Astride a Pink Horse (22 page)

“By meeting with them for a clandestine midnight huddle in a private corporate jet? Come on, Major. I certainly wouldn’t want to have to defend your actions to my superiors.”

“Our meeting wasn’t clandestine, sir, and as it turns out Coseia and Dames provided me with information about several individuals who may have been involved in the Tango-11 security breach and perhaps even Sergeant Giles’s murder,” Bernadette said, relaxing and widening her stance.

“And while they were at it, did either of them outline a plan for you that might prevent break-ins and future security breaches at other decommissioned silo sites? Did Dames promise to polish up our image here at Warren after raking OSI over the coals in that last internet story of his? Have you found out, like I have, that Reverend Wilson Jackson’s wife once had an affair with Sergeant Giles? And just by chance, did Dames or Coseia tell you who murdered Sergeant Giles?”

“No, sir,” Bernadette said, caught off guard by the information about Jackson’s wife.

“Then as far as I’m concerned, your meeting was worthless.” DeWitt cleared his throat as if that might bring extra clarity to what he had to say next. “Two men, one of whom happens to be exceedingly wealthy and somewhat of a playboy, I’m told, and a female air force officer hunkered down under the cover of darkness at an airport in some corporate jet. Now, I’d say that’s an image that sends out terribly bad vibes, Major.”

Incensed, Bernadette said, “I beg your pardon, sir.”

“Your actions wouldn’t look at all prudent to middle America, Major Cameron. That meeting of yours has put us all in a compromising position.”

Struggling to maintain her composure, Bernadette said, “I find your insinuation offensive, Colonel.”

“What you find offensive is immaterial to me, Major Cameron. Besides, I have it on good authority that you topped off that whole unsavory airport situation by leaving in the company of Mr. Coseia.”

Her face flushed with anger, Bernadette asked, “Did Captain Alvarez happen to supply you with any other juicy tidbits?”

“I’ll ignore your attempt to defame Captain Alvarez and pretend I never heard it. The issue here is your behavior, not Captain Alvarez’s. You disobeyed my orders, Major.”

Her teeth clenched, Bernadette said nothing.

“Fortunately, your missteps haven’t inflicted any major damage on our investigation of the Tango-11 matter. While you’ve been out there, quite possibly exposing this office to additional ridicule from the press, I’ve been able to clarify several important issues. For starters, I’ve gathered more than a dozen photographs of Kimiko Takata and a young Sarah Goldbeck talking with Sergeant Giles at several antinuclear protests at missile sites during the late ’70s and early ’80s. Most of the photos were taken at a single silo site in Nebraska. A site that was constructed on land formerly owned by a rancher named Grant Rivers. Were you aware of that information, Major?”

“I’m aware of Kimiko Takata and Sarah Goldbeck’s involvement in the antinuclear movement, of course,” Bernadette said, feeling the bottom drop out of her stomach.

“And Rivers?”

“I’ve been gathering information on him.”

“With the help of your reporter friends, I suppose. Did you know that thirty years ago Mr. Rivers made a vow to get even with the air force and the federal government for supposedly stealing his land?”

“Yes.”

“And you haven’t said a word about that to me!”

“I haven’t had the opportunity, sir.”

“And you won’t, Major. I’ve decided to temporarily assign another OSI officer to the Tango-11 investigation.”

“Captain Alvarez?” Bernadette asked, disappointed.

“Another officer, Major. That’s all you need to know. In addition to the problems you’ve caused me by playing patty-cakes with the press, I’ve had Reverend Wilson Jackson in my office twice today complaining that the air force doesn’t appear to want to look into the possibility of the Giles murder being a racially motivated hate crime. To say nothing of the fact that Professor Rikia Takata called to complain about your unprofessional conduct and abrasiveness during a visit you made to his office. And to top things off, Sarah Goldbeck is threatening to lodge a complaint against this office, claiming that you and your reporter friend, Mr. Coseia, assaulted her husband the other night.”

All but speechless, Bernadette said, “I wasn’t abrasive to Dr. Takata, and I certainly wasn’t unprofessional. And I can assure you that no one assaulted Buford Kane. The man leveled a shotgun on me, for God’s sake.”

“It’s your word against each of theirs, Major, and since your
friends at Digital Registry News seem intent on continuing to show the air force, and this office in particular, in such a negative light, I’ve stepped in to manage damage control.”

“I think you might be overreacting, sir.”

“No, Major. What I’m doing is
reacting
. Reacting to your mishandling of this entire investigation, and to the fact that General Preston summoned me to his office this morning to rap my knuckles. My knuckles instead of yours, Major, and that’s a very serious problem for us both. So here’s a suggestion that I’m thinking will help,” DeWitt said, smiling. “Take a week of leave—maybe even two. Put a little distance between yourself and the Tango-11 investigation while I right the ship and handle the damage. Head down to Denver or over to Salt Lake, relax, enjoy a spa treatment, do some shopping.”

“What!”

“It’s only a suggestion,” said DeWitt, watching a look of absolute anger spread across Bernadette’s face. “I can order you off the investigation altogether, and we both know that wouldn’t look good on your record. Take the leave, Bernadette. It’ll turn out to be a win-win for both of us. Ten days from now, things will have settled down. I’ll have our Tango-11 security-breach problems resolved, and the Giles murder investigation will be fully in the hands of civilian authorities, where it belongs. Think of it as a cooling-off period. By then no one will be looking to scapegoat anyone.”

“And if I don’t take leave?”

“Then your temporary absence from the investigation will turn into a permanent assignment off it. And then, who’s to say? You could conceivably end up at a new duty station.”

“I see. And how long do I have to mull over your suggestion?”

“Until this conversation ends.”

Bernadette suddenly found herself thinking about every single bad and improbable thing that had happened to her in just two short years. She’d lost her ability to fly; she’d been reassigned to a job she tolerated rather than enjoyed; she’d had to fend off the unwanted advances of more than just Captain Alvarez; and she’d been forced to carry out her duties under the watchful, what’s-in-it-for-me eye of a colonel who had but one objective: earning a general’s star. Instead of shouting, “Take this job and shove it,” she thought about something her father had always told her to remember when things weren’t going her way. Something that had served her well over the years:
Inhale before you yell, baby, and always exhale before you scream
. Inhaling deeply, she said, “I’ll take the leave,” then slowly exhaled.

“Good. You’ll be happy you did, and when you come back to work, I can pretty much assure you, our Tango-11 problem will be water under the bridge.”

“Anything else, sir?” she asked, taking another long, deep breath and holding it.

“No. I’ll have Sergeant Milliken get your papers ready for my signature. And Bernadette, don’t take it too hard; we all run into obstacles now and again.”

Bernadette smiled without responding and pivoted to leave. She made it to the first-floor fire-door exit before exhaling, and she’d slipped behind the wheel of her Austin-Healey and cranked the engine before she finally screamed.

Jimmy “Jackknife” Cameron was dripping sweat in Scottsdale, Arizona’s 102-degree heat and sizing up the nine-foot putt that he had a thousand dollars riding on when his cell phone began ringing. Shouting, “Damn it!” and shaking his head, he slipped the phone out of his shirt pocket. Recognizing the number on the screen as Bernadette’s, he dropped his putter and took the call.

“Who the hell’s calling you now, Jackknife?” the sandy-haired retired three-star general standing beside him groaned.

Jackknife grinned and pressed the phone to his ear. “Nobody but Bernadette or the president. And as you know, I haven’t been taking calls from the White House for years.”

Laughing at a remark that only Jackknife would make in earnest, his three companions simply shook their heads.

“Cut the man in the White House some slack,” the three-star shot back. “Who knows, he could be calling to tell you that your confirmation as a Vietnam combat ace has finally come through.”

“Fat chance.” Jackknife moved the phone to his good ear and finally said, “Hello.”

“Dad, it’s me.”

“Well, hi, sugar.” Jackknife smiled, mouthed, “Bernadette,” to his buddies, and then said to Bernadette, “What’s up?”

“I’ve got a problem I need to run by you.”

“How big a problem, honey?” The three men at his side, men whom he’d gone to war with and who’d all known Bernadette since she was a baby, suddenly looked concerned.

“Pretty big. Have you got time to talk?”

“I’m in the middle of a round of golf, but—”

“Oh. Sorry for interrupting. Go ahead and finish,” Bernadette said, aware that any golf game her father was engaged in more than likely involved a hefty wager.

“The game can wait.” Jackknife glanced at his friends and saw each man nod his approval.

“No. Finish your game. This will probably take some time.”

“Bernadette, it’s—”

“Daddy, my problem is about inhaling and exhaling.”

The man who should long before have been recognized as the second of only two U.S. Air Force combat aces during the Vietnam War but never had because the envious lieutenant colonel who could have verified his fifth enemy kill wouldn’t do it, turned stone-faced. The intense look was one his golfing buddies knew well. They’d all seen that expression on Jackknife’s face during many of the 151 combat missions he’d flown in Vietnam.

Relaxing his stance and picking up his putter, Jackknife said, “I’ll call you back in thirty minutes, Bernadette.” Turning to his golfing buddies, he said authoritatively, “We need to get done here quick.”

“No problem,” the three-star said.

Jackknife flashed him a look that was the clear equivalent of a salute, then said to Bernadette, “Half an hour, baby. Okay?”

“Yes.”

Jackknife closed his cell phone, slipped it into his shirt pocket, and calmly stepped up to his golf ball. Briefly sizing up the putt and without another word, he calmly stroked the ball in.

Before the ball had rattled its way to the bottom of the cup, he glanced up at his friends and asked, “Got my thousand, boys?”

Realizing from the seriousness of Jackknife Cameron’s face that he wouldn’t be joining them for any friendly postround banter in the clubhouse that day, his air force buddies nodded in unison.

Jackknife returned Bernadette’s call twenty-five minutes later as he sat in the clubhouse, sipping a twenty-four-ounce frosted mug of lemonade, his longtime substitute for the alcohol that had largely ended his twenty-two-year air force career.

A midlife surprise, Bernadette had arrived in his and his college sweetheart’s life in 1982, halfway into his career and nearly eleven years after his return home from Vietnam. For a man for whom drinking, fighter-pilot bravado, and camaraderie had long been key to his inner being, Bernadette’s birth had been a blessing. That blessing, however, couldn’t put a damper on his drinking, and only after his wife died of a heart attack on a frigid North Dakota New Year’s Eve, three days before Bernadette’s seventh birthday, did Jackknife Cameron turn off the spigot on his habit. By then it was too late for the African American war hero—a man whom many had once pegged as a future member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff—to salvage his career.

Although he would ultimately earn a general’s star before retiring from the air force, a star that some in the know claimed was a backhanded consolation prize for his never officially having been
named a Vietnam combat ace, his daughter was the only thing that seemed to matter to him after the unexpected loss of the love of his life.

When Bernadette, with a freshly minted UCLA architectural degree in hand, announced at her college graduation that she wasn’t going to take a job with an architectural firm in San Francisco but instead planned to join the air force and become a fighter pilot like her father and grandfather before her, Jackknife, instead of being surprised, had beamed. Eighteen months later, he’d pinned Bernadette’s pilot wings on her, and six months after that, he’d taken what she still jokingly claimed were at least a thousand photographs of her standing beside her A-10, the day she’d been assigned a Warthog. He’d been there to console and comfort her when she’d been grounded, and he’d encouraged her to take the assignment with OSI.

Now he could only hope that the problem Bernadette had called about earlier wasn’t the kind that had stolen her mother from him.

Setting his lemonade aside, adjusting his cell phone to his good ear, and trying his best not to sound overly concerned, he said, “So what’s up, Major C.?”