One Was a Soldier (43 page)

Will looked at him, confused. “A bookkeeper. At the new resort.”

Fergusson sat up straight.

McCrea extended his hand and tapped his palm. “Ellen Bain, who died in an auto accident at the end of July, was a bookkeeper at the Algonquin Waters. Tally McNabb, who committed suicide in October, was a bookkeeper at the Algonquin Waters.”

“Yeah, but…” Will’s forehead crinkled. “It’s got to be a coincidence. Tons of people work for the resort.”

“Chief Van Alstyne always says he doesn’t believe in coincidence.” Fergusson put her cup down. “Did Tally and Ms. Bain know each other? Did they have the same job responsibilities?”

Will shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“We’ve got to find out,” Fergusson said.

“No, we’ve got to tell the chief,” McCrea countered.

“Eventually.” At his look, she spread her hands. “I’m just saying we should come up with something more solid if we want him to reopen Tally’s case. I’m overdue for a visit with her mother. I can ask her how Tally got her job, and what she might know about Ellen Bain.”

“Stop.” Avoiding issues in group was one thing. Acting out that avoidance in real life was a whole other ball game. Sarah pointed to Fergusson. “You are not Daphne from
Scooby-Doo
. We are not going to get into a purple van and ride around town looking for a spooky old house.”

“All I’m proposing we do is ask a few questions.”

McCrea studied the priest. “Are you sure you’re not all hopped up on this idea because you’d like to show up the chief?”

“No!” Fergusson paused. “Well. Maybe a little.”

“Okay. I’m in.”

“Me, too,” Will said. “What should I do?”

Fergusson gave McCrea a go-ahead gesture. “Get back in touch with Olivia,” McCrea said. “Ask her if her mother was behaving oddly at any time before her death. Ask her if she ever mentioned Tally or Wyler McNabb.”

Will nodded. “I’ll IM her when I get home tonight.”

“See if she can get us a look at her mom’s bank balances and investment reports.”

“Investment reports?” Sarah was losing control of the session. Again.

“It’s clear Tally stole a million dollars, and it’s a pretty sure bet her husband was in on it with her.” McCrea had an expression Sarah had never seen before. It was, she realized, his cop face. “If the money’s been found at the resort”—Fergusson nodded—“it’s a good bet that they had an accomplice to help hide it. Accomplices usually get paid off.”

“Unless,” Fergusson said, “somebody decided to cut her out of the picture.”

“Yeah.” His mouth compressed. “I’ll go talk to the HR people at the Algonquin Waters.”

“But you’re still suspended,” Sarah said. “Isn’t that—I don’t know, illegal?”

“I’m not going to arrest anybody.” He grinned suddenly. “Like Reverend Clare said, I’m just going to ask some questions.”

Will looked at her slyly. “What are you going to do, Sarah?”

She shook her head. “I guess I’m going to put on an orange turtleneck and drive the van.”

*   *   *

It was one of the easiest stings Russ had ever set up, even given the tight time frame. Nichols contacted Seelye on Saturday morning and told her he’d found the money after a search of Tally’s house tipped him off. Lyle had soothed Ms. LeBlanc’s fears and assured her that no one would even know an arrest was occurring in her resort’s basement—they would use the employee exit to get in and out. Even persuading Tony Usher to fly up to Albany and run the operation with him had been a cinch. Bringing down a lieutenant colonel could be tricky, politically, but the prospect of bringing home six hundred grand—they had counted the remaining bricks and scanned their FDIC routing labels before replacing them on the pallet—was enough to paper over his concerns. Within twenty-four hours, Tony had found an ambitious CID investigator to be another witness, and right now, at ten o’clock on Monday evening, the man was hidden behind a screen of empty boxes not five feet from the money. It was his small camera stashed in the piping above, recording everything that happened.

Russ and Tony were in another blind, this one with a partial view of the employees’ exit. They could see Quentan Nichols shifting from foot to foot in front of the door. He was dressed in a cleaning-service uniform. They had gotten three of them; Kevin, mopping close to the hotel-side employees’ entrance, had one, as did Lyle, who was playacting sleep in the darkened break room. At least Russ hoped he was acting.

“He’s going to walk a trough in that cement if he doesn’t stop pacing.” Tony kept his voice down. They’d set up a blower farther down Broadway’s corridor to mask any ambient sounds, but no one wanted to take any chances.

“He’s got a right to be nervous.” Russ shifted on his box. The combination of cold and inactivity was making his hip ache. “He’s betting everything on this.”

“Nichols isn’t the first soldier to go stupid and start thinking with the wrong head.” Tony sighed. “And Seelye, sad to say, isn’t going to be the first officer to be tempted by all the money they’ve got floating around over there. The stories I could tell you—” He broke off as Nichols grabbed the handle and opened the employees’ entrance.

Lieutenant Colonel Arlene Seelye stepped in. She was dressed as anonymously as Nichols—dark jeans, dark shirt, dark windbreaker. Nichols said, “Colonel,” but she held up her hand. She glanced around her, then strode past him into the corridor. She walked up toward the hotel-side entrance and back down, past Russ and Tony, past the CID captain, past the loot itself, scanning left and right. She poked her head into the darkened break room but didn’t turn on the lights. Evidently satisfied, she returned to Nichols’s side. “Quentan Nichols.” She looked him up and down. “I’m still not convinced you’re not yanking my chain. What’s really going on here?”

Nichols took two dancing steps into the corridor, like a nervous junkie about to make a deal. Now they were both under one of the dangling fluorescent lights. In perfect focus for the camera. “I told you. I waited until Tally McNabb’s old man was gone and then I searched that house from basement to attic. I found a reference that made me think it might be here, and it is.”

She shook her head. “I think you knew all along. I think she made you a partner when you agreed to help her steal that money from Balad Air Base. So why do you need my help now?”

“I didn’t know where it was! I didn’t even know what it was she was moving!”

Russ tensed.
Keep cool, Quentan. Don’t jerk the line. Just reel her in.

Nichols breathed in. “It’s too much for me to shift. And it’s too much for me to deal with. I’m offering you a fifty-fifty split. I show you where it’s stored, you launder the money. If you don’t want in, the door’s that way.” He pointed.

Seelye paused. “Okay. I’m in. Show me what you’ve got.”

Beside him, Russ felt Tony Usher’s muscles bunch as he clenched his fist in triumph.

Nichols and Seelye passed them. Russ could hear the soft scrape of the cardboard tower moving over concrete, and then the rumble of the dolly being rolled into the corridor. “Help me with this,” Seelye said. “I want to see what we’ve got.” There was a faint grunt and then the sound of plastic slapping onto the floor. There was a long pause. Russ looked at Tony. The JAG officer shook his head. Russ nodded. They wanted her to take the money into possession.

“FDIC tags and all,” Seelye said. “I’d have to match it up to make sure, but it looks like the shipment that was stolen from Balad.”

Tony frowned.

“Excellent work, Chief Nichols.”

The employees’ entrance slammed open. Russ leaped from his seat, his Glock already in his hand. He broke from the blind, empty cardboard boxes tumbling into the boots and black-clad legs of the men pounding up the corridor, and he shouted, “Stop! Police!” hearing his voice huge, reverberating off the walls, many voices, all screaming, “Stop! Police!”

A helmeted and armor-clad man skidded, faced him, M-9 semiautomatic braced and ready, bellowing, “Police! Put your weapon down! Put your hands in the air!”

From the other side of the hall, Russ heard Lyle roaring the exact same words. They were everywhere: shouted commands and weapons and body armor and bright yellow letters screaming
MILITARY POLICE
.

Russ reversed his Glock and raised his hands. The MP opposite him tore the sidearm from his grasp and shoved him around. “Lyle, give up your gun,” Russ yelled.

The guy behind him pushed him hard enough to make him stumble. “Shut up!”

“MKPD, put up your weapons!” They could sort out this disaster, but if someone got shot—

“I said shut up and get on the floor!” His MP’s voice was on the edge of wild. He shoved Russ with the bore of his M-9 this time. Russ shut up. He got down, one knee and then the other, but he was too slow for the kid behind him. The MP slammed him forward, jolting the breath out of his body. Russ lay panting on the cold concrete, craning his head to see while the MP cuffed him. He spotted Nichols cuffed and on the floor, saw the CID captain down on both knees, hands in the air and his mouth going a mile a minute, saw Seelye, dark shirt yanked aside, unstrapping the wire taped to her T-shirt. She was talking to an officer in BDUs whose body armor and
MILITARY POLICE
vest looked at odds with his fleshy body and fifty-something face.

She glanced down. Blinked. Blinked again. “Chief Van Alstyne? What the hell are you doing here?”

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 18

This time, the fight started because Eric
was
putting on a uniform.

“What are you doing?” Jennifer’s voice caught him up short, laying out his BDUs after his shower. “It’s Tuesday. You don’t have anything Guard-related.”

He had figured no one at the resort would answer his questions if he was in civvies, unless he wanted to misrepresent himself as a plainclothes detective. On the other hand, he was pretty sure no one would call his reserve unit to ask why one of their MPs was at the hotel, interviewing the human resources director. Not that that made it any less of a violation of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. He was edgy, already having second thoughts, and that was why he snapped at her instead of just blowing it off.

“What are you, my personal calendar?”

“You haven’t done anything except mope around the house and go to those useless veterans group meetings since you got suspended. Now all of a sudden you’re getting ready to report? What’s going on?” She paled. “Oh, Jesus. You’re not converting your enlistment to regular army, are you?”

“No.” He tugged on his pants.

“Then what?”

He spun around. “I’m trying to help out a friend by asking a few questions. That’s all. For chrissake, get off my back.”

“Asking a few questions? You mean, like pretending you’re working as an MP? You can’t do that, Eric. If you get caught you could face charges. You could lose your job!” She moved in close, forcing herself into his line of sight. “For God’s sake, what are we supposed to do if you get bounced off the force? You’re in a precarious enough position as it—”

“Why can’t you for one frigging time just support me?” He sat heavily on the edge of the bed and began yanking his socks on. “Why is it always criticizing and fault-finding and looking at me like I’m a goddamn monster because of what I have to do?”

“What are you talking about?” She stepped back.

“I am trying, Jen. I am trying
all the time,
and you never notice, and you never appreciate it. You have no idea what I’ve been through!”

“Then tell me! For the love of God, I’m here! I’m listening!”

He picked up one boot. “You don’t want to hear it.”

She made a strangled noise and spun around in a circle, something she did when she got too frustrated to stand still. “No, you just don’t want to face your feelings. Because it’s easier to get angry than it is to let yourself feel scared, or sad, or helpless.” She jammed a finger toward him. “You’re too cowardly to—”

“Mom?” Jake was standing in the doorway, staring, his eyes huge and afraid, his hands clenched in fists as if he were ready to wade into—

—to protect his mother—

—and the feeling roared over Eric, swamping him, and he rose, screaming, “Get out of here!” and hurled the boot, snapped it, hard, and it smashed Jake in the chest and sent the boy stumbling back into the hall.

Then the tide washed out again and he was standing there, dumbfounded, his hand empty, his son sobbing. His son, to whom he had never raised a hand in his life.

“Jake?” Eric’s voice came out cracked and raw. “Oh, God, son, I’m sorry—” He moved toward the door, but Jennifer was there, blocking him.

“Jake.” Her voice was calm. She never took her eyes off Eric. “Honey, I want you to get the big black duffel bag in your room, and your backpack, and get into my car. Can you do that, lovey?” Jake sniffled an assent and staggered off down the hallway.

“I need you to sit back down on the bed, Eric.”

He backed up blindly and collapsed onto the bed. Jen crossed to her closet, still keeping her eyes on him. She bent down, reaching behind her, and pulled out her overnight bag.

“What are you doing?” he whispered.

“Right now, Jake and I are going to my sister’s. I’m going to contact you in a few days and let you know what I’ve decided to do.”

She didn’t put anything in the bag. He realized she had already packed. She had prepared for this. She was leaving him.

He lunged off the bed and grabbed her by the arm. “Jen. For God’s sake!”

She looked at his hand, wrapped around her forearm. Then she looked at him. “You can hurt me, Eric, but you can’t hurt me enough to make me leave my son in danger.”

He snatched his hand away, and a terrible sound broke out of his tight chest and aching throat. Jennifer backed away, one step, then another, and then she was gone; down the hall, down the stairs, out the door, out of his life.

He stood in the bedroom for a long time afterward. Then he wandered through the house, touching tabletops and pictures, stacking the books Jake had left behind. Finally, he went into the basement and unlocked the gun cabinet. He looked at his rifle and his .44 and the youth Remington he’d gotten Jake the Christmas before he deployed. He took out his Heckler & Koch 9 mm, his favorite for target practice, and he sat in the rocking chair by the television and rocked and rocked, holding the gun in his hands. He’d have to go back upstairs and unlock the ammo if he wanted to use it, of course. That was the right way to store guns. Not like the McNabbs, who had kept their firearms loaded. He thought about Tally McNabb, maybe feeling as bad as he was right now. All she had to do was take it out and pull the trigger. Permanent headache relief. He indulged in a little wouldn’t-they-be-sorry fantasy, but it kept breaking into the reality of Jake or Jennifer having to see him with his brains blown off. “Jesus, Eric,” he said to himself. “Teen drama, much?”