The Assassin

FBI Deputy Director Thomas

 Chapter 5

FBI Deputy Director Thomas

Task Force Supervisor

The deputy director of the FBI was Roy Thomas. He was forty-eight years old. He was 6'3" and weighed 210 pounds. He maintained a daily workout routine in the FBI gym in Washington. He was in excellent physical condition.

He stood erect with a military posture. He was completely bald and had been since he was twenty-one years old. Not a single hair on his head. He spoke softly, but, even without a booming voice, he was an impressive figure. He was a man who instantly commanded respect.

Agent Thomas had been married to his wife, Anna, for twenty-six years. They lived in a small town in Maryland. They had two daughters who were now grown and married with families of their own. They had moved on to other parts of the country, but Agent Thomas and Anna visited them regularly. His family always came first. The FBI came second.

Agent Thomas had begun his law enforcement career with the Chicago Police Department when he was only twenty-one years old. He was a patrolman who drove a squad car.

He advanced through the ranks, and Patrolman Thomas became Detective Thomas in the homicide division. He had ultimately investigated thousands of homicides and possessed an instinct that soon resulted in his being promoted to the head of the homicide division.

He had what he liked to call the "chip." He understood things about homicides that others could not see. Those things that meant nothing to other detectives but which allowed him to correctly analyze and evaluate a case quickly. Seldom did a homicide that he investigated remain unsolved.

He had moved on from the Chicago Police Department to the FBI. He was now their deputy director. Second in command only to the infamous Director J. Edgar Hoover himself.

Saturday Night Shootings

Detective Thomas was a busy man when he worked with the Chicago Police Department. He had investigated every possible kind of homicide that could have occurred by the time that he was forty years old. He had initially been assigned to investigate the inevitable Saturday night shootings at the barrooms and honky-tonks of the city. And this meant that there was at least one every Saturday night, usually more than one.

The men and women who filled these bars on Saturday night were there to drink and party. They had worked hard all week, and this was their chance to let it all hang out. Alcohol flowed freely, and the crowd became more and more rowdy as the alcohol took effect.

The men were there to drink and chase women, and the women were there to drink and chase men. Husbands didn't always leave with their wives, and wives didn't always leave with their husbands. Boyfriends and girlfriends weren't always even friends anymore by the time that the bars closed.

There were inevitably arguments by the time that the drunken crowd had moved to the parking lots at closing time. The number of guns that arrived in the coat pockets of the patrons could not be accurately counted. Practically everyone had one.

Some had two. Some had them for protection, and others had them to prove that they were not people who could be pushed around. They recognized the risks involved, and rather than staying safely at home, they intentionally went out to face the risks. The mix of guns and alcohol often led to shootings.

Some of the victims were not seriously wounded and proudly bragged about their wounds to their friends at home. These victims didn't complain and wouldn't cooperate with the police under any circumstances.