Jeremy gets attacked by three men.
The men are masked; one has an orange bat.
Kevin Reilly has an alibi for the beating.
In the hospital, Jeremy freaks out when he sees Reilly.
Jeremy dies from his injuries.
The Reilly brothers chase Gordy into the junkyard of the Potterford Industrial Complex, stumble upon a gang fight.
Kevin Reilly is badly injured.
Bubbs’ motorcycle gets dumped in Pickering creek.
The conjecture:
Reilly’s phone call triggered a war between the UJ and someone else.
The UJ was one of the gangs in the junkyard.
The UJ’s enemy dumped the Harley.
The unknown:
Who is the UJ at war with?
Who was the other gang in the junkyard?
Why did Jeremy freak out when he couldn’t have identified Reilly?
Who…in the hell…did Reilly call?
“Ma’am and sir, I really don’t have time…”
“We know your brother made a call the night Jeremy Sokol was attacked. Was it to you?”
“No!”
Sooo many lowlifes, some of them violent, owed favors to Kevin Reilly. If it was one of them, it might explain who jumped the UJ in the scrap yard.
Then again, it could just as easily have been someone he trusted, rather than someone he owned. That would mean family. That would mean Ian.
“We know the attackers drove to the barn in a truck like yours.”
“Look down this street! Every third person in Potterford owns a truck like mine!”
If Ian had any other last name, they could pummel with accusations just to see what stuck, but he was a Reilly. The cops loved the Reillys. The local judges loved the Reillys. The Potterford Herald loved the Reillys. If they were going to pummel, they’d need a solid starting point. They’d need treasure. They’d need that all-important slam-dunk that Lynch was waiting for.
“Take it easy. Just wanted to make sure it was in your driveway that entire evening.”
“It was.”
“Didn’t loan it to anyone?”
“No.”
Plus, there was the ICU conundrum. No matter who did it, Jeremy couldn’t have identified them, so why did the sight of Kevin Reilly make his vitals go haywire?
“Again, as I understand things, a low-ranking member of the Unjudged gets you to chase him to the Industrial Complex. You see his bicycle on the ground outside the junkyard. You figure he went in there, so you follow him and witness a gang fight?”
“For the third time, yes.”
Carrie’s interrogation strategy was a standard one: a commonly used lawyer trick. She’d ask him a bunch of questions. She’d work in a bunch of giftwrapped “outs.” Then she’d go back to the top and ask them all again with different wording, hoping to catch him in a lie.
“And you didn’t recognize anyone in either gang?”
“For the third time, no.”
“Man, that’s weird. Busy night for gangs.”
It wasn’t working. As strange as Ian was acting, he wasn’t struggling with his answers. Either he was telling the truth, or he’d rehearsed his story so many times that, to him, the lies seemed like the truth.
“We heard you and your boy had a little fracas yesterday. I’m sorry to hear that. It’s probably the last thing you needed.”
“Yeah, well, we’re Irish. Emotions run high.”
Who did Reilly call? Why did Jeremy Freak?
The facts:
Bishop Ryan is killed.
Leo is shown a surveillance video of the murderer.
Leo recognizes the symbol on the back of the jacket.
Leo tells the other…
Whew!
On top of everything else, Lynch couldn’t get the smell of Fowler Brew out of his nostrils.
Then he realized…
Oh my God.
…it wasn’t in his nostrils.
Treasure…Slam dunk.
Warner had started repeating her questions.
“I just think it’s a freaky coincidence that you and your brother just happened upon the UJ in the junk yard. Don’t you?”
“I never said it was the UJ. I don’t know…”
“Detective Warner, may I interject something?”
Carrie’s eyes brightened as she looked upon the face of her companion to discover a Cheshire Cat grin. Fuckin’ A he could interject. She motioned for him to proceed, then stood back to watch and enjoy.
Lynch spoke.
“Your brother told you what happened when he visited Jeremy Sokol in the ICU, right?”
“He mentioned…”
“But you blew it off because you knew he couldn’t have identified any of you.”
“What do you mean ‘any of us?’”
“Yeah, it was a real puzzler. I was ready to blow it off myself as a coincidence. But I just realized something.”
“Oh, did you, now?”
“The masks don’t figure into it. Jeremy didn’t think he saw one of his attackers in the ICU. He thought he smelled him.”
Ian threw back his head and cackled.
“You’ve lost your mind, copper.”
“By your mother’s own words, all of you drink the Fowler Brew like water. You all smell like it too, especially when you sweat. Right, Sergeant Warner?”
“Dear God, yes.”
“He smelled it on your brother at the hospital; he smelled it on you at the barn.”
Ian used his t-shirt collar to wipe his upper lip, while he tried to remember the term “admissible evidence.”
“You call that monkey shit admissible evidence?”
“No, but I’m going to make a guess…several guesses actually, and you don’t need to confirm any of them, so please just listen. I’m not even going to tell you where these guesses came from. We’ve got witnesses and revelation. That’s all you need to know.
“I’m guessing, Mr. Reilly, that in that canvas bag that you are not packing for your son’s batting practice, there is an orange softball bat. I’m also guessing that, while your brother would have been smart enough to scrub that bat down after using it to beat a man to death, you were not. I’m also guessing that sending said bat to the lab would reveal all sorts of blood evidence and DNA from Jeremy Sokol.
“Right now, you are packing up for another bludgeoning. I don’t know if you’re going by yourself, but that’s where you’re going. That means the UJ got back at you for dumping Bubb’s bike into Pickering Creek. What’d they do Ian?”
The oaf fumed. His words left his mouth like dragon’s breath.
“You know goddam as well as me that you aren’t getting your hands on this bag or anything inside it, without a warrant. And there ain’t a single judge in town that will issue
