“Mr. Sloane?” Griffin had a firm grip. He eyed the orange-colored walls. “Interesting place.”
“It’s got good food,” Sloane said, smelling what he decided was meat loaf and brown gravy, though that could have been because he had ordered it the last time he ate at the restaurant.
He led Griffin to a table beneath a large black-and-white photograph of tin snips and sheet metal tools lining a workbench. A waitress greeted Sloane by name and handed them each a menu. The colonel asked for a Diet Coke. Sloane requested an iced tea. Neither ordered food and they handed back the menus.
“You come here often?” Griffin asked, making a poor attempt at small talk.
“I’ve watched a few ball games,” Sloane said, motioning to one of the flat screens to the right of the bar. He let the silence drag.
The waitress returned with their drinks. Sloane waited until she had left.
“You wanted to talk about James Ford?”
Griffin removed the straw and drank from the glass. Then he got down to business. “Every soldier’s death overseas is investigated by his company and by CID. Regulations require that it be an officer not involved in the operation, but those were my men, and I believed it important to hear what they had to say, to understand what went wrong that night.”
“You conducted the witness interviews?”
Griffin nodded. “One of my men died. It was my responsibility to make sure we minimized the possibility of reoccurrence.”
“What did you find out?”
Griffin fixed Sloane with a cold stare. “You were a marine.” It was not a question. “You saw combat in Grenada and suffered a shoulder wound when you removed your flak jacket in the middle of a military operation. Your psych evaluation said it was because you felt it weighed you down, that you wanted to move faster.”
Sloane sat back. “Is this about me or James Ford, Colonel?”
“I like to know who I’m meeting, Mr. Sloane. It’s an old habit. Don’t take it personally. Besides, if I had really researched your background I’m sure I’d know the real reason you removed your flak jacket instead of the story you told that doctor who signed the official report.” Griffin folded his hands on the table. “Am I right?”
Sloane kept a poker face. “So tell me, Colonel, since you conducted the witness interviews, did you find anything about them interesting?”
“You mean the fact that the four men told virtually identical stories?”
Sloane was surprised at the colonel’s candor. “My experience interviewing witnesses is that is not ordinarily the case. I find it even more implausible for four men engaged in battle. We’ve both been there. It’s chaos. You react. You don’t remember much of what you did.”
The colonel nodded. “And my experience is that sometimes what gets put in reports is what the witness wants other people to believe happened, not what actually did happen.” He stared across the table at Sloane, obviously implying that the report filed by Sloane regarding what had happened in Grenada was not the truth.
Sloane wasn’t interested in revisiting his past. “You think those men with James Ford the night he died rehearsed their stories before you interviewed them?” he asked.
“Did you, when you told that doctor why you took off your flak jacket?”
“Water under the bridge, Colonel.”
Griffin smiled. “I questioned the uniformity of what I was being told, yes.”
“And the soldiers’ responses?”
Griffin shrugged. “You read their statements.”
“But you have reason to believe something else happened, something other than what those men told you?”
“I do.” Griffin sat back.
“But not something that will turn up in any report I subpoena or get from any witness,” Sloane inferred.
“Captain Kessler was well liked and well respected by his men, and for good reason. He was an excellent soldier. The men he commanded were fiercely loyal to him. The fact that he only lost one man in that ambush is a testament to his capabilities.”
Sloane did not respond.
“I spoke to Captain Pendergrass,” Griffin continued. “You will not find anything untoward, anything that will allow you to successfully argue that Specialist Ford was not killed incident to his service. I didn’t.”
“You’re advising me to tell my client to take the money.”
“I’m giving you the facts.”
“Then I assume you are aware that Phillip Ferguson, one of the men in Captain Kessler’s squad, is dead?”
Griffin nodded. “I know about it, yes. Captain Kessler attended the funeral.”
“And are you aware that Dwayne Thomas, another man who served with James Ford that night, was found shot in the head in a vacant lot in Tacoma?”
Again Griffin nodded. “Someone showed me the article in the Tribune.”
“And are you equally aware that a couple of days ago a man paid a visit to my house and threatened my family.”
For the first time since they sat, Griffin did not have an immediate answer.
PUEBLO BONITO LOS CABOS
CABO SAN LUCAS, MEXICO
THE MAN HAD put on a straw hat and removed his sunglasses, but Alex had no trouble spotting him in the yellow shirt. He sat on a stool at the hotel bar periodically letting his gaze slip from the television mounted on the wall to the mirror behind the bar. He watched the table on the outdoor patio where Tina and Jake sat with a horde of young men. Alex borrowed a pen from the hostess, wrote a note on a napkin, and intercepted a young woman selling red roses. She handed her $5 and the note. Then she stepped back out of view and watched the woman approach the table.
Tina accepted the rose without question and deftly slipped the note into her palm.
Alex looked over her shoulder to the entrance. She estimated she had no more than five to seven minutes before the man who had followed her realized something was wrong. When she looked back, the man at the bar was talking on his cell phone.
“Come on,” she said. “Now, Tina.”
Tina casually glanced down and opened the note. After a moment she stood as the note instructed, walked to one of the men from the boat, and kissed him on the cheek as if to thank him for the rose. Alex removed the blue bandana, part of the restroom attendant’s uniform that had held her curls in place, and moved quickly across the restaurant, keeping her back to the man at the bar. Vincent eagerly stepped forward, looking relieved. He held a margarita and a shot of tequila. As she approached the table she let the tears flow.
“What’s the matter?” he asked, not even noticing the blue uniform.
She shook her head.
“Maria, what’s the matter? What happened?”
“That man at the bar, the one in the yellow Tommy Bahama shirt, has been following me,” she said. “He said some horrible things to me. He called me a Mexican whore.”
Vincent’s head snapped in the direction of the bar. “He said what?”
Tina took Jake by the hand and walked casually toward the back exit. The man at the bar stood, grabbed his hat, and moved to follow them. That was apparently all the provocation Vincent needed. He stepped into the man’s path.
“Hey, asshole, who are you calling a whore?”
Three of his friends, sensing a confrontation, quickly joined him. The man’s gaze shifted to Alex. He raised his hands, palms out. “I’m afraid there’s been a misunderstanding,” he said.
“You got that right,” Vincent said. “A big misunderstanding.”
Alex stepped onto the patio, hurried around the tables with the colorful umbrellas, and darted around the corner of the building to the front of the hotel.
Tina had already hailed the cab, Jake was sitting inside, and they were waiting for her.
MAPLE VALLEY, WASHINGTON
THE “FOR RENT” sign listed to the side, pushed by the increasing winds. As Jenkins sat waiting, the skies opened. Raindrops danced off the roof of his Buick and sheeted down the windshield. It was l
ike looking through a waterfall. Still, he liked the location because the street dead-ended at horse pastures, and the deciduous trees and thick foliage surrounding the property meant he didn’t have to worry about attracting the attention of any neighbors.
Sitting with nothing to do, however, gave him time to think about Alex. He had been unable to reach her, and though he had tried to remain upbeat around Sloane, he, too, had begun to worry.
A white Chevy pickup turned the corner and inched down the street. For a minute Jenkins thought the idiot would roll right past the house, but the truck jerked to a stop, backed up, and sat idling. Three minutes passed, Cassidy likely waiting for another car to arrive before braving the rain, then the driver’s door swung open and the blurred image of a thin man in blue jeans and a T-shirt dashed across the lawn holding a newspaper over his head. Cassidy quickly knocked, then tried the door handle. The one-story house had no eaves. He continued to get rained on as he cupped his hand to the plate-glass window. Earlier in the day, Jenkins had looked through the same window to ensure the house was empty. Cassidy knocked again before retreating back across the lawn to the safety of his truck.
Jenkins gave Cassidy five minutes. He lasted three. The windshield wipers started, Cassidy backed the truck into the gravel driveway, and drove down the road in the direction he had come. Jenkins started the car and followed. He could have confronted Cassidy at the house, but based on Cassidy’s criminal record, Jenkins suspected that handing him a subpoena to appear in court would likely have about as much impact as handing him a roll of toilet paper. He needed to find out where Cassidy lived and sit on him until Sloane had a chance to talk to him.
Cassidy’s truck turned into the gravel lot in front of Valley Painting and parked alongside a late 1980s Toyota Corolla. The brown truck was gone, Kroeger likely having returned to his current job. Jenkins pulled off the road and watched Cassidy hurry inside the building. Ten minutes later his phone rang.
“Mr. Johnson?” Chuck Kroeger sounded more anxious than annoyed.
“Mr. Kroeger, I’m glad you called. I was looking for your number. I’m afraid I lost the piece of paper on which I had it written.”
“My guy was just out there. He said no one showed up.”
“I’m afraid I’ve run into a snafu. My renter flaked out on me. Didn’t show up this morning to sign the lease and make the first and last month’s payment. Left me a message he and his wife found a place to buy.”
“Don’t you still need it painted?”
Kroeger was no dummy when it came to possibly making a buck. “I do, but given that I’m no longer under a time crunch, I’d prefer to wait. You indicated the kid wasn’t too good. No offense, but if I’m paying top dollar—and I still will—I’d prefer the best. Why don’t you give me a bid in the next couple days when it’s convenient?”
Jenkins suspected Kroeger would be disappointed to not be making money for doing nothing, but his hard feelings would be tempered by the prospect of keeping the cash.
“All right,” Kroeger said. “I’ll let Butch know.”
“Thanks again,” Jenkins said. “I’ll be in touch.” He flipped closed the phone. No sooner had he done so than Cassidy exited the building followed by an overweight young man with shoulder-length blond hair and a goatee. He wore a black T-shirt with a skull and crossbones, and hitched up his pants as he walked.
“Like father, like son,” Jenkins said.
The mottled dog skipped along at his heels, tail whipping from side to side as Kroeger’s son shut the metal doors to the building and padlocked them. He lowered the tailgate of Cassidy’s truck and coaxed the dog into the bed, clipping its collar to a short leash hooked to the side of the truck not long enough for the dog to even sit. He got into the truck next to Cassidy.
Cassidy backed from the lot, proceeded down the street, and jumped on 18 East toward Kent. Minutes later he exited to city streets. Staying close enough not to lose him to a traffic light without being detected would be tricky. Cassidy turned into a strip mall and parked. Jenkins did likewise, several rows behind. Kroeger’s son exited the cab and entered a Bartell pharmacy.
“Great,” Jenkins said. “Errands.”
Ten minutes later Kroeger’s son returned, holding a small white prescription package.
“Time to go home, Butch,” Jenkins said.
But after another couple of miles Cassidy pulled into another parking lot and Kroeger again entered a drugstore, returning with another package.
“Interesting.”
The pattern became quickly apparent. In between each excursion Cassidy made calls on his cell phone. After their fourth stop Jenkins realized he could be in for the long haul, checked his gas tank, turned on the radio, and decided he’d just have to wait it out.
THE TIN ROOM
BURIEN, WASHINGTON
“TELL ME EVERYTHING that happened,” Griffin said.
“Not much more to tell, Colonel. A man came to my house and gave my son a fishing lesson—helped him catch the biggest fish of his life. When I went to thank him, he knew my name, my wife’s name, and my son’s name.”
“Could he have obtained that information from your son?”
It was a legitimate question, and it made Sloane wonder if Jake could have talked to Mr. Williams about Cabo as well. “It was a threat, Colonel. He was letting me know I couldn’t protect them. He wasn’t subtle.”
Griffin sat forward. “No one was hurt?”
Sloane shook his head. “Not physically, no.”
“And your wife and child—they’re somewhere safe?”
“They’re safe,” he said, wishing he knew for certain.
Griffin ran a hand over his face. “Could it have been someone else, someone with a different axe to grind?” He didn’t sound like he believed it could.
“Doubtful. Too many coincidences,” Sloane said.
Griffin looked to the window. The rain trickled off a maroon awning, spilling into the gutter. “You wonder what it does to a man.”
“What’s that?” Sloane asked.
“To suddenly find himself confined to a wheelchair for the rest of his life. You wonder what it does to him psychologically.”
Sloane had indeed wondered the same thing about Captain Robert Kessler.
“We have psych evaluations when the men are discharged.” Griffin looked up at Sloane. “But if what you’re telling me is true—”
“It’s true. What do you think happened over there, Colonel? What is it Kessler doesn’t want anyone to know?”
SHIMRAN AL MUSLO, IRAQ
“I DON’T LIKE this, Captain,” Ford said, and he knew Kessler didn’t like their current situation either.
The town, two-and three-story mud and brick buildings, looked to have been standing since biblical times. Some had been reduced to burned and bombed-out husks. Metal shutters and doors covered abandoned storefronts, and thousands of rounds pockmarked what remained of the walls.
“I don’t hear anything,” Ford said. “Why is it so quiet?”
He crept the Humvee farther down a street barely the width of the vehicle. Kessler scanned the alleys to the left and right, a maze of deserted dead ends. Ford saw no one, and couldn’t imagine anyone still lived here. His instincts told him this had been a mistake, that he should hit the gas and drive them the hell out of there, but that had its own disadvantages, like failing to spot IEDs.
What the hell had they got themselves into?
Cassidy leaned forward and said what was on everyone’s mind. “Let’s get the fuck out of here. Let’s get back on the main road and head back to base. This was wrong.”
“At ease, Butch. Man your sector.” Kessler scanned the buildings, searching every doorway and ragged wall opening.
“Dismount right,” Thomas shouted.
“I own him,” Ferguson replied through the headset, confirming that he had his M240 machine gun locked on the target.
“Burka!” Kessler shouted, quickly identifying the traditiona
l head-to-toe black garment still worn by many Iraqi women.
Ford tried to swallow but it stuck in his throat. The fact that it was a woman both relaxed and unnerved him. It was another advantage for the insurgents—they could blend into the populace, with no way to distinguish between hostile and friendly.
“Dismounts alley left,” Ferguson said.
This time Ford saw the muzzle flash of Kalashnikovs before he heard the retort of gunfire.
“Gun left! Gun left!” Kessler shouted.
As Fergie returned fire, Ford turned his attention to the road, searching for their escape, and saw what would have been just a pile of leftover scrap lumber in any other country in the world. Not in Iraq. With that realization came another: The person in the burka was not a woman.
Ford threw the transmission into reverse as the woodpile exploded. The inside of the Humvee flashed a brilliant white. A deep, penetrating boom followed, and with it came a wave of energy. It lifted the front of the vehicle off the ground, causing it to bounce on its front wheels. The side-view mirror evaporated, and a shard of wood embedded in the bulletproof windshield, shattering the glass.
Kessler shouted through thick smoke. “Drive! Go! Go! Go!”
But another stake had pierced the Humvee’s front block, causing the engine to emit a horrific roar and belch smoke. Ford stepped on and off the pedal.
“We’re disabled,” he yelled.
A string of three blasts erupted in succession. Large blocks of stone and concrete crashed down around them, a watermelon-size chunk crushing the hood.
And the gates of hell opened.
Insurgents wearing red-and-white-checked scarves poured from their hiding places like ants from a hole. Bullets pinged and thumped against the Humvee’s armor. Another volley tore into the dashboard, the FBCB2, and the radio. Ford heard the supersonic, high-pitched whistle of rocket-propelled grenades and explosions all around them.
It was a textbook ambush. And they were caught in the kill zone.
Above them Ferguson unleashed a firestorm from his M240. Hot brass links dropped into the passenger compartment as quickly as the big gun could spit them out, the noise deafening, the acrid molten smell of heated lead and gunpowder suffocating.
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