KIA

by Thomas Holland

  “Mr. McKelvey, I don’t think—”

  Kel tapped the shoe again, harder, and the blob of plastic fell away taking a mass of charred muscle with it, exposing the clean, buttery yellow bone underneath.

  Kel stared at what he saw.

  Hoey noticed the change in Kel’s body language and looked down at the source of interest. “Why, I’ll be,” he said as he moved closer. “Will you look at that? That should make the identification part of this case all the easier. Don’t know that I’ve ever seen one quite like that. How about you, Doctor? You ever seen anything quite like that before?”

  Kel stared.

  “Doctor?” Hoey repeated.

  “You have a car?” Kel asked.

  “What?” Hoey responded. “Yes, of course. Why? Is that something important?”

  “Yeah,” Kel answered. “Very.”

  CHAPTER 58

  Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri

  THURSDAY, APRIL 24, 2008

  “This is the last thing I need to be doin’. Last thing. I’ve got a wife and kids and a big old stupid dog—they all need me—at least the dog does,” Shuck Deveroux muttered, almost to himself. As he handed his cell phone over to Fick for safekeeping, he said, “You’re a general, why don’t you order me to not do this?”

  Paul Fick had been standing by watching, quietly; now he responded. “I’m retired, remember, Chief? Besides, you wouldn’t listen to me if I did anyhow.”

  “Try me, General.”

  Fick smiled. “In that case, stand down, Chief Deveroux. I’m ordering you to stay here.”

  Now it was Deveroux’s turn to smile. He shot a quick look at the barricaded door of the multipurpose building and then back at Fick. “No offense, sir, but you’re retired.” He took a couple of deep breaths and then said, “General, do me a favor.” He waited for a slight nod of agreement and then dropped the volume of his voice. “Keep these boys here from doin’ somethin’ stupid while I’m in there. Especially that chucklehead Captain Walters. Don’t know where he slithered off to, but if he comes back here, distract him somehow. Ask him to recite the multiplication table or somethin’—especially the times twelves…”

  Deveroux’s cell phone interrupted by playing the “Chicken Dance” song. Fick looked at it oddly and handed it back to Deveroux, who hesitated, unsure whether to take it. He didn’t recognize the number showing on the screen.

  “Agent Deveroux,” he finally answered. “Make it quick.”

  “Shuck, it’s me, Kel. Listen, partner…”

  “Not now, Doc. Not now. This is really, really a bad time. I’ll call you back in a bit—I hope.”

  “No, Shuck, wait. I’m on my way there. Listen, it’s Tenkiller. You hear me, bubba? It’s Tenkiller.”

  “I know,” Deveroux replied. “He’s got himself boarded up in an empty buildin’ here at Fort Wood. Maybe has a hostage. I’m gettin’ fixed to go in to try and talk to him. I’ll call you—”

  “No,” Kel almost screamed into the phone. “I mean it’s Tenkiller. Here. The body from the house, the one that’s all burned up. It’s him. Tenkiller.”

  “What? What’re you sayin’? Tenkiller? How do you know?” Deveroux looked again at the building and then back at Fick. The old general’s face suggested he could overhear Kel’s part of the conversation leaking past Deveroux’s ear.

  “Screws. His ankle, it looks like a goddamn hardware store. He’s got screws in his ankle.”

  “But…”

  “But nothin’,” Kel said. “I’ve seen Tenkiller’s file. It’s him.”

  “You sure?”

  “Positive.”

  “Then who’s boarded up here?” Deveroux asked.

  “Got me, Shuck, but it sure ain’t Tenkiller.”

  Fick, seeing the question in Deveroux’s face, shrugged a response.

  “Thanks, Kel.” Deveroux paused and took a deep breath. “Guess there’s only one good way to find out.”

  “No. Wait,” Kel shouted into the phone. “Don’t do anythin’ till I get there.”

  Shuck Deveroux wasn’t listening. He had his eyes on the boarded-up door. “I’ll call you as soon as I can. Deveroux out,” he said, almost absentmindedly, as he snapped the phone shut and handed it back to Fick. He swallowed hard.

  Fick shook his head slowly, indicating that it was okay for Shuck to not go.

  “Remember, General,” Deveroux said, “nobody, and I mean nobody, does nothin’ stupid.”

  “Roger, Chief, nothing stupid.”

  Shuck Deveroux patted himself down again as if he were getting ready to walk through an airport metal detector. It provided an excuse to stall a moment longer. “Did I say my old dog needs me?”

  “You did,” Fick responded. “You don’t have to do this, Chief.”

  Deveroux smiled wanly. “Maybe not, but…this guy’s killed at least four people. And he may have a hostage in there right now. Maybe Ngo. There isn’t a trained negotiator within two hours of here.” He paused and smiled again. “Remember now…”

  “Nothing stupid,” Fick finished the thought.

  CHAPTER 59

  Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri

  THURSDAY, APRIL 24, 2008

  Deveroux walked out from behind the Humvee that they’d been using as a shield and slowly made his way across the open asphalt to the front door of the multipurpose building. It was a long walk, at least seemingly so, and he kept his hands slightly raised to his sides, not assuming the posture of a prisoner, but clearing advertising the fact that he was unarmed and nonhostile. He had to assume he was being watched.

  The sheet of half-inch plywood that had barricaded the door earlier in the morning was now partly ajar, fastened to the inside of the doorframe only on one side with a couple of sixteen-penny nails. Deveroux paused and examined the wood, noting the splintered margins of two bullet holes about shoulder height. As he poked his head around the edge of the plywood sheet, he called out, “It’s Warrant Officer Deveroux. I’m alone. Unarmed. Hello?” He waited and listened. Nothing. “I’m comin’ on in. Just me. Alone. Unarmed. We talked. Unarmed.”

  He pushed on into the building. It was dark. It smelled of pooled rainwater and drying latex paint. He was in an open, three-story atrium with plenty of windows, but most were either boarded over or covered with protective sheets of foggy, thick plastic film, and stepping in from the bright sunlight, Deveroux’s eyes shut down. Signs of construction were everywhere, spools of cable, metal scaffolding, paint cans, crushed soft drink cans, and crumpled sandwich wrappers.

  Deveroux stood in the middle of the atrium, rotating in a slow circle, hands still outstretched. “It’s Warrant Officer Deveroux. The one you talked to. I’m here. You said we should talk. I’m here. Unarmed. To talk. I’m here.”

  “So you are, Agent Deveroux,” said a voice from somewhere off to the side.

  Deveroux looked but could see only bands of shadow and tangles of wire near an elaborate tubular scaffold that rose thirty feet to the glass skylight. “Yes, sir. Here I am, and here you are. You wanted to talk.”

  “I did, didn’t I?”

  “Yes, sir, you did.”

  “What would you like to talk about, Agent Deveroux?”

  “Your call. Anythin’ you want. We can start by you tellin’ me who you are.” He squinted, trying to pattern the form from the shadow. His sight was slow to return, and he turned his head slightly to the side to enhance his vision in the dimness.

  “I’m Jimmy Tenkiller, remember?”

  Deveroux hesitated while he tried to work out the next several moves. Finally he spoke. “No, sir. I don’t think you are.”

  “Now that’s interesting. If you don’t mind my asking, what happened in the last ten minutes that changed your mind?”

  “Maybe the fact that we’ve just identified the body from Mr. Ngo’s house as that of Tenkiller.”

  “Interesting. That’s really very interesting. In that case, me being Jimmy Tenkiller would be a bit problematic, right, Agent D
everoux?”

  “Yes, sir. That’s the way I see it. Very problematic.”

  The shadow laughed. “Po’ Jimmy. Po’ Master Sergeant Tenkiller. He was quite a runner in his day, did you know that Agent Deveroux? Quite a runner. The Running Redskin, they called him. That was back when you could say that sort of thing and nobody got upset. Political Correctness, and all. The Running Redskin.”

  Deveroux had turned and was facing the shadow square on. His vision was slowly returning. He dropped his hands to his sides. “You wanted to talk, so why don’t we shift topics. You know who I am, now how ’bout tellin’ me who I’m talkin’ with? Only fair.”

  “No, Agent Deveroux,” the shadow replied. “We can start with you telling me what your interest in Tenkiller is. Or should I say, was? I’m curious how much you know, or at least think you know.”

  Deveroux took a step toward the shadow.

  A gun cocked. “I’d stay put if I were you, Agent Deveroux,” the voice said.

  CHAPTER 60

  Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri

  THURSDAY, APRIL 24, 2008

  Kel was forced to leave Mr. Hoey’s car several blocks away, behind a barricade. In the distance, less than two hundred yards away, he could see a mill of people around several Humvees and military police cars. Lights were flashing and there was constant movement of men in full battle array. He took off running, flashing his CILHI badge and shouting officiously at any of the guards who challenged him, careful not to stop or even slacken his stride. As he neared the crowd, he scanned the faces for Deveroux but saw General Fick instead and made a path to him.

  “Thank God, General. Where’s Chief Deveroux?” he asked Fick as he muscled into the knot of people. Many had taken up positions behind vehicles, their weapons pointed at the opening of a building directly ahead; others were talking into radios and cell phones and pointing in different directions. Several young soldiers took notice of him but no one made a move to stop him.

  Fick nodded to the building, his eyes focused on the boarded-up doorway.

  “Shit,” Kel said. “Crazy bastard. I told him to stay put until I got here. Please tell me he’s not alone.”

  Fick didn’t answer.

  “Shit. Who’s in charge here?” Kel scanned the faces around him. “General?”

  “Chief Deveroux,” Fick replied quietly.

  “Shit. Who’s second? There’s got to be a second.”

  “I was asked to make sure no one did anything stupid.”

  “No offense, but then you should have stopped Deveroux. We need to talk, General. That was Tenkiller back there in Rolla. And he wasn’t just burnt to a crisp—someone killed him before they set the place on fire. Shot the sonofabitch right here.” He tapped the middle of his forehead. “And my guess is that that someone is in there with Deveroux right now. And that someone’s got absolutely nothin’ to lose.”

  “My guess, Dr. McKelvey, is that you’re correct,” Fick said.

  “Yes, sir. So what are we goin’ to do?”

  “I have no real authority here, Dr. McKelvey.” Fick kept his eyes on the front of the building.

  “This is no time to be modest, General. You’re Paul Fick. Even civilians have heard about you. You could order the sun to stand still. What are we goin’ to do? We gotta do somethin’.”

  “You have a weapon, Doctor?”

  “A wea—? Of course not. I’m a goddamn anthropologist.”

  Fick looked directly into Kel’s eyes. “Then the question is what am I going to do about it?”

  CHAPTER 61

  Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri

  THURSDAY, APRIL 24, 2008

  “Who are you?” Deveroux asked.

  The man stepped out of the shadows; he was smiling. “You never know, I just might be a dangerous man, but in any case, I asked you a question: What’s your interest in our boy, Jimmy Tenkiller?”

  “Tenkiller’s wanted.”

  “Is he, now? By whom?”

  “The army,” Shuck responded. He’d taken some control of his knees, but the shake had moved into his hands.

  The man laughed. “Now that’s interesting, considering that Mr. Tenkiller’s dead.”

  “So I hear. You kill him?”

  “Me? No, sir. Now as I understand it, he was KIA in Vietnam. Isn’t that the army’s position, Agent Deveroux? K-I-A.”

  “Who are you?” Deveroux asked again.

  “His name is John Bergeron, and he lives in the shadows,” Paul Fick said.

  Deveroux stiffened at the sound of Fick’s voice. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the old general standing just inside the doorway, squinting into the shadows, legs bent and spread, his left hand steadying the butt of a nickel-plated pistol. It looked to be a .45 semiautomatic service piece. He’d had no idea that Fick had snuck in, or when, or that he was armed, but he was glad for the arrival of the cavalry, even if it took the form of a civilian whose only authority was what was seated in his right hand.

  He looked back at the shadowy form Fick had called John Bergeron, his eyes drawn magnetically to the black Glock nine-millimeter that had been pointed in his direction but was now aimed at Fick.

  “Well, well. If I’m not mistaken, that would be Captain Fick of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Always get your man, right, Mountie Fick?” Bergeron’s voice suggested he was enjoying the whole situation much more than could be considered prudent under the circumstances. He was either very much in control or very much not. “You’re not looking so good, ol’ boy. The years they haven’t been kind to you.”

  “Y’all know each other, General?” Deveroux was still scared witless, but the idea that Fick hadn’t been completely forthcoming with him was raising his pissed-off quotient to record levels. Had he not been the only one in the room unarmed, he’d have made his point more forcefully.

  “General?” Bergeron’s voice carried genuine surprise. “Congratulations, Fick. Really. My heartfelt congratulations. I don’ remember getting an invitation to any promotion parties; I guess that’ll teach me to leave a better forwarding address.” Bergeron shifted his eyes but not his body or the gun. He looked at Deveroux. “Now, in answer to your question, Agent Deveroux, no, I can’t say that the captain—the general—pardon me—and I have ever formally met. But when a man spends a couple of months sniffing on your trail the way Mountie Fick did some forty years ago, you get to where you feel like you’re family. Isn’t that right, Captain?” He shifted his full attention back to Fick. “We’re almost family—you, me, Tenkiller…almost like…what would you call us? Brothers? I like that—we’re almost a Brotherhood, you might say.”

  “In case you haven’t checked the scorecard recently, Bergeron, your family seems to be on the verge of extinction,” Fick replied. “First Colonel Pham, then Major Doan, Colonel Trinh, Major Linh—now Tenkiller. Being a member of your fraternity seems to come at quite an admission price.”

  “You forgetting someone, Captain? Seems like there’s someone missing from your roll call.”

  Fick tightened his grip on his pistol. Bergeron did likewise.

  “Now calm down there, cowboy,” Deveroux responded quickly, trying to dilute the tension. He managed to put more calm into his voice than he really felt. “Mr. Bergeron, where’s General Ngo? Is he here with you? Is he here?”

  Bergeron smiled at Deveroux’s contorted pronunciation, but he kept his eyes and gun on Fick. “General En-go is inspecting the building. The burden of management—having to check up on your workers all the time. I guess it’s worth it, though, they tell me he’s raking in millions off this construction contract. He always did like working for Uncle Sam.”

  Deveroux looked toward an open doorway on his right and then back at Bergeron. The heavyset man’s eyes betrayed affirmation.

  “Now let’s just stay calm,” Deveroux repeated as he slowly sidestepped to the open doorway. He kept his eyes on Bergeron until his right shoulder touched the doorjamb. “Holy Christ,” he said as he peered around the wall
into the adjoining room. There, amid the coils of electrical wire and empty, white-plastic buckets of latex paint was the curled body of General Ngo Van Thu. Even in the dim light and from ten feet away, Deveroux could see that he was dead; there was a gunshot entry wound to the left temple and a large creeping Rorschach blot of blood on the concrete.

  Deveroux closed his eyes and sighed, letting his head rest on the doorframe momentarily, knowing that the prospect of negotiating a marketable solution to the problem at hand had just gotten harder.

  He filled his lungs with air and turned back to see a smiling John Bergeron. A flick of his eyes to the side established that General Fick was still coiled tightly.

  “Why, Mr. Bergeron? Why’d you do it?” Deveroux asked.

  “Do it?”

  “Yes, sir. Why? Why’d you kill them. Tenkiller, Ngo, all them others. You killed them all, didn’t you? Why?”

  Bergeron narrowed his eyes and seemed to be seriously considering the question. “Now, you just might be jumping to the wrong conclusion there. Doesn’t pay for a special agent to jump to conclusions. No, sir. Didn’t they teach you that in special agent school? Ask General Fick here. He was a special agent once. Most special. No, if you want to know who killed Master Sergeant Tenkiller, you’ll have to go ask the man sleeping in there.”

  “Ngo?”

  “None other.”

  “But…”

  “But why?” Bergeron asked. He shook his head as he spoke but he kept the gun on Fick. “Who can figure those inscrutible yellow bastards, right? You know, I always liked Jimmy. I recruited him. You know that? Not for the army, of course, he got himself into that, but I signed him up for a little operation that I had going on the side. Good kid. Not very bright, but likable in an odd way. The Running Redskin. Ngo on the other hand, now he’s a—guess I should say was, given his recent induction into the past tense society—that man, he was a real shitbag. Smart, but a real shitbag.”

  Bergeron took a deep breath, as if he were preparing to tell a long story. “Truth is, Tenkiller went and got spooked. After all these years, he went and got himself spooked.” Bergeron smiled. “Maybe I had something to do with that. I paid his brother a visit a while back, up there in Oklahoma. You know what’s so ironic? I actually wanted to warn Jimmy—I did. I always liked him, like I said. I wanted to warn him that someone seemed intent upon settling up some old scores. I wasn’t positive who, but I had my suspicions, and me, I figured there was a real good chance that Jimmy was on Ngo’s dancecard. Me too, for that matter. Jimmy now, he wasn’t the smartest redstick in the tipi, no, but he could add two plus two, and when he did, he got five. He came to the same conclusion I did—the Fifth Brother—General Ngo Van Thu.” He paused to assess the situation in the room.