come to work today?”

  “Yes, sir. I will be there directly.”

  The line went dead.

  Shit! Another three minutes, and when he asked, “You’re en route here?” I could have said, “Yes, sir.”

  I wonder what’s going on?

  Why did he put the arm out for me?

  [TWO]

  Twenty minutes later—after having twice en route responded to radio requests for his location—Detective Payne entered the walled collection of aging red-brick buildings once known as the U.S. Army Frankford Arsenal and now somewhat hopefully dubbed the “Arsenal Business Center” by the C
ity of Philadelphia.

  When business had not rushed to the Arsenal, the city had given its permission for two units of the police department to occupy some of the buildings. One was the Sex Crimes Unit, and the other the far larger Special Operations Division, which previously had been operating out of a building at Castor and Frankford Avenues. Built in 1892, the Frankford Grammar School had rendered the city more than a century of service before being adjudged uninhabitable by the Bureau of Licenses Inspections.

  It had then served as Special Operations Division Head-quarters—with Inspector Peter Wohl installed in what had been the principal’s office—until space had “become available” in the Arsenal Business Center. Just as soon as funds became available, the city intended to demolish the old school. Unless, of course, it really died of old age and fell down by itself, thereby saving the city that expenditure.

  Matt drove through the collection of old and mostly unused Arsenal buildings until he came to one of the “newer” buildings—the cornerstone was marked 1934—and drove around it, looking for a place to park. There were none. Even the spot reserved for COMMISSIONER was occupied.

  He finally parked a block away and then trotted to the Special Operations headquarters building. Inspector Wohl was now housed in the ground-floor office of what had once been the office of the Arsenal’s commanding officer.

  He pushed open the door from the corridor to Wohl’s outer office.

  Officer O’Mara pushed a lever on his intercom.

  “Sir, Detective Payne is here.”

  “Send him in.”

  Matt knocked politely at the door and waited for permission to enter.

  “Come in, please,” Inspector Wohl called.

  Matt pushed the door open.

  There were five people in the room. Inspector Peter Wohl, sitting behind his desk; Captain Michael J. Sabara, fortyish, a short, barrel-chested Lebanese, who was Wohl’s deputy; Captain David Pekach, the weasel-faced, fair-skinned, small, wiry thirty-seven-year-old commanding officer of the Highway Patrol; and, sitting side by side on Wohl’s couch, two white shirts Matt was really surprised to see in Wohl’s office: Deputy Commissioner (Patrol) Dennis V. Coughlin and his Executive Officer, Captain Francis X. Hollaran.