The Summer House

Chapter 11

Special Agent Manuel Sanchez is sitting next to Special Agent Connie York as she drives the rental Ford sedan down a bumpy dirt road, and Manuel is holding on to the door handle, trying very hard not to upchuck his morning breakfast of greasy sausage, eggs over easy, and grits. Grits! He has yet to figure out the attraction of grits — just a fancy name for mush. And beans for breakfast? Not here, not in this place.

At the entrance to this dirt road was a wrought-iron metal pole — pockmarked with rust — and dangling to the side was a very worn wooden sign with painted carved letters saying THE SUMMER HOUSE 1911.

In the rear of the sedan, Major Cook — sitting so his injured left leg is stretched out — says, “Connie, you can slow it down.”

“Sir, we’re running up against the clock. I think we’re almost — yep, there it is.”

Manuel knows what Connie means about the clock, because he’s been here in Georgia less than six hours, and after the rushed briefing before breakfast, he already feels like he and the rest of the squad are a day behind. Four Rangers in jail, seven civvies dead — including a two-year-old baby girl! — and pretty soon reporters will be dogging their every step.

Connie brakes the Ford to a halt and dust rises, then they all get out, Major Cook struggling for a few seconds with his cane. Connie and he pretend not to notice, though he enjoys noticing Connie. In the morning heat she’s discarded her black jacket, and the slacks are pretty tight around her curvy bottom, and the white blouse is clinging nicely to her torso.

But Manuel knows better than to look too much at his fellow special agent, because he’s still deeply in love with his wife, Conchita, back home in East LA with their three girls, a sweet little home in a relatively quiet neighborhood.

Besides, Connie is wearing her Army-issue SIG Sauer in a waist holster and is a better shot than he is.

As he and Connie wait for the major to join them, Manuel examines the old two-story house. At one time it was probably a destination to be proud of, a place to unwind from the city. Two wooden pillars at the front, black roof and black shutters, wide wooden door in the center. But the paint is faded, shingles are missing from the roof, and the pillars are cracked and sagging. There’s yellow-and-black crime-scene tape fluttering across the door, along with an official sheriff’s department adhesive seal pressed against the doorjamb.

Two pickup trucks are parked nearby, along with a Sentra whose trunk is being held closed by a length of frayed clothesline. A light-blue Volvo sedan with a Delta Air Lines parking sticker on the windshield is set some meters away, like the driver was concerned the run-down vehicles here would somehow infect it.

In every direction, except the dirt road they just came down, there’s nothing save brush and tall pine trees, though through the brush at the far end of the lot there looks to be a body of water. Manuel frowns. Too much emptiness, too many trees. He grew up in a crowded LA neighborhood, joined the Police Academy, and went over to the Army when the police department was shedding personnel to balance its budget, plus the Army at the time was promising a hefty enlistment bonus.

“Looks damn empty and quiet, Major,” he says.

“True,” Cook says. “Connie?”

She glances down the dirt road. “Odd. Only one real entry in and out. You come in for a hit, and you leave yourself open for trouble if a UPS truck or some lost soul comes down the road. It could block you, get people curious why you’re here.”

In the distance a dog barks.

“Let’s take a look around,” Cook says, and he leads the way, leaning heavily on his cane. Manuel and Connie follow.

It doesn’t take long. The perimeter is trashy, with discarded tires, rusty fifty-five-gallon drums, piles of lumber and chicken-coop wire, and sodden pizza boxes. Manuel wonders if the ghosts of the rich folks who built this place mourn the once-perfect yard. On the far side of the house one of the windows is open, and from another window a rusting air-conditioning unit is sagging on supporting two-by-fours, looking like it could fall at any moment.

One and then two helicopters roar overhead.

The other two windows on that side are closed, and so are the ground-floor windows on both sides. One of the windows is covered with plastic.

After returning to the front, Manuel says, “I don’t like that single door, Major.”

“Tell us why.”

He says, “Like the dirt road. Only one way in or out. With a dynamic entry, rolling in, you’d think they’d use a ladder, smash one of the first-floor windows, come in through both the door and the windows.”

Cook says, “This is Georgia. Lots of firearms in private hands. Maybe they thought rolling in through the windows exposed them more. That door looks like it was breached by explosive charges. You do that, folks in tight quarters like this, in a small house like this, they might run to the rear when the door blows open. That means you’re funneling your targets into one area.”

“Maybe,” Connie says, and Manuel knows she’s looking at the scene with the same cop eyes he is, though her earlier time was with the Virginia State Police — not as difficult or as tough as the LAPD. “I wish the sheriff hadn’t been such a bitch. I’d love to go inside.”

Manuel turns at the sound of a loud car engine, getting louder, and roaring down the dirt road is a brown-and-white Sullivan County Sheriff’s Department cruiser, bouncing up and down in the dust, and Cook says, “Well, let’s see what happens if we talk nice to the sheriff.”

The cruiser skids to a halt, and Manuel sees a woman in her fifties jump out, face red with anger, wearing jeans and a black polo shirt, and she yells out, “Damn it, Major, I told you I wasn’t going to let you into the goddamn crime scene! What the hell do you think you’re doing here?”

Cook looks pretty damn calm, and he says, “You told us we couldn’t go inside. We’re not. We’re outside, looking in.”

The sheriff strides forward, fists on her hips. “You like to play games, Major, is that it? Well, tell you what. I got some friends in DC, and I can play games, too, including getting your whole goddamn crew out of my county and back on the first plane to Dulles!”