The Dead Room

Epilogue

Christina Chadzynski was buried on a bright summer morning in her hometown of West Roxbury. Boston police had cordoned off the surrounding streets to accommodate the swelling numbers of officers and politicians attending the funeral. The media were out in full force, their numbers swelling behind the police barricades, to film the spectacle

While the murder of a police commissioner was front-page news, the real reason for their presence was to hunt for information about how dead FBI agents had somehow risen from the ashes. Had the FBI known? Had they deliberately helped in the subterfuge? So far, Boston PD and the FBI had managed to prevent anything from leaking out.

Well, maybe not for long, Darby thought, and checked her watch.

She stood with hundreds of other mourners at the cemetery. Her lawyer, a man named Benjamin Jones who had successfully handled a lot of investigations for Boston police officers, had insisted that she come. He wanted her front and centre, to show everyone she had nothing to hide.

She didn’t have anything to hide, but that hadn’t prevented her from being suspended, with pay, pending an internal investigation.

She recalled her SWAT instructor’s warning: Every bullet has a lawyer’s name on it.

From behind her dark sunglasses she looked at the predominantly male faces across from her, staring and watching. Her. She had got used to the stares. Some officers, she was sure, had found out what really happened. There was no such thing as a secret inside Boston PD. She was also sure that some of those officers were wondering if their voices or names were on Kendra Sheppard’s flash drive.

Darby hadn’t been allowed to listen to or see what was on the USB drive. It had been confiscated by the Boston brass, along with her phone containing her taped conversation with Chadzynski.

For the past week the commissioner’s death had been front-page news. The national news outlets were more interested in the discovery of the body inside an abandoned East Boston auto garage – Special Agent Jack King, a man who, along with Frank Sullivan and three other Federal agents, had supposedly died in 1983.

There was still no official comment from the FBI. The Boston Police Department’s PR machine, though, was already in motion.

The PR rep cited how the police commissioner’s Criminal Services Unit discovered the bodies of two other ‘dead’ Federal agents – Peter Alan, who had been found shot to death inside the basement of a home owned by Kevin Reynolds; and Steven White, who had been killed at the Wellesley home of Jamie Russo, a previous victim of an unsolved home invasion that had claimed the lives of her husband and two children. While the PR rep would not cite actual specifics of the ‘ongoing investigation’, it was reported that Police Commissioner Chadzynski had been shot to death by a nine-millimetre handgun belonging to Arthur Pine, a Belham detective who had died at the garage along with former Federal agent Jack King.

The Boston press, through ‘inside sources close to the investigation’, reported that Chadzynski had been murdered to prevent the exposure of the four FBI agents who had allegedly died, along with Frank Sullivan, in July of 1983.

The PR rep wouldn’t explain what the commissioner was doing at an abandoned automotive garage.

There was much speculation in the press as to whether or not Frank Sullivan was alive but no mention of his real name or the fact that he was a Federal agent.

Darby checked her watch, wondering about the fourth and final agent, Anthony Frissora. As far as she knew, he had not been found. She doubted he ever would be.

The preacher gave a heart-thumping eulogy about Chadzynski’s ‘dedicated years of service to justice’ and ‘her tireless crusade to keeping Boston’s streets safe’. Darby tuned it out, looking at the massive flower arrangements scattered around the coffin, and thought about Jamie Russo.

She had tried speaking to the woman on two separate occasions. Each time Russo showed her the same piece of paper containing the same message: ‘My lawyer has advised me not to speak with anyone. And I can’t allow you to speak to either Michael or Carter. They’re traumatized by what happened, as I’m sure you can understand. They’re being treated here at the hospital. The doctors have generously allowed me to stay here with them until they’re released.’

Darby knew the woman had a lawyer. Wellesley police had found a wallet belonging to Ben Masters and a mobile phone that didn’t belong to Russo. Police had also found a .44 Magnum. Since Wellesley was outside of Boston’s jurisdiction, the state lab had been used to process the evidence. Darby had heard, through Randy Scott, that the state’s ballistics had confirmed that the Magnum had been used in the Belham home. Jamie Russo, watching through the woods with her husband’s binoculars, had shot her way inside the house to save Sean Sheppard.

Finally the fulsome eulogy ended.

Everyone bowed their heads and prayed.

Darby felt her new phone, a BlackBerry, vibrate against her hip.

A message had come in from Coop. She read it and waited.

Darby watched the coffin being lowered into the ground. She thought back to her father’s elegant casket being lowered into its final resting place, the grass around her leeched of colour, tears sliding down her cheeks. Her father was dressed in a black suit, the only one he owned, and she remembered wondering if the newly dead could still feel heat, wondered if her father was still suffering in that casket. She remembered wanting to ask her mother and then stopped when Sheila ushered her away from the grave.

Now her mother was dead, buried next to her father, and here she was, their daughter, standing at the grave of the woman who had played some role in her father’s murder. Why? Because her lawyer told her to. Because it looked good. She was here keeping up appearances. Darby wondered what her father would think of her now, standing here.

Suddenly all around her came the sound of mobile phones ringing. The preacher was not pleased and gave the crowd a disgusted look to show he meant business. It didn’t stop everyone from checking their mobile phones.

Darby tried watching each of their faces. She was especially pleased by the blank look on the mayor’s face as he listened to the audio clip of her conversation with the police commissioner. Coop had worked tirelessly the past week, calling his old friends and contacts to find out the mobile phone numbers of every Boston bigwig. Darby gave him the numbers for the movers and shakers inside Boston PD, all of whom were in attendance. That was phase one.

Phase two was to send out messages to the media, saying they could listen to Christina Chadzynski’s message free of charge on the massively popular internet site YouTube.

The mayor hung up and looked at her, eyes like daggers. Then he mumbled something into the ear of Chadzynski’s grieving husband and turned to leave.

The mayor pushed his way through the crowd. Now the senator excused himself.

The crowd started to dissipate around her. The preacher looked confused.

Darby watched the spectacle. She wasn’t aware that Randy Scott was standing next to her until he spoke.

‘What’s going on?’

‘I don’t know, but it doesn’t look good,’ Darby said. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘I thought you’d like to know they found Dr Wexler in France. They’re working on extraditing him back to the States. He’s talking with the Feds, trying to work out a plea deal.’

A deal, Darby thought, watching everyone scattering across the grass.

‘The Feds are slowly worming their way into the investigation,’ Randy said. ‘Now that they have Wexler on team Fed, they’ve asked to look at those pictures you gave the Photography Unit. I hear Boston PD’s going to play along. It’s a trading game. You tell me this, I’ll tell you that.’

Then they’ll play a final round of damage control. I’ll scratch your back and you’ll scratch mine.

‘I’m in contact with this guy at the state’s forensic lab,’ Randy said. ‘We’ve been coordinating evidence for the past week. He tells me that he has it on good authority that Kevin Reynolds is a Federal agent.’

‘What a surprise.’

‘Well, I thought you’d want to know. As for the evidence the police commissioner said she planted – your father’s murder book and the associated evidence – I haven’t found anything yet. I probably won’t. The brass is forming an independent committee – a special task force – to look into the matter, and into Chadzynski. They’ve also confiscated the evidence to make sure it isn’t tampered with. In other words, they booted everyone at the lab off the case.’

‘Wonderful.’

‘One other thing… Sean Sheppard died this morning.’

Darby took in a deep breath.

‘I’m sorry.’

She nodded. ‘I forgot to thank you for everything.’

‘Nothing to it.’ He forced a grin. ‘See you soon.’

‘I don’t think so.’ She started walking.

‘Where are you going?’

Darby didn’t answer. She tossed her badge into the grave and looked out at the roads, wondering which one led home.