A Knife Edge

THIRTY-EIGHT

By the time I made it back to Bragg, my nerves felt like they'd been rubbed with crushed glass. I'd bought a fifth of single malt to keep me company on the return flight, but I left it unopened in my carry-on. Instead I found myself churning over the past few weeks, the brief investigation into Tanaka's murder, and the equally brief inquiry into the death of Ruben Wright. Neither investigation had been concluded satisfactorily. Time was proving to be my biggest enemy. I hadn't had enough of it to resolve my caseload. And now the world was under the gun. If Boyle had perfected his biological weapon, a nuclear war was imminent. Boyle had to be stopped. Only, I was having trouble dealing with the irony that Butler and I were the ones who were going to be working together to stop him. I recalled the phone conversation I'd had with Arlen, the one where he'd sounded out my view on whether Butler was guilty or innocent of murder. I'd told Arlen that doubt about him being the perp had crept in. Had that been enough to clear Butler for this operation?

I picked over the investigation into Tanaka's death. That case might have been easier to resolve — a hell of a lot easier — if I'd been cleared to know exactly what Tanaka and Boyle had been working on. If I'd been aware they had something so valuable, and as relatively easy to sell as a biological weapon, that would have been a plausible motive for Tanaka's murder right there. Boyle wouldn't have been able to move with his research partner hanging around, so he had thrown him to the sharks. I could have — would have — seen it from the start. I might even have been able to nail Boyle before the people paying the bills in Pakistan had pulled off his vanishing act in downtown San Francisco, an act which had cost hundreds of lives. But that was the problem with hypotheticals. Stewing over what might have been did no one any good — not me, and least of all the family and friends of the people who had died in the explosions at the Transamerica and the Four Winds.

I mulled over the Ruben Wright investigation some more. If I'd had another couple of days, I'd have paid Amy McDonough another visit, even if just to ask her the same questions over again to see if she gave the same answers. And there was Ruben's lawyer, Juan Demelian. He seemed about as straight as a paper clip. Something was going on there that didn't ring true. Demelian's answers seemed to be more like deflections. Maybe it was my gut talking, and not just because it was churning with the start of the descent to Pope AFB, Fort Bragg.

There were angles I'd asked Clare Selwyn to follow up for me in my absence — obtaining phone records and so on for McDonough and Demelian. While she wasn't, strictly speaking, in my line of work, I hoped she'd had the inclination — and the time — to carry through on my requests. The big question for me was this: What if Butler really had murdered Ruben Wright? It could be that I was about to parachute into harm's way with a guy itching to make a habit out of slicing the chute harness off of people he didn't get along with. And without doubt, Butler and I did not get along. Searching my memory, I couldn't recall reading anything remotely like this scenario in Have a Nice Flight.

I decided I wouldn't be going on so much as a Coney Island ride with Butler until we talked a little more about Ruben Wright's death. I wanted a few more answers on his relationship with Amy McDonough, the woman who was both his lover and sole heir to the Wrong Way fortune. One and a half million give or take might not be a king's ransom these days, but I've known people killed for twenty bucks and change.

I made it back to my quarters in the dark. It was late and I was beat. There was a note under the door. Be ready at 0500. It was signed with the letter F. That would be Fester. I cracked the seal on the fifth. There were no rocks in the small bar fridge so I chipped some ice clogging the freezer coil with a knife and put it in a glass with a couple of slugs of bravado. I watched the glass for a moment or two, wrestling with something inside that told me not to drink. The something lost. It tasted like I imagined fermented sock water might taste, so I guess the something also won. Maybe booze wasn't the path. I pulled a card from my wallet and dialed the number scribbled on the reverse side. A familiar voice came on the line.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Clare.”

“Who's that?”

How soon they forget. “It's Vin.”

“It's late, Vin.”

“Sorry, what's the time?”

“Forget it. It's good to hear from you. How's it going?”

“Like a house on fire …”

“Great.”

“… where everyone's trapped in the attic.”

“Oh. What's up?”

“Guess who I caught up with today?”

“The Queen of England? I don't know… can you at least give me a short list?”

“Staff Sergeant Butler.”

“Really? Did the meeting go well?”

“We didn't get to talk. Listen, have you got onto those things I asked you to follow up for me?”

“Vin, I haven't had time.”

There it was again, the enemy — time.

Clare continued. “Also, I have to go through civilian channels and all of them are on vacation. The judge I wanted to see got back to town this afternoon. I've got all the paperwork sorted out. I'm seeing her first thing tomorrow.”

“Clare, would you mind seeing her tonight?”

“Tonight?”

“Tonight.”

“Tonight's almost over,” she said.

“It's important,” I said.

There was a pause, the sound of reluctance.

“She's in Pensacola.”

My turn for a pause, the sound of I-don't-care.

“You really expect to turn something up?” she asked.

“I'm following my gut here, Clare.”

“No, I'm following your gut, Vin.”

“I wouldn't ask if it wasn't important.”

I heard a sigh. “I know.”

“How's Manny?” I asked.

“Asleep.”

“Oh.”

“Vin, it's past ten p.m. and he's only five. We're not exactly going to be sitting around playing cards at this time of the night. Perhaps when he turns seven.”

“Yeah. Sorry. I don't have kids.”

“That you know of.”

“Very funny.”

I heard her sigh. “It's OK, I'll throw him in the car. It'll be an adventure. And maybe I can use him as a little emotional blackmail with the judge when I get there. She's got kids of her own.”

“Atta girl. Listen, Clare … thanks.”

“Vin, if I'm going to do this, I'd better get moving.”

I waited for her to hang up the phone. She didn't. She said, “So… is everything all right with you, Vin? You seem a little, um, distracted.”

Yeah, Boyle was helping Pakistan get ready to hurl nukes at India. I said, “That's because I am distracted. Listen, when you get those phone and bank records for McDonough and Ruben's attorney, call me. It's important. If you can't get through on my cell, call Colonel Arlen Wayne, OSI, at Andrews. He'll know how to reach me.”

“Will do.”

There was nothing more to say that hadn't already been said, if not in this conversation then in previous ones. As we'd agreed before I'd left for D.C., it'd been fun, and fun was all either of us had wanted.

“Be safe,” she said.

“You, too, Clare. Now… fly like the wind.”

“Will do,” she said, and there was a smile in the space between the farewell and the dial tone.