The woman says, “I’m Brianna Stone, Alex Cross’s wife, and I want to know who you are and what you’re doing.”

  Shit. “I’m doing my job, ma’am,” she says. “My name is Mary Mullen, I’m an RN on this floor. And please put that gun down or I’ll get security.”

  The gun is unwavering, still pointed at her.

  “I know every nurse and doctor who comes here,” Cross’s wife says, motioning to a whiteboard on the wall. “And you’re not on that list.”

  “Something’s come up and—”

  Brianna starts walking around the bed. “Security? Sure. Go get security. I’ll stay right here and wait for you to come back.”

  Shit, she thinks again. “All right, fine, right after I administer this medication.” She pulls the IV tubing closer to her and brings up the syringe, and the armed woman says, “You put that syringe away. You get it any closer, I’ll shoot you.”

  “No, you won’t,” she says.

  The sound of the gunshot is deafening in the ICU room. The pain erupting from her right shoulder causes her to cry out, and as she falls to the floor, the syringe flying from her hand, she thinks, Damn, the bitch wasn’t joking.

  Chapter

  40

  Agent Wagner says, “Why are you here, Detective Sampson?”

  “Meeting up with an old buddy of mine,” I say. “Sergeant Mel Carr. Eighty-Second Airborne Division, Third Brigade, First Battalion. But I imagine you already know that.”

  “Why did you come from DC to see Sergeant Carr?”

  “I heard the Drop Zone Café serves a great breakfast,” I say. “But now I’ll never know, since you and your partner interrupted us before we were served.”

  “Sorry about that,” she said.

  “Thanks,” I say. “Maybe CID will comp us.”

  “Trust me, Detective Sampson, you’ve got a lot more to worry about than missing some eggs and bacon.”

  “It was French toast and sausage,” I say. “So, do tell, Agent Wagner, why the big production in taking us out of the restaurant? Why are you so interested in my travels? You two could have joined us for breakfast without all the official doom and gloom. I would even have picked up the check. Or were you just interested in making a show for your superior officers?”

  A long pause. “I’m never interested in making a show for my superiors. I’m interested in your travels because we believe you might be involved in an ongoing investigation.”

  “What kind of investigation?” I ask.

  “The confidential kind,” she says. “Detective, why are you really here, right outside of a sensitive military installation? And what did the two of you talk about?”

  “Your ongoing investigation, of course,” I say. “And Army Intelligence’s too, I’m sure.”

  That gets her attention. “What are you saying?”

  “The series of terrorist attacks that began last April and include assaults on Fort Leavenworth and Fort Irwin.”

  “There was no attack on Fort Irwin.”

  “I’ve heard otherwise,” I say. “As to your earlier question, we caught up on old business and talked about old times.”

  Agent Wagner says, “Like your trip to Afghanistan?”

  An interesting development. “I’m afraid I’m not in a position to comment on any operations conducted in Afghanistan or even if any such operations occurred,” I say.

  “You went to Afghanistan as part of a CIA-sponsored operation,” she says. “I would like to know more about that mission, its participants, and its goals.”

  “Give the CIA a call,” I say. “In the spirit of interagency cooperation, I’m sure they’ll tell you everything.” She looks hard at me and I add, “That is, if anything did happen over there.”

  I let a few seconds slide by before going on. “Why are you so interested in what may or may not have happened in Afghanistan?”

  She continues the hard stare.

  “Part of your confidential investigation, I imagine,” I say.

  Agent Wagner says, “Please answer the question.”

  And something odd happens. I see it in her eyes.

  Army CID investigators have a tough reputation; they have the duty and responsibility to investigate any and all malfeasance conducted by any soldier, from a private to a five-star general. Yet Agent Wagner seems unsettled.

  I give her my best smile. “I’m afraid I’m not in a position to assist you in any aspects of your investigation, Agent Wagner.”

  “Try.”

  There’s a tone of pleading in that word. What the hell is going on here? Maybe I should stay, spar with her a bit, try to squeeze more helpful information out of her.

  Or maybe I should get back to work.

  I say, “In the words of the immortal Bartleby the scrivener, ‘I would prefer not to.’ It’s been a delight to make your acquaintance, Agent Wagner, but I must be leaving.”

  I stand up and she says, “Sit down!”

  “Not happening.”

  “Detective Sampson—Sergeant Sampson—I’m ordering you to stay and answer my questions.”

  “Agent Wagner, you have no authority over me,” I say. “I’m a member of the Individual Ready Reserve. If I am activated, I have to follow your orders. But since I’m not, I’m leaving.”

  Her eyes narrow. “I could get you activated, force you to answer my questions.”

  “I doubt you can do that in the next five minutes,” I say. “But in those few minutes, you can return my service weapon. Please.”

  “No.”

  “You have no authority to hold my weapon. Please return it.”

  “I have a feeling you’re violating the laws of pistol ownership in the state of North Carolina.” She sounds like she’s trying everything she can think of to keep me here.

  “As you’re not a peace officer in the state of North Carolina, and since the law requires following the law, not one’s feelings, please return my weapon.”

  We stare at each other for a few seconds, then she ducks down and retrieves my Glock 17 from her soft leather briefcase. She pops out the magazine, expertly works the action to eject the cartridge contained in the pistol, catches it, and hands over all three items to me.

  “Please don’t reassemble your weapon in my presence,” she says. “If you do, I will take it as a threat and put a round through your large head.”

  “No worries, Agent Wagner,” I say, holding the magazine, round, and unloaded pistol in one hand. “Any chance you could give me a ride back to the Drop Zone Café? That’s where I’m parked.”

  She drops her pen on the metal desk. “Don’t push your luck.”

  “Sorry, ma’am, that’s part of my job description.”

  Chapter

  41

  She opens her eyes, feeling woozy as hell. She takes in her surroundings. A hospital room, curtains drawn around the bed, monitors tracking her respiration, blood pressure, heart rate. IV in her left hand, and in her right hand—

  Something jingle-jangles.

  She’s handcuffed to the bed railing.

  Well, shit, then.

  She tries to move her left shoulder and it feels like that entire part of her body has been replaced with stiff Styrofoam.

  The curtain zips open, and a woman in blue scrubs who identifies herself as an anesthesiologist comes in holding a thick binder in her hands. After some blah-blah-blah, she leaves, and she’s followed a few minutes later by a male OR nurse in scrubs who gives her an additional blah-blah-blah about her upcoming surgery.

  “Any questions?” the nurse asks.

  Yeah, she thinks, got any ideas what I should tell my boss about how I screwed up? “No,” she says. “This isn’t my first rodeo. I’ll be fine.”

  He leaves; a tall, thin woman enters and identifies herself as the surgeon. More blah-blah-blah about how hopefully she’ll be out of the OR and in recovery in two hours, blah-blah-blah.

  The doctor says, “You’re lucky to be alive and lucky that the bullet didn’t do more damage. But this isn’t like television or the movies. You’re facing months of rehab before you’re fully recovered.”

  “Thanks for the cheerful message,” she responds. “But now I feel like taking a nap. Why don’t you get the hell out and leave me alone?”

  The surgeon’s face reddens and she leaves, but, damn it, only about a minute later, another figure enters, a woman wearing blue scrubs, and, damn it some more, the woman in the bed recognizes that angry face.

  The angry woman takes a chair next to the bed, pulls out a pistol, points it at her, and says, “I’m Brianna Stone. You tried to kill my husband a half hour ago. Let’s chat.”

  Chapter

  42

  Through luck and the services of Uber, I get back to the Drop Zone Café, where I find a pleasant surprise. Mel Carr is standing in the parking lot, leaning up against my Grand Cherokee’s front left fender and sipping coffee from a cardboard cup.

  He smiles as I approach. “Big John,” he says.

  “M’ man Mel,” I say.

  “Good to see you out and about,” he says. “I figured you’d be coming back here to fetch your wheels. How did you get bounced out?”

  I say, “Agent Wagner was prepared, aggressive, and knew what she wanted. Unfortunately for her, she lacked jurisdiction over my ass. How about you?”

  He lifts his cup in a salute. “I told you I have a friend in CID, the one who told me that those two suicides were really homicides,” he says. “I asked Agent DeGrasse to contact my friend, who happens to be her superior, and here I am. Free as a bird for the foreseeable future.”

  I remember the parting words of Agent Ned Mahoney as I say, “Feel like a drive? We need to get some stuff squared away.”

  He takes a final swig of his coffee, drops the cup into an overflowing orange and white trash bin, and gets into the passenger seat.

  I get in and return to Route 210; the highway is fairly busy. “What did Agent DeGrasse say to you?”

  “Not much,” he says. “She started chatting and I slipped in my friend’s name and that was that.”

  “What was she chatting about?”

  “This and that,” Mel says. “You know.”

  “Working in DC homicide, you get familiar with chitchat. Hold on, I need to take a leak.”

  I turn into a large lot containing a Waffle House, a Piggly Wiggly, and a plumbing-supply store. I drive to the far end of the lot, where there’s nothing but a guardrail and low brush and trees. I pull up and take a look around, making sure we’re not being watched or followed.

  Mel says, “Looks pretty isolated.”

  “Exactly.”

  With my left hand I open the door; with my right, I grab my Glock 17, whirl it around, jam it into Mel’s left ear. I let go of the door, grab his shirt collar, and give it a sharp twist.

  “Hey, hey, hey, what the hell—”

  I twist the muzzle of the Glock harder into his ear. “What the hell is that your story is bullshit, and you know it,” I say. “You’re active-duty army, you’re pulled in for an interrogation from a CID special agent, and now you’re out because of a supposed friend in CID? You don’t think that story is hard to believe?”

  I stop talking, remembering FBI agent Ned Mahoney’s parting words: Don’t trust anyone.

  Chapter

  43

  In her hospital bed, the handcuffed woman smiles, even though she feels like she’s tripping something awful; the light green curtains over there look like they’re melting.

  “Lady, I hate to disappoint you, but as you know, this isn’t the first time I’ve had a pistol pointed in my direction,” she says, smiling wider. “And this isn’t the first time I’ve been wounded either.”

  “I don’t doubt that at all,” Brianna says. “Let’s start by finding out who you are. Your ID was fake. There’s no Mary Mullen employed in this hospital. But your identification looked just like the real thing, and you even had key-card access.”

  “Wow,” she says.

  “Your fingerprints aren’t in any database,” Brianna says. “And I expect DNA analysis and facial-recognition software will have the same results. So who are you?”

  She says, “Just a hardworking gal trying to make her way in this crazy, mixed-up world.”

  “By committing murder?”

  “That’s the way of the entire world, isn’t it? Survival of the fittest.”

  “And killing an unarmed man in a hospital bed, that’s survival of the fittest?”

  “It had to be done for the greater good.”

  “Says who?”

  She’s fighting sleepiness but she likes giving this member of the deep state the runaround. “I’ve said too much already.”

  “Not a word, then?” Brianna asks.

  “Not a word…”

  The curtain slides open and there are two men and one woman in scrubs, and the woman says, “Sorry, we need to take this patient to surgery.”

  She whispers, “See, cop? Not…one…word…”

  Brianna is frozen with anger and frustration, and then she spots something on the woman’s left arm, and the woman thinks, Oh no, not that.

  But Brianna moves quickly to her side.

  The woman knows what’s exposed.

  And so does Brianna.

  “Well, well,” Brianna says, her voice triumphant. “What do we have here? I’ll tell you. A tattoo. And not just any old tattoo. It’s a red numeral one on a green background. The emblem of the U.S. Army’s famed First Infantry Division, the Big Red One.”

  The three medical workers come in and start moving her hospital bed.

  The last thing the woman hears is “I’ll see you when you wake up, and we’ll talk again. By then, I’ll know who you are.”

  Chapter

  44

  In a strained voice, Mel says, “John, what the hell are you doing?”

  I twist his collar again. “Watching my six, pal. Forget our friendship and what we’ve done together. All I know is that I come down here to talk about Afghanistan, we both get picked up by CID, and you—active-duty army!—get cut loose before I do.”

  “But my friend—”

  “Yeah, your mysterious friend who has the power to get you set free. He must have one set of brass ones to get that done.”

  Mel says, “It’s not a he. It’s a she. Captain Andrea Sharkey.”

  “Go on.”

  “Come on, John…”

  “Go on.”

  “Or what? You going to splatter my brains and bones over your car’s interior?”

  I say, “I can afford to dump this car and get a new one. Can you get a new head?”

  Mel mutters something profoundly obscene, then says, “We’re seeing each other. Met eight months ago when she came to my platoon looking into the theft of some ammo. We hit it off and…you know how it is.”

  “How come you never told me this?”

  “Because I wanted to keep it a secret. Colonel Michael Sharkey wouldn’t be happy to find out what I’m doing with his wife.”

  I pull my pistol back a few inches. “You got your girlfriend to spring you?”

  “Sort of,” he says. “I burned a pretty sweet bridge back there, John. I told her that unless she got me cleared and off post, I’d tell her hubby about our relationship.”

  I pull back the pistol just a little bit more. “Crap, Mel, that was a hell of a thing to do.”

  He says, “Well, damn, it wasn’t going to last forever, right? Her husband is in CID but rumor has it he served in Delta Force before going into law. But if he ever found out…shit, John, I didn’t want to spend my last hours on earth having my legs fed to a wood chipper.”

  I stare at him and he stares back and I put my weapon down. “Sorry.” I feel ashamed, pulling a weapon on an old friend. One of the rules that’s hammered into you at basic training the first day on the range: Never, ever, point a weapon at someone unless you intend to shoot.

  But I’d had to do it in this new world.

  Mel says, “Yeah, we’re all jumpy. What now?”

  I holster my pistol. “Time to kick it up a notch. We need to reach out to the CIA officer who was our tour guide into the ’Stan, see if she can shed some light on what went on over there and how it’s connected to these terror attacks.”

  “Deacon, right?”

  “That’s right, Elizabeth Deacon.”

  “You just gonna call up Langley and ask them to put you through?”

  I put the Cherokee in reverse, make a turn, and head back to Route 210. “No, I’m going to call someone who has sources all around the globe,” I say. “I bet we’ll have her home address in less than an hour.”

  “She your girlfriend?”

  I don’t answer right away. “I should be so lucky.”

  I want to put some miles behind us in case a concerned citizen saw me putting a gun to Mel’s head, and once we’re north of Fayetteville, Mel says, “How did your CID interview go? More than just chitchat?”

  “She took me off post so she could interview me without any official records. She asked me why I was here and what you and I talked about, and after a while, I got bored and left.”

  Mel says, “I bet she was pissed. How did you manage to slip out without all sorts of bad things happening to you?”

  “I reminded her that I was in the Individual Ready Reserve, that unless I was called up, she had no authority over me. Then I left.”

  Mel shakes his head. “Why didn’t you do that back at the café’s parking lot? Why wait until you were taken away?”

  I say, “I wanted to find out what they know. Mel, she pressed me on Afghanistan. That means the army also knows something about our trip being linked to the terrorist attacks, and they’re doing their very best to find out why. I also noticed something else.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The CID special agent looked spooked, like she sensed something big was coming and she and her investigators couldn’t do a damn thing about it.”