Unmanned (9780385351263) (33 page)

Riggleman checked the location on Google Earth. Huge spread, lots of waterfront. Farm fields, a forest, and hardly a neighbor within sight. Not a bad place to hide out. But all that space made it an easy place to infiltrate and surveil, too. Riggleman was already contemplating his next move.

He searched for any overlap between the names Lyttle and Darwin Cole, and he scored right away with a
Boston Globe
profile of Cole from several years earlier, datelined in Italy and written by Keira Lyttle. From there he quickly established that Keira Lyttle was Edward Lyttle’s daughter.

So there was a third journalist, then. The guy, Steve Merritt, plus Barb Holtzman, who was letting Cole use her computer, and now Lyttle. All three of them wrote about military affairs and national security issues, and he was betting that all three were now holed up together and plotting to do God knows what from that big waterfront property owned by Lyttle’s father on the Maryland Eastern Shore.

Riggleman checked his watch. Not yet noon. With some quick footwork online he could arrange an afternoon flight to Baltimore or Washington that would put him in the area by nine or ten. Well after dark, but for what he had in mind, darkness was desirable. The more darkness, the better, in fact, especially if he was able to procure some night vision equipment. It would be a recon job, plain and simple, and the location seemed to offer ideal space and cover. With any luck Riggleman would be able to secure a positive ID of Cole and the exact coordinates of his whereabouts by the time General Hagan arrived at the office tomorrow morning for his first cup of coffee.

He immediately began setting up the logistics to put his plan in motion. Flight reservations and the rental car were a snap. So was the motel, a motor court out on Route 50 near the Easton bypass. He reserved it for two nights, just in case, then made a list of items to pick up on the base, and then at home, on his way to the airport: Boots, for clomping around in mud and underbrush. A camouflage uniform? Might as well. Plus some greasepaint for glare. Or would that be overkill? He’d take some and decide later. A sidearm, because you just never knew. Fortunately he still had a Beretta M9 in his possession as part of the borrowed SF gear. The SF Taser might also come in handy, so he put that on the list.

Within half an hour he was ready to roll. The last thing he did before heading to the airport was to shoot an email to Hagan, to let the general know about his plans. Immediately he wondered if it was a bad move. Hagan, not exactly the kind of guy who stayed plugged in at all hours, probably wouldn’t see it until Riggleman had completed the job. But what if, for whatever reason, he saw the message sooner and ordered a halt to Riggleman’s op? After all the hinky stuff that had cropped up already, it certainly wouldn’t be out of the question.

Or, worse, what if Harry Walsh, or whoever he was, spent the rest of his Sunday contacting his connections and otherwise moving heaven and earth to stop him.
Get this fucker off the case, now!
And if Hagan had Walsh’s private number, there was a decent chance Walsh had Hagan’s.

So Riggleman shut down his laptop, shut down his smart phone, and even shut down his new cell phone, the one he had used only once. But he didn’t destroy it as Walsh had demanded. Something told him he might yet need a record of that call, if only for his own legal protection.

For the next twelve hours at least, he was going to be officially out of touch.

He locked his office door and set out for the parking lot. It was time to go operational. Time to get Cole in his sights and shoot him down. Figuratively speaking, of course.

COLE
,
ON FULL ALERT NOW
, pulled back the blinds and checked outside. Lights were again on in the main house. One downstairs, two upstairs. Either the gunman was inside, lording it over them with blood on the floor, or everyone was awake for the same reason he was. Sharpe’s van was silent and dark, all locked up.

He stepped reluctantly into the night and the cold, walking quietly but briskly toward the house. Halfway there he stopped, overcome by the same creeping sense of another presence that he’d experienced the night before—someone, or something, watching from the trees. Or maybe even from above. He imagined himself as a green blob on an infrared display.

He moved behind a pine and peered at the dark line marking the edge of the woods. Nothing, as far as he could tell, although he knew this observation was meaningless. If someone back there wanted to drop him, it probably would have happened by now. He stepped out from behind the tree and made his way to the door, pausing on the porch to listen for sounds from inside. Muffled voices, no sense of panic, a few footfalls at an easy pace. He pushed on through. Three of them—Barb, Steve, and Sharpe—were gathered in the living room, just beyond the foyer. They looked up in unison, eyes a bit wide.

Sharpe looked at Cole and grimly shook his head as if to say, “Not my doing. Not this time.”

“Where’s Keira?” Cole asked.

“In the kitchen,” Barb said. “She called the cops. They’re keeping her on the line.”

“Some deputy named Tony,” Steve said. “She seems to know him.”

“And you’re surprised?” Barb said.

“Probably a friend of the family’s,” Cole said. It was too early for their usual bullshit. Keira emerged from the hallway, cell phone pressed to her ear.

“There’s a police cruiser now at the upper end of the drive,” she said. “They’re looking around, but they’re thinking it might be hunters.”

“At this hour?” Steve said.

“Spotlight hunters,” Cole said. “I knew guys back home who did that shit.”

“Spotlight?”

“For deer. Blind ’em and shoot ’em. Illegal. It’s why they do it in the middle of the night.”

“Tony said some of the neighbors heard cars coming and going. I don’t think we were the only ones who called.”

“Cars?” Barb said. “In the plural? Jesus, how many people are out there?”

“Is there a coffeemaker handy?” These were Sharpe’s first words since Cole had come through the door, and it was clear he didn’t give a shit about what the others were saying. He looked detached from them, as though thinking this was their fight, not his. Cole saw his sleeping bag, unrolled on the living room carpet. Couldn’t they have at least offered him a bed? Maybe this had been his punishment for the stunt with the minidrones. Or maybe Sharpe had preferred it this way, with easier access to his boxful of toys out in the van.

A voice squawked on Keira’s cell phone. She pressed it to her ear while everyone watched. Her mouth flew open, but for a moment no words emerged. She turned away from them and spoke in a low voice, the words inaudible. A few seconds later she turned back around, shaking her head, holding the phone at her side.

“What is it?” Barb asked. “What’s happened?”

“They found a body. On the property, up in the woods. Shot.”

“Hunting accident?” Barb asked hopefully, almost desperately.

“Shot twice,” Keira answered. “The two shots we heard.”

“No accident, then,” Steve said. He was already reaching for his coat. “One to knock him down, then a second to make sure. We need
to get a look at the scene before they’ve had time to clean it up. Somebody bring a notebook.”

Barb had already produced one from somewhere—did she sleep with a supply?—and she held a pencil in her right hand. Steve paused at the door.

“You coming, Keira? It would probably help to have you out there, since you know the cops.”

“Sure,” she said, barely a whisper. She turned slowly, took her coat from the closet, and got Barb’s out as well. They trooped out the door together, a team again, at least for now, pursuing their story. Cole’s first impulse was to join them, but something made him hesitate. Maybe he didn’t belong, not this time. After the door shut, the room was enveloped in silence. Then Sharpe spoke up.

“Any theories?” He looked somber, but not particularly surprised.

“No idea. It’s the hour of death.”

“What?”

“Nothing. I should go out there. See what’s up.”

“Suit yourself. I’m going to find a room upstairs where I can get some sleep. We’re flying at first light, provided the cops have cleared out. We need to make the most of every opportunity now, because it’s pretty obvious someone is trying to shut us down.”

“Maybe they got shut down instead.”

“By whom? It’s not like the woods are crawling with our allies.”

“True. Doesn’t make much sense, does it?”

“None at all.”

Cole paused, looked around, as if wondering if there was anything he should take with him. “Okay, then. I’m off.”

Steve led the journalists toward the murder scene, which was lit up by the headlights of two Talbot County police cars parked at angles facing the body from the driveway. The body lay about ten feet into the trees. The victim had fallen perhaps a hundred yards from the house, about seventy from the pool house. Even from a distance you could tell it was a man. He wore a camouflage uniform and some sort of floppy jungle hat. Off to one side was a rifle with a sighting scope. He was either a hunter who’d come to the wrong place or some sort of freelance commando.
But on what sort of mission? To watch them, or to bring them down? And if either was the case, then who had brought him down, and why?

Steve watched Keira for her reaction as they reached the scene. He’d already been feeling guilty about the drone thing and the way they’d accused her, and now there was a murder on her family’s property, with God knows what sort of ramifications. She’d grown up with this place, a haven of peace and safety, and now she’d probably never feel the same way about it again. They’d ruined it for her, and a man was dead. She was probably scared, too. He knew he was, out here in the wild with shooters on the loose and all their secrets up for grabs, now that the police were involved.

Two cops were at work. One was unspooling yellow crime scene tape around a framework of trees in a tight perimeter around the body. The second was down on one knee, examining but not touching the rifle. The first cop looked up as he heard them approach.

“Hey! Get back! Get away from here!”

“No!” the second one said. “Hold your ground, damn it, before you track any more footprints onto the scene. Right there. Hold those positions until I give the word. And we’re going to have to get a look at the soles of your shoes now, all three of you.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” the first one said. “Here comes another one.”

Steve turned and saw Cole coming toward them through the trees.

“You! Hold it there. And take your shoes off.”

“Take ’em off?” Barb complained. “It’s twenty fucking degrees.”

“Don’t worry, little lady,” the first one said. “Only need to remove ’em long enough to get a look at the bottom. Then you can slip ’em back on. But, like he said, don’t move. Calbert’s a stickler on this stuff.” He lowered his voice and smiled. “Been watching too much
CSI.
”

“I do it cause its protocol, damn it. You know that, Earl.”

“Hey, man. Just doing my best for community relations, Calbert,” the cop named Earl said. He winked at Barb. Steve suppressed a laugh. But Keira was still pale and silent, her face looking drained in the glare of the headlights. Cole had halted some fifteen feet behind them. The look on his face made him seem forlorn back there in the shadows, as if he was aching to join them. Aching to join Keira, more likely.

The whole episode from the other night still rankled, although what
had they really expected? Bring in a military guy who probably hadn’t been laid for more than a year, and stick him out in his own little cabin—his own idea, Steve reminded himself—on a property belonging to an attractive woman who hadn’t been quite the same since her married boyfriend went down in flames over the English Channel, like in some war movie. Squeeze that much needfulness into a small space and something reckless was bound to happen. Besides, he had detected a spark between them almost from the beginning, and he grudgingly conceded that there was a redeeming hint of sweetness about it.

Was he envious? Well, yes, but why not let them have their fling? The four of them could probably keep working together as long as Barb was okay with it. Why, then, had he been so eager to follow Keira’s car down the highway with the drone? Spite, probably, a realization that shamed him. Or maybe Barb was right. He’d been thinking with his dick.

“Hey,” he whispered to Keira. “You okay?”

She nodded but said nothing. Hadn’t said a word since they walked out here.

“Have you called your mom and dad?” Barb asked.

She shook her head.

“I’ll do it in the morning. After everything’s calmed down.”

They stood in the cold while the cops did this and that, taking photos of the soles of their shoes and of footprints here and there. After another twenty minutes a third car arrived. Some sort of crime scene tech emerged, pulling on a white smock over a sweat suit and donning a plastic white hat and latex gloves. He got out a kit for making casts of footprints, then took a handful of plastic bags from the car along with a pair of tweezers.

“Who are the idiots, Earl?” he asked.

“From the house. Don’t worry, Calbert froze ’em in their tracks. I got shots of their treads.”

The tech guy shook his head, then got down to business in the small area around the body. Steve figured the county probably didn’t have a huge staff for handling this kind of event, but he didn’t know enough about crime scene work to judge if they were handling it well or not.

After another twenty minutes or so the cold and the lateness of the hour began to seep into his bones. He was damn tired. He yawned.

“Earl?” It was Calbert, motioning the other cop toward him. The two cops leaned their heads together, whispering.

Steve distinctly heard Earl mutter “No shit?” but Calbert kept his voice down and continued for a while longer while Earl kept nodding.

When they finished, Calbert turned toward them and said, “Okay, you folks can move freely again. But go on back to the house and stay out of our hair. We’ll be down there later to ask some questions. Just sit tight and let us do our jobs.”