Page 73 of Paranoia

I patted him on the shoulder and walked him to the door. Trilling greeted him, then left the room to give Doyle privacy.

Doyle sat quietly at the end of the conference room table. I said, “Kevin, this is my grandfather, Seamus Bennett. You can quiz him about if he’s going to talk. But I can already tell you he won’t. I’ve told my grandfather not to get any closer to you than the end of the conference room table, and I’ll be watching from outside. Does all that sound reasonable to you?”

“What about Communion?”

“When you take Communion after your confession, I’ll have to come in and stand here while you do it.”

Doyle said, “That sounds fair.”

I left them in the conference room and sat at an empty desk right outside. Walter Jackson approached me almost immediately and squeezed into the chair next to mine. He looked anxious. That wasn’t like him.

“What d’ya got for me, Walter?”

He shuffled a few pages around. He signaled for Rob Trilling to join us. I took a quick glance into the conference room. Doyle had his head bowed but was talking. I turned back to Walter.

Walter cleared his throat a couple of times, then said, “I found something I didn’t expect in his background.”

“Can’t wait.”

“Doyle was raised in Brooklyn.”

“We knew that. It was in his DoD file and we’ve already talked to him about it.”

“His father’s oldest brother and family appear to have lived in the house next door. They had three girls and one boy. All would be cousins to our man, Doyle.”

“Walter, we’re on the clock here. Can you get to the point? Is there anything important about his cousins?”

Walter shifted his bulk in the chair uneasily. “The oldest of those cousins is a Celeste Doyle, who now goes by her married name: Celeste Cantor.”

I couldn’t speak. I just stared at Walter Jackson. I knew he hadn’t made a mistake. This was the sort of thing he’d check from five different angles.

Everything immediately became clear. I knew what this was all about now. The Land Sharks had done something bad. And Celeste Cantor was eliminating everyone—former colleagues and criminals alike—who could derail her campaign.

Trilling looked just as shocked as I was. Then I said, “We have to move fast. She’s going to find out pretty quick he’s in lockup. If Doyle agrees to help us, we might be able to bag Cantor and make a decent case.”

Trilling said, “Do you think he’ll help?”

“I do. I don’t think he would’ve asked for a priest otherwise.” And I really believed that.

CHAPTER 109

SEAMUS STOOD UP and tapped on the door. That was my signal to come in so that he could administer Communion to Doyle. I waited just inside the door and watched silently as my grandfather prepared the wine and host and recited the litany. Doyle moved only his head to take the Communion wafer and drink from the chalice.

As my grandfather packed up his satchel and headed out of the conference room, he turned and said to Doyle, “Bless you, my son. The first step in any redemption is admitting your mistakes.”

Seamus made a point of looking down at the floor and not making eye contact with me or Trilling as he hurried out of the office. I wasn’t sure what that meant.

Doyle appeared decidedly more confident. Making his confession and receiving Holy Communion had clearly taken aweight off of him. He sat up straight in the chair, looked at me, and said, “I’ll tell you one thing for sure.”

“I’m all ears.”

“I screwed up. I listened to the wrong people.”

“Like your cousin, Celeste.”

That had exactly the kind of effect I was hoping it would. Doyle seemed stunned by the comment. He tried to come up with the words to express it, but he was at a loss.

I said, “It looks like she had you murder a lot of decent people just so she could advance her own career.”

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