The Vigilantes Part 4

The pistol automatically ejected the empty bra.s.s casing, which flew up, hitting the trunk lid, then landed beside JC's body, near where a dark stream of blood flowed from the bag, staining the white shirt and pooling on the football jersey.

Now you won't be going after those high school girls-or any others.

Then he moved the pistol muzzle to the same place at the base of Gartner's skull and squeezed off another round.

This time the ejected spent casing landed on the concrete of the alleyway. The bra.s.s made a tinkling sound in the darkness as it tumbled to a stop against a curb.

Rot in h.e.l.l, you sc.u.m! Will Curtis thought, then slammed down the lid. Will Curtis thought, then slammed down the lid.

[TWO].

Loft Number 2180 Hops Haus Tower 1100 N. Lee Street, Philadelphia Sat.u.r.day, October 31, 11:10 P.M.

As Matt Payne looked out of Amanda Law's penthouse window, thinking about how much d.a.m.n truth Amanda had written in his would-be obituary, he took a sip from the beer bottle and swallowed hard.

So then why do I feel the pull to be out there running down those animals?

Because of what else Amanda said, long before writing the obit? That it takes cops like me and her dad to keep the city as safe as possible from the bad guys loose on the streets.

Which she'd told me, more than a little ironically, right before those s.h.i.ts s.n.a.t.c.hed her off the street.

At the memory of finding her bound in the gutted kitchen of that abandoned row house, Payne suddenly felt his throat constrict.

That place wasn't a house. It was a slum, and a f.u.c.king prison slum at that.

But there it is: I'll take the door of any place like that a hundred times over. That may or may not make me a good cop, but bagging bad guys is the right thing to do.

Proof of that being that Amanda is alive.

And further proof being that b.a.s.t.a.r.d Jimenez is on the fast track to serving a life sentence in Graterford.

Following his arrest at the row house, Jesus Jimenez had confessed to killing twenty-seven-year-old J. Warren "Skipper" Olde over what Juan Paulo Delgado claimed was a bad drug debt. In exchange for avoiding the death penalty, Jimenez also ratted out everyone in their small band of thugs in a signed confession.

Payne drained the beer bottle, which helped ease the constriction. Then he grinned as he thought: Too bad the b.a.s.t.a.r.d's about to become somebody's b.i.t.c.h.

Jimenez will hope he gets thrown alone in an RHU.

The door to the bathroom swung open and Amanda Law, still starkers, stood momentarily backlit in the doorway.

My G.o.d, she's stunning! Matt thought. Matt thought.

"You take my breath away," he said. "In more ways than one, it would appear."

She flashed a sly smile. "That, Romeo, is my evil plan."

She clicked off the bathroom light and said sweetly to the dog, "Good girl, Luna. Lie down."

Then she smoothly and swiftly moved across the dimly lit bedroom, completely comfortable in her birthday suit. It reminded Matt of the second time he'd met her, just last month in Liberties Bar, when she seemed to float effortlessly across the well-worn wooden floor. Clothed, of course, but even then he'd been mentally undressing her.

As she crawled back into bed, Matt smelled the delicate floral scent of her perfume. It became stronger as she moved in closer to put a hand on his chest and kiss him on the forehead. He smoothly turned his head so that his lips were on hers. She moaned softy and appreciatively, and then-hearing a brief familiar vibrating sound-made an unhappy groan.

Payne's eyes turned in the direction of the sound, to the bedside table where he'd left his cell phone. It was set to SILENT/VIBRATE. Its color screen was now casting a pulsing bluish-green glow.

Amanda playfully bit his lower lip and held it as she mumbled, "Don't you dare get . . ."

Matt, still in her grips, carefully reached for the phone, then held it more or less behind Amanda's head so he could clearly see its screen.

She bit harder.

Payne grunted as he read the text message on-screen: -BLOCKED NUMBER - YO, MATTY . HOPE I'M INTERRUPTING SOMETHING REALLY GOOD AT THIS HOUR!

GOT ANOTHER POP-N-DROP AN HOUR AGO. TWO ACTUALLY.

COULDN'T HAVE HAPPENED TO NICER GUYS. YOU KNOW ONE. THE BLACK BUDDHA SAID TO GIVE YOU A HEADS-UP.

CLICK ON FOX29 NEWS. -TH.

Matt sighed, then turned his eyes to meet Amanda's and raised his hands up, palms out.

"I surrender," he muttered as best he could.

She let loose his lip and slipped back between the sheets.

Her tone sounding disappointed, Amanda said, "I sure hope that's not what I'm afraid it is. Especially at this hour. Please tell me it's not work."

He held the phone out for her to read its screen.

As she did, Matt thought, Someone I know? Someone I know?

What the h.e.l.l does that mean?

"TH" was Tony Harris-age thirty-eight, slight of build and starting to bald-who was widely regarded as a really good guy and a really good Homicide detective. He had worked closely with Matt and Sergeant Jim Byrth of the Texas Rangers last month when they'd tracked down Juan Paulo Delgado.

And the Black Buddha was their boss, Lieutenant Jason Washington, head of the Homicide Unit. He was a great big bear of a man-six-foot-three and two hundred twenty-five pounds, with very dark skin. Washington, well-spoken, superbly tailored, and highly respected, did not consider the nickname unflattering. "I'm d.a.m.n sure black, Matthew," he said in his deep, sonorous voice. "And Buddha, the 'enlightened one,' surely is a wise man. I have no problem wearing that badge with pride."

"So," Amanda said softly, "I guess since you've been working the pop-and-drops, we're done for the evening?"

Someone in the city was shooting fugitives. These particular ones were wanted on outstanding arrest warrants for crimes against women and children. He had not told Amanda that their crimes were s.e.xual in nature.

After "popping" a s.e.x offender at point-blank range, the shooter then transported the body to the nearest police district headquarters, "dropping" it off in the parking lot with a copy of the perp's Wanted information-a computer printout downloaded from one of various Internet websites listing fugitives-stapled to some part of his clothing.

Thus, "pop-and-drop."

Not that anyone's complaining that the sc.u.m of society is being swept from the streets for good, Payne had thought. Payne had thought.

But as Jason Washington said, "Murder's murder, Matthew. And who knows what the shooter might escalate to next?"

Matt Payne hadn't figured out how in h.e.l.l the shooter had been able to get so close to any of the district HQ buildings without being caught in the act of dumping a body. So far it had happened five times in about as many weeks, and the department had been able to keep the incidents quiet-which meant away from the news media-while the bra.s.s finally found someone who was available to take the cases and try to piece together who the h.e.l.l the doer or doers might be. A lucky Sergeant Payne, stuck at his desk a.s.signment, had been chosen.

[image]

Matt turned, kissed Amanda on the forehead, and said, "Hold on, baby."

Matt reached back over to the side table and fished around in its drawer until he came up with a remote control. He thumbed the ON b.u.t.ton and the sixty-inch flat-screen television mounted on the wall made a humming sound and its screen began to glow.

He punched in from memory the channel of the local Fox station, and it was clear a live news report was being broadcast. In the bottom left-hand corner was confirmation: A small box alternately blinked the FOX29 logotype and the phrase "News Now, News You Can Use." A white bar also ran diagonally over the left top corner of the image, and it flashed red text: "REPORTING LIVE at 11:21 P.M. from Old City."

As the red and blue emergency lights from the police vehicles flashed, the news camera panned down the narrow tree-lined street. On the red brick sidewalk were curious bystanders-Payne noticed more than a few in Halloween costumes-held back by a length of yellow crime-scene tape.

Payne's eyes went to the ticker of text scrolling across the bottom of the TV screen: BREAKING NEWS BREAKING NEWS . . . TWO MEN FOUND BOUND AND SHOT DEAD . . . ONE IS A 25-YEAR-OLD WANTED ON AN OUTSTANDING BENCH WARRANT . . . ARREST WARRANT WAS FOR FAILURE TO APPEAR IN MUNIc.i.p.aL COURT ON TWO COUNTS OF INTENT TO DELIVER A CONTROLLED SUBSTANCE . . . THE OTHER DEAD MAN IS A CRIMINAL DEFENSE LAWYER, ABOUT AGE 50 . . . BOTH BODIES DUMPED AT LEX TALIONIS OFFICES . . . POLICE WITHHOLDING NAMES PENDING NOTIFICATION OF FAMILIES OF THE DECEASED . . . . . . TWO MEN FOUND BOUND AND SHOT DEAD . . . ONE IS A 25-YEAR-OLD WANTED ON AN OUTSTANDING BENCH WARRANT . . . ARREST WARRANT WAS FOR FAILURE TO APPEAR IN MUNIc.i.p.aL COURT ON TWO COUNTS OF INTENT TO DELIVER A CONTROLLED SUBSTANCE . . . THE OTHER DEAD MAN IS A CRIMINAL DEFENSE LAWYER, ABOUT AGE 50 . . . BOTH BODIES DUMPED AT LEX TALIONIS OFFICES . . . POLICE WITHHOLDING NAMES PENDING NOTIFICATION OF FAMILIES OF THE DECEASED . . . BREAKING NEWS BREAKING NEWS . . . . . .

Then the camera cut away from the shot of the sidewalk and the TV screen suddenly filled with an awkwardly tight shot. It showed the jowly face of an almost bald man wearing a dark rumpled suit coat and a wrinkled white shirt with no necktie. The emergency lights bathed him in pulses of red and blue.

"Oh, h.e.l.l!" Matt said. "That's a bit more of good ole Five-Eff than I'd care to see."

Then, in a jerky motion, the camera lens pulled back.

Amanda looked at the TV screen. She recognized the man, who now was shown head-to-toe in front of a nice but old brick building. He was in his mid-forties, short and stout with a small defined gut. He had a round face and wore, perched at the end of his bulbous nose, tiny round reading eyegla.s.ses.

He stood addressing a small crowd of news media types. Reporters held microphones to the portly man's face, almost touching his big nose, as well as camera lenses, both still and video.

"'Five-Eff '?" she repeated. "I thought Frank Fuller was 'Four-Eff.'"

Payne turned to her and smiled. He said, "f.u.c.king Frances Franklin Fuller the Fifth. That makes five." Frances Franklin Fuller the Fifth. That makes five."

[THREE].

Matt Payne's family had known Francis Fuller's as long as Matt could remember. They had many connections, both social and professional, and while Payne did not actively dislike the man, he had on more than one occasion called him Five-Eff to his face-and that almost always had happened when Fuller was being a pompous a.s.s.

Payne otherwise addressed Fuller as "Francis," knowing full well (and purposely ignoring) that Fuller preferred the more masculine "Frank."

Fuller boldly and shamelessly touted the fact that he traced his family lineage-and what he called its puritanical ways-back to Benjamin Franklin. Fuller fancied himself a devout Franklinite, mimicking his ancestor from his looks to his philosophical beliefs. Fuller regularly sprinkled his conversations with quotes from Poor Richard's Almanac Poor Richard's Almanac and other Ben Franklin sources. And like the mult.i.talented Franklin, Francis Fuller was involved in all kinds of enterprises, private and public. and other Ben Franklin sources. And like the mult.i.talented Franklin, Francis Fuller was involved in all kinds of enterprises, private and public.

Payne somewhat begrudgingly admired Fuller for having built on the wealth he'd been born into, because he himself had enjoyed being raised, as he called it, "comfortably"-though certainly not nearly on the level of the super-wealthy Fullers-and he'd seen many others p.i.s.s away vast sums of money that they had done nothing to earn and, he believed, thus did not deserve.

Fuller's primary company-Richard Saunders Holdings, which he'd taken from the name Franklin had used to write Poor Richard's Almanac Poor Richard's Almanac-had many ent.i.ties. There was KeyCom, the Fortune 500 nationwide telecommunications corporation that he'd built city by city by buying up local community cable television providers. And KeyCargo Import-Exports, which was one of the largest leasers of warehouse s.p.a.ce at the Port of Philadelphia, which was easily visible from another of Fuller's holdings-the Hops Haus Tower-which fell under his KeyProperties.

With so much financial wealth came a great deal of influence, and Francis Fuller had political connections from Washington, D.C., to Harrisburg to Philly's City Hall and police department. He was more or less happy to share with all both his wealth and his opinions, though sometimes far more of the latter than the former. And in terms of the latter, Fuller was a devout believer in the Bible's an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.

And so Francis Fuller funded and personally promoted a nonprofit organization he called Lex Talionis, from the Latin phrase for the "law of talion," which more or less translated as "an eye for an eye"-which, of course, was the meting out of punishments that matched the crimes. The logotype of Lex Talionis had the "o" as a stylized eyeball.

The offices for Lex Talionis took up half of the first floor of a five-story brick building on the tree-lined corner of North Third and Arch Streets. Fuller said he felt the location on Arch, in the historic section of Old City, with the Delaware River just blocks to the east and the Liberty Bell on display just blocks to the west, was more appropriate than any shiny marble-and-gla.s.s high-rise office building.

Francis Franklin Fuller V's belief in the fundamental philosophy of Lex Talionis Lex Talionis was strong and unwavering, and there was a good reason for it: Tragedy had struck him personally. was strong and unwavering, and there was a good reason for it: Tragedy had struck him personally.

Five years earlier, his wife and their eight-year-old daughter had been driving home in the early evening of a rainy Sat.u.r.day, when she had accidentally exited just shy of the Vine Street Expressway she'd been aiming for.

My dearest could get lost in a closet, Fuller later lamented, Fuller later lamented, and that GPS street map in the dash of her Benz may as well have been a video game for all she knew how to operate it. and that GPS street map in the dash of her Benz may as well have been a video game for all she knew how to operate it.

After getting off the expressway at Spring Garden Street, then driving east and crossing over the Schuylkill Expressway, she'd somehow, maybe because the rain was disorienting, made a wrong turn onto Pennsylvania Avenue. Shortly thereafter she'd found herself in the North Philadelphia West area, driving down the darkened streets of struggling and failing neighborhoods.

What had happened next was a matter of great speculation. It could have been because of the luxury convertible automobile she was driving. Or it could simply have been an unfortunate case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

According to two eyewitness statements, as the Mercedes waited for a traffic light to turn green, two vehicles flew up to the intersection and squealed to a stop alongside. The second car actually went up over the curb, striking a garbage can and newspaper dispenser box, knocking them over.

Angry words were exchanged between the occupants of the two cars-and suddenly a torrent of gunfire filled the air.

Then the first vehicle ran the red light, followed by the second, both racing off into the night.

The Fullers' Mercedes-Benz did not move for a couple of minutes, even as the traffic light cycled to green and back to red. Then the car began to roll into the intersection, running the red traffic light and getting struck by an old pickup truck.

The truck did not kill them, although it struck the Mercedes-Benz hard enough to trigger its air bags. The Medical Examiner's Office determined that both mother and daughter had died when struck by multiple hits of single-aught buckshot from a shotgun-or shotguns. The windows of the Mercedes, and certainly the soft fabric of the convertible top, were no match for the fusillade of lead b.a.l.l.s.

The shooters were never caught, despite the extreme pressure Francis Franklin Fuller V placed on everyone from the police department to the offices of the mayor and the governor.

Frustrated, Fuller shortly thereafter announced his new nonprofit organization: "That night, I lost my wife, my child-my family. Sadly, it was a tragedy that could happen to anyone. And those responsible for such harm must be brought to justice and held accountable. To help the police and the justice system do exactly that, today I have established Lex Talionis in honor of my wife and daughter and all other victims in the City of Philadelphia."

He explained that he had funded the organization with an initial endowment of five million dollars. From that, he said, "Lex Talionis will reward ten thousand dollars cash to any individual who provides information that leads to the arrest, conviction, and/or removal from free society of a criminal guilty of murder or attempted murder, rape or other s.e.xually deviant crime, or illicit drug distribution in the City of Philadelphia. Lex Talionis will work with the Philadelphia Police Department and our courts to protect the ident.i.ties of those providing the information, keeping them anonymous."

Every week, usually on Fridays, he ran an announcement restating that message in Philadelphia's newspapers and on its television stations.

"You don't like Fuller?" Amanda Law asked Matt Payne.

"Sometimes I do. And sometimes, not so much," Matt said, turning up the volume. "Here. Let's see what he's saying."

Fuller's voice filled the bedroom: "As my ancestor Benjamin Franklin wrote in the Year of our Lord 1734, 'Where carca.s.ses are, eagles will gather. And where good laws are, much people flock thither.' And so tonight I am personally signing the paperwork for my organization"-he gestured grandly toward the cast-bronze signage listing all his companies that was embedded in the wall behind him, to the line that read LEX TALIONIS, LLC-"to transfer two ten-thousand-dollar rewards into two separate escrow accounts at PNC Bank. These will be payable immediately upon the determination of who is properly responsible for the apprehension of these evildoers."

There was a smattering of loud applause in the background, and the cameras panned to show the people who were clapping outside of the police crime-scene tape.

Matt said, "Looks like Francis has the support of Batman and-what's that other character there that's the supervillain?-the Joker?"

Amanda looked at the screen and made a hmm hmm sound. sound.