Exceptional Merit (16 page)

Castillo parked in Keegan's spot and entered Federal Plaza.  He went to the office of the Joint Terrorist Task Force.  He had been directed by one of the detectives in the squad room to the office of Captain Anderson.  He took out a phony identification card that he was authorized to carry for such investigations as this one.  He clipped the I.D. card to his shirt pocket and knocked on Captain Anderson's door.  “How are you doing Captain, I'm Lieutenant Monet from Quality Assurance Division.  I'm here to do a spot check of clerical records.”

Captain Anderson always kept good records and didn't have anything to fear whenever any internal department units came to inspect his logs.

“You have my full cooperation Lieutenant.  What would you like to see?”

“Just your sign-in log to make sure everyone that is supposed to be here is accounted for.”

Anderson handed Castillo the log and he quickly scanned it, noting James Keegan's signature signing him out for the night at 2045 hours. 
Three hours L/T
, the department’s shorthand for lost time scribbled next to his name.  At least Castillo knew that Keegan had left for the night and was not in the field.  Now he didn't have to waste his time waiting for Keegan to return to the office.  Castillo handed the log back to Captain Anderson.  “Thank you Captain, everything seems to be in order.”

Anderson thought it was weird that the Lieutenant conducted such a short inspection but the shorter the better he figured.  After Castillo walked out of the office, Anderson looked over the log himself to make sure there was nothing inappropriate that could have been spotted.  Anderson was satisfied that everything was in order and never gave it a second thought.

Castillo went back to his nondescript department auto and started it up.  He didn't know where Keegan had gone but his only shot would be to see if he was at McBride's.  Castillo drove to McBride's wondering if he would find him there or if he had possibly left work early to go home.  Castillo had the feeling he would find Keegan at the bar.  As Castillo drove along Third Avenue, he observed Keegan's unmarked department auto parked directly in front of McBride's.

A smile came across Castillo's face as he looked for a parking spot of his own.  Once he found one, he made sure to take his camera book with him, hoping to catch Keegan on film doing something incriminating.  Castillo was excited.  He felt this would be the night he could make his case against Keegan.  Keegan hadn't been here in about a month so there had to be a reason he was back tonight.

Castillo entered the bar scanning the patrons for Keegan.  He wasn't at the bar where he had been last time.  It took about five minutes or so for Castillo to locate him.  How ironic, Castillo thought to himself.  Keegan was seated in the same booth Castillo had been in last time they were here.  He was sitting there with a much younger man.  Keegan looked uncomfortable, a look unfamiliar to him.  Castillo saw the two men were talking and wished he could hear what they were saying.  There was no way he'd be able to hear them over the music, even if he was sitting at the table right next to them.  Castillo tried not to stare at the men as he was waiting for the hostess to seat him.

Castillo was seated three tables away.  He sat in a way that he could keep both men under discreet observation.  Castillo held the camera up to eye level and snapped a couple of pictures of each man individually and an additional few of them both in the same photo.  When Nora came over to his table, he politely diverted his attention to her and ordered a beer, offering a smile in the process.

As soon as she walked away, he returned his attentions back to Keegan and this mystery man.  Castillo saw the man was shifting uncomfortably under the table and Castillo couldn't tell what was going on.  Castillo couldn't see the man's hands and wondered what he was doing.  It was odd to be seated at a table, yet keeping your hands under the table the majority of the time.  Nora returned with Castillo's beer and put it down on top of a napkin.

After a few moments of idle conversation, the man who had been introduced as Sean Murphy got to the heart of the matter.  Flynn looked down at the floor where Keegan had set the duffle bag.  “So now Mr. Keegan, I understand you brought something for me.  Would you mind handin
’ it over?”

“Yes I have, but first I need to know what you plan on doing here in the United States of America that would require the need of gun?”

Keegan had a right to know exactly what he was getting himself involved with.  Could it be the man simply needed to protect himself while he was stateside?  Keegan had no idea who this man was.  It was possible that he has been in America before and has made some enemies.  Keegan could live with the idea that he needed to protect himself.

“Mr. Keegan, I don't believe that's your concern.  That's me own business.  Your business is to get the gun for me.  It’s not that hard, is it?”

Keegan was growing agitated.  He was used to getting answers to the questions he asked, when he asked them.  He recognized the hard look in the man's eyes but he had success fully interrogated men much harder than the man seated in front of him.  “Sean, do you know what my job is here?  Do you?”

Keegan decided a soft approach would be the best way to start.  If he needed to get tough, he would but he didn’t think that would be the case.  After all, they were on the same side and once he realized that Keegan was a well respected and influential police lieutenant, he wouldn’t want any problems from him.

“No Mr. Keegan, I don't.  But I also don't give a rat’s arse.  I have a job to do and I plan on doing it.  With or without your help, see.”

Keegan wasn't making much progress but he didn't let up.  “Listen, I'm a police officer in charge of anti–terrorism here in New York City.  I have no intentions of interfering with you but I still must insist on knowing what you plan on doing before I put a gun in your hands.”

Flynn pulled a cigarette from the pack with his lips.  He looked Keegan in the eyes as he lit up.  He took in a deliberately slow and deep drag and blew the smoke in Keegan's face.  He was not intimidated by Keegan in the slightest.  As Gerald Flynn, he had numerous encounters with the police and never backed down from them.  As Sean Murphy, it would be no different.

“Mr. Keegan, all I plan on telling you is that it's a legitimate target.  That is all that you need to know.”

“
A legitimate target!?”

Keegan shook his head.  He could feel the angst building up inside him.  Keegan began to lecture him.  “You plan on killing someone…here in America?  Listen Sean, I demand you tell me who and what you are talking about!  I could lose my job if I was connected in any way to a murder.  Do you understand that?”

“I don't give a damn about your job, your country or you.  Do
you
understand
that?
  Me only concern is to further the cause of freedom for Ireland.  I have a job to do and, rest assured, it will be done with or without your help.  If you plan on helping me, give me what you came here to give me.  If you don’t, then be on your way.  But Mr. Keegan, or should I say Officer Keegan, don't get in me way.  Dan seems to think highly of ya.  I’d hate for him to have one less mate.”

Flynn was not intimidated in the slightest by Keegan.  He was almost bored by him.  He was thinking more of his chances of bedding the waitress tonight than his current encounter with the police officer.

Keegan could sense the man’s arrogance and indifference towards him.  There was a feeling of fear that came over Keegan.  He wasn't used to being afraid of anyone or anything for that matter.  There was just something about the man.  Maybe the hardness in his eyes, or maybe his demeanor, but whatever it was, he was intimidated for the first time in a very long time.

Keegan was used to dealing with street punks over the course of his career.  This guy was no ordinary street punk, however.  After taking another drag of the cigarette, he once again discarded the smoke into Keegan's face.  “Well what's it going to be Mr. Keegan?  I haven’t all night to waste me time with you.”

Keegan waved his hand, dissipating the smoke and softly coughed.  He pushed the duffel bag over, not sure why he was doing it.  “Here, this is what you wanted.”

Flynn accepted the duffel bag and its contents.  He brought the bag down to the seat next to him, unzipped the bag and looked inside.  He removed the gun from the bag, careful to keep it under the table so nobody else in the bar would see it.  He pressed the magazine release, dropping the magazine into his hand.  With his thumb he felt the familiar feel of a copper jacketed round in the magazine.  Now he knew the gun was already loaded.  He inserted the magazine back into the pistol.

Keegan wondered what Murphy was doing.  Why was he keeping his hands under the table?  Then Keegan recognized the familiar sound of an automatic handgun chambering a round.  What the hell is he thinking?  The guy was not only dangerous but he was also reckless, Keegan determined.  He had nerves of steel but it certainly was not the smartest thing to do.  The bar was packed.  There are people everywhere.

Keegan’s mind was racing in different directions.  Why would he feel the need to load it right here, right now? 
Is his target here in the bar with us?
 
What if someone noticed and called the police on him?  What if Castillo had followed him here and was watching us right now?
  Keegan became extremely nervous and looked around to see if anybody had been watching.  The Irishman shifted his body.  Keegan figured him to be putting the gun in his waistband.  At least he was not about to shoot someone right here, Keegan assured himself.

Nora caught Keegan's eye as he was scanning the crowd.  She was bent over a table, serving a patron his beer.  Keegan recognized the man instantly.  It was the same man he had seen last month that he thought had been watching him.  The man was once again reading a book, just like he had been doing last month.  Keegan figured he could be a regular at the bar that he had never come to notice.  The man seemed to be staring in their direction a moment ago but he wasn't sure.  Keegan became anxious.  The man would fit the mold he figured Castillo to be.  He wasn't Irish, or at least he didn't appear to be.  He was about thirty years old and was sitting alone in a bar on a Friday night.  If he was just a regular guy trying to meet women he'd be hanging out at the bar, not at a table in the back.

Keegan excused himself and got up making his way back to the bar.  Once he got to the bar, he again got Dan O'Brien's attention.  “Dan, do you see that man sitting at the table by himself, the one wearing glasses and reading a book?”

‘Yeah Jim, I see 'em.”

“Do you know him?  Is he a regular in here?”

Keegan hoping the answer was yes.

It wasn’t.  “No Jim, I've never seen him in here before.”

Keegan felt his heart pound heavy against his chest.  Was he Castillo or was Keegan being paranoid yet again?  Keegan now studied the man as he read his book.  The man never looked up from the book but Keegan had an uneasy feeling about him.  “Dan I think he might be the one I was warned about.  Would you help me with something?”

“Of course I would, Jim.  If he’s a problem for you, he is also a problem for me.”

“Can you call the waitress over here?  I'm going to need her for this.”

Keegan wrote a message on a cocktail napkin at the bar.

“No problem Jim.”

O'Brien signaled for Nora to come over to the bar area.

Nora walked over to the bar to see what O'Brien wanted.  After making sure the man was not watching him, Keegan handed Nora the napkin and explained what he wanted her to do.  Keegan thanked both O'Brien and the waitress and made his way back to the table where Flynn was still seated.  Keegan sat back down opposite him.

“Miss me?”  His initial fear of the Irishman had given way.  He was no longer Keegan’s main concern.  If the man with the book was in fact an internal affairs cop watching him, then that danger is more imminent to Keegan than whatever the hit man had planned.  Flynn didn’t even bother to respond.  He emptied the remaining nine millimeter rounds from the box and put them into his inside jacket pocket.  He passed the now empty duffel bag back to Keegan.  Keegan accepted the bag but his attention was fully on the man he suspected to be Castillo.

The man had been looking but then quickly looked away.  His didn’t know if his plan would tell him for sure that the man was Castillo, but it might.  At worst, the bookworm wouldn't understand what was going on.  There was nothing Keegan could do now except wait and watch.

Castillo hoped Keegan didn't notice him staring in his direction a couple of times.  Castillo rationalized to
himself; there would be no reason for Keegan to expect anybody to be watching him.  Castillo was very interested in what was going on at the bar when Keegan walked away but he felt Keegan's eyes burning on him so he didn't dare look up.  Castillo kept his nose in the book pretending to read it.  He would turn a page every so often to keep up appearances in case anyone was watching closely.  He was cautious not to expose any of the mechanical devices in the book that would indicate to someone that he was really holding a camera.

When Keegan rejoined the young man at the table, Castillo looked up for a moment in time to see the man hand Keegan a duffel bag.  Castillo desperately wanted a look inside the bag, thinking it could be the piece of evidence that he would need to nail Keegan once and for all.  He studied the bag.  It didn't appear to be heavy at all.  Castillo wondered what could possibly be in it except maybe cash.  The bag could contain a payoff of some sort.