by Glenn Meade
Tanner gave Courtney a look and then stared down at the map. “Looks fresh. Don’t seem to be any marks or indications of where Quentin Lusk may have been headed. If the boat did belong to Lusk.”
Courtney pursed her lips. “Nothing, except maybe . . .”
“What?”
“Midway down the map, there’s a greasy mark, a smudge, like someone tapped a finger there. It’s a stretch of waterway more than seventy miles from here, in Marion County.”
“Give me a break. That’s a big if. Someone could have smudged it by simply opening out the darn map.”
“True. And we’ll have it checked for prints.”
“Meanwhile, we’re nowhere closer to knowing anything more.”
Courtney made a face. “You’re probably right. So right now, that smudge is all we’ve got.”
* * *
Courtney watched as Tanner drove away in his white Camry.
He gave her a wave and winked through the open window, and then he was gone. He was a handsome man. She liked his pale-cinnamon looks. A few pounds less, and she’d probably like them even more. Put him on a diet and a treadmill, and he’d be quite a hunk.
She took her cell phone from her purse and punched in a name. The call was answered immediately.
“Dexter.”
“Hey, Dexter, it’s Courtney from CID. How are they hanging, buddy?”
“Straight and low, as always. You doing OK?”
“Good. Listen, I just needed to run something by you.”
“Run away.”
“Tanner said you told him you did a thorough search of the area using ground radar but found no remains.”
“That’s correct. Zilch. Unless you want to count the skeletal remains of some possums, rabbits, and an adolescent bear.”
“You reckon your scans are reliable?”
“First-class. Why?”
“Maybe it’s the OCD in me. I wanted to be certain. And if there are any other angles you’ve yet to cover.”
“We’re going to run the radar equipment over several areas of the site again, places that seemed a little nebulous, just to be absolutely certain, but the experts tell me they don’t reckon on any surprises.”
“Not that I don’t trust Tanner or anything. I guess I just wanted to hear it from the horse’s mouth.”
“You and Tanner getting on OK?”
“Yeah, why?”
“Tough about his wife. Her dying in an arson blaze. All that messy stuff in his past.”
“What do you mean?”
“He didn’t tell you?”
60
* * *
When I pulled up into the driveway I saw my father’s blue Ford Taurus in front of the house.
A bunch of press vehicles were still on the street, as were Channel 5 and WBIR vans and a cop car. Another squad car was parked in the driveway next to my father’s car, a sheriff’s deputy standing by the vehicle. He tipped his hat as I got out and walked up to the front door. “Ma’am.”
I had been apprehensive all through the ten-minute drive. Not only about confronting my father now that he was back but about the fact that Jack had called. I checked my watch. 4:10 p.m.—I had fifty minutes until Jack would call me back.
I still desperately wanted to tell Courtney and Tanner what was happening. But I knew I couldn’t risk ignoring Jack’s demands. It might prevent me from ever seeing my children again.
I felt my body quiver. It was almost violent, as if I was in meltdown, every nerve on edge, every sense heightened. The last thing in the world I wanted to do was confront my father. But I knew I had to. And I knew it had to be now. I couldn’t put it off any longer.
I had the damning envelope in my tote bag, the one with the photographs that had been left on the passenger seat of my car. Part of me was scared to show it to him. Another part of me was angry, desperate for answers, to see his reaction when I confronted him.
I had never feared my father—never. He was my protector. Yet I was conscious of the fact that I had put my Taurus revolver in my bag. I didn’t know how he would react.
Would I finally learn the truth after all these years? Would I learn that my father was a murderer? He was a soldier. Soldiers sometimes have to kill in battle. But I never imagined my father was capable of killing my mother.
I looked at my phone again, at the snapshot image I took of Chad’s laptop screen. It was a little grainy, but I had no problem making out the pile of bloodied bodies. The weird thing is, I’d never thought of my father as capable of killing, even though he was a lifelong soldier. I guess I put that part of his life to the back of my mind.
He was my father, a man I loved and trusted, from whom I knew only love and kindness. But a brutal logic started to kick in. If my father was capable of ordering a massacre as gruesome as this—and surely there were other bloody attacks he’d taken part in during his career—surely he was capable of killing my mother?
Another thing, the twenty-five million dollars Chad mentioned. The fact that he couldn’t deny that Jack was in some way involved in its disappearance unsettled me. Was that a reason Jack disappeared? The more I thought about it, the more sense it made. Twenty-five million was a lot. Or a share of it. Jack could live in comfort for the rest of his days. And it might be a motive to hide.
As I went up the patio steps, I felt my legs shaking. I opened the door quietly. The alarm was on this time. It chimed as I entered. My father’s overnight case was outside his study. I heard the shower running upstairs. I stepped into his study, the same room my grandfather had used.
The smell of old books and leather and walnut was heavy in the air. My eyes moved over familiar objects. On one wall, the Irish and American flags crossed above a pair of broadswords. On another, photographs of my parents on castle ramparts high above emerald-green fields, kissing the Blarney Stone, and at the Cliffs of Moher. In a bar, their hands raised in a toast of whiskey and Guinness.
And my mother’s favorite memento of her visit: a six-inch bronze cast of a legendary Celtic bird, perched on a thorn tree. I felt my eyes water as I stared at my mother’s image and clutched the stiff-backed white envelope.
Anger raged through me like a tidal wave.
I heard the shower water stop upstairs. My father’s voice called out, “Is that you, Kath?”
He would have heard my car from upstairs.
“Yes.”
“Be right down,” he called back.
I sat there, clutching the envelope, waiting for my father to appear.
* * *
He descended the stairs, dragging his foot, his wispy hair still damp as he toweled it dry. I saw very little trembling in his hands or face. He must have been taking his Parkinson’s meds. Once they wore off, the trembling and other symptoms would start to affect him again.
But he looked strained, his eyes bloodshot. “I half expected some press, but I didn’t think I’d see this many—or the police.”
“The press will want to talk. I’m just not up to it yet.”
“You don’t have to talk to anyone, honey.”
He wore fresh jeans, a military khaki-colored T-shirt, and Nike sneakers, and the damp towel hung around his neck. He still had that Clint Eastwood look, the confident walk of a man who kept himself in good shape. A powerhouse, despite his age.
“Are you OK?” His eyes never left my face as he came over and hugged me, kissed my cheeks. I felt the familiar rub of his chin on top of my head. My father smelled of soap and the scent of his favorite Polo cologne.
I didn’t respond, just stood there stiffly.
He took a step back, sensing my unease, both his arms outstretched as he held on to my shoulders. “You look like you’re still in shock.”
I nodded. He squeezed my arm. I wanted to recoil.
“We both are, Kath. My mind’s be
en in turmoil all during the drive back.”
I could barely force myself to meet his eyes for more than a few moments, before I had to look away. Was my father a cold-blooded killer? I was desperate to know the truth, but at the same time, I dreaded knowing it. Instinctively, I drew myself away from him and took a few steps toward the window.
His expression changed to puzzlement. “Are you OK? What’s the matter?”
I remained mute a few moments, the silence like a crushing weight. “How’s Ruby?” I asked.
It was all I could muster the courage to say. The other things I wanted to discuss—the accusation written on the photograph—I couldn’t marshal the strength to bring up just yet. I was distressed, couldn’t get the words out that I wanted scream at my father. Did you kill Mom?
His expression tightened as he shook his head, slid the towel from his neck, and tossed it onto the back of the chair. “Not good.”
I stood there, saying nothing.
“When they opened her up, things were a lot worse than they expected. She hemorrhaged pretty bad during the operation.”
“I’m sorry,” I muttered, barely able to speak.
I saw his eyes grow moist. “Look, I hate to have to tell you this, but I need to fly back up there tomorrow. The doctors are not sure Ruby’s going to make it, Kath.”
My eyes flicked to the kitchen clock. 5:25 p.m. I had exactly thirty-five minutes before Jack would call again.
“I know it’s a quick turnaround, honey, but I wanted to be here for you. I ought to be there for Ruby, too. The doctors are not optimistic. I guess I’m caught between two stools. But just tell me to stay, and I will.”
I didn’t speak.
My father raised an eyebrow. “Are you OK?”
“You need to be with Ruby. I understand that.”
“Are you really sure?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll fly back tomorrow. I’ve got a seat booked. With all that’s been going on, I just couldn’t take another twelve-hour drive. I guess you can figure it’s pretty bad if I intend to fly.”
“Sure.” I felt as if I were talking on autopilot.
“I just had to come back, Kath. I had to see if you were coping. Are you? It’s all such a terrible shock.” He looked into my face, said it as delicately as he could. “Did they find the remains yet?”
“No.”
“Nothing, nothing at all?”
“Some personal belongings. And an aluminum briefcase.” I decided not to mention the case contents just yet.
“What belongings?”
“Some clothes of Sean’s and Amy’s and a PlayStation game.”
“You . . . you saw them?”
“Yes.”
He teared up some more and said in a kind of astonishment, “My God.” He wiped his eyes with his sleeve. As always, trying not to demonstrate his pain. “That’s all they found?”
“So far.” I took the big envelope with the photographs from my bag. “We need to talk about some things. Personal things. They’re . . . they’re important.”
His eyebrows crinkled as he stared at the envelope I was clutching. “What’s that?”
“Something you need to see.”
I felt my legs quiver. I was truly scared to show him. What would his reaction be? Anger? Denial? Fear? Puzzlement? Whatever it was, it might reveal all I needed to know. I held on to the envelope for now, didn’t offer it over just yet.
My father’s gaze shifted back to me. I met his stare. I needed to get the ball rolling, to spit it out. But part of me dreaded the response, whatever it would be. I forced myself to speak again as I looked into my father’s face. I felt a tear roll down my cheek.
“Jack, Sean, and Amy survived the crash. They survived. Eight years ago, they walked out of those woods alive, and for whatever reason, they never came back.”
61
* * *
The silence was almost total.
All I heard was my father’s breathing. Deep and hard. Like he was trying to recover from a bolt out of the blue. That military term pretty much described his reaction: shock and awe.
Slowly, he wiped one eye with his left index finger, then his other eye with his right. I saw his eyes moisten, his lips quiver. “Jack . . . Jack and the kids are alive?”
“They didn’t die eight years ago. I know that much. I know they survived.”
My father looked as if he’d received a shot of adrenaline, his eyes widening before they narrowed with puzzlement. “Know? Now?”
“There’s enough physical and circumstantial evidence to corroborate it.”
“What evidence?”
I told him. About the flashlight, the first-aid kit, the bloodstains, the DNA, the blood traces in the cabin two hundred yards away.
My father collapsed into the study chair, pale shock spreading over his face like a sudden rash.
“Have they searched all the woods yet? Have they said conclusively that Jack and the children were alive?”
“The investigators can’t say anything with absolute certainty yet. They still have to check the terrain with ground-penetrating equipment. But they think that if they were capable of walking out, they were in a fit enough state. They think there’s a good enough chance.”
As desperate as I felt the need to do so, I couldn’t risk telling him about Jack’s calls. The other things—the damning accusation written on that photograph—I couldn’t bring myself to speak about just yet. I still felt in distress.
“I . . . I . . .” My father stammered.
That was as far as he got for a few moments, his voice hoarse, whatever words he meant to say choked in his throat. My father rarely drank during the day. For special occasions or maybe if he had a visitor now and then. But now he crossed to the liquor cabinet and plucked out a bottle of Jameson whiskey.
“What’s going on, Kath? Why? Why would Jack do that? Survive with Sean and Amy and not contact you?”
“I’m guessing his mental state may have contributed. But I need you to tell me the truth. I need you to be honest with me and tell me what happened to Jack and Kyle.”
He smacked a glass onto the tray and rubbed his face with a big hand. He looked trapped.
I glanced at the kitchen wall clock. Twenty-one minutes until Jack called.
“This is not the time, Kath.”
“Yes, it is. It’s never been the time. But now it is.”
“Kath, it’s . . . it’s complicated.” My father looked as if he were caught on the end of a hook, and he was squirming. This time, he splashed a large measure of Jameson into the glass.
I faced him. “It must be. Courtney’s involved.”
His eyebrows arched in a stare. “Courtney?”
“She’s the lead for the CID. The feds are on the case, too.”
I took out my cell phone. I selected the photo gallery and the gory image of the pile of corpses—women and children. I handed it to him. He stared at it.
“I know about Red Rock,” I said. “I know there was a massacre and your men were responsible. I know a lot of money went missing that day. Is that the kind of complicated you mean?”
My father put the Jameson bottle down and stood rock-solid. The whole world seemed to come crashing down around him. For the first time in my life, I saw real fear on his face.
“Who told you all that? Where did you get this?” He looked up from my phone to stare at me, his voice a rasp.
“It doesn’t matter. What matters is the truth. CID investigated Jack back then about the missing money, not just the massacre. You knew that, didn’t you?”
He was silent. For a few moments, his eyes settled again on the image on the screen. Then he slowly handed the phone back to me. He raised his glass. His head snapped back, and he drank the whiskey fast. It was almost an angry gesture. He slapped dow
n the glass.
“Yes, I knew.”
“So why didn’t you ever tell me?”
“Kath, what happened that day was in the public domain, but the Army kept the lid on certain details in the case. I was ordered to keep my mouth shut. Besides, why upset you? You were grieving as it was. There was no need to add fuel to the fire. No need to deepen your pain by sullying Jack’s name.”
“And that’s your answer? That’s it?”
He ran a hand over his face again. “Kath . . . things happen in war that you don’t plan. Bad things. It’s shifting sands, all the time. You meet action, get hit, you hit back. In the heat of battle, it’s like you’re fighting in thick fog. You, of all people, ought to know that. You’re a soldier’s daughter. No matter how well trained you are, sometimes you just can’t tell the collateral damage that’s unfolding until after the smoke clears. Mistakes like that get made all the time in war.”
I saw my father’s hands tremble as he splashed more Jameson into his glass. The man I adored, the man I always put on a pedestal, seemed to be on shaky ground before my eyes. And I hadn’t even put the cherry on top yet.
He lifted his glass. “Who told you all this? Courtney?”
I saw the clock’s second hand sweep around. Sixteen minutes until Jack’s call. Our talk was dragging on, but I needed to know.
“It’s irrelevant.”
“No, it’s not. I’ll bet the prime reason CID is involved is to keep tabs on this, make sure it doesn’t get out of control. They don’t want a can of worms opened up.”
“You ordered the attack on the convoy, didn’t you?”
He nodded. “My intel said the convoy was insurgents. But I never knew they had their families with them in the vehicles. If I had, I would have handled it differently.”
“Jack took it badly?”
“All of the men did. Soldiers are human, for God’s sake. A lot of them were married men with families. So many civilian deaths traumatized us all. There were dead and dying everywhere. Children crying. Teenagers, kids, infants, badly injured. It was like a scene from Dante’s Inferno.”