The Last Mile

by David Baldacci

  prison triggered their interest.”

  “Do you think they believe that Roy Mars is actually alive?” asked Milligan.

  “Maybe, and/or that Melvin getting out of prison has once more piqued their interest about whatever was in that safe deposit box. They may hope he can lead them to it, like I suggested before.”

  “So if the cartel took Davenport?” said Jamison slowly.

  Milligan and Bogart exchanged glances.

  Bogart said, “I won’t try to sugarcoat this. The odds of us getting her back safely don’t look very good.”

  “So how do we find Roy Mars?” asked Milligan, breaking an awkward silence.

  Decker said, “Well, I’m convinced he’s close by. So one way or another we might just run into each other.”

  “You’re joking of course,” said Milligan.

  Decker didn’t answer.

  CHAPTER

  49

  DECKER WAS WALKING in a gray drizzle along the same route that he and Mars had earlier taken. His thoughts had turned to another facet of the case. One way to find Roy Mars was to figure out his connection to Charles Montgomery. If Mars had paid off Regina, then he had to have some connection to the Montgomerys. He hadn’t picked them out of the blue. There had to be a reason. And that answer might lie in the man’s past.

  Charles Montgomery had not told them all of the crimes of which he’d been accused. This was understandable since the list was lengthy. But Decker had done some digging.

  Montgomery had come back stateside and left the Army in March 1967. In January 1968 he had been arrested in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, for driving while intoxicated and for possession of marijuana. Bail had been posted and he’d skipped town. A month later he’d been stopped in Cain, Mississippi, for illegal possession of a stolen gun and drunk and disorderly. Again he’d posted bail, and again he’d skipped town. The crimes had not been serious enough to warrant much of a follow-up, and he apparently had never returned to either state until shooting the Alabama state trooper. And back then there was no central database for cops across state lines. But the crimes were relatively minor and the police no doubt had more pressing matters to claim their time than chasing a petty criminal.

  In his mind Decker listed the offenses in chronological order:

  DUI and pot possession in Alabama.

  A stolen gun and drunk and disorderly in Mississippi.

  Bail posted each time.

  And he’d skipped town each time.

  There was no reason to think it important, but as the drizzle hit him, Decker couldn’t think it unimportant, he just didn’t know why.

  He went back to his room and sat in his chair and stared out the window at the gathering gloom. It was barely five in the evening and it looked and felt like midnight. His energy just seemed sapped. If this weather kept up they might all well drown without even stepping into the water.

  But Decker’s desire to find the truth trumped the weather. His brain hit the reset button and the key question popped up again.

  Why did Roy Mars pick Charles Montgomery?

  Montgomery’s explanation of seeing Melvin’s name and putting two and two together obviously had been a lie. The process had actually worked in the reverse. Montgomery hadn’t found Mars. Roy Mars had selected Charles Montgomery.

  The only possible reason was that the two men had known each other before. And perhaps Montgomery owed Mars for some reason. And that reason, coupled with the inducement of the money to be left to Regina Montgomery and their son, was enough for the condemned Montgomery to lie about killing Roy and Lucinda Mars.

  But how and where had they previously met?

  Both men were about the same age. Roy Mars was not the man’s real name, so he could have been in the military with Montgomery over in ’Nam. They had no fingerprints from Mars to search for in the military database.

  Yet had they been in the military together? Maybe Mars had saved Montgomery’s life over there? That seemed plausible.

  But if not in Vietnam, where?

  Had Mars been a petty criminal too? If he were connected to the cartel then Montgomery might have been in South America at some point. Or in Mexico. Or in some way had been connected with the drug trade. He had told them of his pain problem and his quest to steal money and drugs in order to deal with his headaches.

  Had Montgomery known Lucinda?

  Was that the angle to come at this by?

  Decker rubbed his eyes and then closed them.

  Even for his exceptional mind this was a staggering conundrum. He could not find traction anywhere. Every time he thought he had something figured out, another question of even greater complexity took its place, like a vanquished cancer cell being replaced by an even more malignant and entrenched one.

  But something in the back of Decker’s brain told him that if he could find the connection between the two men, many other questions might be answered.

  He opened his eyes and looked out the window. Somewhere out there Lisa Davenport was being held against her will and perhaps tortured.

  Or she might already be dead.

  Decker had concluded that his first assumption had been wrong. They had not taken Davenport to later exchange for Mars.

  And he wasn’t even convinced they had taken her for information purposes.

  But if not either of those two reasons, why? What else was there?

  What was a possible third reason?

  He closed his eyes again. The answer simply wasn’t coming.

  * * *

  He ate dinner in his room while the others gathered together in the small restaurant off the motel lobby. An apple and a bottle of water. Only two months before he would have laughed at such a meal. It would not even have constituted a snack. Now it filled him up. He wanted nothing else.

  He notched his belt a hole tighter. At this rate he would have to cut another hole in the belt or get a new one. He was losing weight rapidly. Not in a good way. His inability to solve any significant part of this case was pretty much eating him from the inside out.

  He finished the water, tossed the bottle and the apple core, undressed, and got into bed. But though his eyes closed, his mind did not turn off. If anything it hit another gear and raced even faster.

  Every conceivable explanation was run through his brain and came out the other end with an imagined “rejected” stamped on it. Some conclusions seemed promising right up until the moment they ran into a fact that could not be explained away and were discarded into his mental rubbish pile.

  Again and again he seemed to be close, but something always came around to screw it up. It was like having one move left on a Rubik’s Cube and being unable to seal the deal. The truth was, he was no closer to working this out than he had been on the very first day.

  And he had this oddly creeping feeling that he was running out of time, though he could think of no plausible reason why that would be the case.

  He opened and closed his eyes, and his brain, perhaps taking a cue that it was overworked and not anywhere near success, also shut down.

  Decker slept.

  And he awoke for only one reason.

  A knife blade was pressed against his throat.

  CHAPTER

  50

  DECKER DIDN’T MOVE.

  The room was very dark, the moonlight that would normally be coming in through the window obscured by the cloud cover. He could hear the rain drumming on the roof.

  But his focus was on the knife blade. It was pressed against his left jugular, a superhighway of circulation. If it was severed, he would bleed out in under a minute.

  He could hear the other person’s breathing, slow, measured—no panic or lack of control there. That gave him some comfort. The breath was also foul: coffee, cigarettes, and garlic. The confluence of smells swept into his nostrils, nearly making him gag.

  By casting his gaze downward he could just make out the very large hand holding the knife.

  The voice said, “You’re fucking e
verything up.” It was calm, low, and still managed to be intimidating.

  Decker thought about this candid opening. He wondered if the follow-up would be to slash his neck open. “Not my intent,” he said.

  “Don’t play stupid with me. I know you’re a cop. I know you got brains. But you leave it be. Go home. And leave it be.”

  “What about Melvin?”

  Decker felt the knife blade press harder against his skin. So hard in fact that it cut into him. Something slid down his neck. A drop of blood. But only a drop. The jug was still intact.

  “What about him?” asked the voice.

  “He’s got nothing.”

  The knife pressed still harder and Decker could feel another little prick of the blade. And another drop slid down his neck and was absorbed into his T-shirt.

  “He’s got his freedom. That’s enough.”

  “After twenty years?”

  “He should be grateful.”

  “I’m not saying he’s not,” replied Decker calmly, even as he felt the blade push deeper against his skin. His jugular was exposed, right at the surface from the pressure. The guy knew exactly what he was doing, and had probably done it before. Which did not make Decker feel any better.

  “I’m just saying that he’s feeling vulnerable.”

  “Tell him not to worry. I’ve got his back.”

  “Because of his mother?”

  The blade withdrew just a hair. “What the hell do you know about anything?” the man growled.

  “I don’t know much. In fact, there’s a lot I don’t know. But I know Lucinda loved her son. And you loved her. And she made you promise, didn’t she?”

  The blade pressed more firmly against his artery. “You’re making this difficult on yourself.”

  “I’m just trying to help Melvin.”

  “I told you I’ve got his back.”

  “Against the cartel?”

  The man snorted.

  Decker said, “So not the cartel?”

  The man fell silent.

  “Why did you pick Montgomery to get Melvin out of prison? What’s the connection?”

  “Not going there.”

  “You don’t have Davenport, do you?” asked Decker.

  The man didn’t answer right away. “Who?”

  “She was with us. Someone took her.”

  Decker felt the blade slowly move away from his neck. “When?” The voice was not intimidating now, just wary.

  “A few days ago. She must have known them. They took her from her room and made it look like a fight. But it was all staged. She knew the person. And that narrows things down.”

  “Why would they take her?”

  “I don’t know. I thought for leverage against us. Maybe to ask for Melvin in exchange, but they’ve made no attempt to contact us.”

  “Maybe they want information.”

  “Maybe they do. And maybe they got it from her. But I think what they really wanted was Melvin.”

  “Why?”

  “The stuff in the safe deposit box. They think he has it.”

  “How do you know about that?”

  “I’m a detective. It’s what I do.”

  “Mellow knows nothing about it.”

  Decker didn’t understand this name, but he didn’t think right now was a good time to get into it. “I know he doesn’t, but they don’t know that. They think he will lead them to it.”

  “Shit.” This was said more to himself than to Decker. “I didn’t think…after all this time.”

  “Right, I get that. But it did happen and it’s a problem,” said Decker. “You had to be aware that might happen. You sprung him and now we see the consequences. They didn’t buy Montgomery’s story. And they know you’re alive…Roy.”

  Decker steeled himself for the blade to return to his jugular, because he had finally named the man. He added, “Even though that’s not your real name.”

  “I told you to back off.”

  “I know you did. I’m just telling you what I know. Lucinda’s dead, you’re not. You set up your own son.”

  “No I didn’t.”

  “Then what happened?”

  “I don’t have to tell you nothing.”

  “No, you don’t. You’ve got the knife. I’m just saying that they’re out there and they want Melvin, and I’m not sure you can cover his back.”

  “You’re with the damn FBI, what can you do?”

  “We’re doing all we can. I just don’t know if it’s going to be enough, considering I have no idea who else is out there. Maybe you can help me there.”

  Decker waited for the man to say something. He knew he was still there. He could hear him. And smell him.

  Outside the rain continued to pour down. Decker wondered if this would be the last time he would hear the miserable rain. He imagined himself bleeding out on this crummy bed in the middle of nowhere in Texas.

  “You there?” he asked. “You got something to say?”

  “If they took your friend, I’d stop worrying. It’s too late for her. Just the way it is.”

  “Okay. I hope you’re wrong, but you’re probably not.”

  “And you need to stand down. I’ll take care of this.”

  “Like you took care of Regina Montgomery?”

  “You want me to kill you?”

  “No, but I want to understand what’s going on.”

  “Why?”

  “I told you why. I want to help Melvin.”

  “Nobody can help him, not really. He got screwed. No fault of his, just the way it turned out.”

  “He had his whole life planned out.”

  “So did I. It happens. Life is like that. Plans go to shit.”

  “He went to prison because of you, Roy.”

  “It was better than the alternative. He’s alive, isn’t he?”

  “For now.”

  “Just go back to wherever you came from and let me take care of this. Take Mellow with you. As far away as you can. I won’t ask a second time. The next time I’m just going to gut you, you understand what I’m saying?”