No Return

59

Everyone but Monroe was gathered in Dione’s room. According to Danny, the host of Close to Home was in her room on the phone with her agent.

Dione was just finishing up a call of her own as she let Wes in.

“Well, that’s official,” she said as soon as she’d hung up. “Production on our ‘High Desert’ episode is suspended.”

“It wasn’t like we could shoot anything right now anyway,” Danny said.

There were murmurs of ascent.

“Did the police tell you anything?” Dione asked Wes.

Wes shook his head. “Just asked me questions.”

“So now what?” Alison asked. “We just stay here and wait?”

“I think as long as we stay within city limits, we’re fine,” Dione said.

Alison folded her arms across her chest. “Well, that makes a huge difference.”

“I’m getting hungry,” Danny said. “Anyone interested in getting something to eat? Wes?”

“I think I’m going to pass,” Wes said. “I’ll check back with you all later.”

He started for the door, anxious to take a look at Lars’s papers.

“Where are you going?” Alison asked.

“I don’t know. Out. I just need some air.”

Alison started to get up. “I’ll go with you.”

“No. I kind of want to be alone. Okay?” His words came out sharper than he’d expected, so it wasn’t surprising Alison looked like she’d been slapped. He knew he should tell her he was sorry, but he just needed to get out of there.

He headed for his room, but when he got there he found it still full of police.

“I’m sorry, sir,” the cop at the door said. “I can’t let you in.”

“It’s my room.”

“The crime techs are still looking around. You’ll have to come back later.”

Dammit. Wes thought for a moment. “Can I at least grab a clean shirt? I hadn’t expected to spend all day in this one.”

The cop looked back into the room, then said, “Where is it?”

Wes pointed at the pile of clothes on the dresser. “It’d be easier if I just grabbed it.”

The cop frowned, then jerked his head toward the pile. “Make it quick.”

“Thank you.”

At the dresser, Wes made a show of going through the clothes. As he did, he moved a black T-shirt out so that it completely covered Lars’s papers. Then he bundled it all up and walked back across the room.

Though his instinct was to race out and find someplace where he could look at the pages undisturbed, he didn’t want to raise any red flags. At the door he asked the cop, “When do you think I can get back in for good?”

“I’d give it a few hours,” the officer said. “Probably around two.”

“Great.” Wes lifted the shirt. “Thanks again.”

“You’re welcome.”

Wes walked over to the Triumph and stuck the shirt and the pages into the storage compartment behind the seat, then hopped on. There was every chance Detective Andrews would see him on it, but he didn’t care. Not today.

As he pulled onto China Lake Boulevard his mind was so focused on his concern about Anna he almost didn’t notice the sedan that pulled out of the Desert Rose parking lot a few seconds after he did. It was dark blue and, except for the color, looked very much like one of the cars that had cornered Lars the night before.

Wes decreased his speed a little to see if the sedan would pass him, but it also slowed, and kept pace about ten car lengths back.

Wes could feel his anger growing. Forman again. Watching him. He was sure of it. But as much as he would have liked to confront the driver, he needed to know what was in Lars’s papers more.

He eyed the road ahead, all the while keeping tabs on the sedan.

Then, at the last possible second, he took a sharp right, and hit the accelerator. He checked his mirror again and grimaced. The sedan had made the turn behind him.

If he had any doubts he was being followed, they were gone now.

But the driver of the sedan had made a mistake. He was hanging too far back.

Wes took a left, then sped to the end of the block, and turned left again before the sedan had even made the first turn. Two intersections on, he turned right and knew he’d lost his pursuer. Just to be sure, though, he made several more random turns.

The sedan made no reappearance.

A couple minutes later he spotted the old Carl’s Jr. where Lars had worked in high school. It was as good a choice as anywhere else, so he turned into the lot and parked. He grabbed the papers out of the storage compartment and headed inside.

After he got a soda, he took a seat in a booth near the back, set his drink out of the way, and placed the papers on the table.

The top page was some sort of personnel information sheet. In the upper right corner was a black-and-white photograph of Lieutenant Adair. It was the same photo the newspaper had run. To the left was the kind of information you would expect: name, birth date, height, weight, education. Oddly, the line for current address was blank. Under “Family” was written: “Wife-Stacey. Children-Darla, Rachel.” Each name had a corresponding birth date.

Below that was a list of military postings. Most were configurations of numbers and letters that Wes didn’t recognize. Fleets designations? Maybe squadrons?

There were several more sections. “Rank History.” “Commendations.” “Special Training.” Most contained few entries or none at all.

By the lack of information, Wes would have assumed Lieutenant Adair had been only an average officer at best. But there was no such thing as an average fighter pilot.

More confused now than he’d been when he’d started reading, he set the sheet to the side and looked at the second page. Printed on it was a description of a weapons system the F-18 had been equipped with during its ill-fated flight, called SCORCH. Wes didn’t understand most of the technical jargon, but what he did understand was that the SCORCH system had been integrated into the operating system of the plane itself.

The third page, as far as he could tell, had nothing to do with Adair at all. It concerned something known as Project Pastiche.

PROJECT PASTICHE

Project Pastiche is based at the Pentagon. All inquires concerning the project should be made through Admiral Nolan Barker in Naval Operations. All further information is classified

.

PP-214

The only other information was an initiation date of two years previous. Why Lars had thought it was important was lost on Wes.

He started to set the page down, then stopped and looked at it again.

PP-214.

He picked up the personnel sheet, then looked at the list of Adair’s previous postings. There it was at the bottom. Adair’s very first posting: PP-214.

Did that mean Adair had been part of Project Pastiche?

He looked back at the project sheet, specifically at the initiation date, and frowned. The dates didn’t line up. Adair’s service in PP-214 was listed as occurring prior to when Project Pastiche had been in existence.

Maybe the designation was used for more than one thing? That didn’t sound very organized, and if the Navy was one thing, it was organized.

Not sure how the pieces fit together, he put the pages to the side and took a look at the last sheet. On it were two lists.

PP-214 Personnel

Barker, Nolan

Admiral

Lorang, Kyle

Commander

Operations

Butler, Thomas

Lieutenant

Computer Technician

Karner, Kenneth

Lieutenant

Computer Technician

West, Thomas

Lieutenant

Computer Technician

PP-214 Pool 7B

Lemon, Theodore

Lieutenant

Complete

Faith, Brian

assign

Available

Briley, Donnel

Lieutenant

Complete

Adair, Lawrence

Lieutenant

Complete

Bruce, Cameron

assign

Available

So Adair was tied to Project Pastiche. But what did “Pool 7B” mean? And how were those in it different from those listed under “Personnel”?

As Wes was trying to make sense of everything, his gaze strayed over to the papers he’d already examined. Something on the second sheet caught Wes’s attention. It was near the top. A short, almost invisible crease.

No, not quite a crease.

He flipped the page over. On the back was a word written in blue ink. With everything that had happened, Wes had forgotten Lars had taken the sheet back and written something on it. He had said it was “the key.”

The word was “Jamieson.” It meant nothing to Wes. Sure, it was a name. But was it a first or last? Or even the name of a place? Perhaps it was a project designation.

Whatever the case, it was just one more piece of the puzzle, and try as Wes might, there wasn’t enough in any of the papers for him to get a grasp of what it all meant.

He needed a computer, but not just any computer. It had to be one that wouldn’t bring Commander Forman straight to him while he was using it.

Unless …

He stared out the window, thinking for a moment, then nodded to himself.

Casey.

He started to grab his cellphone, then stopped. After Lars’s paranoia the night before had proven justified, Wes didn’t know if he could trust his phone to make the call. What he needed was a landline no one could tie him to.

It only took him a couple seconds to come up with a solution for that, too.