Among Thieves (19 page)

It only took a few yards before they were upon the first signs of the massacre. A body lay facedown in the middle of the driveway,
covered with a light sheet. Stone bent down and lifted a corner. “Jimmy Kent,” he said to Sanchez.

“That’s about all the confirmation we need on Ballick,” Sanchez said. “We’ll find him here somewhere.”

“Looks like he was shot in the back. Clean kill would be my guess. Nothing out of the ordinary.”

They could see three other areas of activity outside, one set of lights on both sides of the drive, and a couple of lights
on what looked like a pile of lobster pots at the end of the entryway. The little shack out toward the pier, however, seemed
to be the center of attention. There were half a dozen cops and technicians milling about in and around the doorway. Even
from a distance, some of them looked shaken.

Stone and Sanchez took a brief look at each of the three other bodies outside the shack. They didn’t recognize any of them,
but they all had the same look of thug soldiers. “Whoever did this is good,” Sanchez said.

“I’m not sure ‘good’ is the first word that comes to mind,” Stone replied.

“Skilled, then. Whatever you want to call it, we’re dealing with someone who knows what he’s doing.”

They headed over toward the shack and cut through those loitering outside. No one seemed to want to look them in the eyes.
As they approached the door, Sergeant McAfee stepped outside. “Detectives,” he said. “You’re not gonna believe this. You may
wanna take a minute and get prepared.”

“Like Murphy?” Stone asked.

“Sort of,” McAfee replied. “Only way worse. There are lots of different knives and hooks in there used for gutting, scaling,
and cleaning fish. Motherfucker got creative with his work. We assume it’s Ballick, but it’s gonna take dental records to
be sure. There ain’t much left that’s recognizable. There’s a huge sink in there. That’s where he is. What’s left of him.
Makes it a little cleaner, I guess.”

Stone peered around McAfee inside the shack. He couldn’t see much; there were too many people. He recognized one of them.
He was difficult to miss. He was around six-four and black. “Feds are here,” Stone said to Sanchez.

McAfee nodded. “He got here around the same time we did.”

“How’d he find out about it?” Stone asked.

McAfee shrugged. “Don’t know. Maybe the feds have some sort of newfangled crime detectors they aren’t sharing with us. Could’ve
heard it on the radio, but he would have had to have been listening for it.”

Sanchez stepped into the shack. “Hewitt!” She didn’t quite shout it, but it was close. “Out here!”

Hewitt was standing against the far wall of the shack, staying out of the way, observing the crime scene people as they went
about their business. He stepped around one of them who was on the ground, pulling up some debris and tagging it. “Detective
Sanchez,” he said. He put his hand out.

She ignored the hand. Instead she pushed him toward the door.

“Take it easy, Detective,” he said. His voice was deep and there was a hint of a threat in it. “We’re on the same team.”

“Bullshit,” Sanchez said. “This is my team. I’m in charge here. If you were on my team, I’d know what the hell you’re doing
here. I don’t.”

“I told you last time, at the Body Shop,” Hewitt said. “I’m involved in an organized crime task force. We have to investigate
when connected guys get killed.”

“Bullshit again. Connected guys get killed in this city every day. I’ve never seen you at a crime scene before.”

Hewitt looked uncomfortable. “It’s a recent investigation,” he said. “This may be relevant to it.”

Sanchez put her hands on her hips. “Oh, well, why didn’t you tell me that? What’s the nature of the investigation? If we know
that, then maybe we can help.”

Hewitt’s look went from uncomfortable to pained. “I’d like to, but it’s classified,” he said. “If there was any way…” His
voice trailed off.

“Right,” Sanchez said. “
If there was any way
…. I’ll tell you what, Special Agent Hewitt. You have three choices at this moment. You can tell me what you’re investigating,
and we can work together. You can assert jurisdiction right now, in which case I’ll pull all my people off this. Or you can
file an official request for cooperation through channels. Barring any one of those three, however, I want you to get the
fuck out of my crime scene. I swear to God, if I see you within a hundred yards of any of my investigations, I will arrest
you for obstruction of justice.”

“You wouldn’t,” he scoffed.

“I would. I’m sure the FBI’s Boston office would love another investigation into its operating procedures right now. The last
one went so well.” She stood there with her arms crossed. Stone decided at that moment to try to avoid ever crossing her.

“I’ll file a request for cooperation,” Hewitt said after a moment. He walked past the officers who had gathered around the
scene to watch the show.

“You do that!” Sanchez called after him. “I’ll make sure it gets exactly the consideration it deserves.” Hewitt didn’t turn
around. “I don’t trust them,” she said in a quieter voice.

“The FBI?” Stone asked. “You don’t trust the entire organization?”

She looked at him. “You weren’t here back in the nineties. We had Bulger and his crew nailed a dozen different times, but
the feds tipped him off every time. We’d have the bastard nailed, and then he’d skate. We thought he was clairvoyant. But
no, it turned out that the FBI was crooked. So, no, I don’t trust the entire FBI.”

“That was one agent, though, wasn’t it? John Connolly, and he went to prison for it. You can’t blame the entire organization
for that.”

“John Connolly was the only one caught. He was the only one prosecuted. He was the only one who went to jail. You think he
was the only one involved? How likely is that? He was involved, but no one else in the entire office could figure it out in
more than a decade? C’mon.”

“You really think Hewitt’s mobbed up?” Stone whistled doubtfully. “I ran a check on him; he’s got a solid rep, even with our
people. He doesn’t seem like the type.”

Sanchez looked back up the driveway. Hewitt was nearly to the end of it now. The flashlights had been turned off as the sun
came up, and the property had lost the otherworldly feeling to it. Now the dead men outside had the full edge of reality to
them. “I don’t know. I’m just saying there’s something bad going on here, and I don’t trust them.” She looked up at Stone.
“Now, are you ready to deal with the mess inside?”

Stone nodded.

“Good. Let’s get this done.” She walked back into the building.

As Stone followed her, he took one last look down the driveway. Hewitt had disappeared now. That was for the best, he thought.
Given Sanchez’s opinions, they would never be able to be productive as long as he was there. Still, in his heart, Stone couldn’t
accept the notion that Hewitt and the FBI might be involved.

The morning of Devon’s arraignment, Finn arrived at the office later than usual. He’d dropped Sally off at school, and by
the time he got back to Charlestown, it was nearly nine o’clock. Kozlowski was already cloistered away in his back office
when Finn pushed open the door to the brownstone. Lissa was working at her desk. She looked up to say a quick hello and then
put her nose back into her computer screen.

Finn had a couple of hours before he had to appear with Devon, and he planned to use the time effectively. He had a number
of briefs and motions in other cases he had been neglecting, and he knew that if he didn’t get to them soon, he’d start missing
deadlines. Tardiness was the only true cardinal sin in the judicial system. You could be a terrible lawyer in other respects—you
could mis-cite precedent and fudge facts; lack logic and structure in your arguments; have trouble putting together a competent,
grammatical English sentence—and you’d still receive a fair and reasonable hearing. But heaven help the lawyer who missed
a deadline. For that transgression, the weight of the legal system would land with full force upon the lawyer’s client.

Fortunately, Finn liked writing. Since leaving the world of the mega-firm, he no longer had endless amounts of time to spend
polishing his written work, but he still had a good feel for telling his clients’ stories. His approach was simple: state
relevant facts and apply the appropriate legal principles from the case law in as few words as possible. Judges appreciated
his brevity.

He was shortening a brief in a civil case for one of the few corporate clients he had when the phone rang. He picked it up.
“Finn here,” he said.

“Mr. Finn, this is Detective Stone.”

“Detective,” Finn replied. “What can I do for you?” He tapped away at the keyboard as he spoke, rushing to complete the brief
so that he could get it filed on time.

“We’d like you to come down to the station today to have a talk.”

“We?” Finn was deleting a redundant paragraph and only half paying attention.

“Me and my partner. Any chance you could make it this morning?”

“Today’s a little busy for me,” Finn said honestly. “What’s this about?”

“It’s about Eddie Ballick. We understand you talked to him yesterday.”

“I did.”

“We’d like to know what about.”

Finn was wrapping up the conclusion in his brief, typing out the last few words. “I can’t really talk about that, Detective.
I was doing work for a client.”

“We’d still like you to come down.”

Finn finished the last sentence. He scrolled to the top of the document and started reading it through to make sure it made
sense. “I’m very busy today,” he said. “Why are you interested in my conversation with Ballick?”

“Because he was murdered last night.”

Finn stopped reading the brief. He blinked hard and looked at the phone in his hand. A million questions ran through his head.
He didn’t ask any of them; all he managed to get out of his mouth was a feeble, “What?”

“He was murdered, Mr. Finn,” Stone replied. “What time can we expect you at the station house?”

Finn hung up the phone and leaned back in his chair. He looked over at Lissa, who had overheard his half of the conversation.
“What was that all about?” she asked.

“That was about Eddie Ballick. He was murdered last night. Apparently he b—”

Lissa raised her hand to stop Finn. “Hold on,” she said. “No point in going through this twice.” She stood up and walked to
the door at the back of the office, which led out to both a back door and to Kozlowski’s office. “Koz!” she yelled. “You need
to get in here.” She walked back and sat down at her desk again.

A moment later, Kozlowski emerged. “What’s going on?” he asked.

“That was Detective Stone on the phone.”

“Stone? What did he want?”

“Ballick was murdered last night.”

Kozlowski stopped. He turned and looked at Finn. “That can’t be good.”

“No, I wouldn’t think. They found him early this morning. Four of his boys, too. Stone didn’t give me all the details, but
from the sound of it, it wasn’t pretty.”

Kozlowski sat on the chair in front of Finn’s desk. “What are you going to do?”

“I put them off; told them I was too busy today, and that I’d get back to them as soon as I could. Devon’s being arraigned
this morning.”

“You think he’s caught up in all this?”

“If not, it seems like one hell of a coincidence. Either way, I want to have a long talk with Devon before I deal with the
police. And that talk will be a lot easier to have once he’s out on bail.”

The courthouse was a twenty-story slab of gray concrete in Center Square, downtown. It was cut in an unadorned, utilitarian
style that seemed calculated to betray the mechanical nature of the judicial system.

Finn parked in a nearby underground garage and entered the building, flashing his bar card at the door to bypass the line
of civilians waiting to pass through the metal detectors. He went straight to the courtroom and inquired about Devon’s whereabouts
from the clerk. She told him his client was in transit, and that he wouldn’t have time to meet before the hearing. That was
frustrating; he had much to discuss with Devon.