Blood On The Bridge

by Zack Klika

  The comedown from the pills caused her to pause in her living room. Had her apartment always looked like this? she wondered. There was a beige shag rug in the living room and a white leather couch in front of her bed. Two pink Hello Kitty pillows on the couch set the tone of the room. Plants were scattered around the apartment, most of them by windows. Most of them dying.

  She kept a tight ship. Not anywhere near being OCD. It was just easier cleaning up after one person. She had paper cups and plates, so there were usually no dishes.

  The only exception was the dining room table. Riley had files scattered about it in no apparent order. She spread out the profiles she had on everyone she had questioned so far and started looking for connections between the battalions. Andrew was assigned to a forward support company in 2nd Battalion, which also fell under 3BCT.

  It was one thing for Jennifer to join the Army to track down Andrew’s killer. Being assigned to the same brigade as him, though, was no coincidence. It would take help to place her there. Help from someone with some rank. She looked at Colonel Wright’s profile. Not high enough up the ladder to orchestrate something like that. Still worth it to have Tim get his hands on his file, though.

  Riley knew she should be playing it cool. Jennifer, Andrew, Buck, and Danny were dead. Lee had been hospitalized. And they were all connected. If someone could kill that many people and get away with it, Riley should be worried. For some strange reason she was starting to care less and less about her own safety. If anyone was going to find out what really happened to Jennifer, they’d need to get their hands dirty.

  A red flag would be raised when Conn went looking into Andrew’s case file. But that wasn’t Riley’s problem. Conn had offered to help. Lee was sure he could get into Jennifer’s laptop. There had to be information on it. Her best bet was to keep an eye on Thomas.

  She opened her text messages and clicked on Thomas’s name. She punched in a quick message: “Pick me up at 8?” Thomas replied back almost immediately. “Sounds good.”

  Riley had known Thomas for a little over a year. But what did she really know about him? Nothing, now that she thought about it. It was easy finding drugs off base. On base was a different story. A friend of hers had put her in touch with Thomas.

  The first time she went to his barracks, everything was hush-hush. He let her into his room and she waited in a chair while he disappeared into his closet. He came out with a bottle and told her it was $100. She had the money on her. But he was standing there with his shirt off and it had been a while. Work kept her busy. Before she knew it, they were on each other in his bed. When they had finished, she put her clothes on and put the pill bottle in her pocket. He never said a word. Between her addiction and her father’s ailing health, she was visiting Thomas about once a month—well, more frequently now.

  It wasn’t even noon yet, and all Riley wanted to do was sleep the day away. She’d been going full speed for the better part of three days. A nap would help. She threw back three pills and let them work their magic.

  *

  Moonlight filtered through Riley’s open window. She jerked awake from a clicking sound, unsure of whether it was real or imagined. Scrambling for her phone, she grabbed it from underneath her pillow and hit the home button. The large touch screen bathed her face in a blue glow.

  “Shit,” she said to herself.

  She had slept through the entire day. It was 7:15 at night. Maybe three pills was two too many. Her head felt clouded, and she wondered how she would ever be able to go to sleep that night. Monday looked imposing. Her stomach growled at her. Thomas would arrive soon. There was still the question of how to handle him. What she really wanted to do was tie him to a chair and get answers.

  Thomas arrived right on time. Riley didn’t want to give him the chance to come into her apartment, so she waited at the curb for him. When she hopped into his car, he leaned in and kissed her on the cheek. It would have been a nice gesture if she didn’t think he was wrapped up with a murderer somehow. He was dressed in slacks and a tucked-in white polo. He smelled nice too. None of it mattered to Riley now.

  It was a quiet ride to the seafood restaurant he had chosen. The silence was nice in a way. He didn’t seem to mind it and neither did she. Business was slow on a Sunday night, so they had their pick for seating. Thomas chose a booth in the corner of the restaurant that could easily seat six. There was an anchor on the wall next to them that looked like it weighed a few hundred pounds. The restaurant’s lighting was dim, and round mirrors hung along the back wall from heavy rope that frayed all over, arranged in a way to make the room feel like the hull of a ship.

  Thomas grinned from ear to ear.

  “You look gorgeous,” he said.

  She knew she did. She wore a loose black dress that had spaghetti straps and had opted for three-inch heels, putting her at eye level with Thomas when standing.

  “Thanks.”

  Riley decided her best bet was to let Thomas do most of the talking. She couldn’t ask him any questions outright. That might clue him in. Right now he thought he held all the aces. Riley wouldn’t have had it any other way.

  A waiter came over and set a bread basket down and took their drink order. Thomas ordered a whiskey. Neat. Riley settled on water.

  “How’s the rest of your weekend been?” he asked, chewing on a small bite of bread.

  “Eventful so far.”

  Thomas nodded.

  “I saw they found the guy who killed Jennifer.”

  “Yeah. It looks like it all worked out.”

  “What do you mean, ‘looks’?”

  “I don’t think the guy they found is the one who killed her,” Riley said, skimming over the menu. The prices were outrageous.

  Thomas looked surprised by her statement. “Really?”

  “Yeah. It just doesn’t add up. The way she was murdered. It looked like something a serial killer would do.”

  “I can help out some more if you want,” Thomas said as the waiter dropped off their drinks.

  “You’ve already done enough.”

  “No, really. I want to help.”

  He leaned forward enough for the dangling light above the table to brighten his face. He must have realized he seemed needy because he leaned back, as if retreating into the shadows of the restaurant, and took a gulp of his whiskey.

  “I don’t really have anything right now—well, I might, but I don’t know yet,” said Riley.

  Thomas nodded and bit into another piece of bread.

  “What is it?”

  “I don’t want to say just yet. I’ll fill you in when I get some more details.”

  Thomas nodded and steered the conversation away from talk of murder and cover-ups after that. Riley knew she had piqued his interest, though. He didn’t seem like a shot caller. Whoever he worked for would be contacted tonight and put onto Riley. It would have been easy enough to ask him what he was doing in Lee’s apartment and how he was connected to Jennifer’s murder and Andrew’s training accident. To ask him who he was working with. It’d be easier to get him drunk and back to her place, though.

  By the time they left, Thomas had finished four whiskies. Riley drove them back to her place while he talked a big game about what would happen when they got back to her place, his hand running up and down her thigh. Talk was all it could be. He wouldn’t be able to get hard if his life depended on it. Why men drank whiskey on dates perplexed Riley. They all knew what it did to them.

  Maybe the sign of a good man could be determined by what he drank on a first date. If it was whiskey, then sex might not be the only thing on his mind. Thomas was still awake when they got back to Riley’s apartment, but barely. She saw him play with his phone on the way home and memorized the pass code he punched in.

  1-3-5-7.

  He was out by the time his head hit Riley’s pillow. He wrapped his arm around her and pulled her to his chest. They were face-to-face, which made it a little difficult to get to his phone. Eventually, she got
his phone from his pocket. She dimmed the brightness on the phone, holding it above his shoulder so he wouldn’t wake up from the light. She tapped in the code and went to work.

  There were no email accounts set up on the phone. No recent calls, not even from her. Then she opened the text messages. She saw her message thread, but there was one that was more recent. And the number hadn’t been stored under a contact. Riley opened it and read the short message exchange between the two people. The first message was from Thomas at 9:56: “She knows something. Still looking into Andrew and Jennifer.” It was short and to the point. That might have been because he was halfway drunk when he wrote it.

  The reply message came in five minutes later: “Keep an eye on her.”

  Chapter 38

  Monday, 10/16/17

  Conn woke her son up Monday morning with the smell of pancakes and bacon. Dustin stumbled into the kitchen with a smile on his face. He crawled onto the chair at the dining table and dug in. The child was growing up fast. Too fast, she thought, watching him scarf down strip after strip of bacon.

  He looked a lot like his father. Light blond hair and deep blue eyes. She hadn’t heard from him in four years. His name was Max Wilkins, and he was another MP in Conn’s unit. It was a short-lived fling, but he knew about Dustin. That didn’t stop him from moving on to his next duty station in Germany. He was probably somewhere else by now. Conn wondered if he had a child he wanted now.

  Dustin had nothing to do with her decision to leave the military. Sure, it was nice not having to worry about deployments anymore. But being able to do her job was the main objective in her decision to leave behind the job security of the Army.

  After he finished, she got him ready for school and saw him onto the bus. It was cold out, and she could feel it in the interior of her car, in the air and on the steering wheel, as she drove to work. She was expecting a phone call back from an old friend from her days in the Army.

  Jack Lincoln was just another MP when Conn knew him. It didn’t surprise her that he had moved up the ranks. What surprised her was how quickly he did it. After calling him the night before, she found out he had been promoted again since they’d last spoken, six months ago to be exact. He was now a CID special agent, assigned to a battalion in Washington, DC.

  Conn told him what she needed. The case file on Andrew Brown. She hadn’t been able to locate a police report in the police department’s records. Probably because whoever responded to the scene of the accident called the military police right away.

  Handing out government files was frowned upon, but Lincoln could make a good case as to why she needed them. He would tell his supervisor that Andrew had been linked to another case. Conn was a detective. It would make sense to whoever heard it. The ball was rolling. Conn felt good about what she was doing.

  Conn noticed a steady calm when she walked into the police station. She looked around the office at all of the officers and detectives busy working their cases. Now that her operation was finished, and Jennifer’s case closed, she was back to taking on new cases. Johnson wasn’t at work yet. But he had made it pretty clear that Conn shouldn’t look into Jennifer’s case anymore.

  She sat behind her desk and sifted through some case files that dealt with small-time drug users and dealers. She had reports to write that should have been done weeks ago, but her operation had taken center stage, and then she got assigned to help Agent Sanchez.

  It was 9:30 a.m. and Conn had just finished typing up a report on a drunken driver who the apprehending officer thought was a drug dealer because he had a joint and a gun in his glove box. She was just thinking about how it was a waste of her time when her phone rang. It was Lincoln.

  “Lincoln, what ya got for me?” she asked.

  “Good morning to you too. Yes, yes. The weather’s beautiful out today.”

  Conn grinned. “Get on with it.”

  “You’re not going to like it,” he said, pausing for effect. “Andrew Brown’s case file is classified. I can’t even see it.”

  “Really? Why would a training accident be classified?”

  “Beats me. Mind my asking why you’re looking into it?”

  “You hear about that murdered soldier they found near Fort Campbell last week?”

  “Can’t say that I have.”

  That didn’t surprise Conn. Usually only local papers reported on cases like Jennifer’s. There were people dying in towns, cities, and bases all over the world. Too many to keep up with on a day-to-day basis.

  “Thanks for your help,” Conn said and hung up.

  She set the phone down on her desk, thinking about what Lincoln had just told her. If Andrew Brown’s case file was classified, that could only mean one thing. Andrew wasn’t involved in a training accident.

  Chapter 39

  Riley and Tim had lunch in the chow hall right at eleven so it wouldn’t be that packed. Riley had received a text from Conn earlier in the day saying Andrew’s file was classified. Riley and Conn agreed Andrew wasn’t involved in a training accident. She told Conn she was still waiting to hear back from Lee. Other than that, her investigation was in good shape. She had Jennifer’s laptop. The phone number for whoever had Thomas keeping tabs on her. And a solid theory about what Jennifer had been mixed up in.

  Riley told Tim about Thomas being in Lee’s apartment and the text message she found in his phone and Jennifer’s laptop.

  “Did you call it yet?”

  “No.”

  “Why the hell not? That’s investigating 101. You call and see who answers. Try to get a name out of them.”

  Riley thought about it. Tim had been watching too many movies.

  “I can’t call it from my phone. Then they’ll have the number.”

  “Really? Give me your phone.”

  Riley handed it to him. He opened her settings and went into her caller ID setting and switched it to off and handed the phone back to her.

  “There. Now it will show up as unknown when you call someone.”

  Riley pretended not to be impressed. She tapped in the phone number she had stored in her phone. The line started to ring. It rang a few more times; then a familiar voice picked up.

  “Special Agent Sanchez,” said the voice on the other end of the line.

  Riley looked at Tim.

  “Hello?” Sanchez said.

  Riley jabbed at the end-call button and shook her head.

  “What the hell . . . ,” she said.

  “Who was it?”

  “Agent Sanchez.”

  “Why would Sanchez be keeping tabs on you?” Tim asked.

  Her stomach turned to mush. Was she being watched because of her drug use? No. She was just being paranoid. Thomas was in Lee’s apartment looking for something that had to do with Jennifer. Thomas texted Sanchez about what she had told him at dinner as well. This definitely had something to do with Andrew and Jennifer. But that meant Sanchez probably knew about Riley’s drug use. Fuck. She couldn’t tell Tim the whole truth. Not now.

  “Maybe they think I’m getting too close to figuring out about Andrew’s cover-up.”

  “You don’t have any proof it was a cover-up, though.”

  “Tim, think about it. Andrew’s mom said Jennifer thought he was murdered. Andrew’s case file is classified. Jennifer is dead. Sanchez was assigned to both investigations.”

  “That’s not proof there’s some cover-up happening.”

  Riley shook her head.

  “I’m just saying,” Tim said. “As a journalist you need to follow the clues and gather real evidence.”

  “Someone went through a lot of trouble to make sure there isn’t any evidence.”

  Riley knew Tim could tell how angry she was.

  “Hey. Just take a deep breath. I’m on your side.”

  “I know, I know. Sorry. What do I do now? I can’t confront Thomas or Sanchez.”

  “Why not? You’ve got Jennifer’s laptop. Maybe something is on it. Something they don’t know about. You’v
e got leverage.”

  Tim didn’t know about the pills. Riley thought about what would happen to her if she got caught with a bottle full of prescription pills. That was serious. She could do jail time. And her father would have no way to get them on his own. She needed an out. And fast.

  “Because Sanchez just makes things disappear.”

  “Not this time. You’ve got a royal flush here.”

  Riley had to show Tim she wasn’t willing to budge on this. He would just keep on pushing if she didn’t.

  “I’m not going to Sanchez. Drop it.”

  Tim kissed his teeth and ate the rest of his meal in silence. Addiction always made you hurt the ones you cared about most. She wasn’t ready to let Tim in on her troubles.

  “I’ll let you know what I find out,” Riley said. She picked up her half-eaten tray of food and left Tim at the table.

  Riley hopped in her car and looked around. Not in a paranoid way. Situational awareness was a skill many lacked in the civilian world. Riley’s deployments had taught her to always keep one eye open, even when she slept.

  She needed to confront Thomas. In a split second, a plan hatched before her eyes. She sent Thomas a text message.

  “Can I see you again tonight?”

  Chapter 40

  Lee swung the van door shut and slid behind the wheel. He and Chris had just finished their fourth installation for the day. It felt good to be back to work. It helped him forget about the previous week’s events and the fact someone might be watching him, waiting to strike. Or maybe whoever had been in his apartment would just leave him alone.

  Chris set the laptop that Lee had given him on his lap and started typing. The fact that Chris could box and break into someone’s laptop was impressive. If it were not for his stint in jail, he might have had a bright future in some shadowy government agency. Not that Chris wanted that.