Jack and Joe: Hunt for Jack Reacher Series (The Hunt for Jack Reacher Series Book 6) (9 page)

“Sheriff,” I nodded and held out my badge. A quick look was all he required. Most law enforcement officers know an FBI badge when they see one. “Special Agent Kim Otto.”

“Randy Taylor.” He looked down at the dead gunman. “What happened here?”

“Alvin says this guy wanted that woman and when she refused, he started shooting.” My adrenaline levels had been falling to normal since the shooting stopped and I realized all of a sudden how freaking wet and cold I was, even in the hot room. My whole body was shaking. I had to clamp my teeth to still the chattering.

Taylor kept scanning, completing his own professional appraisal, presumably. “That seem like the truth to you?”

“I was asleep in my room across the road when the shots woke me up. I called 911 and Major Clifton. By the time I got here, everything was almost over.”

“You fire your weapon?” Taylor asked. “If you did, we’ll need to take it.”

“No chance to.” I shook my head and handed over my weapon so he could confirm and didn’t argue. We both knew the rules. “The shooting was over by the time I came inside.”

“We’ll want to talk to you for more details.” He seemed to see me for the first time. My wet clothes, chattering teeth, and blue skin. He checked my weapon and gave it back.

Clifton walked up. “We’ll have plenty to do tonight, Randy. She’ll freeze to death if she doesn’t get a hot shower and warmer clothes. You’re at the Grand Lodge across the street, aren’t you?”

I nodded.

“Check in with me before you leave town, Agent Otto?” It was a request. He had no authority over me.

I nodded again through my chattering teeth and turned to leave. Clifton bowed his head closer to me. “I’ll report to the locals and call you in an hour.”

Processing the crime scene would take a while, and processing the carnage would take weeks. There would be plenty of time for me to answer questions and ask a few of my own. Starting with what had happened between Jack Reacher and Alvin way back when. But the feud was old. My questions could wait. Assuming I didn’t freeze to death first.

“Works for me.” I holstered my gun and made my way out of the bar, navigated its frozen parking lot, the glazed highway, and the hotel’s parking lot, sleet lacing me every step of the way. By the time I trudged through the lobby and up the stairs and stepped into a steaming hot shower, my entire body was colder than a frozen turkey.

CHAPTER 12

Ninety minutes later, when Major Clifton arrived with two huge Styrofoam cups of hot black coffee from the truck stop, I could have kissed him with gratitude. It was late and we were both exhausted but keyed up, too. The hot shower had reheated my body, but he was still wet and cold. I sat on the bed and he paced the room trying to warm up.

“What’s going on out there now?”

I knew most of the answer. While I’d waited for him, I’d opened the heavy drapes and watched some of the show. I’d seen the arrival and departure of several medical trucks, Highway Patrol and local police vehicles from New Haven and the county. Uniformed officers were now posted at the entrance to
The Lucky Bar
. Crime scene processing had already begun and the familiar yellow tape was slashed across the doorway.

Through everything, water in various stages of freezing continued to fall. Temperatures must have fallen slightly since I left the scene because the ground was now dusted with white. Snow over ice is among the most treacherous possible driving conditions. Processing tonight’s crime scene and handling the victims would be more complicated and difficult until the weather cleared.

Clifton ran a flat palm across his face, which was showing a day’s growth of beard. He replied in the formal way he might report to a superior officer. “All of the injured civilians have been transported to the hospital. I have MPs on the scene to assist Sheriff Taylor. We located no additional injured Army personnel. The homicides will be processed by civilian law enforcement. Sherriff Taylor is a good cop. He’ll do what needs to be done.”

He stopped pacing a moment and turned to face me. “The case isn’t my jurisdiction, so I have no choice in any event.”

I nodded. “What about the bartender and the bouncer? I assume they were arrested for opening fire on the shooter, just to keep track of them until things get sorted out if nothing else.”

“Taylor sent Junior to the local jail. But Alvin required medical attention, probably surgery to that shoulder, so he was arrested and then transported to the hospital.” He turned his head again to watch events across the road.

“Did you interview them before Taylor got ahold of them?”

“A little bit. I’ve been the XO at Bird for about a year, so I’ve had dealings with both of them before. Alvin is a decent guy who’s had a tough life.
The Lucky Bar
is all he has to support himself and his family. He’ll reopen as soon as possible.”

In my experience, places like
The Lucky Bar
operated on a thin line barely inside the law. On any given night, there were plenty of chances for trouble of one kind or another. Judging from the response to that gunman tonight, Alvin and Junior expected trouble and were prepared to handle it.

“Seems like Alvin was pretty lucky to me.”

“How so?”

“Neither he nor his son are dead. The gunshot wound to his shoulder will give him some problems, but it appeared treatable. Lots of folks, including at least four soldiers from your base who were trying to do the right thing, weren’t that lucky tonight.”

Clifton squared his shoulders and leaned his back against the window. “I could have made the place off-limits to enlisted men. I’ve threatened to do it more than once. I could’ve confined them to the base tonight because of the weather, and I thought about it.”

“But you didn’t do any of that.”

“You drove here from Bird. How many five-star restaurants and symphony halls did you see along the way?” He paused and raised his cup again. “The Army’s not an easy gig. We train hard. We expect fewer soldiers to do a lot more. The discipline is tough. People need an outlet and we can’t provide everything on the base, as much as I wish we could.”

I understood his point. Compromises had to be made. Enlisted personnel were entitled to free time. They were going to spend it somewhere.

The Lucky Bar
was reasonably close and somewhat manageable for the MPs. Maybe everything in the place wasn’t strictly legal, but there were worse places they could go.

And, until tonight, when four of Bird’s personnel were killed, worse things could have happened when soldiers went farther afield.

I asked, “Do you know anything about the shooter yet? Or the dancer?”

“Shooter had a Tennessee driver’s license in his wallet and a few credit cards. A little bit of cash on him, not much. His name was Jeffrey Mayne. Mean anything to you?”

“No.”

“Alvin doesn’t keep the best records on his employees, so we’re not sure about her yet. She grew up here in New Haven, but she’d been gone for ten years. She told Alvin her name was Gloria Bedazzle, which he simply accepted because he didn’t remember her at first. Said she was looking to escape an abuser. It was probably instinct that brought her back where Alvin could at least try to look out for her. Alvin has always been a sucker for those stories.”

He again rubbed a palm over his face. “Alvin should know better. He’s been in the business long enough. He knew the ex would come looking for her and the outcome would be ugly.”

Meaning that Alvin’s response to the gunman was premeditated, at least. Racine said Alvin didn’t allow guns in
The Lucky Bar
, but he’d let Jeffrey Mayne bring one inside. And both Alvin and Junior were only too willing to shoot back.

“So you think this was a personal problem between the star-crossed lovers that got out of hand. Straight homicidal mania?”

“Seems like it now. When our guys rushed Mayne, they might have made the situation worse.” Dark circles marked his eyes and deeper lines ran toward his mouth. Gone was the sexy dude I’d first met back at Bird. This guy was grim and exhausted. “It’s hard to say until we have more facts from the witnesses. And from the medical examiner.”

My gut said Tony was probably right. The final report would contain final conclusions, but right now there was no evidence to suggest anything other than a domestic argument gone wrong. Any cop on any beat in any jurisdiction will tell you that there’s nothing more dangerous than responding to a domestic disturbance.

And if this was ruled a domestic disturbance, the case would be handled appropriately and had absolutely nothing to do with me or my assignment. Which meant that none of it—Alvin and Junior and the shoot-out at
The Lucky Bar
—was my concern.

So I moved on to something that was my business. “Junior told me that Alvin’s bad knee was the result of a fight with Jack Reacher. You know anything about that?”

Clifton’s left eyebrow lifted, but he didn’t respond.

“What about Colonel Summer?” I pressed. “She was there. She’s got to know all about it, doesn’t she?”

“That’s why I wanted to talk to you privately. To deliver the rest of the bad news.” He paused a moment, maybe looking for a way to soften harsh words. Finding none, he simply reported the facts. “Fifty minutes before you arrived at Fort Bird this morning, Colonel Summer’s car was crushed between two semi-trucks. A chain reaction collision. On the highway. Mile marker #224, between here and the Fort Bird exit. Experience says Colonel Summer was dead in less than half a second.”

“Experience?” I held my expression steady, but the news jolted my stomach. Of all the things I’d expected him to say, “Summer’s dead” was nowhere on my list. Dead in a vehicle crash less than an hour before she was supposed to spill everything she knew to the FBI? Way too convenient.

Whatever Summer had learned about Reacher back then, whatever she knew about his life after he left the Army, might have died with her. More than a million active and inactive co-workers became instant suspects in her death, but my money was betting on her connection to one particular big, bad MP being at the center.

CHAPTER 13

Tony shared the remaining facts. How Summer had been on the way to meet me from her office in Rock Creek, Virginia. Driving like a bat out of hell, as was her well-known habit. How she’d rear-ended the tanker going 80 per and then the long-haul driver behind her had nowhere else to go except over the side to the deep valley floor below. The driver said he considered going off the road, but concluded his suicide wouldn’t help the small woman in the already crushed sports car. He’d have been right.

The details of the crash weren’t really that important. About ninety people die in car crashes every day in the United States, give or take, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Not as common as fatal heart attacks, but common enough that news outlets don’t report vehicular fatalities unless somebody famous was drunk, high, or dead.

Summer wasn’t a celebrity of any kind. Tony had brought her personnel file with him, along with the rest of the already fattening file on the crash that had killed her. She’d left no children or parents or ex-spouses. She had a passel of siblings and cousins scattered about, as relatives usually are. She was a serious, dedicated Military Police Officer, one of the best the U.S. Army had produced in the past twenty-five years, based on that file. Her death wouldn’t rate a two-sentence mention anywhere except in the military press and her church bulletin.

Not that honoring or mourning her would make a difference to my assignment. Colonel Eunice Summer was dead. Not even the Boss could bring her back to life.

Several things clicked into place in my head. Like why the Boss didn’t give me the JAG report before my scheduled interview with Summer. He’d certainly possessed it before she died. He could have provided the redacted version to me earlier if he’d wanted to so I could’ve been farther along on my Reacher file by now.

He wouldn’t have sent me to Colonel Summer in the first place unless he knew she could fill in a few blanks. But when she no-showed, he hunted her down and found out why. When he learned that she’d died and could never reveal what she knew about Reacher, he intended me to go after the Intel another way. He meant me to use the JAG file instead of whatever he’d expected Summer to tell me. Like Summer was another chess piece removed from his board and nothing more.

That didn’t sit right with me. Not at all.

“You’re sure that’s how it happened? She was driving too fast on the slick pavement and rear-ended a tanker? Going eighty miles an hour? And you’re sure it’s her?”

“That’s why you couldn’t reach me when you called tonight. I was at the crash site. I saw the car.” He paused. “I saw the body. You can pull up news footage on the Internet. It’s been on all the stations tonight.”

“You feel confident that’s all there was to her death, then?”

He raised both eyebrows this time instead of one. “What else would it be?”

“Dunno.” I shook my head. “Maybe she was impaired. Was she a drinker? Drugs?”

“If she was impaired, the autopsy would discover that, but she wasn’t, and it won’t. So what’s next?” His eyes widened. “Are you imagining that Summer would have committed suicide by slamming into that tanker just to avoid telling you ancient history about Jack Reacher? That’s a bit absurd, don’t you think?”