Coming Out of the Cold

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

RJ and Pete were in Pete’s office with Samuel Feltz, the commanding officer the AG’s office sent to Belgrave to clean up the department.

“It’s needed,” RJ said. “There’s no doubt about that. But let me be clear,” he added to the man seated next to him. They were in Pete’s office seated in front of Pete’s desk. “I love Grant McGraw. I am not his enemy. He’s a good man.”

Feltz stared at Captain Jeffers, the man who had the most to gain if McGraw was booted out. “But?”

“He’s a businessman,” RJ said. “He’s not a cop. He’s not a chief.”

“This department has gone to hell in a handbasket under his leadership,” said Pete. “Chief has to go. Bottom line.”

“I see he has very loyal men working for him,” Feltz said.

RJ and Pete looked at each other. They realized they were showing their hand.

“All we’re saying,” said RJ, “is that we need new leadership.”

“We desperately need new leadership,” added Pete.

“I hear you, but not so fast guys,” Feltz said. “No decisions have been made about who stays or who goes. I just got here.”

“There he is,” RJ said and they all looked out of the window too. Grant’s Mercedes had just driven up. Grant got out and opened the passenger door for Marti.

“He’s sleeping with her you know,” Pete said as the couple began heading for the entrance.

Feltz was surprised. “Is he?”

“They live together,” RJ added. “You didn’t know that, did you?”

Feltz exhaled. “No, I did not.”

But when Grant and Marti entered the building, Pete called out from his office. “Chief? Chief ?”

But Grant and Marti ignored his calls and kept on walking.

“The guy from Tallahassee is here!” Pete yelled out again, but that didn’t stop them either. Because Grant was singularly focused. They went into Grant’s office.

While Marti closed and locked the door behind them, Grant hurried behind his desk and turned on his computer. Then he looked up the background intel they had on the Wafer House shooter.

“There it is!” Grant said after strolling down. “I knew I saw that name before. I remembered it because it was spelled with a K.”

Marti was leaned against him, looking at the computer screen too. “Kamille’s name is in this report?”

“The Wafer House shooter was married three times. Look,” he said. “His second wife was a Kamille Oliver.”

When he said that name, Marti leaned in closer. And she saw Kamille’s name. “She was married to the Wafer House shooter?”

“Yes! It didn’t last long, probably because she had moved on to some other sucker, but there’s the connection. She used him like she used Eric Peterson.”

“But to what end?” asked Marti.

Grant leaned back. “That’s the part I don’t know.”

“What about the two shooters at Karney’s grocery store? Is there a connection there?”

Grant leaned forward again and searched his computer for the background they had on the two Karney’s grocery store shooters. On the first shooter, he found no connection whatsoever. “Nothing on the first one,” he said, and began looking at the second one.

“Which one is which?” asked Marti.

“The one I’m looking at now is the one we surrounded in his trailer.”

“The one your own officer shot and killed because he claimed he had spit on him and head-butted him when there was absolutely no evidence of that?”

Grant nodded. “That’s the one.” And then his eyes lit up. “And there is a connection!” he declared.

“What is it?”

“He was born and raised in Memphis,” Grant said.

“That’s a connection,” said Marti, “but it’s kind of weak.”

But Grant found something else. “He also spent time in prison there.”

“At the same time Eric was there?”

“I don’t know when Eric was imprisoned.”

But then Grant saw a single sentence on his rap sheet that caught his eye. “While incarcerated, the shooter was accused of shanking another prisoner, but his cellmate testified that he was in his cell the entire time. “His cellmate,” Grant said, looking up at Marti, “was Eric Peterson.”

Marti was floored. “They were cellmates ?”

Grant nodded. “Yes.” Then he smiled. “Still think it’s weak?”

She shook her head. “Hell nall.”

“And if that’s not enough, guess where the shooter’s last known employment was?”

“Kamille’s restaurant?”

“He worked at Kamille’s restaurant, yes, ma’am.”

Marti couldn’t believe it. “They both link back to Kamille.”

“Right. Like they were puppets on her string. And I saw that woman with my own two eyes,” Grant added. “She’s stunning. I could see men falling for her like that. Easily.”

“And I can see her using men like that,” Marti hated to admit it. “Easily. But I still don’t understand why she would go after me. Because those mass shooters wouldn’t hurt me by shooting up a lot of people. But they would discredit you.”

“Right,” said Grant.

“But then are you the target,” asked Marti, “or am I?”

“Or,” said Grant, “are both of us?”

“But why ?” Marti was distressed.

“You said she phoned you and told you to apply for the job. You weren’t even living in Florida at the time.”

“No, I wasn’t. But she knew I was moving all over the place.”

“Did she give you a name to contact?”

“Yes. She told me to call the Assistant Attorney General directly, to say her name, and he would hire me. And he did.”

“Over the phone?”

“Based on Kamille’s recommendation, yes.”

“So the mayor might be right.”

“About what?”

“The governor is trying to discredit him because he knows Dooney is planning to run for governor himself in the upcoming election.”

“But I thought Governor Devere was under term limits and couldn’t run again.”

“He can’t. But his handpicked successor, Jake Crocker, the Assistant Attorney General, can. And he intends to do so. And Mayor Dooney Rickter will easily be his toughest opponent.”

And that was when it all came together for Grant. “That’s it!” he said out loud.

“What’s it?” asked Marti.

“Why didn’t I think of that before!”

“Think of what before?”

But Grant turned off his computer and was on his feet again. He grabbed Marti’s hand and they hurried out of his office.

But as soon as they neared the exit, Commander Feltz was hurrying out of Pete’s office. “Sir, I need to talk to you,” he said to Grant as he hurried behind him. “Sir, I’m with the Attorney General’s office. Sir?”

When he exited the building and hurried down the steps behind Grant and Marti, he continued to call out Grant’s name.

Grant knew he couldn’t hide from him forever. “Hop in,” he said to Feltz as he opened the door for Marti and then hurried around to the driver side door. Commander Feltz, seizing the opportunity, hopped into the backseat.

“Where are we going?” the commander asked Grant.

“Who are you again?” Grant asked him, looking through his rearview mirror.

“I’m Commander Feltz. I was assigned to check out this department.”

“Assigned by who? Jake Crocker?”

“The Assistant Attorney General, yes sir. Now is that enough backstory for you to answer my question and tell me where we’re going?”

“That’s enough backstory for me not to tell you anything,” Grant responded, and sped even faster.

Marti was as in the dark as the commander was, but like before, she was willing to let Grant work it out in his head rather than pepper him with questions. But when they were pulling up to a condominium building, she was too curious. “Who lives here?” she asked him.

But before he could answer, she saw who. Celeste. His former plaything. She was coming out of the front of the building.

Grant got out and hurried toward her as she made her way to her car the valet had just drove around. Marti and Commander Feltz got out and hurried behind Grant.

“What’s this about, Chief McGraw?” Feltz hurried up to Grant and asked him.

“She’s his niece.”

“She’s whose niece?”

“Jake Crocker.”

Marti and Feltz were both surprised.

“That woman,” Grant said as they hurried toward Celeste, “is the Assistant AG’s niece. She’s your boss’s niece.”

“That’s very interesting,” said Feltz as they hurried, “I’ll give you that. But why should it be dispositive?”

“Because of Marti’s angle in this.”

“What do you mean my angle in it?” Marti was struggling to keep up with the two men.

“When I said we both might be the targets, I was right,” said Grant. “But we’re the targets for different reasons.”

“Why was I the target?”

“You’re by the book and Kamille knew it,” said Grant. “You wouldn’t hold back in your reports of how awful a police department we were. But they didn’t plan on anything else happening.”

“What else happened?” Marti was still puzzled. But then they were upon Celeste just as she was opening her car door.

“Celeste!” Grant called out.

Standing between her car’s opened door and front seat, she turned around when she heard Grant’s voice. And immediately Marti saw the fear in her eyes when she saw he was not alone. “What are you doing here?” she asked, looking at Marti and Feltz more than she was looking at Grant.

“The game is up, Celeste,” Grant said. “I know why you did it. I know you got your uncle to handle it because the person he assigned to come here was by the book. She’d discredit the mayor just by doing her job. He knew, through Kamille, that Marti couldn’t be bought. And you knew all about it because you and Uncle Jake are tight. But then something happened that threw a wrench in it for you.”

Celeste was now staring at Grant. “What happened?”

“Instead of you getting me to fall in love with you,” Grant said, “I fell in love with the very woman that was supposed to bring the mayor down and, by association, bring me down right along with him.”

“That’s absurd. Why would I go along with somebody bringing you down, if I loved you so much as you claim?”

It was a good question to Marti and Feltz too. They both looked at Grant.

“Because a weakened man,” said Grant, “is a needy man. I would be right where you wanted me to be: ripe and ready for a barracuda like you to swallow whole.”

Grant hit the nail on the head because Celeste suddenly looked different to Marti. She suddenly looked wounded the way she did when she was arguing with Grant in his office. “You chose her over me,” she said, “when I told you I was willing to leave my husband for you.”

“And I told you that you and I were never going to be anything more than what we were, and you knew that from the start,” said Grant.

“But I loved you! You just met her. How could you choose her over me?”

But Grant didn’t want to hear that wang about love. “Did you ask Jake Crocker to get Eric Peterson to kill Marti?” he asked her, getting on with it.

“I don’t know who he got, but I told him she was ruining everything for me. I told him how you let her stay all night with you when you would never even let me visit your house! He hired her because he knew she was by the book like you said and she would write a terrible report about the police department that would discredit the mayor when he runs for governor. But I told him she was in love with you and you were in love with her and she would never again write any more bad reports after that first one. She would probably rescind that first report and claim she didn’t even write it to protect you. I told him he didn’t need her anymore. And he agreed,” Celeste said.

Marti never believed in grand conspiracies. Until now. “Who’s Kamille Oliver to your uncle?” she asked.

“She’s a hoe, if you ask me, but she’s his girlfriend. She wants to be first lady of Florida some day when Uncle Jake runs for governor and wins. He told her whatever he wanted and she went out and found the people to do the job. She found you. She found Eric. She found RJ and Pete Kerrigan on the local level to make sure everything stayed on track. But you had to fall in love with Grant,” she said with tears welling up in her eyes. “And he fell in love with you.”

Then before they realized it, she had pulled a gun out of her pocket with her car door giving her cover. And before anybody could respond, she pointed it directly at Grant’s head.

“Whoa,” said Feltz, backing up, his hands in the air.

“I’ll kill him if anybody makes a move. I’ll kill him!”

“I’ll leave town,” Marti said, begging her. “Please don’t shoot. I’ll leave right now and never come back. You can have him!”

But Celeste wasn’t buying it. “You liar,” she said. “Nobody can be with Grant and give him up. Nobody!” she screamed, and then she fired her weapon, causing Marti to scream even louder.

But Grant had moved his body before she fired that shot, but not enough. Although he wasn’t shot in the head where she was aiming, he was shot in the arm as he was turning away from her. He fell to the ground and Marti fell to the ground with him.

Celeste pointed her gun at Feltz before hopping in her car and trying to drive away.

But Feltz pulled out his Magnum and began running with the car. “Stop now or I’ll shoot!” he yelled as he ran. “Stop or I’ll shoot! Stop!”

When she still would not stop, Feltz let it rip. He fired and fired. He nearly emptied his chambers firing on Celeste.

Apparently one or more of those bullets took her out because the car suddenly began to drift, and then it slowed, and then it finally came to a stop.

Marti was helping Grant on his feet when the car came to a stop. “I’m alright,” Grant was saying to Marti as he held onto his wounded arm and they both ran over to where the car had stopped.

When they got there, Feltz was forcing open the jammed car door. When he opened it, they all could see that Celeste was hunched over the steering wheel and definitely dead.

“I know you don’t believe me,” Feltz said, “but I had nothing to do with this madness. I had no idea any of that was going on.”

Grant was staring at Celeste. “I know you didn’t,” he said.

Feltz looked at him. “When did you know that?”

“When you were willing to shoot to kill your boss’s niece,” Grant said, and looked at the commander. “I knew it then.”

Feltz nodded his head. “And don’t you worry. I’m turning this case over to the FBI right now. And everybody involved, from the local cops to anybody in the governor’s administration, including my boss, will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. I promise you that.” He looked at Marti. “Both of you.”

Marti smiled. Grant nodded. “Thank you,” he said as they could hear sirens in the distance.

Marti placed her arm around Grant’s waist. “You need to sit down,” she said, “so I can stop your bleeding.”

He looked at her with a sincerity that warmed her heart. “You already have,” he said to her. “You already have.”