Chasing the Lost (20 page)

Chase threw a tennis ball to Chelsea, out on the road in front of his house. There wasn’t much traffic on the dead-end street, and the big dog took delight in chasing down the bouncing green ball. It was a ritual they participated in every morning. Chase was finding that he had to build rituals in this new life, to fill the time and to try to fill the yawning hole inside of him.

It had been two months since that eventful weekend. Cardena had been right. He was a shadow hidden in darkness. Chase’s calls to anyone and everyone had led nowhere, even to some threats that he never call again asking about that particular person. Cardena’s number was never answered again, the times late at night, buzzed from some beer, that Chase called it. He left the threats that pulsed in his heart on the voicemail, wondering if Cardena laughed when he listened to them.

He wasn’t sure that Cardena had ever laughed in his life.

Dave Riley had been no help, considering the matter closed and done, and retreating to Dafuskie.

Gator and Kono had gone back to their lives, shadows among the low country, smuggling their loads to those who paid them.

Erin was long gone.

All he had was the dog.

It was more than he usually had.

As Chase prepared to throw again, the
cling-cling
of a bicycle bell rang out behind him. He turned. A man, woman, and child were rolling down the road on beach bikes, rentals that the tourists picked up for the week. It was Sunday, and the new tide of northerners were rolling in for their week in the sun.

Chase called out to Chelsea to get her out of the way. He started to wave at the tourists, then froze.

“Stop!” he yelled, startling the three.

They stumbled to a halt, the woman almost falling off her bike.

“Cole?” Chase asked, stepping up to the kid. “Cole Briggs?”

The kid looked to the man.

“What’s your problem?” the man asked.

“You’re Cole Briggs,” Chase said, reaching out for the kid.

“Hey!” the man got off his bike, letting it fall to the ground. “Keep your hands away from my son.”

Chase pulled his hand back.

“What is wrong with you?” the man demanded, stepping between Chase and the boy.

Chase blinked, tried to sort his brain. “Were you here two months ago?” he asked the boy.

“We were here,” the man said. “We come down every couple of months.”

“Do you know Sarah Briggs?” he asked.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” the man said.

Chase shook his head, trying to get past the man. “Son, I saw you out here on your bike two months ago. A woman was jogging. An attractive woman. Short, blonde hair. Do you remember?”

The kid nodded nervously. “Sure. We’d just met and were talking. I don’t remember about what. I didn’t know her name.”

“Listen, mister,” the man said. “This is my son. If you have a problem, you take it up with me.”

Chase took a step back, bumping into Chelsea. “I’ve got a problem, but it’s not with your son. I’m sorry. I’m very sorry.”

He walked away, heading back to his house, Chelsea right behind him.

Chase hit the beach. And hit it again and again, as the Caribbean surf pounded him into the sand. He rolled with the water, twisting over onto his back as he reached down and removed his fins, one at a time. He looped the ankle straps over his right wrist. Then he turned back onto his stomach and rode the waves up the beach, until he was able to crawl to the edge of the surf line. He loosened the sling holding the silenced MP-5 submachine gun tight against his chest, and held the pistol grip in his left hand as he scanned the area.

He gave his initial entry report over the radio to the rest of his team. “On the beach. Moving in.”

The exterior lights from the house on the rocky point above competed with the full moon, giving Chase plenty of light to maneuver by and to be spotted in. There was a wooden staircase zig-zagging down the rocky cliff to his right.

That was too easy and too obvious.

He gathered himself in a crouch, and then dashed across the strip of beach to the base of the cliff. He hid the fins among the rocks, and put on the running shoes he’d brought in the small waterproof backpack. He let the MP-5 dangle on its sling.

Chase climbed, choosing his hand- and footholds carefully, aware of the irony of splattering on the rocks after all that had happened this past couple of months. It took twenty minutes to reach the top. He edged himself up.

He glanced over his shoulder. He could barely make out the dark shadow of the blacked-out
Fina
, holding offshore where Kono, Riley and Chelsea waited.

His earpiece crackled and he heard Gator’s voice. “In position in overwatch. I have a clear line of fire. Motherfucker!”

Chase turned his head forward so that he could see the mansion and what Gator was overwatching, and understand the expletive.

The mansion was spectacular. There were at least four different levels of pools, one cascading into the other, the muted roar of the water echoing and meeting the sound of the surf behind and below.

And reclined in a chaise near the lowest pool was Sarah. She was topless, her body lean and taut. The combined reflection of the security lights and the moon made her skin glisten. Her hair was just as short, but styled differently. And it was as black as the night sky, not blonde. Chase felt no allure or enticement. He watched as she took a sip from a long-stemmed glass, and he thought of all those who had died.

He looked past her and scanned the rear of the house.

There was no one else in sight, which he didn’t find surprising.

Chase stood, weapon at the ready, and strode forward. He walked around the edge of the pool toward Sarah. She must have sensed him coming, because she turned her head as she took another sip of whatever was in the glass, but otherwise did not react.

“Look what Poseidon deposited on my beach,” she said, taking in his wetsuit. “Why not take that off and get comfortable?”

“I don’t think I could be comfortable around you,” Chase said.

“Too bad.” She put the champagne flute down. “It would make the evening complete.”

Chase wasn’t pointing the submachine gun at her, but he still had his finger alongside the trigger. She looked at the gun and sighed. “Have you come to kill me?”

“I don’t know.”

“That’s your problem, Horace. For a man of such violent capabilities, you just can’t make your mind up regarding your own course of action. It’s a limitation.”

“I’ll live with it,” Chase said.

“Will I?”

“That remains to be seen.” He stared at her eyes and now that he knew, he could see it. “You’re crazy.”

Sarah laughed. “Oh, come on, Horace. I’ve been to shrinks. I scared them. ‘Borderline’ was the nicest diagnosis they could come up with. Some were much harsher. Psychopath, perhaps? But I do feel things, Horace. Most importantly, though, unlike you, I have self-awareness. I know what I am capable of, and where I have flaws. You, poor dear—” She just sighed and cocked her head. “How did you find out?” she asked, showing only mild curiosity.

“Cole. I saw him a week ago on the street. With his parents. On vacation.”

Sarah laughed. “I figured you’d wise up sooner or later. Luckily for me, it was later. But I meant, how did you find out where I was?”

“The man who ordered the Predator strike on the
Shashka.
He’s deep-black. It wasn’t hard for him to track the money.”

“Ah.” Sarah nodded, but a slight flicker of concern crossed her face.

“The Russians,” Chase said.

“Which ones?”

“The two who you said tried to kidnap you. Who threatened Erin. Who were getting tortured. They didn’t work for Karralkov, did they?”

“Don’t ask questions you know the answer to,” Sarah said. “They worked for Walter. At first. Although they didn’t have a clue what they were getting into. They just did what we texted them to do.”

“How did Karralkov get them? He was torturing them to find out what the hell was going on, just like we were.”

“I gave them up to him. Worked, didn’t it? Reinforced your belief.”

“They’re the ones who shot you?”

“Yes.”

“You ordered them to shoot you?” Chase was trying to accept the unacceptable.

“Wound me,” Sarah said. “I was a bit concerned about it. But they did a good job, you have to admit. Ivan was a good shot. You were wavering. Your friend Riley was actually talking some sense, and I couldn’t have any of that, so I had them up the ante.”

“But you were dead on the boat. Erin did CPR.”

Sarah smiled. “Tetrodotoxin. I injected myself, remember? Erin thought it was ketamine. But I’d brought my own special cocktail. Simulates death at just the right dosage. Too much, you die. Too little, you flail about.”

“Why?” Chase asked.

Sarah stretched her arms over her head, her breasts arching perfectly. It was a move Chase was sure she had practiced many times in front of a mirror. He now knew there was nothing that Sarah did that was by chance. “Why, what?”

“Why did you pick me?”

She smiled as she let her arms drop to her sides. She leaned over and pulled the champagne bottle out of the ice bucket. “Like some?”

“I’ll pass.” Chase waited.

“You should know the answer to that question, too, now that you’ve had some time,” Sarah said. “Remember when I first saw you? Facing down a gun over a dog. I knew right then that a man who would do that for a dog would do anything that appealed to his sense of honor. And you have a magnificent sense of honor, Horace.”

“In the future, I’ll stick to dogs,” Chase said.

“No, you won’t.” She poured herself more champagne. “You can’t help yourself. That’s the thing about people, Horace. We’re born a certain way, raised a certain way. We are who we are.”

“So that was it?” Chase tried to sort it out in his brain. “You decided right then and there to use me? That was your plan?”

“You think I was behind everything?” Sarah asked. She laughed. “You give me too much credit. You weren’t far off in how you looked at me. I was trapped. My husband had his own plan to claim the Russians were muscling in on him again. We had to get out, and we needed to get out with money. We knew the Russians would come after us again, after the first time they shut SAS down. It was inevitable.”

“So they never came after you to start with?”

“Oh, those two poor Russians did. That was Walter’s half-assed idea, so he could say I had been kidnapped and make it look like Karralkov. I made it an actual event, including you in the script. I knew Walter would fuck it all up from the start. He just wasn’t smart enough. I knew I would be the one left standing in the rubble with nothing, if I survived at all, which wasn’t likely, especially with Karralkov involved, and all of those whose money was siphoned off. And the clock was ticking, and then I thought of you. The honorable stranger who rode into town. And I saw my way out. The rest, you know.”

“Walter was your brother.”

“Very good. We did pretend well for years.”

“You were the brains of SAS. You don’t miss him.”

“Another question you know the answer to. He was always flawed.”

“You took all the money you said was being funneled to the Russians.”

“I did. And, as a bonus to God-fearing citizens everywhere, you took out Karralkov, who was, you have to admit, not the nicest person and will not be missed in the slightest.” She regarded him over the lip of the flute as she took another sip. “So are you going to kill me, Horace? Over money?”

“I wouldn’t kill you over money.” He looked at her. “And the non-existent son, Cole? When did you plan that?”

“I didn’t.” She smiled and she was quite beautiful, in a very cold way. The dark hair was a better look, Chase thought. It fit her soul. “You
gave
me that. On a platter. It was so delicious, I couldn’t resist. It didn’t occur to me until you asked where my son was as you looked at your poor, wounded dog. That was your assumption from just seeing me talk to some kid on a bike one time. You truly are very naïve. You invented the phantom, and I knew it would work perfectly the moment you asked. I figured the ghost would last for forty-eight hours, which was all I needed. And it did. The rest, as they say, is history.”

It was the answer Chase had feared but expected. “How did you get Walter onboard with the son story?”

She laughed. “Those goons
were
trying to kidnap me that night, except Walter had hired them. Make a big scene, have the cops come in, and then the cover story would hold. It didn’t work the way Walter planned, because I came up with a better one. What else could he do but play along?”

“Like me.”

“Like you. Frankly, I didn’t trust
anybody
. Except you, of course, Horace.
You
, I knew I could trust. I talked to Walter right after we got to the vet’s, while you were reminiscing with your childhood sweetie and saving your dog’s life, and got him up to speed. A better plan, actually. No one on the island had ever seen me. So they had never seen our son. Walter was very secretive about his personal life, hinting he had a wife. It worked. Perfectly.”

Chase stood as still as the rocks behind him.

His lack of action seemed to bother Sarah. “So are you going to kill me over your sense of betrayal, then?”

Chase looked at her. “You couldn’t have used me if I hadn’t allowed you to. As you noted. It was my fault.”

She put the flute down. “It
is
a blind spot in your character, Horace. You should work on that. Don’t be so trusting in the future.”

Chase shook his head. “I’d rather be me and be used, than you and use people.” He looked around. “You’re alone.”

“You were alone when you came to Hilton Head.”

“True, but I’m not any more. I have you to thank for that. The team is back together, and this time we’re really together. Because it’s real now. I sensed something was wrong, and something was hurting the team. It was you.” Chase lowered the submachine gun. “Enjoy your mansion.”

She sat up and leaned forward. Her eyes were intent on his. “You can stay, Horace. Really.”

Chase shook his head. “My friends and my dog are waiting for me.”

“We could have a good life here.”

“I don’t—” Chase brought the stock of the MP-5 tight to his shoulder as he spotted movement at the rear of the house. A slight figure stepped out into the light.

Erin, wearing a sundress, her tiny body toned and tanned, walked out. She had two flutes of champagne, one in each hand.

She came forward, ignoring the gun.

“Hello, Horace.”

Sarah spoke up from her chaise. “You should have brought the gun, dear, not champagne. Horace is a bit perturbed, as one might expect.”

Erin walked up. She offered a glass to Chase. He shook his head, and she put it on the table while she took a sip from the other. She looked up and regarded Horace with those beautiful eyes he remembered from that wild summer so long ago, just before he went off to West Point.

“Horace won’t hurt us,” Erin said. “Will you?”

Chase slowly lowered the submachine gun.

Sarah shook her head. “I could tell he was smart. That’s where you were wrong about him. He found us.”

Erin cocked her head and regarded her compatriot. “Oh, Sarah. Of course, I knew he’d find us. I thought
you
knew that.”

“I’m right here, you know,” Chase said. “I can hear you.” Despite the lightness of his words, Chase felt a heavy weight pressing down on his heart, as if an anvil was in his chest, trying to plunge down through him into the very earth.

“How did you two get together?” he asked, trying to gain time to figure this out.

Sarah laughed. “Horace. Like attracts like. Have you ever had a normal friend? Your boat full of friends, waiting for you out there. Any of them normal? Riley? He’s the poster child for PTSD. Gator? The steroid use is obvious. Do you know why he was booted from the Army? Kono? I guarantee he’s got secrets, deep in his heart. You ever have a normal relationship with a normal woman? Perhaps your wife, who left you. The moment Erin and I ran into each other, we knew what we were seeing. We were looking into a mirror. Hell, Horace,
you
were attracted to Erin as a teenager, and you were no different with me as an adult.”

Chase closed his eyes, because he knew what she was saying was true. ‘Normal’ wasn’t part of his world. Never had been. Never would be.

“Don’t be so hard on yourself, Horace,” Sarah said. “We’re women. When we go bad, we go way bad. You’re a good guy.” But her eyes were shifting between him and Erin, and he knew he’d hit a chink in the link between the two of them; this was something Sarah hadn’t expected. “I knew you were a good guy,” she continued, “from the moment I saw you in that driveway. Erin had told me you were coming to Hilton Head, so I made sure to be out there. My plan wasn’t crystallized yet, but it was forming. Then I saw you, and I saw what you did, and it all came together. And then there was your question about my son. So now, you know it all. Not as simple as I first explained. I did have some advance notice about you.”