STATE OF ANGER: A Virgil Jones Mystery Series (Detective Virgil Jones Mystery Series Book 1) (3 page)

4

__________

V
irgil
was not a believer in God, at least in the traditional sense. If pressed, he’d
admit that he believed in something bigger than life…something bigger than
himself, but he’d also be the first to admit it was something he couldn’t quite
define. He’d been raised catholic but it hadn’t stuck and by the time he’d
turned eighteen—more than twenty years ago—he’d never gone back to
church at all except for weddings and funerals.
And
, he was hitting the
age where he’d begun to notice there were less of the former and more of the
latter.

It seemed to Virgil that almost everyone
believed all they had to do was talk to God, ask for their prayers to be
answered—which really, he thought, amounted to nothing more than asking
for
stuff
—and then God, in His wisdom, would either grant your
request or not. The whole concept seemed kind of selfish. A little too…feel
good. Like comfort food. The idea that groups of people would get together once
or twice a week and listen while someone stood on stage and waved a book at
them and told them how to live their lives seemed very…republican. Like it didn’t
matter if you waved the book or waved the flag, in the end it was all pretty
much the same.
Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition.

So. Virgil was a believer of
something. What that something might be was just a little hard to pin down. But
believer or not, over the last eight minutes since he’d heard Sandy on the
radio, he had to admit he’d been talking to someone, asking…
praying,
that she wasn’t hurt.

When he finally rolled up to the
scene and saw her working on Jerry Burns, saw her physically okay, he felt like
his prayers had been answered.

And wasn’t that, Virgil thought,
just a kick in the nut sack of belief.

__________

He slid his truck to a stop at the
south intersection, almost a half block away. It was as close as he could get.
It looked like every cop car in the city had converged on the scene. He flashed
his ID to the city cop and ran through. Sandy had moved over and was sitting
down on the curb across the street from the trooper, her head down, her hands
in her hair. Virgil didn’t know who had the overnight duty so he didn’t know who
the trooper was, but even as he ran he could tell it wasn’t good. He looked up
and saw two news helicopters circling overhead, and when he crossed the street
he saw the fallen trooper was Jerry Burns and that fact made something click in
his chest. Jerry had been Virgil’s training officer when he joined the State
Police.

After a few seconds of reflection
Virgil walked over to Sandy and squatted in front of her and noticed the blood
on her shirt and in her hair. “Jesus, Sandy, are you hurt? Are you hit?”

Sandy shook her head, then leaned
into him, her arms around Virgil’s neck. He felt her shake and sob into his
chest. “I’m…I’m all right. Not hit.” She pulled back and rubbed her eyes, then
tried to wipe the blood out of her hair. “It’s Jerry’s blood. It’s in my hair.
I was trying…I was trying to do CPR.”

Virgil looked at her and for just
a moment he wanted to scoop her up and take her home. Get her cleaned up.
Wanted to take care of her. The blood was everywhere…in her hair, on her shirt,
her hands, her face. He tried to wipe some of it from her cheek, but it was
useless. He turned toward the EMT’s and motioned them over, then turned back to
Sandy. “Where’s the governor, Sandy?”

She didn’t answer right away and
he had to ask her again. She pulled her hair away from her face streaking it
with more blood in the process. “He’s, uh, still inside, I guess. Hasn’t left
yet.”

“Stay here. Do not move.
Understand?”

She nodded and Virgil went over and
grabbed one of the city cops, a guy named Cauliffer, according to his nametag.
“Officer Cauliffer, my name is Detective Virgil Jones, with the State Police.”

“Yeah,” Cauliffer said. I know who
you are. “You’re the guy—“

Virgil cut him off. “Listen,
Cauliffer, go secure the governor. He’s inside his house. Keep him there.”

Cauliffer let his face form a
question. “Sir?”

“Go, Cauliffer. Keep him the house.
Stay right by his side. I don’t care what he’s doing, you stay right with him.
If he’s in there taking his morning dump, I want you standing ready with a roll
of toilet paper. You got me?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good. Go. Now.”

Cauliffer took off toward the
mansion and Virgil went back to Sandy. “What the hell happened?”

Sandy shook her head. “The hell if
I know.”

“Are you sure you’re not hurt?”

“I don’t know. I hit my head
really hard getting Burns out of the car.” She blew a deep breath out of her
mouth. “Jesus, Jonesy, half his head is gone. I mean it’s Jerry. Who’d have
ever thought something like this could happen to Jerry?”

“I know, I know, but listen, it’s
okay. You did good. Did everything you could. Do you have anything? Anything at
all?”

“Nothing really. I saw a white
cargo van just turning westbound from the south corner as I came out of the
gate. Couldn’t get the plate. Couldn’t even tell you the make of the van.
Chevy, maybe? Or GMC. It had the tall taillights at the top. It was just a
glimpse. They were already gone, you know?”

“Okay. But it was a van? You’re
sure of that?”

“Yeah. White cargo van. Like a
delivery van or something.”

“Okay. Sit still. I’m going to get
the medics to look you over.”

“I don’t need any of that. Let me
work this with you.”

“It’s not a request, Sandy. They’re
going to look at you.” Virgil stood up. “I’ll be right back.” He reached for
his phone before realizing it was still in the truck. He jogged back down to
where he’d parked a few minutes ago and the phone was ringing when he got
there. The caller ID showed a blocked number. He hit the button. “Jonesy.”

“Uh, Detective Jones? This is
Cauliffer, up at the house? The governor’s? He gave me your number.”

“Yeah, Cauliffer, what is it?”

“Well, you think you could come up
here for a minute?”

“Why?”

“It’s the governor. He’s pretty
pissed that I won’t let him out of the house.”

Virgil could hear the governor in
the background and realized Cauliffer was right. He did sound pissed. “All right.
Just sit on him for a minute. I’ll be right there.” Virgil pressed the end
button then hit the speed dial for his boss, Cora.

She answered immediately. “What
the hell’s happening, Jonesy?”

“Ah, we’ve got a hell of a mess is
what’s happening. You better get out here. Be nice if you could handle the
politics for me.”

“Turn around, Slick.”

Virgil turned and saw Cora walking
toward him. He hit the end button and stuck the phone in his pocket. At
fifty-two years old, Cora stood little more than five feet tall, carried about
twenty extra pounds, was dark skinned and kept her salt and pepper hair high
and tight like a man. She began her career as an Indianapolis Metro patrol cop
and the stories of her days on a foot beat are legendary. She once found
herself cornered by three gangbangers jacked on meth in an abandoned warehouse.
When they closed ranks to take her down, she left her gun in its holster and
instead took her nightstick from the chrome loop on her belt and proceeded to
offer a free demonstration on the quality of hand-to-hand combat training
offered by the Indiana Police Academy. When it was over she shook a cigarette
out of her pack, lit up, and stood over them, the ashes from her cigarette
scattered around their broken limbs and bloodied faces. She finished her smoke
before she called for EMS on the radio. No one messed with Cora LaRue more than
once, and only then at their own peril.

She walked up and put her hands on
her hips. “Jesus Christ. I heard it’s Jerry Burns.”

“Yeah,” Virgil said. “I don’t
believe it.”

“All right, I’m going to go up and
talk to the governor. Get this scene locked down, then come up and join me,
will you?”

“You bet.”

“Jerry Burns. Who’d have ever
thought…”

5

__________

T
he
Sids sat across from each other at their kitchen table; Senior lost in thought,
Junior amped from the adrenaline rush.

“I still think we could do them
all,” Junior said. “I want to do them all.”

“We’ve been over this before. It’s
too risky.”

Junior’s hand slapped the table. Hard.
“Then what the fuck did I drive all the way up there for? Answer that for me,
will you? An entire week of surveillance in that God forsaken shithole of a
town and now you want to just let it go? Who retires to Osceola anyway?”

Senior sucked in his cheeks. Maybe
he’d trained his child too well. Or too hard. Sid Jr. could be a handful for
sure. Junior wanted it all, and anything less than that would be considered a
failure. Sid Sr. shook his head then pointed at the map on the table. “Look,
everyone else is either right here in Indy or within fifty miles. He’s the only
one that’s out of the area. You want to blow the whole deal over one guy?”

Junior didn’t answer. “You’re
turning chicken shit on me, aren’t you?”

Senior pointed a finger at her. “Chicken
shit my ass. Did it look chicken shit to you when that trooper’s melon popped?
And don’t you talk to me that way.”

“It was pretty good shootin’, I’ll
give you that,” Junior said. “But listen, we may have a little problem.”

“What?”

“I lost some brass.”

This time it was Senior who
slapped the table. “God damn, girl. That could be a problem, right there.”

“No, no, listen. I think it’s
okay. It’s not good, but I’m not printed anywhere and neither are you, so if
they find it, and they probably won’t, what good can it do them?”

“Ah, they’ll find it,” Senior
said. “We killed a cop. There’s no way they won’t find it.”

“I still think it’s okay. They
don’t know to look for it. We fired four shots total, right? Yours, and my
three. I picked up two, but the third was hot. That’s how I lost it. Slipped right
out of my hand and rolled down the storm drain. Unless they pull the grate and
look in there…”she let it hang, like she was trying to convince herself. “Besides,
you know the cops aren’t all that smart to begin with. Hell, half the time they
can’t find their own ass with a GPS, a flashlight and a how-to video.”

“It’s not the cops, though, don’t
you get it? If the cops don’t catch us in the act we’re probably okay. But
those fucking crime scene techs? They scare me. They can figure some shit out.”

“Ah, that’s a bunch of TV
bullshit. We’re not printed anywhere, so all they could do is hang us after the
fact anyway, and if it comes to that, it won’t make much of a difference. It’ll
be fuck you very much and good-bye, know what I mean?”

They bantered back and forth like
that for a bit before they got back to work, checking their gear, loading their
supplies for the next run, but all the while, somewhere in the recesses of
Senior’s mind, he heard himself say it wasn’t too late to back it down, to toss
the whole thing in the shitter and flush it away like a bad memory. But he
wasn’t really listening to himself and so in the end he never really heard. It
was too bad for that cop, no doubt about it, but it really was the only way—the
banker had to go.

They still had another one to do
later today. By tonight the city would be shocked. By tomorrow they’d be
worried. By the end of the week they’d be shit-faced with panic.

And this was just the beginning.

6

__________

A
not-so-short walk brought Virgil up to the side entrance of the governor’s
mansion. He entered without knocking, stepped through a short service hallway, and
then turned a corner into the kitchen. The governor’s chief of staff, Bradley
Pearson was already there along with the governor, and Officer Cauliffer.
Virgil pulled out a chair and sat down. “Morning Governor,” he said by way of a
greeting.

“Jonesy,” the governor said. “What
do we know so far?” Then, without waiting for an answer, “And perhaps we should
excuse Officer Cauliflower here.”

Cauliffer reddened. “It’s, uh,
Cauliffer sir.”

The governor tipped his head
sideways and closed one eye. “Yes, of course. Sorry. Cauliffer. Got it.”

When Virgil caught Cauliffer’s
eyes he gave him a nod that said, ‘you’re done in here.’ Cauliffer gave him a
look back that said all at once, ‘got it’ and ‘thank God’ then went back
outside.

The governor looked at Cora. “Is
Sandy out there? Is she hurt?”

Virgil thought,
hmm
. Cora spoke
to the governor, but her eyes were on Virgil. “She’s fine, Governor. But
Trooper Burns is dead, along with your neighbor directly across the street.”

The governor’s jaw muscles were clenched
tight. “Yes, I know. It’s all over my Blackberry already.” He held his phone up
and wiggled it in the air, then tossed it on the counter. Governor Hewitt
McConnell was ex-military and looked it. Tall, hard and lean with a military
buzz cut, slightly gray at the temples, clear blue eyes and a salt and pepper
goatee he wore off and on. Today it was on. The gray in his hair and beard
contrasted perfectly against his black over black three-piece suit. Pearson,
his chief of staff, was the polar opposite. Narrow shoulders, a soft stomach
that strained the buttons on his wrinkled shirt, and a polyester suit that
looked capable of surviving nuclear devastation. His hair was drug store bottle
black but left gray along the sides. The common consensus held that he was
trying for Mitt Romney, but the reality was he looked more like Pauley Walnuts
from the Sopranos.

“Jonesy, ever hear of a guy named
Samuel Pate?” Pearson asked.

Samuel Pate was something of a
minor celebrity in our state, a televangelist who somehow managed to attain an
impressive measure of financial success over a very short period of time despite
of his lack of education, verifiable credentials, and physical shortcomings. Or
perhaps because of them. “Sermon Sam, the Preacher Man? Sure, who hasn’t?” Virgil
said. “Why do you ask?”

“What do you know about Sunrise
Bank? Do you have an account there, or know anyone who works at their
institution?”

“That’s three questions in a row. Which
would you like me to answer? And why does it suddenly feel like I’m the only
one in the room who doesn’t know what’s going on here?”

The governor caught the
frustration in Virgil’s tone and held up his hand in a peaceful manner before
speaking. “You’ll have to forgive Bradley, Detective. At times I think he
wishes he had chosen a career in law enforcement. Or maybe it’s my fault. I
often let him ask the difficult questions for me.”

“Maybe if we started at the
beginning,” Cora said.

Pearson let out a heavy sigh, and
then started over. “We don’t think this attack, these murders…we don’t think
the governor was targeted. At all. We want to be clear on that. There may be
political implications, and we’d like it handled in a manner befitting the
office of the Governor of the State of Indiana.”

Virgil didn’t like Bradley Pearson,
and knew of few people who did. “I’m not sure what that means, Bradley. And who
exactly is Franklin Dugan? The name rings a bell, but I can’t quite place it.”

“He is, I mean was, the President
of Sunrise Bank,” the Governor said. “He was also one of my closest friends.” Pearson
had a look on his face, his expression indicating there was more. The Governor
seemed to notice too, because he puffed out his cheeks, exhaled loudly through
his mouth and said, “He was also one of my biggest campaign contributors.”

“I want you to catch this son of a
bitch, Jonesy,” the governor said. “Or kill him. Sooner the better. Elections
are only nine months away and voters have a memory for this kind of thing.”

“Especially if your platform was a
reduction in capitol crime,” Cora added. Sort of dry.

Virgil winced when she said it,
but the governor just pointed a finger at her and said, “Exactly.” He stood, shot
his cuffs and made a circular motion with his hand at Pearson. “Cora will fill
you in on the details, Jonesy. I appreciate your efforts. You’re sure Sandy’s
okay?”

“Yes, sir, I think so.” He thought,
hmm
, again.

The governor shook his head and
looked at no one. Then to Pearson: “Where’s officer Cauliflower? Perhaps he can
clear us a path out of here so we can get downtown.”

__________

Ten seconds later Pearson stuck
his head back in. “Uh, I just want to be sure we’re clear on something. The governor,
when he said ‘catch him or kill him’…what he was really saying was ‘catch him.’
Just so we’re clear on that, okay?”

__________

Once Pearson was finally gone,
Virgil looked at Cora and said, “What aren’t they saying?”

“You never answered Pearson’s
question. What do you know about Sunrise Bank?”

“What’s to know? They’re a bank,
just like any other, aren’t they?”

Cora pursed her lips. “In many
ways, they are. But did you know that there’s a bank up in the northern part of
the state—I can’t remember the name—but they’re based out of South
Bend. Strictly local, people walk in and out all day and deposit their checks,
take out loans, the whole thing. Just a regular local bank,
but
, they
also happen to be the third largest specialty financer in the entire country. Garbage
trucks, rental cars, aircraft for regional air carriers, the works. If it runs
or flies, they’ve got their hand in it.”

“Fascinating stuff, Cora, really. But
what does that have to do with Sunrise or Dugan?”

“Care to guess where Pate’s
ministry does their banking?”

“So like the bank up in South
Bend, Sunrise does specialty financing, right?”

“You got it, Jones man. And it’s
big business, at least according to the governor. We’re talking billions of
dollars in outstanding loans to religious institutions all across the country. Big,
big stuff.”

Virgil thought about that for a
few minutes. “If they’re doing that much business, what’s the tie-in with Pate?
He’s regional at best. Why has his name come up?”

“Pate just borrowed over five
million dollars from Dugan’s bank to buy a run down church in Broad Ripple.”

“Maybe I’m not quite the detective
I think I am, because I still don’t see how that would make Pate a suspect.”

“Maybe you should go over to
Dugan’s office and look things over. You’ll probably revise your last statement
after you do. I’ve attached his office as part of the crime scene and I sent
Rosencrantz and Donatti over there as soon as I heard what happened out here.
They’ve got his office locked down and are personally standing guard outside
until you get there. There are only two things on Dugan’s desk. One is a copy
of Pate’s financials and the other is a copy of a Texas Department of Insurance
investigator’s report. They have an open file on him. He started his ministry there
five years ago with the proceeds from an insurance claim that paid out over a
million bucks when his Houston church turned to a pile of ash one night. He
brought the money here and set up shop all over again. He calls it Grace
Community Church, and it’s mortgaged to the hilt.

“And the church over in Broad
Ripple? The one he just bought? It looks like it’s being held together with
baling twine. I think they have a congregation of about thirty people, all dirt
poor. The building is about to be condemned by the city, the lot can’t be worth
more than about fifty grand and the victim, Franklin Dugan is the one who
approved the loan to Pate. He’s also the guy who financed the vast majority of
the governor’s campaign when he ran for office. Word on the street is ol’ Sermon
Sam is thinking about making a run at the governor’s chair. A quick five
million would make a nice campaign starter fund, don’t you think? Maybe Dugan
was playing both ends against the middle.”

Then, as if she hadn’t quite made
her point clearly enough, she added, “Politics. It’s good stuff, huh? By the
way, Rosencrantz says the bank is calling an emergency board meeting. Should be
starting anytime now. You might want to stop by at some point. When you get
there, ask for Margery Brennan. She’s Dugan’s secretary, or personal assistant
or whatever they’re called these days. Keep me in the loop, will you?”

__________

Virgil walked outside and back
down to the street and saw Sandy at the back of an EMS van getting her blood
pressure checked. The two news helicopters still circled overhead, their news
feeds streaming live video of the scene, though there wasn’t much to be seen
from the air. The crime scene technicians had erected two tents with side-flaps,
one covering Dugan’s body at the end of his drive, the other over the top of Trooper
Burns and his squad car. Virgil estimated a total of about fifty uniformed
officers on the scene from all three jurisdictions, City, County, and State.
Metro Homicide would be in charge of the scene, and Virgil’s team, while
technically over the Metro Homicide Task Force, would do what they did best:
work the fringes, the areas outside of normal investigative procedures.

Virgil got to Sandy just as the
paramedics were finishing up. “How you doin?”

“I’m okay. Jesus, what a mess,
huh?”

“That about says it. So, you’ve
had a little while to think about it. Give me something I can use.”

The paramedic interrupted. “If it
can wait, I’d like to get her downtown. Her blood pressure is off the charts. I
mean way up, and so is her pulse. You said you bumped your head, Miss?”

Sandy shot the medic a look. “It’s
Detective. And yes, I bumped my head, but it’s no big deal. I’m fine.”

“Nevertheless, we’ve got to have
you looked at. You may be concussed. The docs will know for sure.”

Sandy turned away from the
paramedic. “Jonesy, can you do something about this?”

“I sure can. See you at the
hospital.”

“Jonesy.”

“No way, Sandy. You’re going.
That’s a direct order.”

“Okay, okay. But listen, before I
do, you said you wanted something you could use. I think we’ve got two
shooters, both with silenced weapons. The shots were muffled, like a quiet
backfire from a car engine. Not even that loud really. The loudest thing I
heard was the ratcheting cycle after the shots. If it wasn’t for that, I might
not have even thought they were shots at all, you know?”

“Why two shooters?”

“Well, it’s the sequence. I’ve
been going over it in my head. First I heard a pop, then another pop before I
heard the cycle action. Then there were two more pops closer together and two
fast ratcheting sounds. So that means one shot from something, a rifle maybe,
that doesn’t cycle. Something with a bolt action? I’ll tell you something else
too, the more I think about it, the more I’m convinced that the first pop
sounded different—quieter—than the rest. So, two victims, two guns,
two shooters, right?”

“Sounds right. But, you know, if
you heard it wrong, missed the first ratchet because you weren’t listening for
it…”

“No, I wondered about that. But I
didn’t miss it. It was quiet this morning. I was quiet. And I was close.”

“Okay. You can write it up later.
Right now you’re going in to get checked out.”

She raised her eyebrow at him,
then let it go. “You think this is about the governor?”

“Have you met Pearson yet?” Virgil
said.

“The governor’s chief of staff?
Yeah, we met a few days ago. Hell of a guy.”

“He is. Anyway, McConnell and
Pearson made it clear this had nothing to do with them, or at least they don’t
want it to look like it did.”

“And you think different?”

“I like to keep an open mind. The
governor asked about you, by the way.”

“Yeah?” Sandy said.

“Yeah. Twice. Say, I didn’t see
Mrs. McConnell up at the house. Where’s she?”

Sandy let her eyelids drop a
quarter inch. “She’s been out of town for the last few days. Sister in Oregon,
I think. Something like that.”

“I see.”

“I don’t think you do, Jonesy.”

Virgil bit the inside corner of
his lower lip, then said, “Get checked out, Small. You did good. Really.”

Sandy just stared at him.

__________

Virgil looked around until he saw
Metro Homicide’s lead detective, Ron Miles, speaking with one of the crime
scene techs just outside the tent covering Dugan’s body. Ron’s white hair was
mussed out of place and he kept running his hand over it, trying to flatten it
to the top of his head. The knees on his pants were covered in dirt and grime.

“Sorry about Burns, Jonesy.
Somebody told me he was your training officer?”

“Yeah, he was.”

“So, the state getting in on
this?”

“Yeah, something like that,”
Virgil said. “McConnell wants us to take a peek. See if we can get in front of
it sort of quick. We’ll probably just shadow you guys. See what we can see.”

“In other words, we do all the
work and you guys get all the credit.”

“Nope. You can have the credit. Like
I said, we just want to try to get in front of it, if we can.”