Chapter 7

Craig had expected that there would be more thunderbolts headed his way after he finished writing up the Mahoney shooting as clean, if not from Gaffney, then certainly from IID. But there was no real fallout from it, at least not right away.

Mike and Meldrick seemed to get through the next few days relatively calmly. The coldness that had been in Mike's affect dissipated, and he was a lot friendlier to Craig then he'd been since joining the unit. He had gone to see Stivers a couple of times in the next few days to make sure she was going to come out all right. She admitted to him that she'd been feeling a little shaky physically, but was starting to feel a bit better.

Worden had actually begun to think that he might have gone through the most difficult case that he'd have to deal with when he joined Homicide. By this point, however, he should've known that far worse things were about to approach.

It certainly started innocuously enough, though. They were on the late shift, and Pembleton, of all people had just finished regaling the unit with a story of people in Kentucky falling prey to death by a machine that made cole slaw.

"Since when did you start doing Munch's job?" he found himself asking.

John didn't seem to mind, and in fact complimented Frank on his delivery.

"Well, if that's the case, John, what are we going to need you for?" Howard piped up.

"Police work."

Gee just happened to be walking through the squad. "Police work?"

"So, there's a bit of red under my name. Things will clear up eventually."

At that moment, the phone rang. Frank picked it up, even though he had just caught and closed a murder less than twelve hours ago. He looked around. "Where's Bayliss?"

It was a valid question. Apparently Bayliss' disappearance the day Mahoney had been shot had not been an anomaly. It seemed that half the time Bayliss was out of the squad, and when he returned, he would offered half-assed excuses and always seem a little distracted.

"What is it. Frank?" Giardello asked.

"There's a dead body in Hampton," Frank told them. "Apparently, uniforms have the suspect pinned down."

"A dunker? Give it to Detective Munch," John said.

"Why should I hand you a closed case?" Frank asked.

"Consider it your good deed for 1997." Craig told him. "You hand him an easy case, I won't have to hear him bitch about his clearance rate for the next two weeks."

Pembleton seemed to be considering this for a few moments. "All right," he said. "But you've got to lend me your partner."

This clearly came as a shock to everybody in the squad, not the least of whom was Craig himself. "May I be so bold as to ask why?" Munch replied.

"Suspect was last seen heading towards the main building of the African Revival Movement." Pembleton was already walking to the closest to get his coat and fedora. "There's a decent possibility we're going to need to do a fairly thorough search in order to bring him out. We're going to need manpower."

"Just try not to dent him, Frank. I'm still got to need him to help me with the Jimenez case when this is done." Munch said. "I take it I'm handling the dead body."

"You always get the easy stuff. You get spend time with Dr. Cox, I have to deal with house to house searches."

"How much do you know about the ARM?" Pembleton asked as they were driving to their headquarters.

"Only what I hear on the morning talk shows," Worden admitted. "Their founder, Burundi Robinson, has been building an organization to try and help the unfortunate in Baltimore the last few years. He runs a soup kitchen, a drug rehab center, and a couple of major day care centers."

"Seems to be the model of a community leader." Frank said, thinking to himself. "So why would a murderer run into his building?'

"First of all, until we actually have him in custody, and he's confessed, we can't even really call him a suspect." Craig reminded him. "Second of all, you're from New York. You hear about this kind of thing all time. Suspect doesn't think he'll get a fair shake from the establishment, he runs into his church. Robinson's no deacon, but his whole organization does sound like the kind of place a man might run."

"I'm hoping its as simple as that," Pembleton told him. "Gee was not happy when I told him about this."

They pulled up to the area around the main building. There were murals and signs everywhere, but for all that, it was a pretty intimidating looking building at three in the morning.

The uniforms were around the building, but as far as Worden could tell, no one had gone in. "What's everybody standing around here for?" Pembleton demanded.

"They said they wouldn't let us in without a warrant." Deutsch told them.

"You don't need a warrant. You were in pursuit of a suspect on foot. That is the definition of exigent circumstances." Pembleton turned to him. "Take the door."

"Hold on, sergeant." Worden blinked a couple of times. Even after he heard the voice, he wasn't sure whether the lateness of the hour wasn't making him see things. Colonel Barnfather was at a crime scene. "The African Revival Movement has a lot of sway in this city. I believe proper procedure should be followed, which includes getting a search warrant."

This was borderline ridiculous, even for the bosses. Nevertheless, Craig had just been about to follow orders, when Frank called him off.

"I'm ranking officer," Barnfather said slowly.

"And I'm the primary. This is an extension of the crime scene, which makes me de facto commander, according to Section 6-4 of the Baltimore Criminal Justice Code. I'm therefore using my authority and I say we take the door."

Any other cop, Craig would have thought that he was pulling this out of his ass. But Frank Pembleton had always had a reputation for having the Code of Police Procedure memorized. Even given all that, he still expected Barnfather to pull rank, or at least call Giardello. He did neither, and the officers walked to the door.

Pembleton walked up to the Colonel. "What brings you out to an ordinary crime scene at three in the morning?"

Worden blinked again. He'd been wondering the exact same thing, but he wouldn't have had the balls to ask the question. Now that he'd had a moment to think about it, the Colonel hadn't exactly sounded happy when he'd given the order in the first place. Something was clearly going on, and while most of the higher-ups activities were above Craig's paygrade, he didn't think this was business as usual.

For the next three hours, Craig was too busy to give the strangeness much thought. He was too busy focusing on the business at hand.

The deceased name was Kenya Merchant. Munch had actually found a witness at the scene, and even odder than that, this witness said he knew who had killed Kenya and who had told him to do it.

Deutsch had identified the man who had run into the building. That had been, if anything, even more awkward than the problems with Barnfather. Craig was used to seeing dozen of black faces staring down on him at a crime scene, but this seemed... different. More personal, somehow. Even in a crowd, most of the witness just seemed indifferent. The Movement was angry. Was it because Merchant had been one of their own?

The suspect was one Benin Crown. A thorough search of the house had revealed only one gun, a .45, which according to Munch, matched the bullets that were found in the crime scene. Crown's prints were on the weapon, which made this case seem like a slam dunk.

Worden figured that Munch and Pembleton had this handled. He was about to go home, and try and hit the sack for a few hours, and leave them to do the paperwork.

Then he got a call. From Captain Gaffney, who he hadn't talked to since the Mahoney shooting.

"I need you to do me a favor," The Captain wasn't even bothering with protocols. "The suspect in the Merchant shooting. I need you to have a conversation with him."

Now Craig was starting to get really worried. "That's Munch's case. And Pembleton's the secondary. There's no way he's going to let me go anywhere near the box."

"You're a creative guy, Detective Worden. Find a way to get them away from the interrogation room for five minutes. Then I need you to go in, and tell Benin Crown to invoke his right to council."

Craig was now really pissed. Gaffney hadn't exactly been a great rabbi to him, but what he was asking him to do was actively interfere in a murder investigation. This was the kind of thing that could get you thrown off the force, and the Captain was basically ordering him to do it with no moral dilemmas. But then, Gaffney had never seemed like the kind of person who suffered from morals.

"You know, when the Colonel tried to piss on our crime scene, at least he had the dignity to come down and do his own dirty work." This was open insubordination, but considering what Gaffney asking of him, that was the least of his worries right now. "Which does beg the question, whose dirty work are you doing?"

There was a long pause on the end. "There are consequences to not respecting the chain of command, Detective." Gaffney sneered.

"At least my conscience will be clean." There was more Craig wanted to say to the Captain, but he terminated the call first. Probably just as well. Gaffney might have put him back on street patrol before the night was on if he'd kept talking.

Reluctantly, Craig found himself walking over to Gee's office. The Lieutenant looked troubled himself. "Gee, can we have a talk?" he asked slowly.

"What's this about?"

"Does the African Revival Movement have any pull in the department?" It was a fair question.

"The man in charge, Burundi Robinson, he used to be a cop. "

"Did you know him?"

"He left the department in 'seventy-two, about the time I joined."

"So there's no way he could have any pull with the bosses?"

Giardello appeared pensive. "I just had an interesting conversation with Barnfather. He more or less told me that he came down to the crime scene in order to pull you and Pembleton off it."

Craig was momentarily struck dumb. He wasn't sure what he found more astonishing: that Barnfather had been acting under the tool of the bosses, or that he actually had some moral compass. "Why did he let Frank win that argument?"

"I've been sitting here for the last five minutes, wondering that myself."

"Where's Benin Crown?

Everybody recognized that voice. Giardello and Worden came out of the office to see that Captain Gaffney was in the department

Worden watched the conversation that followed in a kind of detached fashion. Gaffney had apparently decided that if you wanted to do toady for someone, you had to do it yourself. Then he did what not even the Colonel had had the balls to do. He pulled rank on Giardello, and ordered him to let Gaffney speak to Crown.

By now, Pembleton and Munch were clearly as puzzled by what was going on as Craig was. Why were the bosses so determined to interfere in this what looked like a simple murder?

Gaffney came out of the room in less than two minutes. "You know, I think we need to have a conversation about your style of leadership, Lieutenant," he practically sneered. "Apparently, anybody who works for you starts to feel that they don't owe a damn thing to the chain of command."

That was an arrow aimed right at Craig, and he had no doubt that Frank or Gee would pick up on it later. Right now, however, there were far more pressing things to consider.

Like the fact that their suspect in the shooting of Kenya Merchant had just invoked his right to counsel.

Giardello told Craig about an hour later that he wanted Worden to work this case a little longer. Worden hoped that it was because they considered him a decent detective, but he had a sinking feeling it was because Gee was looking for the rat.

The witness in the Merchant shooting was another member of the African Revival Movement named Malawi Joseph. Worden watched through the interrogation room window as Joseph was more than willing to tell them why Kenya had been murdered. It had been as a direct order from Burundi Robinson. Merchant had found out that Robinson had been whoring out some of the women in the movement, and that some of the kids that were seen running through the building were his. When Kenya had found out about it, he had threatened to go public. Which probably wouldn't have helped Robinson's reputation with all the morning shows that he'd been doing recently.

Pembleton had told Craig to administer a polygraph to Joseph about this story. Worden was a little uncomfortable doing so to a man who was a cooperating witness in this investigation, but considering that Joseph offered not only to do so, but to bring further evidence against Robinson in order to bring him down, he managed to stow his objection. He was beginning to understand why Munch had wondered if there were any more like Malawi at home.

Giardello was more angry about the idea about what they were suggesting than the fact that Robinson might have ordered a killing. He likened it to J. Edgar Hoover wiretapping the civil rights movement supposedly out of national security, when the man was nothing more than a common blackmailer.

Danvers clearly saw the potential dangers here, and said that they had enough to charge Crown, and they could leave Robinson out of it.

"Maybe we should," Worden told them. "Look, Gaffney and Barnfather have been all over our asses about digging in too deep. Now, I'm not wild about giving in to the bosses, but you know what they say about discretion."

Everybody, including Gee, found themselves looking at Pembleton. There was no reason they should be; he wasn't even the primary on this case, but he was the moral center of the unit. "However this shakes out, its still a murder."

This seemed to resonate with the Lieutenant, who reluctantly agreed to go along with it, under the condition that Joseph's name stay off the files.

The next eight hours they wired Joseph up, and sent him back into the ARM. Joseph managed to win back Robinson's confidence, but the leader of the movement clearly remembered a few rules from being a cop. He spoke in the tones of someone who didn't want to be entrapped. The closest that he came to saying anything about Kenya Merchant's murder was vague terms about the 'need for a sacrifice'. That sure as hell wouldn't stand up in court.

"We need to send him back end, get him talking directly about Merchant's murder." Danvers told him.

"You think he'll be willing to stick his head in the lion's mouth again?" Craig asked.

"He knows how dangerous this is," Munch told them. "He wants justice for Merchant more than we do."

At that moment, almost as if he'd been on cue, there was a knock at the office door. Gaffney had resurfaced, and if he had been unpleasant before, he was positively loathsome now. He asked what was on the tape recorder.

"My legal notes," Danvers was apparent by now, even more suspicious of Gaffney than Craig had ever seen him.

"Interesting listening?"

"They're property of the State's Attorneys office."

Gaffney shrugged, as if he hadn't just bullied one of their closest allies. Then he turned to Giardello, and told him that he had been going over the Merchant file, and that the name of the witness had been left out. "I need the name," the captain said casually.

"When you look at yourself in the mirror, Roger, what do you see?" Gee demanded.

"I see someone who follows the chain of command.. Now, will you give me the name of the witness, Lieutenant?" Gaffney demanded.

"This is the second time you've pulled rank on me. There won't be a third."

This was the moment where Craig casual dislike of Gaffney became out and out hatred. It took all of his restraint to not snarl at him as he took Malawi Joseph's name from him.

Craig could see what was going to happen over the next eight hours before it actually happened. They wired Malawi Joseph back up, and sent him back into Robinson's inner circle. When Malawi asked whether the sacrifice of Kenya had been necessary, Robinson laughed in his face, and said that the idea was utterly ridiculous.

Listening to the recording, Pembleton had no choice but to conclude that they had been compromised in this investigation from the very beginning. For whatever reason, Gaffney - or whoever above him was pulling his strings - had decided that Robinson and the ARM were not to be touched by this investigation.

Danvers was no less infuriated by this as well, but by now had reached the conclusion that there was nothing that they could do. "We'll charge Crown with first-degree murder, and see if a couple of months down the road, he'll be willing to take a lesser charge in order to testify against Robinson."

Pembleton and Munch clearly didn't like this idea - Crown hadn't said so much as a word since being charged yesterday - but it was clear that they weren't getting much in the way of options when it came to getting somebody to talk.

Then Gee, who had been silent through all this, began smiling. "We're not going to talk to Benin Crown. We're going to talk to each other."

Even having been in the unit for more than six months, Craig was more than a little surprised about what happened next. They brought Benin Crown to the box. Pembleton, Munch and Giardello sat there for five minutes, and said absolutely nothing. By the end of that time, Crown, who wasn't the sharpest knife in the drawer, was beginning to wonder what the hell was going on.

Frank then began talking to Munch about the Merchant murder. John told Frank that he had a murder weapon, a witness and a suspect who was giving no extenuating circumstance for why he had committed the crime, and he was content.

Gee then began talking about Crown's history, that he was a good kid, that he had a real family, and that for him to just throw his life away seemed ridiculous. Then they started talking about how Robinson was whoring out women, including Benin's sister.

This understandably got Benin's attention, but Frank and the others continued to speak as if he wasn't in the room. Benin continued to get more and more irate when Danvers 'happened' to show up, to discuss the sentence that Benin might receive. Which was looking, even under the most optimistic of judges, as 20 to life. More discussion of Benin's complete and utter foolishness in being loyal to a man who was, in every sense of the word, screwing him over. Crown eventually got more and more belligerent, and then Frank told him that his best move would be to fire Robinson's attorney, get one who had Benin's own interest, and get a good deal for himself the next minute he was in lockup.

The three of them then left the room, and Crown left the building about five minutes later.

"I have to say that was beautiful," Craig told them.

"Did you hear something?" Frank asked.

"Nope. Not a goddamned thing." Munch said cheerfully.

"All right. I get it." Craig admitted.

"It's going to take a few hours for things to unfold," Giardello told them. "But considering how genuinely messed up the situation is, I give Crown five minutes after getting back to lockup before he fires his lawyer, another thirty before a public defender arrives, and another hour after that before he and Danvers can knock out a deal involving testimony against Burundi Robinson."

"I'm sorry we have to do this, Gee," Pembleton told them. "I know you had respect for the man and what he was doing."

Gee looked a little more pensive. "There's some piece of this we're still not seeing," he said slowly. 'Who's giving him his information?"

This was something that Craig had been avoiding thinking about for the last few hours. Gaffney had demonstrated more thoroughly than ever that he was a stooge. But even he wouldn't do something this deliberate unless he was listening to someone much higher up the food chain. It clearly wasn't Barnfather, and Gaffney would never have taken orders from Robinson directly. So who the fuck was making everybody dance?

This was the kind of thinking that was way above his paygrade, and he had a feeling that if he and the rest of the unit stepped any further out of line, they could all end up being fired.

He didn't realize just how horrible the situation could be yet.

The next twelve hours would be among the most harrowing that Worden would ever go through while working for the Baltimore PD, and that was even before the full measure of the consequences would fall on everybody.

The first part had gone more or less exactly how Giardello had predicted it. They had the warrant to arrest Robinson within the next two hours. Considering the mess that was likely to follow, Gee had called for the entire unit to come in case things started to go south. And things went FUBAR very quickly.

Mere moments after Pembleton served the warrant to Robinson, he slammed the door shut, and three members of the ARM came out, looking very unhappy. Pembleton had a clearer idea of what was going to go wrong before anybody else, and ordered every unit to fall back. Unfortunately, it wasn't nearly quick enough, and there was a member on the ground within five minutes. The ARM members started throwing bottles on the cops, and it was beginning to look like a riot was on the verge of breaking out.

The tension was already starting to get thick, and then it came from another altogether different source. Because Bayliss, who had been AWOL ever since the original call, was there.

Frank was not happy to see him now, and he got even more pissed off when Tim was very vague about where he had been the last day and a half. Pembleton had a great ability to put personal issues aside in favor of a red ball, which this was rapidly becoming.

In less than an hour, QRT, Barnfather, and Gaffney were all on the scene, even though no one had asked for their support. He could understand why QRT was there, but Craig figured this situation was one errant bullet away from erupting into a wave of violence.

Craig walked up to Jaspers, who, as almost always was the case in the middle of these situation, was a perfect mixture of calm and irritation. "Detective, I don't have time to get into a pissing contest right now. I have my orders."

"I realize that," Craig said calmly. "But unless things have changed since I was on the squad, you need to get a call from a superior officer in order to form a cordon. And since I know for sure that Gee didn't call you, I'd like to know which of the brass gave you the order."

The look of frustration that Jaspers perennially seemed to have on his face disappeared. In its place was a look of conflict that the lieutenant never tried to show to his men, or anybody else. "I know that the rest of the department thinks were just here to clean up the messes that other people make. But we have to do this for a reason. I didn't take this job to become an assassin."

Suddenly Craig went cold. "What the fuck are you talking about?"

"We have orders. If the situation comes up, QRT is to take Burundi Robinson out. Negotiations are to be considered secondary." Jaspers momentarily seemed to pale. "Any other lives lost are to be considered acceptable collateral damage."

This was appalling. Something like this could damage the already shaky reputation the Baltimore PD had with the rest of the community for decades. And even Barnfather had to realize this. Only someone way up the food chain could give this kind of order. "Who's pulling the strings, Jaspers?"

"I think you know."

"If there's to be any chance of getting out this without bloodshed, we need to be thoroughly briefed." Craig looked at his former superior. "I need to hear you say it."

For a very long moment, he thought he'd pushed him too far. Then the head of QRT turned to him, and whispered in his ear. "Deputy Commissioner Harris."

Craig had expected to hear this name, but there was one thing about thinking and knowing it. The head of the Baltimore Police Department, a thirty-five year veteran of the PD, had been manipulating and trying to circumvent the investigation into a homicide. He couldn't think of a single reason why he'd be willing to flush his career down the sewer in the name of Burundi Robinson, but he'd just received confirmation of that fact. Gee had to know.

He ran over to one of the black-and-white's where a grim-faced Barnfather was looking at Giardello.

"The orders are that Robinson is to be taken out," Worden told Gee.

"He's out of his mind." Worden would have done a double take. The Colonel had just said that.

"No, he knows exactly what he's doing." Giardello told him. "And there's no way that I'm letting him get away with it."

And then the Lieutenant did either the most courageous thing he'd ever seen, or the dumbest. He walked right up to the door of the ARM, and hammered on it. Five seconds later it opened, and Gee just walked right in.

"What the hell is he doing?' Pembleton asked.

"Trying to save lives. I think." Worden was still reeling from everything he'd heard.

"How? We're an ass-hair from the gunfight at the OK Corral," Munch was clearly as frustrated as everybody else, but right now, Worden had other concerns than that.

"Has the press gotten here yet?" he asked.

"No, but given how fucked up the situation is, I figure the whole Baltimore media will be here in a matter of minutes." Munch told him.

A dangerous idea was forming in Craig's head. One that he was pretty sure could getting him kicked out of the entire department in a matter of days. He didn't want to go through with it, so he really hoped that Giardello could somehow come outside with Burundi Robinson willing to surrender. But he had long since lost his sunny disposition.

About an hour later, Giardello emerged. He held the door open, ordering all tactical units to stand down. Women and children began running outside as fast as they could, and Craig, the rest of the detectives and uniforms began getting them to safety.

For the briefest of moments, Worden had this fantasy that maybe, things were going to turn out okay after all. But the second the last woman ran out the door, Robinson slammed it shut in Giardello, and the rest of the police's faces.

By now, Gaffney was on scene, ordering a visibly tense Jaspers that the orders were that Burundi Robinson was to be taken out. If he'd been a prick in front of the squad and Danvers, he was downright preening now. He basically told Colonel Barnfather that if he didn't know what the orders were, he wasn't going to be holding his position very long.

Suddenly, Giardello pulled Gaffney aside. He told the Captain that Deputy Commissioner Harris had given up the witness that they had used in the Merchant case, that Harris was corrupt and a liar, and that he intended to have a full report on the Mayor's desk the next morning.

Gaffney just snubbed him, saying that these were unfounded allegation, and that he should think twice before smearing a man's career.

"Whose career would that be?" Worden found himself saying. "The Deputy Commissioner's or yours?"

"I'd really worry about the level of insubordination in your unit," Gaffney said slowly. "Chain of command. You've got to follow it, or you're not long for the job." He walked over to Jaspers. "If the opportunity comes, take Robinson out."

Jaspers looked even unhappier than Barnfather, but reluctantly began ordering his men into position.

The next five hours were long even for a cop who'd been used to spending hours holding position or on stakeout. The house went quiet. Gee ordered half the squad to go home, saying that it could be a long time before this was resolved, and someone needed to stay behind when Baltimore citizens started killing each other again.

Munch, Pembleton and Craig stayed behind, just waiting, mostly silent. Gaffney ended up leaving, too, which was a relief for Craig. He didn't know how much longer he could be around the man without punching him in the face.

By midnight, Craig couldn't take the tension any longer, and walked over to one of his friends from QRT to ask him what the fuck was going on.

"We don't know," he admitted. "Last hour, there hasn't been a sound or movement out of the entire place."

Munch heard this. "That's impossible. There's sixteen men down there. How can they not be making a sound?"

"They can't." A look of horror was on Gee's face. He gave the order to Jaspers to take the building.

Even then, Worden wasn't sure what the hell was going on. He knew it had to be something horrible, but even wasn't willing to consider what it might be.

QRT smashed the door open, and came crashing in through what appeared to be every window in the building. Not a single gunshot rang out. The ARM had been ready for blood when Gee had gone in, but not they let it be taken without a single shot being fired. And even after all of this happened, Craig wasn't prepared when the through the building floor by floor, and found all the lights out, and not a single member to be found.

They went to the basement. And there was Robinson and the fifteen other members. All of them were holding glasses and there was a large chemical jar. It wasn't clear what was in it, but the end result was obvious. What had started out as a movement designed to help the downtrodden forgotten of Baltimore had gone the way of a cult thinking the endtimes had come. And for the ARM, it had.

No one on the squad said anything, even as the ME's started carrying the bodies out to the morgue. The press descended on Giardello, and the other detectives. Gee looked even more depressed than usual when Dawn Daniels approached him.

"What happened here, Lieutenant?" Daniels asked.

"I won't say." Giardello paused. "But I can tell you this much. There'll be hell to pay."

Craig agreed with his lieutenant one hundred percent. He looked around, and sure enough, Elizabeth was there. Her normal stoic reporters look was gone, and she looked as sickened as Craig felt.

He took out his pad, wrote down a few words, then pushed himself past the media, looking harassed, only half as an act, and bumped into Elizabeth.

Wu looked into her hand a couple of seconds later very discreetly. Craig's message didn't leave much room for doubt.

DEEP BACKGROUND. COVERUP. RG.