The man behind the man

He was known as the toughest cop around, strong and fearless, the guy you wanted beside you while busting down a door or breaking up a street fight. His baritone voice commanded respect, his look demanded attention. Quion Riley was smooth and he was cool, so cool that no one even bothered calling him by his first name. They simply called him Q.

Boston Mayor Raymond Flynn was impressed. In 1989, having watched Riley's work as a member of the mayor's elite anticrime unit, Flynn summoned him to his office. He wanted to know if Riley was interested in getting into the protection business. Specifically, Flynn wanted to know if Riley would protect him.

The man who needed no first name wasn't sure. He was a street cop. Protecting the mayor? Driving him around? Couldn't someone else do the job? Riley wavered.

But then he got a piece of advice that changed his life: When the mayor of Boston asks you to do something, you just do it . And that's when Q. Riley became the guy behind the guy, the man in dark sunglasses -- and sometimes his trademark earring -- protecting the most important people in Boston.

"I'm always thinking like a cop," he says. "I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing. But when I go into a restaurant I always sit in a position where I can observe people coming in. I always sit with my back against the wall."

Quion (pronounced KEY-on) Riley , 55, was born in Charleston, S.C., and his heritage was about as unusual as his name. His mother was Cuban-Chinese. His father was black, with white and Native American ancestry .

They raised him in Jamaica Plain and he grew up to take a blue-collar job. Riley worked on the tarmac at the airport, fueling airplanes for Trans World Airlines, before finally deciding in 1982 that he wanted to enter the Police Academy. "I took the exam," he recalls, "and got lucky."

Such modesty is classic Q. He isn't boastful. He didn't want to sit down with a reporter. The pictures of the famous people he's met over the years are in a box, not on his wall. And when asked if he's as tough as everyone says he is, Riley replies, "I guess I can hold my own."

This, colleagues say, is an understatement. Detective Richard Whalen , who met Riley 25 years ago while both men were cadets at the academy, says he's seen Riley take down men twice his size, using nothing but his hands.

"He's tough like that," says Whalen, who joined Riley on the security unit in 1993. "It's nice knowing you have somebody not afraid of anything on your side."

But he was more than just tough. He was street-smart. He moved up fast, earning a spot on Flynn's anticrime unit in 1985, cleaning up Boston Common and the downtown Combat Zone.

Riley threw himself into it , earring and all. Officially, a dangling earring like his isn't allowed for cops in uniform. But on the streets, working undercover, the earring worked.

"I did my best undercover work in my earring," he says. "That was my trademark."

He was fearless in the face of drug dealers, gang members, and suspected murderers. As far as he was concerned, this was the job for him. But Flynn wanted Riley to join the Police Department's security unit.

The unit, dating back at least as far as the 1970s, is charged with protecting the mayor, the police commissioner, and any other visiting dignitary . Such units are common in major cities, including New York, Chicago, and Philadelphia. Boston's today has seven officers and two sergeants. Flynn thought Riley was perfect for the job.

"My first impression was he was very serious," recalls Flynn, who was mayor from 1984 to 1993. "He was always working, always on the job, never doing anything idly. You'd never see him reading magazines or listening to music on the radio."

In the car, Riley would monitor the police radio. He often knew something big had happened before the mayor himself, and he soon came to warm to the job: how he needed to know the fastest way in and out of any building; how he needed to avoid confrontation, not seek it.

At best, no one noticed him. But he noticed them. Standing in the shadows, stage right of the powerful, in his dark Maui Jim sunglasses, Riley watched and waited. And, in time, Flynn came to view him as far more than just his bodyguard. He was the bodyguard who hung around Flynn's house after a long day, helping the mayor's kids with their homework. He was family.

"We adopted him," says Flynn. "He was more like a deputy mayor than he was a driver ."

Flynn left office long ago. But Riley stayed put and now, 18 years later, he is the longest-serving member of the security unit. His base salary is $55,558, and payroll records show that in 2006, he made $110,789, including extras such as overtime and details. He's helped protect two mayors, two interim police commissioners, four appointed police commissioners, and countless others including former president Bill Clinton and current House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Even Edward Davis, the recently appointed Boston police commissioner, who has carried a badge since 1978 and had no protection at his previous job as chief of police in Lowell, says he likes having Riley on his shoulder.

"Q knows the city and he knows the people here. And I feel very comfortable with him as a partner, really, in the car," Davis says.

Only twice, Riley recalls, has he had to really respond to danger.

A few years ago while protecting Cardinal Bernard Law in church at the request of the Boston Archdiocese, he stopped a man rushing the altar where Law was standing.

"I secured him pretty good," Riley says. "I don't think he was going to do any bodily harm. But at the time, I didn't know that."

In 1994 , Riley actually had to protect himself when he was attacked while sitting in a parked car in Charlestown with the wife and son of then-commissioner Paul Evans . That day, a man shouting racial slurs punched Riley through the open window of the car.

"Q, I can tell you, could have devastated the individual," says Dan Linskey , first assistant to Commissioner Davis. "He's very talented in the martial arts."

Sitting in another parked car recently, waiting for another commissioner, Riley recounts that story with typical modesty. He says he learned a lesson that day in 1994: "Don't leave your car windows down if you're not paying attention."

He laughs. The radio crackles. Commissioner Davis, he's told, is on his way to a meeting at the federal courthouse downtown.

"OK," Riley tells Whalen, who's driving the commissioner. "I'm waiting for you."

At this point, Flynn says, Riley is experienced enough to be commissioner himself. Even Riley will acknowledge that after almost two decades of escorting the powerful, he has learned a thing or two about the running of Boston.

But he's not interested in any of that. What he knows, he keeps secret, even from his wife. He's happy just doing his job.

He steps out of his warm car idling outside the courthouse and into the cold. His signature sunglasses are on. There's an extra pair in the car in case these break. He's ready for the commissioner .

In a flash of black coattails, he's gone.

Got a subject to suggest for Heart of the City? E-mail Keith O'Brien at kobrien@globe.com.