Known Devil

by Matthew Hughes

  Then Rachel mentioned that she was a mixed martial arts fan. That surprised me a little, but then I’ve been accused of stereotyping people in the past. We got into a mild debate over whether supernaturals should have their own MMA league, and that went on until the moment when Rachel glanced at her watch, then looked up and smiled.

  “What?” I asked her.

  “Checked the time lately?” she said, the smile still in place.

  I looked at my watch: 7.26.

  Not wanting to put complete faith in either my Omega Spellmaster or the Internet’s posted time for sunrise, I stood up and said, “Excuse me a second.”

  I turned left out of the media room and took the next right. Walking another twenty feet put me right in front of a window. I spent a few moments there, looking out at the sun rising over my city. This part of the building was still in shadow, dark enough for me to see my own reflection in the glass. I watch a smile sprout on my face and quickly grow into a full-out grin, like one of those high-speed films that shows a rose going from bud to bloom in only a few seconds.

  Damn!

  I walked back to the media room and resumed my seat. Trying to sound casual, I said, “Pretty sunrise out there. Looks like it ought to be a nice day.”

  Karl gave us a razor-sharp grin. “Shit,” he said. “I never even noticed.”

  “Well, that was the object of the exercise,” Rachel said. Although she still looked tired, her face had a glow about it now that made even exhaustion look kind of attractive.

  “Eagle, this is Houston,” I said, trying to imitate a super-serious space program guy. “Your mission is a go.”

  Phillip Kevin Slattery, the Patriot Party’s candidate for mayor, was one of those guys some people refer to as Black Irish. Although his great-grandparents supposedly all came from County Cork, he didn’t look like anybody who’d be invited to dress up like a leprechaun for next year’s Saint Patrick’s Day parade – besides, everybody knows they use real leprechauns for that.

  Slattery’s thick, carefully combed hair was the same dark brown as his eyes, and his complexion wouldn’t have earned him a second look at any Sicilian’s family reunion. I doubted he’d ever known a freckle in his life. He had a heavy beard growth that I’d bet he shaved twice a day to avoid looking like a common thug. That impression would have been misleading, anyway – as far as I was concerned, Phil Slattery was a very special kind of thug.

  His blue pinstripe suit was good quality, and the shirt he was wearing – white with thin blue stripes – went with the suit well enough, but whoever had picked out that tie for him must have been either color-blind or demented.

  The interrogation rooms that we use to question suspects were way too small for the number of people who’d be involved this time. Besides, the Media Room had the advantage of being windowless – good thing, too, since the sun was well up in the sky now, shining bright and clear.

  Slattery had brought three men with him. The thin, balding one with wire-rim glasses had been introduced as Bob Franks, his campaign manager. He had the pinched look of somebody who has ulcers on his ulcers. The stocky guy with prematurely gray hair was somebody I already knew. Jerome Duplantis was a partner in Archer, Duplantis, and O’Brien, the biggest law firm in the city. I guess he was along in case we tried to violate Slattery’s rights or something. His own suit made Slattery’s look dowdy, but then Duplantis wasn’t running for anything.

  The last man’s name, we were told, was Robert Brody. Slattery referred to him as “my personal assistant.” In my experience, that’s usually a fancy name for “gofer”. but not this time. Brody had big shoulders and a narrow face, with blue eyes that were colder than a five hundred year-old vampire’s – and I ought to know, since I’ve met a five hundred year-old vampire. He had a way of standing, with feet spread and the right foot slightly forward, as if he was waiting for someone to knock him down – or try to. Personal assistant, my ass – I know a bodyguard when I see one.

  McGuire had ordered every detective on the squad who wasn’t on the street that morning to be sitting in one of the media room’s uncomfortable folding chairs, even if it meant he had to pay overtime to several of them. There were even a couple of guys from Homicide there, because McGuire had asked Scanlon for a few warm bodies to fill the seats. The chairs were laid out in twelve rows, with a central aisle running down the middle.

  Most of those cops didn’t have speaking parts in the little drama we were staging, but that didn’t make them unimportant. For one thing, they would provide strength in numbers, which McGuire thought might intimidate Slattery and his people a little. Fat chance of that – the Patriot Party crew looked about as bothered as a bunch of cats at a mouse convention.

  But more important, such a large group of detectives meant that introducing them all was impractical. We didn’t want any of Scanlon’s group to hear a name that might raise a red flag, and lying about who Karl was could come back to bite us later. Besides, McGuire and I had figured that a crowd this large gave us a chance that neither Slattery nor his entourage would notice one of the detectives in the room was a vampire. Karl knew enough to keep his fangs out of sight, and none of our visitors would be expecting one of the undead, anyway. It was broad daylight, after all, which meant that all vampires were asleep snug in their coffins. Everybody knew that.

  Karl had remained in his back-row seat, just as we’d planned. I was down front, since I intended to take an active part in the questioning. As I took my seat, I resisted the urge to look behind me and see how Karl was doing. Being awake during daylight hours must’ve been a weird experience for him. I hoped he could make his Influence work under such unusual conditions.

  Four chairs had been moved to the front of the room, and that’s where Slattery and his crew were asked to sit. Once they were in place, McGuire got up from his front-row seat and turned to the audience of cops. “Alright, quiet down,” he said, loud enough to cut through the buzz of a dozen quiet conversations. “We’re about to get started.” The low murmur of voices stopped almost at once.

  McGuire then turned to Slattery. “On behalf of the Scranton Police Department, I want to thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule to come down and talk to us,” he said. His voice held nothing but formal politeness. Me, I wouldn’t have been able to deliver a line like that without wrapping some sarcasm around it – I guess that’s one reason why McGuire is a lieutenant and I’m not.

  “You’re quite welcome,” Slattery said. He took a slow, deliberate look around the room. “But I can’t say I was expecting such a large group of inquisitors.”

  McGuire had sat down by now, and he didn’t rise again as he said, “This is no inquisition, Mister Slattery. Most of these officers won’t be asking you any questions today.”

  Slattery tilted his head a little to one side. “Then why are they here?”

  McGuire was ready for that one. “My understanding is that, like me, they are concerned about the recent violent events and want to hear your views on what’s been happening,” he said smoothly, then made himself smile. “Although I’m pretty sure that some of them are fans of you and your party. I’m afraid you might be asked for a few autographs before you leave here today.” McGuire paused, then took the big gamble. “Of course, if having so many police officers in the room makes you… uncomfortable, I can send most of them back to their duty stations before we start.”

  McGuire and I had talked about this earlier. It was important that he offer to clear the room before Slattery could ask him to, which he just might do. But now, if he said, “I want them out,” people might start to wonder what he had to hide. After all, as a politico, he was used to speaking to crowds much bigger than this one.

  Of course, if Slattery took McGuire up on his offer, we were screwed, blued, and tattooed. But I didn’t think he would – and I was right.

  “No, it’s fine, let them stay,” Slattery said with a tight smile. Then Duplantis, the lawyer, piped up.

  “I wan
t the record to show that my client is here of his own free will, Lieutenant,” he said. “He is under no legal obligation to answer any of your questions, and is prepared to do so, for a limited amount of time, purely out of his sense of civic duty.”

  That was as fine a layer of rhetorical bullshit as I’d heard in quite a while – but then, for what Duplantis charged, it ought to be good.

  “There is no record here, Counselor,” McGuire said, still polite. “This meeting is not being recorded in any fashion, although I suppose I can’t stop some of these officers from taking a few notes, if they want to. But if there was some kind of record, I’d certainly want it to show my appreciation for Mister Slattery’s… exemplary citizenship as shown by his willingness to come down here today.”

  Duplantis nodded with satisfaction, but I saw something glitter in Slattery’s eyes. He was pretty sure that all this elaborate courtesy was McGuire’s way of pissing on his shoes, but he couldn’t say anything about it. How do you complain about somebody being polite?

  “Right, then,” McGuire said. “Mister Slattery, I’d like to start by asking you…”

  Like McGuire had said, nobody was recording the session. But I’d asked Louise, our PA, to sit in. She shouldn’t have been there, strictly speaking, because she isn’t a cop. But she is a master – or maybe that should be mistress – of the arcane art of shorthand. I had her sitting in back, next to Karl, with instructions to keep the notebook she was writing on out of sight from the visiting politicos. After the Q-and-A session, she typed up her notes for me. Far as I could tell, she got down everything said in that room as accurately as if she’d been transcribing it from a tape recording. Louise is good – damn good.

  This is the transcript as Louise typed it, along with my own snarky comments in brackets.

  McGuire: Right, then. Mister Slattery, I’d like to start by asking you about your party’s position on supernaturals. In your party platform, as well as in your speeches, you’ve got some pretty inflammatory statements.

  Duplantis: I object to the use of the word inflammatory.

  McGuire: I appreciate your diligence, Counselor. But we’re not in court here, and the rules of trial procedure don’t apply. Perhaps you could just let your client speak for himself.

  Slattery: If anything I’ve said has upset people – good. Some people deserve to be upset. The Patriot Party doesn’t indulge in political correctness. We say it like it is.

  [“Say it like it is.” Reminded me of the hippies, back in the day – although Slattery was about as far from a flower child as you could imagine.]

  McGuire: But you are aware that the law says that supernaturals are entitled to the same rights as anybody else, right?

  Slattery: I respect the law – I’ve never said otherwise, even though, like many Americans, I regard the Supreme Court’s decision in Stevens v. US to be misguided. But if the supernatural community expects the protection of the law, then they should be prepared to obey the law.

  Markowski: Are you saying that all supernaturals are lawbreakers?

  [Of course, that’s exactly what he was saying – but I wanted to see if the son of a bitch would admit it.]

  Slattery: It’s Sergeant Markowski, right? You of all people should be aware of what’s been going on in our city, Sergeant. Shootouts in the streets, bombings that destroy life and property, drug addiction, armed robbery – the list of crimes is practically endless.

  Markowski: I know supernaturals break the law sometimes, just like humans do. That’s what the police force is for, to deal with that kind of thing when it happens.

  Slattery: Then when are you going to start dealing with it? So far, the police have seemed powerless in the face of this recent crime wave. It’s like you’re trying to stop a flood with buckets and squeegees. No disrespect intended, of course.

  Markowski: No, of course not.

  [Yeah, right.]

  McGuire: Since you mentioned bombings, I’d like to ask you about that, Mister Slattery. Your party ran a full-page ad in the Times-Tribune the other day about the latest bombing, the one in front of a place called Ricardo’s Ristorante. The ad claimed that it was just another example of supernaturals run wild with the police helpless to stop them. Remember that?

  Slattery: Yes, of course. We got a lot of positive response to that one.

  McGuire: I’m not surprised. Somebody clearly put a lot of thought into that advertisement. Your case was very effectively argued, I thought.

  Slattery: Yes, we’ve got some talented people working for us. A couple of former journalists, in fact.

  [Slattery smirked a little as he said that. Maybe he thought McGuire was a kindred spirit. If so, he couldn’t have been more wrong.]

  McGuire: I’m sure you do. But there’s one thing that puzzles me. I’m told that your advertisement, all laid out and ready to print, was received by the Time-Tribune’s advertising department less than twenty minutes after the bomb went off. Considering all the specific detail about the bombing at Ricardo’s contained in that ad, I don’t see how it was possible for anybody, even those well-qualified ex-journalists, to put it together in such a short time.

  Slattery: Are you suggesting that my campaign had something to do with that act of terrorism? Is that what you’re implying, Lieutenant?

  [Sounding really pissed now – although, since he was a politician, there was no way to tell if it was genuine.]

  McGuire: I’m not implying or suggesting anything, Mister Slattery. I’m just asking a question. How is it possible to write an ad containing all that detailed information, not to mention layout and design, in something like fifteen minutes?

  Slattery: Obviously, it isn’t. Therefore, I’d have to say that you’ve been misinformed, Lieutenant. Whoever told you about the arrival time of our advertisement is either mistaken or lying. It’s as simple as that.

  McGuire: Well, here’s the thing, Mister Slattery. The ad copy was sent as a PDF, attached to an email. You know as well as I do, when an email is received by somebody, the time when it arrives is included in the message heading. Well, the explosion occurred at 7.17, give or take a minute. Your campaign’s email containing that advertisement was received by the Times-Tribune at 7.29 in the evening. Sounds to me like somebody was in a sweat to make the 7.30 deadline for getting an ad in the next day’s paper.

  Slattery: Emails can be tampered with, Lieutenant, as I’m sure you’re aware. Some geek with the right technical background can make an email look like it came from Lee Harvey Oswald on November 22, 1963, if he wants to.

  [Snide bastard.]

  Markowski: I’m pretty sure they didn’t have email back then, Mister Slattery.

  [I can be pretty snide myself, when I want to.]

  Franks: I think there’s been quite enough of this. Mister Slattery did not volunteer his time to come down here and be badgered about some foolish

  [That’s when Karl made his move – the reason why this whole charade was happening in the first place. ]

  Renfer: There’s just one thing I was wondering about. Mister Slattery, what do you expect to happen in Scranton if you and your party win the election?

  [That was what they used to call the $64,000 question. And Slattery’s answer turned out to be worth every penny. He frowned deeply and blinked several times, as if trying to resist what Karl was doing inside his head. Finally, he answered.]

  Slattery: Helter-skelter, of course. The race war will start here, but we have no doubt it’s gonna spread quickly, once other humans see that it’s possible to take a stand against–

  [That was when his campaign manager grabbed Slattery’s arm, and he wasn’t gentle about it.]

  Franks: That’s it! We’re done here. Don’t say anything more, sir. Not another word!

  All four of the Patriot Party guys stood up and headed toward the door. Franks was in the lead along with his boss, still maintaining his death grip on Slattery’s arm, as the group headed down the central aisle between the chairs on their way
to the door. Behind them, the murmur of conversations started again, as the cops asked each other what had just happened. Several of them stood up and made their way into the central aisle as well, probably figuring that the show was over. They couldn’t have been more wrong.

  McGuire and I looked at each other but didn’t have to say anything. We knew what had just happened. There was a lot we had to talk about, once the crowd had cleared.

  One of the detectives who had already stood up was Karl, who had taken a few steps that put him next to the media room’s only door. He wasn’t blocking the way, but anybody who wanted to leave was going to have to pass pretty close to him.

  This move wasn’t part of the playbook that we’d worked out earlier, and I wondered what Karl had in mind. Maybe he hoped to get one more shot at Slattery with his Influence as the PP leader and his entourage left the room. But things didn’t quite work out that way.

  I turned in my chair, and watched as the Patriot Party foursome made their rapid way toward the exit. Franks, the campaign manager, must have noticed Karl standing near the door, because he let go of Slattery’s arm and turned to say something to Brody, the bodyguard posing as an administrative assistant.

  The instructions that Brody had received became clear a couple of seconds later. As the group reached the door, Brody put his wide body between Slattery and Karl – typical bodyguard behavior, even though Karl hadn’t made any kind of threatening move. But then Brody did something that wasn’t so typical of his profession: he reached inside his coat and came up with a crucifix, extending it out toward Karl they way all the vampire hunters do in the movies. I’ve done the same thing myself – for the simple reason that it works.

  I was still in the front of the room and too far away to hear what Brody said, with all the other voices in the room competing with his. But from his posture and expression, I had no trouble guessing that it was something like “Get your ass back, bloodsucker!”