The Investigators (Badge of Honor 7)

If Denny Coughlin accepted the offer, there was no way he would not find out that Amy was here.

Coughlin ignored the offer.

“The trouble with Mickey is that he has a nose like a bird dog, and people tell him things they think he would like to know,” Coughlin said. “And he thinks like a cop.”

“He would have made a good cop,” Peter agreed.

He poured whiskey in a glass and added ice.

“After he fed me about four of these,” Coughlin said, “he asked me whose birthday party it was we were all at at the Rittenhouse Club.”

“We meaning you, me, Matt, and the FBI?”

Coughlin nodded.

“What did you tell him?”

“I told him that Matty had had a little run-in with a couple of FBI agents, and you and I were pouring oil on some troubled waters.”

“Did he buy it?”

“He said he was naturally curious why a couple of FBI agents who don’t even work in Philadelphia were following Matty around in the first place.”

“He knew they had been following him? God, he does find things out, doesn’t he?” Wohl said.

“Including some things that you and I didn’t know,” Coughlin said. “Like when those two FBI agents were waiting in the Special Operations parking lot to see if Matty was coming out, a Highway Patrol sergeant—Nick DeBenedito—thought they looked suspicious and went and tapped on their car window and asked them who they were.”

Coughlin smiled, and Wohl laughed.

“It’s not funny, Peter,” Coughlin said. “And it gets worse. The FBI guys showed Nick their identification, and told him they were on the job, surveilling the guy driving the Porsche, and did Nick know what he was doing inside. Nick asked why did they want to know, and they told him it was none of his business. So Nick goes inside, tells the duty officer, who calls the FBI duty officer and asks him what a couple of FBI agents, one of them named Jernigan, are doing parked in the Special Operations parking lot, and the FBI duty officer says he doesn’t have an agent named Jernigan. So Nick and the duty officer go back to the parking lot, and the FBI guys are gone. Then they go see Matt, who’s working upstairs, and ask him what’s going on, and Matt tells them not to worry about it, the FBI thinks he’s a kidnapper they’re looking for.”

“Oh, God!” Wohl said, laughing. “So within thirty minutes, it’s all over Special Operations. The FBI with egg on its face again.”

“That’s funny, I admit. But what’s not funny is, of course, that somebody couldn’t wait to tell Mickey, and he put that and us being in the Rittenhouse Club together and came up with the idea that something’s going on he doesn’t know about, and the way to find out is to ask me.”

“What did you tell him?”

“I told him I didn’t feel free to tell him until I’d first checked with you.”

What do you call that? Passing the buck?

“So he’s going to come see me?” Wohl asked. “First thing in the morning, no doubt

?”

“Probably, since he didn’t beat me here,” Coughlin said, smiling. He held up his whiskey glass. “I told you, we mostly drank our dinner. I don’t like to make decisions when I do that. I figured telling Mickey he’d have to ask you would give us time to think how much we’re going to tell him. We’re going to have to tell him something.”

Wohl didn’t reply.

“So I decided to come here,” Coughlin said. “And on the way I had a couple of other unpleasant thoughts.”

“Oh?”

“Do me a favor, Peter, and don’t decide before you think it over that this is the whiskey talking.”

“I wouldn’t do that, Chief,” Peter said.

“Yes, you would. I would too, if you showed up at my place at this hour of the night with half a bag on.”