by Jon Land
“Tell me how to do it better.”
“Well, there’s no book on Cotard’s. But this case, your husband’s, was brought on by PTSD, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. And treating cases that lead to a similar psychotic break is often achieved by utilizing trigger points.”
“Trigger points?”
“The where, when and what. You gradually reintroduce the patient to the source of their pain. Before they can remember and reenter the world as we know it, they have to accept what’s happened to them. Running away from it is what put them in their states in the first place, remember.”
“Confront the past.”
“In so many words,” Navarro nodded.
“And how does this reintroduction happen?”
“Different ways. I’ve seen amazing results with pictures, videotapes, recorded voices. I’ve even heard of personal visitation having a profound effect.”
“As in going back to where it all happened.”
Navarro nodded very slowly, then resumed, “But any of those direct evidence strategies are fraught with risk. Just as they can lead to a breakthrough, sometimes a sudden and dramatic breakthrough, they’ve also been known to lead to a setback or even total withdrawal. Confronting patients with the source of their pain could make them feel it all over again, you see.”
“Wish I didn’t.”
“It’s an all-or-nothing approach generally frowned upon by the psychiatric community.”
“Like to ask you a question now, if I may,” Caitlin said.
“Of course.”
“First time we met, during our interview, you asked about my relatives in the Mexican War. When you asked me that, something in your face changed.”
“That’s not a question.”
“Was I right, Rita?”
“The year would’ve been 1875.”
“My great-granddad, then. Fought lots of battles on the frontier and border with cattle thieves.”
“Rancho Las Cuevas,” Navarro intoned slowly. “Ever heard of it? Ranger?” she prodded when Caitlin remained silent.
“I have heard of it, ma’am, but I’m not proud of what happened there.”
“Rangers came over the border to catch cattle thieves who’d crossed from Rancho Las Cuevas,” Navarro related. “It was night and thick fog had washed in. The Rangers got to the ranch and started shooting, kept shooting for quite some time.”
“I know the story.”
“Anyway, as many as twenty men were killed by Rangers that night. Problem was the fog confused them and they hit the wrong ranch. Las Cuevas was another mile down the road.”
“We’ve made our share of mistakes and been responsible for more than our share of senseless deaths maybe. But a person has to live in the times to understand them fully.”
“I understand that,” Navarro told her. “But there’s something I’d like you to understand.”
Their stares locked and held.
“The family that owned that ranch, the family that lost five of their own that night, was named Navarro.”
Caitlin swallowed hard. “I’m sorry” was all she could think of saying.
“No need. You weren’t there and we don’t know if your great-grandfather was either. I’m telling you this because you asked, because you’re right, it still does bother me. And I wanted you to know you’re not the only one chasing the past.”
“I appreciate your concern, Rita, I really do.”
“There’s one more thing I need to tell you about Peter, based on what you just told me.”
“What’s that?”
“I’ve worked with a lot of veterans of the Iraq War suffering from PTSD. Every single one of their chart workups I’ve seen included plenty about certain physical maladies like rashes and other skin conditions brought on by a combination of the climate, the spiders and the various bugs native to that region. I’m not exactly sure what this means, but, well . . .”
“Keep going,” Caitlin urged.
“What’s bothering me here is that none of the exams done on Peter Goodwin from the time he was found in Bahrain mention any of those symptoms. So if you ask me, Ranger,” Rita Navarro finished, “he was never even in Iraq.”
PART SEVEN
In the 1940s, former Ranger Manuel T. “Lone Wolf” Gonzaullas headed the Department’s Bureau of Intelligence, which gave Rangers the benefit of chemical, ballistic and microscopic testing in their criminal investigations. In their early years as part of the DPS, Rangers were paid automobile mileage and furnished a Colt .45 and a lever-action Winchester .30 caliber rifle by the state. Rangers still had to provide their own car, horse and saddle, though the DPS issued horse trailers.
—Mike Cox, with updates from the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum, “A Brief History of the Texas Rangers”
62
HOUSTON, THE PRESENT
The limousine cruised down the private drive lined with stately old oak trees draped with Spanish moss. Harmon Delladonne looked at them and thought of the things they had paid witness to through the years. The amount of power that had passed through the gates of the River Oaks Country Club, after all, was staggering. The path to the presidency even could have and had been laid on the tips of cigars smoked and brandy sipped in the library bar upstairs in the palatial club house. A private retreat within a private retreat. The other members knew, understood. There were ample other places for them to discuss the day’s play or evening’s plans without encroaching on the discussions of those with much greater ends in mind. There was even a private rear entrance to the library bar up a staircase accessible beyond a sign that read NO VEHICLES PAST THIS POINT.
Upstairs the senator was already halfway into his brandy and sucking on a Cohiba when Delladonne approached. He did not rise when he saw Delladonne or offer him the matching leather chair set across from his own with a mahogany cocktail table eased closer to his side. The man establishing his territory, setting the agenda.
“We haven’t spoken since your return from Washington,” the senator said, greeting him. “I was told the recording equipment malfunctioned, but there are no plans for the committee to recall you.”
“A wise decision on their part,” Delladonne mused, settling into the chair that was waiting for him.
“Maybe not.” The senator sucked on the cigar, the smoke wafting upward before it reached Delladonne. “MacArthur-Rain’s very important to this country, Harm.”
“The reverse is true as well, Senator.”
“But, just for argument’s sake, what’s this latest contract worth to the company?”
“Ten billion dollars conservatively,” Delladonne said, without hesitation. “More reasonable estimates put it at closer to twenty-five.”
“Then it’s in our mutual interest to consider the prospects of our futures under the auspices of the new administration.”
“Ours or the country’s?”
“Same thing, like it or not.” The senator maneuvered his chair, so Delladonne could see over his shoulder a wall lined with wood-framed photographs of those members of this exclusive club who had passed away. “I’d offer you a cigar but I know you don’t smoke. A brandy but I know you almost never drink. What do you do, Harm?”
“I make your life easier, Senator. Just don’t expect someone who couches his ambitions in qualifiers or takes every step as if they’re afraid of falling through ice.”
“No, you prefer walking on water. Not lately, though, right, Harm? That’s why I needed to see you.” The senator leaned ever so slightly forward. “People in Washington got short memories and your actions are making them want to forget MacArthur-Rain ever existed.”
“Sounds like the way the members of the Oversight Committee felt until the recording equipment malfunctioned.”
“Enemies are one thing, allies something else again.” The senator jabbed at the air with his cigar, leaving smoke holes dangling between him and Delladonne. “They read the newspapers, watch the news. San Antonio’s turned into a war z
one, Harm, and even the best friends you’ve got in the Capitol are afraid of getting caught in the crossfire.”
“Does that include you, Senator?” When the man seated across from him remained silent, Delladonne continued. “You, all of you, need me to do your job, because you’ve forgotten how to do it.”
“That the way you see it?”
Delladonne shifted his chair so the wall of death was no longer in view. “Because that’s the way it is. You people have abdicated your responsibility, can’t get one single thing accomplished successfully. Then a new administration comes in and what do you do? Turn up the screws on the only ones doing the work you’re supposed to do, the work that’s needed. You want to criticize me, Senator, go ahead. But just tell me who’d do your dirty work if people like me, and companies like mine, weren’t around?”
The senator left his cigar in his mouth and clapped his hands. “You’re good, Harm, I’ll give you that. Your daddy was a BB gun compared to the howitzer you’ve turned into. Your daddy had enemies too, but he always knew when to back off so they’d never outnumber his friends. Smart as you are, that’s a trick you never learned.”
“I don’t do tricks, Senator. Instead, I take stock of the future. The next phase of Fire Arrow means we can get to our enemies anyplace anytime. Halfway around the world or just down the street. No culpability, no recriminations, no comebacks.”
“Guess you haven’t been following the news reports about murdered torture survivors and shoot-outs in the suburbs.”
“I’m willing to do what it takes, Senator. That’s what separates us. If Washington won’t, I will.”
“No, Harm, you won’t. I called this meeting to tell you I’m pulling the plug.”
“On what?”
“On you, MacArthur-Rain, on everything. No hearing, no subcommittee, no microphones to malfunction. Figured you deserved hearing that in person.”
Delladonne squeezed the chair arms, digging his nails into the wood. “You speaking for yourself here?”
“And others.”
“Who?”
“Some things are better left unsaid, Harm.” The senator went back to his cigar, savoring the taste. “Your dad built your company from the ground up. He’d be proud of the heights you’ve taken it to. If he were here, he’d advise you to lay low for a while, wait for your time to come again.”
Delladonne let the words settle. “Man like you should always be aware of the space left on the wall over there,” he said, tilting his gaze toward the wood-framed photographs.
The senator grinned, ignoring the comment and not missing a beat on his cigar. “Something I get asked a lot, but don’t know the answer myself: where’d your father come up with the name MacArthur-Rain?”
Harm Delladonne rose and looked the man square in the eye. “Some things are better left unsaid.”
The senator sat behind his computer in the study of his thirty-second-floor condominum in uptown Houston’s Turnberry Tower. The incomparable view of the city he loved, from every window, pleased him to no end. He used that view, and that love, to motivate him to write the e-mail he’d composed in his head on the drive back from his meeting with Harm Delladonne.
That e-mail, encrypted and sent via secure server, would be before the eyes of the people who needed to see it in mere minutes. He had chosen his words carefully with Delladonne, but had no call to be similarly coy about his intentions now. Once the e-mail was sent, MacArthur-Rain’s efficacy would be reduced to a level from which it could never recover, no matter the amount of lobbying and payoffs expended toward that end.
The senator logged on, sipping his brandy as the e-mail box awaited his words. He laid his fingers over the keys, began reconstructing his thoughts.
The senator had just finished the obligatory greeting when something like a shock hit him in the forehead. He felt a warm trickle running from his right ear and stretched a hand up toward it, two fingers coming away wet with blood. They went numb in the next instant, followed by his hand, then his entire arm. The senator tried to reach for the phone but nothing moved. Felt his face, actually felt it, falling toward the keyboard that clacked when it struck.
The last thing the senator registered was the smoke rising from the computer’s housing, accompanied by the stench of fried wires. Across the screen, meanwhile, an endless series of meaningless letters dissolved into blackness an instant before it descended upon him as well.
Harm Delladonne sat behind his computer for a long time in the wood-panelled private study that had been his father’s after it was over. Actually working the system himself this time left him feeling fulfilled and vindicated. Realizing in that instant more than ever the awesome potential of Fire Arrow, the senator having proven his very point for him.
If only they could get it right. . . . If only Peter Goodwin had cooperated. . . .
But it wasn’t too late. Thing about the future, Delladonne thought, was it would begin again tomorrow.
63
SAN ANTONIO, THE PRESENT
“Bahrain,” D. W. Tepper repeated from behind his desk.
“On my nickel,” Caitlin told him. “I’d just like to go there in an official capacity.”
“Little out of the jurisdiction of the Texas Rangers, ain’t it?”
“In a manner of speaking. But that’s where I’ll find the answers I need to find.”
“Gotta know the right questions to ask and who to ask them to first.”
“I got some ideas, Captain.”
Tepper ran a finger along the furrows on his face, the tip seeming to disappear into the deepest of them. “Won’t be able to carry a gun over there, Ranger.”
“Don’t expect I’ll need one.”
“I’m not so sure of that,” said Tepper, as he started to suddenly sort through the clutter of his desk. “We got those autopsy reports on the other members of your husband’s tech team you asked about here somewhere, one of them anyway. . . .”
“What’d it say?”
Tepper gave up searching for the pages he was looking for. “Turns out the victim who fell down the flight of stairs suffered an aneurysm first. That’s what really killed him.”
“Two out of three now.”
“Third dying in that car accident. That be the woman.”
“Single car?”
Tepper found one of the pages he was looking for and pushed it away from his eyes to better read it. “Went off the road and hit a tree, according to this. Car caught fire, so there wasn’t much left to autopsy.”
“Could be three for three then, couldn’t it?”
“I suppose.” Tepper’s eyes narrowed with concern. “Be careful wherever this takes you, Ranger.”
“Too late for that now, Captain.”
64
ALAMO HEIGHTS, THE PRESENT
“Barn looks empty,” Cort Wesley Masters noted as Caitlin drove down the long driveway. “Guess you can’t have everything.”
The confiscated residence in which the Rangers were watching over Dylan and Luke Torres was an 8,000-square-foot red-stone mansion that sat on four and a half lush acres. The property, paid for with drug money, was on the market for $2.5 million and featured a pool, tennis court, tree house and a two-stall covered horse barn Cort Wesley had glimpsed on the property’s perimeter.
His remark had been meant to elicit a laugh from Caitlin but it hadn’t come out that way.
“You got call to be nervous,” she told him.
“I got call to be a lot of things and not one of them’s a father.”
“If it means anything—”
“It don’t.”
“If it means anything, I think you’re doing a brave thing. Owning up. Trying to pull something out of this.”
“Maybe make my boys’ lives even worse.”
“I don’t see that happening.”
“You don’t know me well enough yet. You remember our deal, right?” Cort Wesley asked her, sounding like an anxious kid himself.
“I’ll
sit down with the younger boy, while you talk to the older.”
Cort Wesley’s eyes drifted back to the horse barn, as they pulled up to a Ranger posted in the shade of an elm tree not far from the entrance. Caitlin braked her SUV and threw it into park. She and Masters climbed out and headed along the thick Bermuda grass for the covered entrance, just a single step to mount in order to reach it. A second Ranger opened the door before Caitlin had a chance to knock. Over his shoulder, Caitlin could hear the tinny thwack of a video game blaring loudly in a spacious family room immediately off the foyer on the right. One of Cort Wesley’s sons blasting away at bad guys, just as she had to save their lives a few nights back.
Moving toward the family room, Caitlin saw it was the younger boy, Luke, behind the controls while Dylan busily waxed a skateboard that was nicked up but already shiny with decals. It looked to her as if the older boy was going over the same spot over and over again.
Even from the brief glimpses she’d gleaned in Shavano Park, she could tell Luke most resembled his mother while Dylan was the spitting image of his father, from the wide brow to his angular jawline. Their noses were the same and so, even more strikingly, were their piercing charcoal-colored eyes.
She could feel heat emanating from Cort Wesley, his powerful frame seeming like molten steel overflowing from a mold. “You mind if I talk to you?” he asked his older son, clearing his throat in the middle of the question.
Dylan shrugged, joined Cort Wesley on his feet.
“Let’s go outside.”
“Can I bring my skateboard?”
“Not a bad idea.”
65
ALAMO HEIGHTS, THE PRESENT
Dylan balanced himself on his skateboard, scooting back and forth across the driveway. They had stopped out of earshot from the posted Ranger but still far enough from the street for Cort Wesley to consider them safe.