The Victim (Badge of Honor 3)

"That's right by the church?"

"Yeah. I live on the top floor of the Delaware Cancer Society Building-"

"Where?" she asked, chuckling.

"You can't miss it. Anyway, there's a parking garage in the back. Just drive in. There's two parking spaces with my name on them. And there's a rent-a-cop on duty. He'll call you a cab."

He started to hand her money. She waved it away. "Nice girls don't take cab fare," she said. "Haven't you ever heard of women's lib?"

"This has been one hell of a date, hasn't it?" he said.

"It lends an entirely new meaning to the wordmemorable," Amanda said.

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be an ass," she said, and stretched upward to kiss him.

Whatever her intentions, either to kiss his cheek or, chastely, his lips, it somehow didn't turn out that way. It was not a passionate embrace ending with Amanda semi-swooning in his arms, but when their lips broke contact, there seemed to be some sort of current flowing between them.

"Jesus!" Matt said softly.

She put her hand up and laid it for a moment on his cheek. Then she ran across the street and got in the Porsche.

Matt got in Wohl's Jaguar and drove north to Vine Street, then left to North Broad, and then turned right onto Broad Street. There was not much traffic, and understandably reasoning that he was not going to get ticketed for speeding while driving Inspector Wohl's car to a crime scene, he stepped hard on the gas.

A minute or two later there was the growl of a siren behind him, and he pulled toward the right. An Oldsmobile, its red lights flashing from their concealed position under the grill, raced past him. After a moment he realized that the car belonged to Chief Inspector Dennis V. Coughlin. He wondered if Denny Coughlin, or Sergeant Tom Lenihan, who was driving, had recognized him or Wohl's car or both.

Just south of Temple University he saw that Captain Pekach was right; he would have no trouble finding Colombia and Clarion. There were two RPCs, warning lights flashing, on Broad Street and Colombia, and two uniformed cops in the street.

When he signaled to turn right, one of them emphatically signaled for him to continue up Broad Street. Matt stopped.

"I'm Payne. Special Operations. I'm to meet Inspector Wohl here."

The cop looked at him doubtfully but waved him on.

Clarion is the second street in from Broad. There was barely room for Matt to make it past all the police cars, marked and unmarked, lining both sides of Colombia. There was a black Cadillac limousine nearly blocking the intersection of Clarion and Colombia. Matt had seen it before. It was the mayoral limousine.

Then he saw two familiar faces, Officer Jesus Martinez and the Highway sergeant who had almost made him piss his pants on the roof of the Penn Services Parking Garage by suggesting that the price for moving a fucking muscle would be having his fucking brains blown out, and who had seemed wholly prepared to make good the threat.

They were directing traffic. The sergeant first began-impatiently, even angrily-to gesture for him to turn right, south, on Clarion, and then he apparently recognized Wohl's car, for he signaled him to park it on the sidewalk.

Matt got out of the car and looked around for Wohl. He was standing with Police Commissioner Thaddeus Czernick, Chief Inspector Dennis V. Coughlin, half a dozen uniformed senior supervisors, none of whom looked familiar, two other men in civilian clothing, and His Honor, Mayor Jerry Carlucci.

Twenty feet away, Matt saw Sergeant Tom Lenihan standing with three men Matt supposed were both policemen and probably drivers. He walked over to them.

And then he saw the body. It was in the gutter, facedown, curled up beside a 22^nd District RPC. There were a half dozen detectives, or crime-lab technicians, around it, two of them on their hands and knees with powerful, square-bodied searchlights, one of them holding a measuring tape, the others doing something Matt didn't quite understand.

"Hello, Matt," Tom Lenihan said, offering his hand. "I thought that was you in Wohl's Jag."

"Sergeant," Matt said politely.

"This is Matt Payne, Special Operations-" Lenihan said, beginning the introductions, but he stopped when Mayor Carlucci's angry voice filled the street.

"I don't give a good goddamn if Matt Lowenstein, or anyone else, likes it or not," the mayor said. "The way it's going tobe, Tad, is that Special Operations is going to take this job and get whatever sons of bitches shot this poor bastard in cold blood. And you're going to see personally that the Department gives Wohl everything he thinks he needs to get the job done. Clear?"

"Yes, sir," Commissioner Czernick said.

"And now, Commissioner, I think that you and I and Chief Coughlin should go express our condolences to Officer Magnella's family, don't you?"