The Kill List

by Nichole Christoff

  “That had better not be a sniper’s rifle.”

  “It isn’t. It’s a GPS. Matty tagged Brandy’s Jeep when I bugged the house.”

  “Why her Jeep?”

  “Because he couldn’t get to Tim’s car. Your MPs were sitting in front of it.”

  “That’s us. Protect and serve.”

  I got up, crossed to the dresser. I flipped the clasps on the case, lifted the tracker from its slot, switched the GPS on. The LCD display glowed in my hand. But it didn’t show me the image I expected. Instead of a static arrowhead on a rough map of Fort Leeds, Brandy’s Jeep Liberty moved across the detailed field of town.

  “That’s strange. Matty told me Brandy hardly went anywhere in the two days he’d staked out the house. Kev confirmed it when we started taking a closer look at Tim’s activities.”

  “That’s true, but she ran a few errands about every other day.”

  “What kind of errands?”

  “The usual, I suppose. One of my cops tailed her to the Commissary once or twice and Maintenance a few times. On the weekend she went into Leeds. She bought a coffee and sat in the park.”

  Something about that itinerary didn’t sit right with me. “She went to Maintenance? On more than one occasion?”

  Barrett crossed his arms across his beautiful boxer’s chest. “I got the impression Thorp thinks things like taking care of minor home repairs is beneath him.”

  “But repairs aren’t beneath a handyman. Like that pedophile Albert Foley.” Could the hunt for Brooke really come back to him? “You released him to Kev, right? So he’s in federal custody.”

  “He was. Foley’s mother made bond after his arraignment. A quarter of a million dollars.”

  I tilted the tracker so Barrett could get a look at the green square lighting up the center of the screen. “Is this the park Brandy went to?”

  Barrett’s face went hard. “I’ll drive. On the way, you call the FBI.”

  Chapter 36

  Brandy Thorp sat on a park bench under a budding tree, a cup of cocoa in her hand. In a peach tweed jacket and with her bright hair loose around her shoulders, she was the picture of spring. Her bench edged the Leeds Municipal Playground and the springtime air rang with the sounds of children playing.

  Brandy’s shining eyes seemed to track one child in particular. The little girl ran from the sandbox to the arms of a man. Rather than the frilly pink dress she wore in the birthday picture I’d clipped to my visor, or the adorable Goldilocks getup to celebrate Halloween, or the sweet tutu she’d sported during her dance recital, this child wore blue jeans and a matching jacket. A red ball cap covered her towhead. Her blond ponytail bobbed happily behind her.

  Like mother.

  Like daughter.

  I recognized the man with her, too. He scooped Brooke into the air, swung her until she squealed. But he wasn’t Albert Foley.

  Many men had the same peaty brown hair, but not same kind of limp when they walked. This was the man I’d seen at Beth Padilla’s just that morning. This was Steve Sago.

  On the far side of the park, the sheriff’s deputies who’d kept an eye on Foley’s house, Hickory and Howdy, sat stationed in their cruiser. In plain clothes, the sheriff himself leaned against a tree not far away. An FBI team sat in an SUV behind me.

  I could pick out more federal agents on foot all around the park.

  It’s easy when you know how.

  Barrett, in his ACUs, had stayed in his truck. He hadn’t wanted to. But he hadn’t wanted to give the game away, either.

  Brandy tossed me an absent smile when I sat beside her on the bench. And then the realization hit. “Jamie? What are you doing here?”

  “I might ask you the same thing.” My eye traveled to the little girl in the red ball cap. “But I think I know.”

  Brandy’s gaze followed mine, lingered on her daughter. “I’m in trouble, aren’t I?”

  “Well, there’s trouble. And then there’s trouble. Why don’t you tell me about yours?”

  Brandy’s hands tightened around her cup of cocoa as if she desperately needed it to warm them. After a time, she asked, “Did Tim ever hit you?”

  “What?”

  “When you were married to him, did he ever hit you?”

  “Just a second.” I reached for the wire I wore under my chocolate-brown jacket and yanked the plug out. The FBI would pitch a fit, but that was the way this had to be. “No, he never hit me.”

  “He finally told me y’all had been married. That you were his ex. He admitted you couldn’t have children, but that you’d wanted them very badly. Jamie, I’m so sorry for what I said to you that day.”

  “It’s okay. You didn’t know.”

  We sat in silence, watching Brooke tow a grinning Steve toward the swings.

  Then I said, “Has Tim ever hit you?”

  Brandy’s smooth brow creased. “Once in a while. He’s pretty quick to apologize. But he yells at me, too. Sometimes without even raising his voice. And that’s even worse. He makes me feel small.”

  I could understand that.

  “I didn’t want my daughter to grow up feeling that way. I didn’t want her to think it’s okay if a man hits a woman. I didn’t want her to get hit. And I knew Tim would never give her up. Never.”

  “How did you meet Steve?”

  Brandy smiled wistfully. “We were sweethearts, back in Texas. Of course, at the time, he tried not to see it that way.”

  She told me how he’d left her to go into the army and how his experiences on the battlefield had changed him for the better. And then she dropped her bombshell. “He’s Brooke’s real daddy.”

  “But Tim—”

  “I was eighteen and a cocktail waitress when Steve went to Iraq. He told me to get an abortion, threw money in my face and said I’d better do it, but I couldn’t. My mama…Well, that makes no never mind. I had nobody to count on but me.” Brandy drew a shaky breath. “One night, I met Tim at work. He was so nice to me. And he flirted with me. I set my cap for him then and there because I thought he’d make a good daddy for Brooke. I didn’t know he was married, Jamie.”

  So. My marriage had ended because Tim believed himself responsible for Brooke. But he wasn’t responsible for her at all.

  Then I thought about what Brandy had said—about the way Tim made her feel small through his words and through his fists. Which made me wonder: As the only father Brooke had known for her entire young life, and as the male example she saw every day, maybe Tim was responsible for Brooke in other ways. And maybe my marriage to him had been over long before she came along.

  “Can I go to my baby now?” Brandy asked, softly.

  “Of course.”

  She leaned over, kissed my cheek. It was a strange sensation, this sense of connectedness to Brandy Thorp. But I didn’t mind it.

  Together, we crossed the playground. Steve Sago beamed when he saw Brandy approaching. When he saw me, his smile faded.

  “Mommy!”

  Brooke’s gleeful shout drowned out any question Steve could ask.

  And when Brandy scooped her giggling child into her arms, seeing them together outweighed any answer I could give.

  —

  By the end of the day, Barrett opted not to bring charges against Steve and Brandy. He could’ve, though, not only for kidnapping Brooke, but also for extortion. Brandy and Steve had stumbled into committing that crime after she spotted the cash I’d tossed on Tim’s desk—and learned from me about the stash in Tim’s safe. It wasn’t hard for her to imagine how some of Tim’s blood money could kick-start her new life with Brooke and Steve. Steve had liked her plan. He called Tim with a fake ransom demand and we were off to the races. Unfortunately, Derrick Larkin’s illegal phone tap intercepted that call. All Steve and Brandy had wanted was the money, so they could be free. Derrick had used the situation to open fire on Tim and nearly decapitate me.

  Steve also confessed to carrying the ladder and Brooke through the woods the night she went miss
ing, inadvertently leaving the partial prints where his prosthetic foot hadn’t made complete contact with the ground. On the gravel road to Franklin Contracting, an old army buddy had picked them up. But Steve hadn’t climbed the ladder to get Brooke. Not with his artificial leg. Brandy had met him at the back door and handed him his sleeping daughter. Then she’d gone upstairs to cut the screen from inside the house, not outside as a kidnapper would’ve done.

  When I arrived—and she learned that I was a private investigator and a security specialist, and that Tim had hired me to search for Brooke—Brandy got spooked. As the news channels blasted stories of my bringing down Charles Chapman Brown, Steve thought up the dead squirrel as a deterrent. But I didn’t frighten easily. So he followed up with a dead skunk he found in a ditch. Once all was said and done, he apologized profusely and agreed to pay for the damages to my Jag. But that didn’t matter. I considered the matter closed.

  Tim, however, wouldn’t stand for anyone letting his pretty little wife off the hook. He railed at Brandy and at Barrett until Barrett pointed out that where whispers of spousal abuse were concerned, a colonel might not have much chance of making brigadier general. At that, Tim shut up. And Brandy packed her bags. She and Brooke headed for Steve’s for good.

  Still, as quiet as we kept all this, the story got out. Not the whole story. Just the part about finding Brooke in the park with a relative. And it looked like the press wanted to give me the credit for it. My voicemail filled up fast. Even Anderson Cooper called. He wanted to interview me.

  As for me, I just wanted some chocolate truffles, a glass of champagne, a hot bath, and my own bed. Considering my head was now splitting with the aftermath of my concussion, though, I was willing to settle for the bed at Barrett’s, which was closer. He drove me to his house and parked beside his barn. He cut the engine but made no move to get out of the truck. At last, he turned to me.

  “Congratulations, Jamie. You found her.”

  My smile was weak and weary, but it felt great nonetheless. “I did, didn’t I?”

  “Yes, you did.”

  He didn’t walk me into the house. He didn’t follow me up the stairs. Alone in his room, I crawled into his bed. I willed my mind to shut down. But it wouldn’t.

  I’d seen firsthand what could happen when men like Charles Chapman Brown, Tony Padilla, and Steve Sago came home from war. Barrett’s homecoming had been just as life-changing. From their common experience came so much that was bad—and so much that was good.

  I’d nearly given up on sleeping when my BlackBerry trilled. The number on the caller ID was a Fort Leeds exchange. I didn’t recognize it, but I answered it anyway.

  “Hello?”

  My caller identified herself as the sergeant who worked for Barrett. She was in a patrol car. She said, “I have a package for you from the office of Senator James Sinclair. My estimated ETA is less than five minutes.”

  Chapter 37

  Six minutes later, I was back on Barrett’s bed, the contents of the courier package spilling across the bedspread. On top, I found a note from my father’s assistant. It read:

  Jamie—

  As you investigate the correlation between those who sent threats to a Ft. Leeds officer and those with access to the post, these photos may be of interest. Many are of soldiers who did not receive transfers shortly before deployment. I have highlighted the names of those who were killed in action or otherwise did not come home. Best of luck in your continued search.

  —Marta

  Sure enough, yellow streaks in the photographs’ captions picked out names I recognized instantly from the threats. Tim appeared in a number of the shots, handing out awards to soldiers completing training courses, sitting among the troops at a Fourth of July cookout. Nearly all of these men had gone to war.

  Some of them, like Donnie Mullany, had replaced other soldiers at the last minute.

  And many of those who’d done the replacing had come home in a box.

  As I flipped through the photos, the years fell away. When they predated Tim’s tenure, the yellow highlighting halted altogether. Marta, ever thorough, however, had included every photo of Fort Leeds personnel she could find anyway.

  When I came across a particular picture, one close to fifteen years old, I was glad she had.

  The solemn-faced man in this interesting photo looked way too familiar. Splattered with the mud and sweat of the obstacle course, the camera had captured him shaking my father’s hand. Pearce was in the shot, too, on the man’s far side. He clapped the soldier on the shoulder. Tim, a company grade officer at the time, was there as well, handing my father the soldier’s certificate of achievement.

  Mesmerized, I grabbed my BlackBerry and dialed.

  “Thorp residence.” But it wasn’t Tim who answered the phone.

  “Hi, Pearce, it’s Jamie. Is Tim there? I need to speak with him.”

  “How are you, my dear? I’ve been so worried about you since—”

  “Thanks, but I really need to talk to Tim.”

  “I’m sorry to say he’s in one of his moods. He’s closed himself in his office and won’t come out for anything. Can I help you with something?”

  “I hope so.”

  I told Pearce about the photo and the soldier pictured in it.

  The soldier was Charles Chapman Brown.

  “Brown?” Pearce said. “He escaped authorities in Philadelphia and—”

  “Yes. Turns out he passed through Fort Leeds a few years ago. I’ve got a photo of him with Tim. You might remember him. You’re in the snapshot, too.”

  “Just a second.” Pearce put the phone down. I heard him walk away. When he came back, he said, “You’d better come over here, Jamie. There’s something you need to know.”

  —

  The early evening was warm when I left Barrett’s home, as if spring had taken advantage of the advancing night to gain ground in winter’s territory. I shed my jacket, though it meant my Beretta would be plain view. But I didn’t worry about walking around with a plainly visible weapon on a military installation.

  At Tim’s, the military police cruisers and FBI sedans had packed up and left. They’d been a constant presence over the last seven days. The street felt empty without them.

  I rang the bell. Pearce opened the door. Early evening light sheared off the lenses of his glasses, making his eyes unreadable.

  He escorted me into the stark living room.

  It felt austere without Brandy’s burning candles to soften the corners and Brooke’s toys to remind me of her.

  Pearce tapped on the door to Tim’s home office. “It’s funny how things work out, isn’t it, Jamie? Tim gave you up to have a family. And it turns out that family isn’t really his.”

  Truly, I didn’t find it funny at all. But Tim’s betrayal didn’t upset me as it once had. I suspected it would never upset me again.

  “I’m all right, Pearce. I don’t need to talk about this—”

  He waved me to silence, opened his arms to embrace me like he always did.

  Resigned, I stepped into the hug.

  He squeezed me tight, heaved a heart-rending sigh. The sound of it sent a sick prickle trickling down my spine. I wasn’t sure why.

  Pearce said, “You should’ve quit while you were ahead, Jamie. You should’ve forgotten about Brown and gone home.”

  I didn’t know what he meant by that. But not knowing didn’t stop alarm from striking me like a lightning bolt. I tried to squirm my way from the circle of Pearce’s arms. He wouldn’t let me go. Past his shoulder, I saw Tim’s office door swing open.

  Charles Chapman Brown stood on the threshold.

  And he wasn’t alone.

  Like a linen shirt that had been hung out to dry, Tim was pale and limp and would’ve crumpled to the floor if Brown weren’t holding him up. But Brown had him in a headlock, clutching Tim’s jaw from behind and digging his fingers into the soft tissue of Tim’s face.

  The grip kept Tim off balance, forced his h
ead back, and left his throat exposed. I could see his carotid dancing the jitterbug in his neck and I felt mine do the same. Worse, I could see the point of Brown’s blade pressed against Tim’s artery—and I knew from personal experience Brown wouldn’t hesitate to push that point home.

  The memory of his steel at my throat made me struggle against Pearce’s embrace. Not that struggling did me any good. Pearce’s arms drew tighter.

  “Jamie,” he said, “I believe you’ve met my cousin, Charles.”

  If Charles Chapman Brown was Pearce’s cousin, I realized he was the unfortunate boy who’d lost his parents in a plane crash. The boy who’d suffered his abusive uncle’s wrath and faced the man’s ire alone when Pearce ran away to the army. No wonder he heard the voice of the Holy Mother and stalked women who were kind to him. No wonder he’d followed in Pearce’s footsteps and joined the military to get out of his uncle’s house. And no wonder, in the high-pressure environment of desert military operations, he’d had a breakdown.

  Pearce, it dawned on me, had probably been the chaplain who’d saved Brown’s neck in the Sandbox. He’d undoubtedly harbored Brown when he’d escaped from the courthouse, too. I could wholeheartedly believe that well-meaning Pearce couldn’t see his cousin as dangerous, but I could—and I did.

  I tried to twist from Pearce’s grip.

  “Please,” Pearce begged me. “I’ve never seen Charles like this. He’s holding Tim hostage until he talks to you. All he wants to do is talk to you.”

  But Brown had wanted to do more than talk to Marianne Lewis when he came after her with duct tape and condoms in his duffel bag.

  And he’d wanted to do more than talk to me when he’d held me prisoner in that courthouse closet.

  “He’ll talk to you,” Pearce promised, “and then he’ll leave.”

  I doubted it. I kicked Pearce square in the shin, with all my might. He howled in pain, but his arms remained ruthlessly locked around me.