Campanelli: Sentinel (24 page)

              Tam laughed through a pent up tear and said, “You don’t. I love you, Frank.”

              “I love you, too,” he said in complete, plain honesty.

              “Come eat,” she directed and tugged him to the table by the hand.

              Frank ate breakfast quickly and prepared for the day. He placed his armored vest over an undershirt and fastened it, careful to keep it out of Tamara’s view. He knew that she would feel it under his shirt and jacket when she departed, but he wanted to soften the shock of its presence as much as possible.

              Once his holster and jacket were on, Frank left the bedroom, fiddling with his tie as he walked. He found that Tam had cleaned up after cooking the eggs and bacon and was putting on her jacket. Seeing the time, he realized that she had to open her diner.

              Tamara Billingsley frowned adorably, crinkling the corners of her mouth. Her eyes passed over him and centered on his puffy torso. She stepped forward and helped straighten his tie. Her eyes met Frank’s and after a moment, she rapped on his chest with a curled up fist. Confirming the presence of the body armor, her eyes welled.

              “It’s orders,” Campanelli insisted and embraced her. Her reaction was unnecessary but understandable. While the armored vests could do little against rifle rounds or some of the larger caliber explosive handgun rounds, which included his police issued eleven millimeter, the vest would soften the blow of EMP rifles and antique firearms using traditional ammunition.

              “Just be careful,” Tam said with difficulty. Kissing him goodbye, she turned and left the residence without another word.

              Frank stood and stared at the door for a long moment. He felt a pang of anxiety for the coming day, so he accessed his implant, requested a release of serotonin and took a deep breath. He stuffed his
RadarCane
into the inner pocket of his jacket and went to his front door. Opening it, he looked around the condo to make sure he had not forgotten anything. He had not.

              By the time he got to the bottom of the stairs, he felt calmer. Stepping outside, he found McKay and his hound sitting outside enjoying the morning air.

              “Mornin’,” Luke greeted.

              “Good morning, Mister McKay,” Frank returned. He stopped a moment after he closed the building’s front door. The day was sunny and clear, but chilly, barely into the fifties.

              “If ya don’t mind me sayin’ so,” McKay drawled, “yer young lady seemed a might upset.”

              “That she is,” Campanelli agreed.

              “I hope somethin’ I said din’t add to it.”

              “What did you say?”

              Luke scratched at the thick gray hair on his chin as he looked to his neighbor. “I says ta be careful t’day. Mentioned that Ol’ Bill here is on edge fer some reason, jus’ like the mornin’ I got burned outta my home back in Miss’sip.”

              Frank looked to Old Bill, lying at his master’s feet as always. It occurred to Campanelli that he had never seen the dog on his feet. Without lifting his heavy head, the hound looked back at Frank with dull eyes, watery and kind. The canine appeared to be no different in mannerism now than at any other time, but he let it go.

              “She’ll be okay,” Frank said and took a few steps down the walk before stopping to look back at the pair. “Say, Luke? Are you going anywhere today?”

              “I was thinkin’ ‘bout perusin’ the hardware store for some things.”

              “Anything pressing?”

              “Some things are, some things ain’t,” Luke said elusively then his eyes widened as if remembering something. “Are you thinkin’ there’s gonna be trouble at that preacher’s rally?”

              “There might be,” Frank felt free to admit.

              “Don’ worry none,” McKay waved, “I’m not goin’ till later this aft’noon.”

              “Okay, great,” Frank said and smiled. Giving the old man a wave he turned and resumed the walk to his cruiser.

              “You be careful now, son,” Luke called after him.

              “I will,” Frank said over his shoulder.

              Stepping to the car, he established the link between its computer and his implant. It opened the door for him and he got inside. A moment later, the car turned onto Seventeenth Street and parked behind District One. Stepping quickly, Frank wished several, half-hearted morning greetings to officers and administrative personnel on the way to his office. While it was normal to not encounter many people on a Saturday, there were fewer uniformed officers overall, which was a clue that Chief Sebastian had followed through on the promise to put more officers on the street.

              “Good morning, Frank,” greeted Williams, who sat in one of the chairs opposite his desk. Frank returned the greeting and sat in his chair. Accessing the computer terminal, he sat back and looked to Williams.

              “Heard anything I haven’t?” Frank asked.

              “I don’t know,” Marcus said after sipping coffee from his cup, “because I don’t know what you’ve heard.”

              “I was hoping that someone had nabbed DeSilva so we don’t have to go through with this.”

              “No such luck, Frank,” Marcus said. Noticing that something was beating his partner’s brow, he asked what was wrong.

              “Sarah Whethers is dead,” the Captain said with restrained emotion.

              “Oh, hell,” Williams said heavily. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

              Campanelli nodded serenely as he went through the reports from the detectives that had been keeping tabs on Taylor, Ignatola and DeSilva. The HV preacher had been the only one that had not left his home on Friday. The other two had been last seen inside their residences the previous night.

              “Sentinel’s been given the warrants for Del and Fillipo,” Marcus said as Frank read.

              “Good,” the Captain of Detectives replied. “When are we picking them up?”

              “Lyman and Davies are on their way with some backup to Del Taylor’s now,” Marcus answered. “There’s a whole SWAT team behind Chavez, Morgan and a bunch of uniforms. The idea is to grab Fillipo as he leaves for breakfast.”

              “Doesn’t that guy ever eat at home?” Campanelli asked.

              “Lucky for us, almost never.”

              Frank brought the satellite locations of the suspect vehicles to his monitor. He confirmed that Ignatola’s vehicles were still at home, as was Del Taylor’s car. DeSilva had a vehicle on the move. “The church’s tour bus is active,” he announced.

              “Oh?”

              “It’s heading toward Daley Plaza, probably full of DeSilva’s followers,” Campanelli surmised. The bus was rolling northbound on North Clark Street and was only a few blocks from Daley Plaza. Toggling the computer’s control to center on the Church of the Divine Intervention, he found further movement from the target vehicles. “He’s got the vans and the other limousine involved. They’re pulling out of the church’s garage now.”

              “Frank, I think we’d better get over there,” Marcus opined and sat forward. “The mayor wanted us to meet in his office before this thing anyway.”

              Campanelli checked the time. It was just minutes after eight in the morning and the meeting was scheduled for a quarter of nine. Just the same, Frank decided that Marcus was right; that to show up early was probably prudent.

              “Okay,” he said as he shut down his terminal, “let’s go.”

              The pair went to the cruiser and Frank got behind the wheel. He noticed the low number of police vehicles near District One and took comfort in the knowledge that many of his fellow officers were on the streets.

              Frank took manual control of the car and set its alert status to ‘Condition Two’. The car’s computer sent out its signal to traffic lights and other computerized vehicles, clearing the way for them. The blue lights flashed and the siren whooped and warbled to warn pedestrians and non-computerized vehicles of their presence.

              Campanelli adjusted his lenses to zoom in just enough that he saw the leading edge of his vehicle’s hood and beyond. This gave him advanced warning of upcoming pavement hazards. He kept his thought commands on visual adjustments, putting them back to default when the car was in traffic and zooming forward again once the road was clear ahead. Frank’s full-service lenses had an advantage over the standard bio-electronic breed. His fully encompassed the surface of the eyes to give him the benefit of peripheral vision. When he magnified his view, it was not merely like looking through binoculars, it was akin to being physically thrust forward a few feet, albeit with some distortion at the edges of his field of view. With this advantage, Frank Campanelli had the reputation of being a rather insane driver, but from his point of view, he simply saw more detail than others and drove to match.

              As it was Saturday morning, the traffic was light. As a result, Frank could get the car up to eighty miles an hour at times, broken up by sudden slowing and lane changing to avoid a vehicle or road hazard. This unsettled Marcus Williams to no end, forcing the veteran to increase his serotonin levels as he held on to the door handle and center console while plastering his feet into the floorboards.

              The engine whined and whistled with acceleration, alternating with the crying of rubber whenever the brakes were hit hard or the steering yoke was twitched to go around something.

              Marcus was just glad they were not in pursuit, otherwise Frank would be in a real hurry.

              Campanelli slowed at the corner of State and Madison and hung a tight left. The powerful car accelerated like a shot, but the siren went quiet. Marcus dared to open his eyes and saw that the road ahead was deserted of pedestrians, cars and potholes.

              The siren sounded again as they approached the intersection at Dearborn. Dodging around a CTA bus, Frank made the turn and accelerated again, though only briefly as they were close to their destination.

              Suddenly, the siren quieted and the motor wound down to its near-silent normalcy. Marcus opened his eyes in time to see the blue lights cycle one last time before going out. The light at West Washington Street still turned green for them, indicating that Frank had set the car to ‘Condition Four’: ‘No lights, no sirens, just an officer in kind of a hurry’, as it had been explained to him once by someone he could not remember.

              Marcus took in a deep breath of relief when the cruiser approached the security gate at the entrance to the underground structure of the Daley Center. Campanelli slowed the car even further and both policemen could see that there was already a gathering of citizenry in the plaza, spotted with uniformed and police officers armored with riot gear.

              Frank hit the lights and siren once more as a passel of pedestrians wandered listlessly in his path. The group were startled into movement and sped out of the cruiser’s way. As he stopped the car at the small guardhouse, he silenced the noise and lowered his window.

              The security officer leaned forward to get a look at Campanelli’s star and ID and brought his head nearly inside the cabin to view those of Williams.

              “Go ahead,” the guard said shortly and waved them on.

              Frank drove the car down into the dark cavern of the underground parking structure. Once there, he happily noted the presence of more than a dozen squad cars and even more unmarked cruisers like his own. He parked his among the others and he and Williams strode westward. Above them was the Richard J. Daley Center, the thirty floor structure where the courthouses, city and county offices were located. Their destination was Chicago’s City Hall, one block west. It was accessible from this parking structure through the “Pedway,” a series of tunnels that were once accessible to the public.

              Campanelli and Williams had to show their ID’s once again to two security guards. The younger one’s eyes shifted back and forth, up and down. Frank knew that he was searching through a list in his implant. Finding their names, they were allowed passage.

              They soon found themselves wandering through the brick-walled belly of City Hall. Lit by old-styled fluorescent tubes, the wide corridor echoed with their footsteps and the hum of the light fixtures. Finding the elevator, Frank and Marcus stepped inside.

              Campanelli checked the time. They were a half an hour early for the meeting, but upon the elevator door’s opening, it appeared to him as if they were late. At least two dozen uniformed officers milled about the vast hallway amongst nameless men and women in suits. Many wore CPD stars or Cook County Sheriff’s badges and body armor. Even though most of these people certainly must have been equipped with implants, the area buzzed loudly with conversation. As Frank and Marcus walked among them, they gathered much attention, especially Marcus Williams, who towered over most.

              “Campanelli!” a voice called from down the hallway. Frank turned toward the caller, but only saw a waving hand just above the crowd. Instinctively, he walked toward it. “This way!”