The Wrong Man (17 page)

‘Sit in the middle, hands in your pockets,’ Bishop said from his position at the dirty kitchen counter. He watched as Cortiss
did as instructed and lowered himself onto the middle cushion of his own couch. Bishop had already checked under the cushions
and found nothing hidden there.

Cortiss’s apartment was large
and open-spaced, with hardwood flooring and floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the New Calvary
Cemetery. Bishop sat on a stool facing Cortiss, with one elbow on the breakfast bar and his left hand holding the Beretta
on his lap. The kitchen counter hadn’t been cleaned in days and dirty cutlery fought for space with food-encrusted plates
and takeout boxes. Bishop could
see a cordless phone buried in a box half-filled with noodles. At least it told him they were
unlikely to be interrupted.

‘Told you you wouldn’t believe me,’ Cortiss said.

‘You haven’t given me enough to form an opinion,’ Bishop said. ‘So you found out about the vault’s existence back when you
worked for Brennan?’

Cortiss
shrugged and said nothing.

Bishop motioned with the Beretta. ‘You gonna make me do this the hard way?’

‘Right. You spend all that effort locating me and now you’re gonna pop me before you get any answers? That’s gonna happen.’

‘It might. Somebody owes me three years of my life, Cortiss. And right now, that somebody’s you. You won’t give me anything,
then I might as well finish you off and move on. You know I’ll do it. I found you when nobody else could; I’ll find your partner
too. It’ll just take longer, that’s all. Talk and I got no reason to kill you.’

Cortiss chewed at his cheek for a moment. Then he turned to the windows and looked out at the sky. Five seconds passed. Ten.
Bishop knew he was
thinking things through. Working the angles. That’s how
he’d survived up until now. He’d know Bishop had nothing to lose at this point. He’d also realized a few answers wouldn’t
cost him anything. That talking might actually gain him something.

Cortiss finally turned back to Bishop and sighed. ‘Okay, brother. Let’s talk for a while.’

‘The vault. How’d
you find out about it?’

‘The old fool let it slip after a few drinks one day. About how he’d had it built shortly after buying the place. Son of a
bitch sent me packing before I got the chance to look for it, though. Bastard.’

‘Why?’

Cortiss looked as if he might not answer. Then he blew out his breath and said, ‘Natalie Brennan, that’s
why. How about a
smoke?’

Bishop considered for a moment, then nodded. Whatever would keep him talking. ‘One-handed. Your left.’

‘Figured out I’m not a southpaw like you, huh?’ Cortiss smiled and used exaggerated movements to take a packet and a disposable
lighter from his shirt pocket with his left hand. He extracted a cigarette, lit it and
reached over to place both items on
the left arm of the sofa. He blew out a plume of smoke and said. ‘You were there, brother. You know what a screw-up she was.
Couldn’t get her old man to give her the time of day, so she’d latch onto whichever father figure was closest to hand and
next thing you know, it’s party time. Not that she had to work too hard on me looking the
way she did, parading around the
house in a tight pair of shorts and a top no wider than a piece of string. Subtle, she wasn’t. But you already know that,
right?’

Bishop didn’t react, but he was pretty sure Cortiss was telling the truth. That was exactly the kind of thing Natalie would
do. He made a quick mental calculation and said, ‘She couldn’t
have been more than a child when you were there.’

Cortiss shrugged and took a drag of the cigarette. ‘Try fifteen going on thirty. I tell you, they grow up quick these days.
Some of the things she wanted to do . . .’ He shook his head. ‘Hey, I wasn’t exactly the first man on the moon, if you know what
I mean.’

Christ
, Bishop thought.
No wonder the girl was so screwed up
. ‘So she told her father about the two of you?’

‘Nah. She wasn’t malicious, just dumb. That silly bitch never bothered cleaning up after us and when Brennan spotted the evidence
on her bed sheets one day, that was it for me. For some reason, he didn’t want
the cops involved so he just let me walk.’ He took another drag and said,
‘Wouldn’t surprise me if
he
was the one broke her cherry and just didn’t want family secrets leaking out. The guy was no saint, let me tell you.’

Bishop recalled Jenna using the exact same phrase this morning. He’d always known Randall Brennan was amoral, but accusing
the man of incest and child abuse seemed extreme without anything to back it up.

‘So he fired you.’

‘Right. About a year before you showed up on the scene.’

‘But you still had a hard-on for the vault.’

‘Oh, yeah. Worse than ever. Enough to want to take myself off any future list of suspects by arranging my car accident.’ He
smiled. ‘It served a few purposes, actually, but that was the main one. The guy in the driver’s
seat was someone who’d outlived
his usefulness, too, so it was win–win all round. You wanna throw me an ashtray?’ He pointed his chin at the counter Bishop
was leaning on. ‘There’s one on there somewhere.’

‘Use the floor,’ he said. ‘What then?’

Cortiss tapped some ash at his feet. ‘Well, I needed somebody with access to the house and the freedom
to search it thoroughly,
didn’t I? I’d already come up with a vague plan where I’d place Brennan’s family under threat, forcing him to hire bodyguards,
and buy one off, and then when I recognized one of your team on the news one day I knew I was on the right track.’

‘Rebecca Newmarket,’ Bishop said.

Cortiss laughed. ‘Yeah. You got it.’

The only time Bishop and his team had ever been exposed to TV was during the six months they spent guarding the rabidly right-wing
media personality Rebecca Newmarket. Willing to spew forth offensive opinions and racial hatred at the drop of a pay cheque,
she’d received so many death threats that nobody but RoyseCorp would take her on any more. She was also the only
person to
ever cause Bishop to seriously question his choice of career. He’d managed to thwart two potentially fatal attacks just in
those six months alone. Frankly, he was amazed she was still breathing.

Cortiss said, ‘I saw you all arrive at some awards ceremony and I knew I’d found someone I could work with. Last time we’d
encountered each other
we were both using different names, but he struck me as
somebody who wasn’t afraid to get his hands dirty. Turned out I was right. We got reacquainted, I filled him in, told him
what I knew and he was like a kid at Christmas. Couldn’t wait to get started on all the planning. He picked you out as the
fall guy straight from the off, by the way. He doesn’t like you much.’

Bishop said, ‘His name?’

Cortiss shook his head. ‘Uh, uh, brother. That ain’t how we’re gonna play. Right now, I figure the only thing I got to trade
is my ex-partner’s identity and current whereabouts. I don’t mind answering any other question you got, but I’ll be holding
back on the big guns until we come to some kind of an arrangement that guarantees
I walk.’

‘I could force it out of you, Cortiss.’ Bishop lifted a trouser leg to reveal his knife.

‘You could, but once you started I’d make sure you went all the way. That wouldn’t get either of us anywhere, would it? But
I
can
be reasonable.’

Bishop saw a determination in the man’s eyes. Cortiss would take it to the edge if necessary.
He decided to be patient and
agree on the reasonable route. It was usually best in the long run, anyway. He said, ‘It was you two stalking the family,
sending photos of the kids to Brennan and leaving threatening messages.’

‘Yeah,’ Cortiss said and blew a smoke ring towards the ceiling. ‘Needed to make it look like it was coming from somebody wronged
by Brennan in the past. And that they were gonna take it out on the whole family sometime soon.’

Bishop shook his head. ‘It doesn’t add up. How could you predict Brennan would approach RoyseCorp for protection? And if he
did, how could you be sure my team would be assigned?’

‘Easy. With Brennan’s money, who else was he gonna call but the
top private security firm in the country? Especially as he
helped Royse start the company up in the first place. You know about that?’ When Bishop nodded, he said, ‘There you go. He
and Royse went way back, and that’s how we also knew your team would get picked for the job. Don’t forget you were the close
protection division’s golden boy, commanding the only team with a
hundred per cent success rate up to that point. Once his
old comrade came calling, Royse was bound to assign his most reliable man to the case. Guy like that looks after his own.
That’s why we timed the threats while you were all on leave and
available. And since you always picked the same crew, my partner knew he’d be along for the ride as well.’ He stretched both
arms
out wide and smiled. ‘And thus it all came to pass, brother.’

‘So when did your partner find the vault?’

‘About three months later, in early September. Never told me how he did it, though.’

Bishop didn’t respond. He thought back to the slashes on Natalie’s body. They’d been deep and frantic cuts from someone who’d
had a personal interest
in the victim. But when Cortiss had talked about Natalie there’d been no emotion there. Which just
left one possibility. Except Bishop hadn’t noticed any signs that his men were messing around with the teenager. Even Chaney
hadn’t stooped that low before.

Bishop said, ‘Natalie told your friend where it was.’

Cortiss frowned. ‘You think?’

‘Sure, pillow talk. He’d been screwing her for a while by then, in that room above the garage. He even risked taking her to
my apartment since he knew I rarely stayed there. Setting up the frame.’

Cortiss sucked on the end of his smoke and slowly breathed out. ‘Yeah, you could be onto something there. There was definitely
some kind of love/hate
thing going on. Apparently, she reminded him of an old lover he’d never really gotten over.’

‘I’ll bet. And he was the one who came up with the idea of an armed assault in the first place, wasn’t he?’

‘Right. It was the only way we’d get away without suspicion falling on him. And we had to make sure the Brennans ended up
part of the collateral damage.’

‘And you were happy with that.’

‘Hey, brother, whatever gets the job done. Wasn’t the first time I’d had to cover my tracks like that.’

Bishop studied Cortiss and suddenly felt the urge to knock his teeth out. He looked so sure of himself, sitting there with
his legs stretched out like he was discussing football averages.

Cortiss continued. ‘So we knew you guys were due to be relieved on October 15, and decided to use that to get us past the
front gate. If the real team were supposed to turn up at seven, we’d turn up at six. Once we had the authentic IDs and codes
we were good to go.’

So the inside man arranged the IDs
, Bishop thought.
Interesting
. And Tennison with
his love of technology. How easy would it be to make
fake documents to get past Neary at the gate? If you were as good as Tennison, probably pretty easy. And then there were the
hidden surveillance cameras, too.

‘And the three extra guys in your assault party?’ Bishop asked.

Cortiss’s face broke into a smile. ‘You liked them, huh?’ He sniggered. ‘They
still haven’t identified those boys. Never will,
either. Romanian ex-army with barely a word of English between them. Poor guys weren’t destined to survive that night. If
you guys hadn’t taken care of them, I would have.’

Bishop kneaded his forehead with his fingers. ‘Why’d you waste Neary?’

‘That was just one of the boys bringing down the odds
once we got in. After that, they each took their assigned man on the
perimeter while I made my own entrance and put you to sleep for the allotted time.’ Cortiss took a last drag of the cigarette
and crushed it under his shoe. ‘So there you go. I made it to the top and found Oates shot, and Brennan and Natalie both still
dripping from my partner’s attentions. I still
had your knife so I thought, since you’d be taking the fall, I might as well
make it conclusive. Wiped my blood off and smothered it in the Brennans’, then dropped it next to the old man. I grabbed the
cash and then met you on the stairs soon after.’

Bishop narrowed his eyes, curious about what had stopped his three hollow-points. ‘Kevlar?’

Cortiss nodded. ‘Covered in blood bags, too. We knew you’d go for the textbook grouping of three in the chest. I’m happy to
say you didn’t disappoint.’

Bishop had figured as much. But at least now he had the answer as to why the raid took place at all. The whole thing had been
nothing more than a diversion to cover up the actual murders that had already taken
place
while Bishop was on duty two floors below
.

And he hadn’t heard a thing the whole time. Not a single sound. He should have listened harder. He had no excuse. None at
all. That was one hell of a bitter pill to swallow.

‘So how much did you come away with in the end?’ he asked.

‘Cash?’ Cortiss shrugged. ‘Just over five million,
I think. Minus the two we planted in that fake account of yours.’

Bishop stared at him. ‘Three million? And that was worth seven lives?’

Cortiss tilted his head and smiled. ‘’Course not, but that ain’t exactly what we came for, was it?’ Then he laughed hard. ‘That’s
what you thought this was all about? A few million Brennan salted away for a rainy day?
Oh brother, that’s beautiful. Just
beautiful.’

And it came to Bishop that Jenna might have been closer to the truth than he thought. Maybe the vault
had
held something other than money. Perhaps something that was priceless in comparison. Bishop thought of Jenna’s comments earlier
about J. Edgar Hoover. And of Helen Gandy, a distant relative of Brennan’s.
‘It was a file, wasn’t it? And old FBI file Brennan
inherited.’