After Midnight (11 page)

Jess spent the rest of the night huddled on the couch. A blaze of lights and the condo’s white plantation shutters held the darkness outside at bay, but nothing could keep the past from haunting her thoughts.

She stared blindly at the black-and-white Busby Berkeley musical flickering on the TV. The three Zigfield chorus girls played by Judy Garland, Hedy Lamar, and Lana Turner sang and hoofed their way across the screen in a succession of exotic costumes. Yet all Jess could see was the hazy image of a dishwater blonde in a mini-skirt that barely covered her rear cheeks and a blouse unbuttoned low enough to display the generous breasts spilling out of her black lace bra.

Was that why those five animals had thought they had the right to sexually assault her? Jess speculated angrily. Because Helen was proud of her body? Because she liked to show off her breasts?

To this day, Jess’s stomach cramped whenever she remembered the stricken look on her mother’s face when the oncologist had urged her to consider a radical mastectomy. In the end, even that brutal disfigurement hadn’t saved Helen. Just as the local authorities hadn’t saved her from the pain and humiliation she’d endured at the Blue Crab.

God! She was raped! Held down and assaulted right there at the bar, according to Paxton. And Sheriff Boudreaux hadn’t even try to build a case against the scum who attacked her.

Jess’s long-buried resentment at the paunchy police officer flared into fury. Fed by the coals Steve had shoveled on tonight, it burned as fierce as a phosphorous flare. Yet the white-hot heat didn’t begin to compare to the searing anticipation of facing Billy Jack Petrie at work tomorrow. Only this time, she’d make sure he was aware that she knew about the Blue Crab. This time, there wouldn’t be any doubt.

“Sorry, colonel.”

Lieutenant Ourek’s round cheeks glowed brick red from the heat. JP-8 fumes rose in waves from his fatigues. When he whipped off his ballcap to swipe the sweat from his forehead, the band left a damp ring in his carroty hair. Jess had caught him on the ramp outside Building 89, where refueling trucks were lined up, waiting their turn at the pumping station.

“Mr. Petrie’s not here,” he told her. “He took off Friday around noon to handle some kind of minor emergency at home, then called in yesterday morning and asked for administrative leave for the rest of the week. Anything I can do for you?”

Shrugging off her sharp stab of disappointment, Jess smiled. “No. Thanks.”

“Mr. Petrie’s not, uh, in any kind of trouble, is he?”

“Why would you think so?”

“Well, the Walton County sheriff came looking for him Friday. Now you want to see him.” He hesitated. “If one of my people has a problem, I should know about it.”

Billy Jack Petrie had a problem, all right, but it wasn’t one the lieutenant needed to know about. Not just yet, anyway.

Still, Jess owed Ourek an answer. He was years younger than most of the men and women he supervised, but he obviously took his responsibilities as chief of the fuels flight seriously.

“I’ll let you know if there’s a problem,” she promised, then turned the subject. “I see you’ve got a string of refuelers loading up.”

“Yes, ma’am. We just got word a C-5 is inbound and has requested a full load.”

“How about I ride along and observe?”

“No problem.”

Eager to show off his operation, the lieutenant escorted Jess to the refuelers. The R-11s were the military equivalents of the tanker trucks that hauled commercial fuel to gas stations all over the country. Painted a uniform mud-brown, each R-11 could carry approximately six thousand gallons of fuel.

Topped off, the trucks drove to transient operations and parked on the apron to wait for the monstrous C-5 cargo plane’s arrival. The gray-painted Galaxy swooped down some ten minutes later, impossibly huge, incredibly graceful, and taxied to its designated spot. Jess had a birds-eye view while the rear ramp lowered and two companies of Army Rangers with full gear poured out and scrambled into trucks, enroute to refresher training at the Ranger Camp located on Eglin’s vast reservation.

The Galaxy required more than an hour to refuel. One of the largest aircraft in the world, the fan-tailed C-5 carried twelve internal wing tanks that gobbled up more than fifty thousand gallons of jet fuel. Jess’s admiration for the personnel of the fuels flight escalated each time they dragged another heavy hose from the R-11s to the aircraft.

The brutal heat reflecting from the ramp spread a shimmering haze over the entire operation. Fuel fumes added rainbows of iridescent color to the thick, almost unbreatheable air. Sweat poured from the T-shirted men and women who wrestled the hose nozzles into place. It was hard, back-breaking labor that technology had yet to make easier.

Jess spoke personally to each of the fuel operators before she and the lieutenant departed transient ops. Back at Building 89, she thanked Ourek for his time and started for the Expedition she’d parked out front. Her path intercepted that of a familiar, stocky figure cutting his way through the parked vehicles.

The salute Ed Babcock snapped off was respectful, his greeting less so. “Ma’am.”

“Good morning, Sergeant Babcock. Did another barge dock?” she asked, eyeing the samples in his kit. “I didn’t see it on the schedule.”

“No, ma’am. These samples are from the 33rd. One of the maintainers reported higher than usual coke residue in a couple of aircraft. I just wanted to re-check the batch of fuel they’re burning.”

The busy Air Combat Command fighter wing on the other side of the base was one of Jess’s biggest customers. If there was a problem with their fuel, she needed to know about it.

“I’d like to see the results of your analysis.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

With a nod, she reached for her car door. Babcock turned away, hesitated, swung back.

“Eileen told me she saw you at the Credit Union yesterday,” he dragged out with obvious reluctance.

“Did she?”

“She said you complimented her on the way she processed your loan application.”

“She deserved the compliment. She shuffled those papers like a pro.”

“Yeah, well, she also said I should get down and kiss your feet for giving me another chance.”

“No feet kissing is either required or desired,” Jess assured him. “I’m just glad to hear you’re maintaining the lines of communication with your wife.”

“Ex-wife,” he corrected, but the grim lines in his face relaxed. The blunt features softened, and Jess caught an unexpected glimpse of the man Eileen Babcock still cared about.

“We’re keeping something open,” he admitted with a shrug. “I’m damned if I know what.”

Jess wouldn’t presume to offer advice that wasn’t asked for, but she drove off hoping Ed continued to drop by his ex-wife’s apartment.

Frowning, Ed carried his samples into the lab. The brief conversation with the colonel weighed on his mind. Almost as much as last night’s visit to his ex-wife.

He’d tried to stay away. What little was left of his pride shredded a bit more each time he knocked on Eileen’s door. She didn’t want him, she’d made that clear. She’d flinched every time he got too close. Yet still he couldn’t stay away.

She was his lodestone. His center. He’d loved her since high school, had never wanted anyone else, couldn’t imagine wanting anyone else. When he lost Eileen, his whole world had tilted off its axis.

Cursing, Ed grounded himself and entered the lab. When he placed the sample kit on the stainless steel counter, his hand shook so badly the glass jars danced and rattled in their slots.

He wanted a drink. Christ, he had to have a drink! Just one. To steady his hands and tame the wild beast clawing at him from the inside out.

Yanking open one of the drawers under the counter, he shoved aside the jumble of funnels and calipers. His fingers searched with frantic urgency until they found the bottle stashed at the back of the drawer and slammed it onto the counter. The cloudy tequila sloshed, settled, whispered to him.

Legs spread, arms outstretched, fingers gripping the edge of the counter, Ed stared at the red and green label and imagined the sharp bite. The liquid incandescence sliding down his throat. The gradual relief from care. The blessed, soothing relief.

But right there, next to the square-shaped bottle, was his sample kit, the pickle jars half-full with fuel that should have gleamed a clear, pale gold. Like the tequila, the fuel was hazy. Too hazy.

With an ache in his bones like that of arthritic old man, Ed uncurled his fingers and released his death grip on the counter. His hands still shook when he reached for the tequila and shoved it back in the drawer, but the sediment clouding the fuel now had his full attention.

He could see it with the naked eye, for God’s sake, which meant the contamination level exceeded tolerance. How the hell had this much sediment slipped through the filters? Why hadn’t the initial off-load analysis picked up the impurities? Frowning, he donned his protective gloves and apron and assembled the tools of his trade.

Two hours later, he was still frowning. He went looking for his boss, only to learn from a co-worker that Mr. Petrie was on administrative leave.

“When’s he coming back to work?”

“End of the week, I think.”

Chewing on the inside of his lower lip, Ed went back to the lab.

Steve didn’t have any better luck locating Billy Jack Petrie. Petrie didn’t answer either his telephone call or his knock when he stopped by the neat frame house occupied by the civilian and his wife.

Eyeing the rolled newspapers lying in the front yard, Steve walked back to his cruiser. Evidently Petrie had decided to take off in a hurry. So much of a hurry he hadn’t bothered to cancel the newspaper or ask a neighbor to pick it up.

The scattered papers were still on Steve’s mind when he pulled into the parking lot of the Silver Acres Retirement Center on the outskirts of DeFuniak Springs. Discreet lettering at the bottom of the elaborate, leaf-shaped sign advised that the facility offered assisted living services and memory-impaired suites.

Opened just a few years ago and privately funded, it was one of a chain that stretched across the South and catered to those with the means to afford the steep fees and luxurious surroundings. Yet even the breezy ferns decorating the white-railed porch and huge sprays of blood-red gladiolas in the foyer couldn’t quite disguise the scent of antiseptic and urine.

His entry triggered a silent alarm and brought a receptionist with a pixie cap of brown hair bouncing around the corner.

“Hello, sheriff.”

Steve didn’t need the nametag clipped to her collar to identify the teenaged daughter of DeFuniak Springs’ high school principal.

“Hi, Trish. I didn’t know you worked here.”

“I started after school let out for the summer.”

“How do you like it?”

“It’s okay. Kind of sad at times, but I’m learning a lot. I may specialize in geriatric medicine when I do my residency.”

Since she had at least four years of college and three of med school ahead of her before she’d decide on a residency program, Steve refrained from comment.

“Did you need to see the director?” she asked. “He’s in his office.”

“No, I’m just here to visit Congressman Calhoun.”

“He’s in the solarium.” Trish’s pert, freckled nose wrinkled. “Trying to lift the skirt of every female resident who passes.”

Senility hadn’t slowed the old coot down, Steve mused as he followed the teen’s directions to a sun-washed parlor occupied by several octogenarians in wheel-chairs. Two were hunched over a game table, clacking ivory dominoes. The third had assumed a strategic position by the door and didn’t try to hide his disappointment when Steve strolled in.

“Hello, Congressman.”

Craning to one side, the skeletal figure crowned with a lion’s mane of white hair searched the hallway.

“Where’s that snippity little piece I heard you talking to?”

“She’s keeping out of range.”

Calhoun’s age-spotted face screwed up into a scowl. Thoroughly disgruntled, he sank back into his chair.

“How about we take a little walk?” Steve suggested.

Releasing the brakes, he wheeled the congressman out of the sunlit game room to an alcove halfway down the hall. He took a striped satin chair, angled it around to face the frail, hunch-shouldered politician.

“Do you remember a dive down on Highway 20 called the Blue Crab? It burned down eight, ten years ago.”

“Can’t say as I do.”

“A waitress named Helen Yount used to work there. Remember her?”

“Hell, boy, why would I remember a waitress if I can’t recall the dive she worked in?” His watery eyes narrowed to a squint. “Can’t say as I recall you, either. Who are you?”

“Steve Paxton. I’m sheriff around these parts.”

“What happened to…?” He lifted a hand, sketched a circle in the air. “Big man. Gut hanging clear to his knees. Face like a bloodhound.”

“Sheriff Boudreaux. He retired a few years back. About this waitress…”

“Did she have a tight little ass and hair like winter sunshine?”

Before Steve could answer, the bony hand made another circle.

“No, no, that was the pharmaceutical lobbyist who came sashaying into my office just before the vote on Medicare reform. Or…” His bushy brows snapped together. “Or maybe that was my legislative assistant. Seems I recall bending her over my desk and going at it a time or two. Was her name Helen?”

Steve didn’t know and didn’t care. “You bent this particular Helen over a table at the Blue Crab and went at her. You and four other men. Roughed her up pretty bad.”

“I told you, I don’t remember any Blue Crab! And I sure as fire don’t remember roughing up any woman.” His querulous expression gave way to a cagy grin. “Didn’t need to. Never got an itch for a female who wouldn’t drop her drawers for a member of Congress. Get it, boy? A member of Congress?”

Patiently, Steve waited for Calhoun’s gleeful, wheezing whoops to subside. “The incident I’m referring to happened before you were elected to the U.S. House of Representatives. You were still in the state senate. This would have been around September, October of 1975.”