Silverfish Ch. 01

"I did think of one thing, sir." said Teddy. "We know there was a lot of money taken during the first crime, but it was interesting to me that there was a bit more than normal during the second one. Even though the crimes were very different in the way they were executed, it occurred to me that they had a source of information that might have been the same both times."

"You guys are getting good." I said. "I see Lieutenant Ross has trained you well."

"No, it's not me." said Cindy. "We're all learning from the Master. That would be you, Commander."

"Keep it up and I'll have an MCD full of Master Detectives." I said, smiling. "And that's exactly what I want."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Robert 'Brown Nose' Brownlee was drinking a bourbon at the bar of the Hyatt Hotel on the north side of Town. At that moment, a woman walked in and they made eye contact. Brownlee went over to the booth where the woman had seated herself. The Iron Crowbar would've noticed that she seated herself to be virtually invisible to others in the room; Brownlee did not notice and sat down, easily noticeable to the bar's clientele.

"So, Robert," the woman said, "the Sheriff was very unhappy with you."

"It wasn't all bad." said Brownlee. "I got I.T., most of I.T., away from Troy. That had to hurt."

The woman hid her annoyance. "I came here to tell you to watch yourself, Robert. Harold Malone liked you, and he ultimately got you to where you are now, where you could do some good for us. But you're no good to us if you get fired."

"I'm not going to get fired and you know it." said Brownlee. "The Police Union has my back all the way. Besides, I've got to establish my territory and defend my turf. Troy needs to be put in his place, as powerful as such a place might be. The Police Union needs him... 'softened up'... or else he'll be too hard to contain."

"I have to go." said the woman, seeing that she'd have better luck working with a brick wall. "Again, Robert, you need to be careful and circumspect. The man you're agitating destroyed a rogue cell of the CIA; if you think you're jack shit compared to him, you'd better think again. Even Harold said so."

"Harold is no longer here. I am... and I'm the same rank as Troy. I have power, too, and don't you forget that." Robert said defensively. He failed to notice the merest look of insulted anger on the woman's face.

"Yeah, right." the woman said. "Robert, you wouldn't know how to properly use power if it came with an instruction manual. Now keep a low profile for a while."

Just then there was a commotion in the hotel lobby outside the bar. Robert noticed that State Senator Katherine Woodburn had just walked in with a small entourage, and was being welcomed by a pathetic sycophant of a hotel manager.

"Now there is someone who knows something about power, Robert." the woman said, her voice full of admiration. "Senator Woodburn is giving a speech here in a couple of hours to the local chapter of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. I'll use the disruption to slip out. Remember my words, Robert." The woman got up and left.

"I'll show you." Robert said to his drink and the empty booth the woman had left behind. "And I'll show Troy, too. This will be my Police Department, and soon..."

Part 6 - Bad People, Hot Sex

"Unnnh!" the Rev. Robert Patterson groaned as he repeatedly pistoned his throbbing cock into the beautiful blonde prostitute beneath him, feeling her push her ass up to meet every hard thrust of his meat into her sodden depths. She was the hottest professional fuck Patterson had ever had, and he understood why Jonas Oldeeds enjoyed hiring this woman for sexual pleasure.

For herself, the woman looked over at the opening in the curtains, seeing the lights of the City from this sixth-floor vantage point. She pretended to enjoy the fucking that this 'Man of the Lord' was giving her, feeling nothing but derision for the man and his sheer hypocrisy. At least to her knowledge he didn't rape underage girls like Oldeeds regularly did, she thought to herself, not having the knowledge that Patterson was taking up right where his predecessor and mentor had left off in child trafficking, and that if she had known about it, she would be dead like Nicole Stanton, a.k.a. Dawn Starrett, was.

"Oh God, I'm about to come... oh God, OH GOD!" Patterson gasped as he felt the pleasure build and then break like an overflowing dam. Spurts of hot man-lava fired from his engorged cockhead, only to be caught by the membrane of the condom in which his penis was sheathed. Cherie felt the man collapse on top of her, trying to catch his breath. Then he rolled off onto his back, staring at the ceiling.

"God, baby, you are absolutely the best fuck in the world." Patterson said. Meaning it as a compliment, he added "No wonder you're the hottest escort in the City, and you're worth every penny."

"You're too kind." Cherie said sardonically. Yes, she was drop-dead gorgeous and her tight pussy was velvet fire for any man who could pay the exorbitant price to sink his cock into it. But Patterson's words reminded her of what she really was: a whore. High-class, expensive, the best at her craft, but in the end still a whore.

"So, Robert," she said, trying to sound sleepy and soothing, "when do you take over the Ministries and make them your own?"

"Soon, babe." Patterson said. "Soon, very soon. We've just about got that bitch Vicki Oldeeds boxed out. And I still have the final ace to play: proof that she murdered that young CIA agent Mike. If she doesn't play ball, I'm going to send what I have to Laura Fredricson... and that will be the end of Vicki Oldeeds."

"And that'll leave you in charge of the Ministries." Cherie said, snuggling into Robert. "You'll have the position and respect you deserve."

"Yes, I will." Patterson said, letting some of his smugness show. "And if you want to come along, you'll have to become the reformed prostitute that found the Lord, but there's a place for you with me... and my wife. She thinks you're hot and she loves to eat pussy. She really wants to eat out that police bitch that used to do those muscle competitions, the one that is the Iron Crowbar's partner."

"Your wife is a hot woman herself." said Cherie, not really interested but pretending to be. "She can get face deep in my muff any time she likes." With cameras rolling, catching it all, she thought silently to herself...

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"Ohhhhh, God, you are so fucking big!" gasped Vicki Oldeeds in her apartment in Midtown as the young Satyr slowly sank his nine inch cock into Vicki's steaming snatch. "God, I love fucking your big, young cock!" The Satyr said nothing but began pumping Vicki with steady and increasingly harder, deeper strokes.

The other young man in the room, another Satyr that was a friend of the first one, watched the couple deeply fucking on the bed, slowly jacking his cock to prepare it for action. Vicki looked over and noticed his huge organ was hard.

"Fuck me dogstyle, baby." she said to the man fucking her. He withdrew with a loud *slurp* and Vicki turned over onto her hands and knees. The Satyr reinserted his huge tool into Vicki's cunt from the rear as the second Satyr got up. He stood at the edge of the bed right in front of the blonde woman's face. She opened her mouth and he inserted his meat, letting it slide past her lipsticked lips, careful not to go too deep and choke her. He began to fuck her face in time and rhythm to his buddy pumping her twat.

It would be long minutes later before the Satyr emptied his balls into Vicki's clutching cunt, followed moments later by the second man shooting his large load down her throat as she greedily swallowed every drop and jacked his cock hard to get as much as she could. Finally, they settled onto the bed in three sweaty heaps of satiated flesh.

Vicki told the second Satyr to take a shower. After the left, she turned to the first man and asked "Okay, what do you have?"

"There is a lot of chatter in the underground." the Satyr said. "Robert Patterson is about to make his move against you. He apparently has something on you, but I don't know what it is. My Mistress knows, but she's keeping things to herself." The Satyr's Mistress was Rita, the lovely, statuesque blonde that ran 'Lashes and Lace', the BDSM club south of the University.

"I see." Vicki said, the gears turning in her mind. She knew what Patterson had, or what he thought he had, on her. "Okay, you and your friend had better get back. Just lay low for a while so you don't get caught, but find out anything you can."

She got up and went to her purse, procuring money that was rolled into a tight wad and secured by a rubber band. She tossed it to the guy and told him to clean up and get his ass out.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Pastor Fred Bundy was in the same hotel but a different room than his boss and mentor, Robert Patterson. He was pumping his small penis in and out of the ass of the skanky young Latina prostitute that he'd been provided by Patterson. His overweight body was pouring sweat as he vigorously sodomized the woman until he felt the painful ecstasy of his release approaching.

He did not try to fight it, but let it all go, firing his climax into the condom. After finishing, he withdrew his penis from the girl's posterior, carefully removing the soiled condom and flushing it down the toilet, then thoroughly washing his hands. By the time he came back into the room, the girl was gone... and so was his wallet from the bedside table.

Damn! he muttered to himself, thinking of the hassle this was going to be. He had no idea that this was the least of his problems. The secreted cameras had recorded everything, and he was now in the power of Henry R. Wargrave...

Part 7 - The Return of The Silverfish

Tuesday morning, March 10th. As usual, at 7:00am it was time for the lovely Bettina!

"This is Bettina Wurtzburg, KXTC Channel Two News!" shouted the redhead into her microphone. "Channel Two News has learned that the Town & County Council will be discussing the structure of the Police Department in their meeting tonight! The Police Union has filed a grievance, stating that Commander Donald Troy should no longer be in charge of the I.T. Department. Commander Troy was originally hired by the Police Department in the capacity of I.T. Supervisor nearly three years ago, and never relinquished those duties as he rose in the ranks and solved many difficult crimes."

"She's buttering you up, Commander." Joanne Cummings said. "Whatever's next, it's going to be bad." Joanne was becoming a good 'Bettina-reader'.

"However, Commander Troy was also the I.T. Supervisor of the Campus Police and has since given up those duties." continued Bettina. "Furthermore, the Police Union has stated that the I.T. Department should be under the pervue of the new Deputy Chief, Robert Brownlee. Commander Brownlee is in charge of administration and the properties of the Police Department, says the Union, and as such should be in charge of I.T."

Bettina went on: "The Council has several ideas to discuss, and will resolve the situation in tonight's meeting. Channel Two News has learned that Sheriff Allgood has nominated Lieutenant Marc Aaron to be promoted or brevetted to Captain and to take over the Physical Properties division of the Police Force, which would directly control the important I.T. Department."

"The 'Brown Nose' wanted Forsyth to be Physical Properties." said Lt. Tanya Perlman. "He's not going to like it if Aaron is put there."

For some reason, I felt something over my shoulder. I turned to look, and caught Brownlee looking into the door of MCD from the side hall. He had a look on his face that was part irritation, but part knowing something we didn't know, as if he was getting something over on us. When he saw that I was aware of his presence, he scurried away.

"Reminds me of when I first got here." I said to Cindy, who had also caught Brownlee looking in. "When Malone and Ikea would be joking in the hallway, thinking they had something on me."

"Yeah..." was all Cindy said, tension behind her ice blue eyes.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

At 8:00am, Sheriff Allgood called me and Cindy Ross into his office.

"I have Sheriff Sorrells of Coltrane County on speaker." he said to us. "Go ahead, Sheriff."

"Yes, Sheriff," said the Sheriff on the other end of the line, his voice betraying his easygoing, country-boy, laid-back style, "I was wondering if we could borrow your officers that are SBI Reservists, and have them come down here for a few hours. We've had a bank robbery overnight at County Regional Bank here in Buford."

Allgood nodded at us, so I said "Sure, Sheriff, we're on our way now."

With that, Cindy and went to change clothes, into black pullover sweaters with sewn-in SBI reserve badges on the front, and khaki pants. Cindy's sweater was tight, and damn did she look good in it, I idly thought to myself. We also wore light jackets with some light armor that had sewn-in SBI reserve badges and 'SBI' in large letters on the back.

"You look good in black, Commander." Cindy said. "You should wear black more often."

"You look good in black, too, Cindy." I said. "Always best to look damn good when we go visit our Coltrane County friends, yes?" Cindy laughed.

We were in my silver Police SUV with its light armor and bulletproof windows. Sheriff Allgood was as skittish as Chief Griswold had been about his crowbar-wielding officers driving around unprotected, and so use of the vehicle outside of the County was authorized at the very highest levels. Just after crossing the County line, I pulled over to the side of the road and we logged in as SBI Reservists using iPhone apps.

We drove past the road leading to Dr. P. Harvey Eckhart's 'The Vision' World Headquarters, and a bit farther down the road was the State Asylum. "Oh, look! They're doing construction there." said Cindy.

"Yes," I said, "the women have been moved out, and a wing is being built for them at State Women's Prison in Madison County. This facility is being expanded to house more male prisoners, and it will become a regular prison as well as mental institution for male patients."

Driving on down into the town of Buford, we went to County Regional Bank. There were already three police and sheriff cars there. Sheriff Sorrells and Deputy Strait came out to greet us, and it did not take much detection to see that Deputy Strait was enamored with Cindy, especially when she was wearing black and looking fine...

"I think this one is really going to interest you, Commander." said Sheriff Sorrells as we went into the bank and towards the open vault. As I stepped inside, I saw some writing on the inside of the round vault door. The words shocked me:

It said "Hello Iron Crowbar! Love, Silverfish." A drawing of a line in a loop, looking like a fish, with an eye inside, drawn in black outline and filled in with silver Sharpie, was underneath the words.

"Looks like this criminal wants your personal attention, Commander." said Sheriff Sorrells in his drawl accent. "That makes him stupid, if you ask me."

"I could not agree more, Sheriff." said Cindy as she examined the writing. "What do you make of it, Commander?"

"Don't know yet." I said. "How much was taken, Sheriff?"

"About $15,000 in cash, and several thousand in Treasury bonds. We've alerted the Federal Reserve in the City and the FBI about that." said Sorrells.

"Yes you have." said a voice behind us. I turned to see FBI Special Agent in Charge Jack Muscone walking up, with Special Agent Lindy Linares in tow. "Hello, Commander, quelle suprise to see you here." said Jack.

"Well, the perp did leave me a calling card." I replied, pointing to the inscription. Muscone's eyes widened in surprise as I said "We have a leak somewhere, Agent Muscone. This cannot be a coincidence."

"Geez, we sure do." Jack said, very softly. "Think it's on our end or your end?"

"Don't know yet. No data." I said, continuing to peer at the drawing and the surroundings.

A Crime Lab team from my County was invited down to assist in gathering evidence, per the contract between our counties. J.R. Barnes led the small group, which did not include Christina Cho. They took fingerprints, and also took prints of the bank employees as control references.

While they worked, I interviewed the bank president, Mr. Shapiro. Mr. Shapiro was a short man with and a ring of brown hair around the sides and back of his head, the top being bald. He was Italian and while he spoke English well, he could hardly speak without making a gesticulation of some kind. He was wearing a brown suit and tan shirt, which looked kind of strange to me, for some reason.

"No, we've never had an overnight break-in like this." said Mr. Shapiro, speaking fast as if he were a radio announcer. In fact, he was the radio announcer for the Coltrane County Little League games on the local radio station. "We've had two robberies at the teller windows in the past twenty years. Why our bank?"

"I don't know, Mr. Shapiro." I said. "Have you or your staff noticed anyone loitering around the bank, casing the joint?"

"No, nothing like that, and Buford is a small town; we tend to notice things that are out of place. You can ask my staff if any of them saw anything strange, of course." said Shapiro.

"So County Regional Bank has branches here, in Hillside in Nextdoor County, and up in our Town in our County, is that not right?" I asked.

"Yes, and a fourth branch in the county southwest of here, between the rivers, in the town of West Point which borders the State Line. It seems off the beaten path, since the highway to Midtown goes southeast, but they've got several industries on one river or the other, and so that branch does well."

"Just one other question." I said. "Have you or any of your other branches had occasion to have a larger than normal sum of money in your vault at any time recently, or were you or any of them planning to have more money in the near future?"

"No, not at all." said Mr. Shapiro. "We got some extra Treasury bonds, because they're given as gifts for Mother's Day and for school graduations coming up in the next few months, but no extra cash of any significance."

Interviews with the staff, all longtime employees and Buford residents, proved fruitless in gleaning any information. I also got a call on my cellphone from SBI Deputy Director Conlan, chief of the SBI Reserve program. He'd seen me and Cindy log in, and wanted to know what was going on. I reported what I knew about the bank heist, including that the possible perp had already drawn the interest of the FBI.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

We were at lunch at the "Buford '57 Diner", the one that had really good food, though Jack said it did not quite beat the double cheeseburgers at the Cop Bar in Town... the cheeseburgers that had been named after him. Still, we enjoyed the delicious food as we discussed the case.

Sheriff Sorrells and Deputy Straight had accompanied me and Cindy and the FBI team, and I realized that the portly Sheriff was far sharper than the appearance he gave. Indeed, I was quite sure he cultivated that 'hick' appearance as much as he could, to throw off criminals that thought they could outwit him.

"Think we'll ever catch this guy?" asked the Sheriff in his Southernly drawl.

"I have hopes, Sheriff. I have hopes." I replied.

"It's obvious that this criminal had you in mind when he did this, Commander." asked the Sheriff. "Now why do you suppose that is?" I felt Jack peering at me.

"Sheriff, there was a series of bank heists, years ago." I said. "The Statutes of Limitations have run out, but the Second National Bank in our County was one of those banks that was hit. After the more recent robbery at our Second National Bank a few months ago I had occasion to begin looking at the previous heists, and obviously the perp has found that out. Why or how, I'm not sure. But if I find that out, I think we may find this 'Silverfish' guy and so solve not only this crime, but several others."