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This is Part II of the story. Read Part I Return to Home Page |
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Bud didn’t get much sleep that night. He didn’t like it when things didn’t add up and if there was one thing he’d learned from both Harm and Mac over the years it was to follow through on his gut instincts.
By the time he got to work the next morning, those instincts were screaming at him. The minute he arrived, he went in search of PO Coates. She looked up from her desk in the general’s outer office. "Can I help you, sir?"
"Yes, you can. I need the name of the witness who saw Col. MacKenzie and Mattie board the plane."
She plucked a file from the stack on her desk and consulted it briefly. "PO William Clarke, sir. He’s an admin assistant at the naval air station."
"Thanks." Filing the name away in his memory, Bud headed for his office. He wanted to talk to that petty officer, but he didn’t really have a valid reason to do so. It took him all of three seconds to decide it didn’t matter. Consulting the directory on his computer, he found the right phone number and dialed it.
Taking a deep fortifying breath, Gen. Cresswell opened the file in front of him. It was the latest update on the investigation. He scanned the report quickly, but then slowed down and read it more carefully. While they were still waiting on some lab tests, the investigators had delivered their preliminary findings. The crash was nothing more than a tragic accident. There was no evidence to indicate foul play.
Nodding slowly, Cresswell closed the file. The accident determination left him feeling strangely ambivalent. He was relieved to learn the crash wasn’t the result of a terrorist attack, but it also meant Col. MacKenzie’s death was a meaningless, random event.
How would Rabb take the news? There was only one way to find out.
Picking up the phone, he dialed the captain’s cell number. It rang four times before he finally answered.
"Captain, it’s Gen. Cresswell."
"Yes sir?" He sounded tired...no, not just tired, weary.
"I wanted you to know we have a preliminary determination on the cause of the crash. It was an accident, due to mechanical failure."
There was a long pause. "I see. Thank you for passing that along, sir."
Cresswell waited for Rabb to ask for more details, but he didn’t. Instead, he heaved a long, slow sigh. "Is there anything else, General?"
"No." Cresswell fought to conceal his surprise. "No, that’s all I wanted to tell you."
"All right. Thank you again, sir. Goodbye."
More than a little stunned, Cresswell stared at the phone for a few seconds before finally hanging it up. Now he was really worried about the captain. Where was the tenacious bulldog depicted in the long and detailed service record he’d read when taking command here?
Looking back on Rabb’s arrival from London, Cresswell realized it had been far too easy to deflect him from going to the crash site. That should have been his first clue that Rabb was more deeply affected than he let on.
Before he could decide what to do about it, the intercom buzzed. "General, Cdr. Roberts would like a word with you."
"Send him in."
The final syllable wasn’t quite out of his mouth before the door flew open. Roberts crossed the room before the door had a chance to swing closed. "General, I believe there may be more to the crash than meets the eye."
"Why do you say that?" Cresswell asked with a frown. "The preliminary determination is mechanical failure."
"Well, perhaps not with the crash then, but with Col. MacKenzie’s supposed presence on the plane."
"Supposed?" Cresswell repeated, incredulous.
"Yes sir. I just tried to contact the petty officer who witnessed the colonel and Mattie boarding the plane. He identified himself as PO William Clarke, and said he was an admin assistant. There is no one by that name stationed anywhere at the air station. In fact, there are no navy personnel with that name serving anywhere in the continental US."
"Are you saying this witness was an imposter?"
"Yes sir, I am, and if he lied about his identity, it’s a good bet he also lied about seeing Col. MacKenzie and Mattie get on that plane."
Cresswell’s chest tightened painfully. The implications of this were huge! "All right, Commander, run with this. Use whatever resources you need but until we have something more definitive, do not share your suspicions with anyone who doesn’t need to know. There’s no point in getting people’s hopes up yet."
"Yes sir, I understand. For now, the only one I need to tell is Capt. Rabb."
"No! Under no circumstances are you to reveal your suspicions to him."
Roberts’ eyes widened. "But, sir, if there’s any chance at all...."
"Commander, he’s been through enough. If this turns out to be a typing error in the report or something equally useless, it will be a tremendous blow to the captain, one I don’t want to be responsible for. Getting his hopes up when we have so little to go on would be...well, it would be cruel, Commander."
Roberts seemed to deflate before his very eyes. "I see you’re point, sir. I just...I wanted to be able to give him a little hope."
"Then get out there and come up with something more substantial. If there is something amiss, let’s get to the bottom of it."
Three times during the next two days, Harm tried to unpack a few boxes, but he just couldn’t summon the energy. What was the point anyway? What was the point to anything?
Roaming aimlessly among the boxes, he spotted one carefully labeled "DESK". Instantly, his mind was filled with an image of the two items lying directly beneath the cardboard flaps. The last two things he’d packed in that box were the pictures from his desk. One was of him and Mac, taken when they were on assignment in Afghanistan. The other was Mattie’s latest school picture. The photographer must have said something to make her laugh. Her smile was wide and genuine, her eyes twinkling with that special glow that had drawn Harm to her from the moment they met.
Oh, Mattie! With a groan, he sank to the couch. She’d fought so hard to come out of the coma, to overcome her injuries, to...live...and now, it was all for nothing. It was a crazy, stupid, selfish move on his part, wanting to drag her halfway around the world, all so she could become the child in the fantasy family he’d always dreamed of having.
He should have kept his mouth shut that night when Mac came to see him and just gone off to England to assume his command. If he had, they would both still be alive.
And he would still be alone.
He groaned again, dragging a hand down his face. Blaming himself was pointless. Blaming anyone was pointless. Their deaths were pointless...
And now so was the rest of his life.
Grumbling under his breath, Bud dropped heavily into his chair and stared at the computer screen on his desk. It had been two days and he was no closer to finding the mysterious PO who claimed he’d seen Mac and Mattie board that plane. He was fairly certain now that the man wasn’t a naval serviceman at all, but that only made it even more difficult to find his identity.
Bud had interviewed virtually everyone in Flight Ops that morning. A few recalled an unfamiliar petty officer coming and going and a marine lieutenant even remembered seeing him talking with Col. MacKenzie. Heaving a sigh, Bud picked up the artist’s sketch, produced with the lieutenant’s help. The face staring back at him was about as generic as it could get.
Plain, unremarkable features gave the guy a distinct "everyman" look. It was one of those faces that was so common, it almost looked familiar...like it was someone he’d seen, but couldn’t remember where. It could be the mailman, the grocery store packer or the waiter at the restaurant where Bud had taken Harriett to lunch.
Tossing the sketch down with a barely contained moan, Bud grabbed the computer mouse. He had to get his mind off this investigation, at least for a few minutes. He checked his email, but there was nothing of interest there except a joke from an online friend in Pennsylvania. He saved it to his personal file and closed the program.
From the nearly overflowing inbox on the corner of his desk, he picked up a stack of routine orders and information sheets. He was way behind on all of this stuff and had been since the accident. He scanned the papers quickly, making mental notes of anything that needed further attention. Near the bottom of the stack was a memo from the federal prison in Leavenworth. It was addressed to all JAG staff and looked like just a general outline of various events.
Reading as quickly as he was, it took a moment for his mind to assimilate the information, but as his hand turned the page over to put it down, the words on the page finally sank in. Flipping it back, he stared hard at the third paragraph from the bottom. There was no way in hell this was a coincidence!
Leaping to his feet so fast his chair slammed into the wall, Bud charged out of the office and through the bullpen. With nothing more than a quick glance at PO Coates, he knocked on the general’s door. The instant Cresswell’s voice rang out, Bud was through the door. "Excuse me, General, but this won’t wait."
"What have you got, Commander?" Cresswell asked, eyeing the paper scrunched up in Bud’s fist.
He stepped up to the desk and handed over the memo. "It’s a memo from the prison in Leavenworth, alerting JAG staff to the escape of an inmate."
Cresswell scanned the memo quickly. "I read this when it came in. What’s your point?"
"Sir, the escaped prisoner, Clark Palmer is a sworn enemy of Comm—Captain Rabb. Palmer’s tried several times over the years to destroy him, sir, even going so far as to impersonate Captain Rabb’s father, He also tried once to set it up so Captain Rabb would shoot his own girlfriend. General, this man would love nothing more than to arrange it so the captain thought his loved ones were dead."
Finally stopping for a breath, Bud handed over the other paper he’d grabbed from his desk. "Palmer is also a master of disguise, sir. I’m willing to bet the man in this sketch is Palmer."
"You think he somehow engineered it so Col. MacKenzie missed her flight, then claimed he’d seen her board?" Cresswell asked, instantly on Bud’s wavelength.
"It’s possible, sir. I thought the sketch looked vaguely familiar but at first I assumed it was because it’s so generic. With some makeup and a hairpiece, that could be Clark Palmer."
Cresswell nodded slowly. "All right, Commander. So far, your theory is the only one that could account for the discrepancies, but there’s still no doubt the crash was accidental. How could this Palmer have known kidnapping the colonel and Miss Johnson before the flight would lead us to believe they died in the crash?"
"I don’t know. Maybe he didn’t. Maybe he had something else in mind and the crash was just a coincidence." Bud saw the instant skepticism on the general’s face. "I know it sounds crazy, but it’s possible, sir. Stranger things have happened, but General, if Palmer did kidnap the colonel and Mattie...."
He let the sentence hang, afraid to give voice to the hope growing deep inside him. Gen. Cresswell had no such hesitation.
"Then," he said slowly, "they could still be alive."
Bud spent the rest of the day tracking down video surveillance tapes from every airport within a hundred miles of Leavenworth. He had to cajole, browbeat, pull rank and occasionally even whine a little, but eventually he managed to get cooperation from all of the airport security companies. He faxed them all copies of Palmer’s picture and the artist’s sketch. It was going to take time to review all the tapes, and it was a major long shot, but if anything came of it, it would be the best lead he had.
As the day dragged on, he tried to stay busy, but waiting had never been his strong suit. He toyed with a few things, trying to focus on something other than the fact that Col. MacKenzie and a helpless teenager in a wheelchair might be in the hands of a madman like Palmer.
He didn’t have much luck.
Ten minutes before they were scheduled to secure for the day, Gen. Cresswell appeared at his door. Bud was halfway to his feet when the general waved him down. "Keep your seat, Commander. I just came to see how things were going with your investigation."
"Slowly, sir," Bud replied, barely suppressing a sigh. "It’s only a guess that Palmer took a commercial flight from Kansas. If he chartered a plane or rented a car, we don’t have much chance of tracking his movements."
"His escape was only a day before the crash," Cresswell pointed out. "If he did have something to do with this, he must have somehow known where the colonel was going to be and when. It makes sense he’d take the quickest mode of transportation. Your instincts were good on this one, Commander."
Bud did sigh this time. "Thank you, sir, but there’s still no guarantee he’s going to show up on any surveillance tape."
"There are no guarantees in life, Bud."
It was the first time the general had called him by his first name. The significance of that wasn’t lost on Bud, but he didn’t know quite how to take it. Before he could decide how to respond, his phone rang.
"Excuse me, sir." Grabbing the receiver, Bud answered the call, listening to the excited voice on the other end. As the young man’s words sank in, Bud’s gut tightened into a hard knot of anticipation. He shot a look at the general, who took an involuntary step forward, eyes opening wide. As quickly as possible, Bud thanked the young security officer for the information and hung up.
"We got a positive ID from the artist’s sketch," he blurted. "Palmer did catch a flight to DC, not two hours after he escaped from jail."
Gen. Cresswell’s expression hardened instantly. "Give me the flight number. I’ll get on the horn to security at Dulles. Someone must have seen him on this end."
Bud rattled off the flight number.
With a curt nod, Cresswell disappeared.
For the first time in his life, Harm spent the whole day doing nothing – literally nothing. He sat on his plastic-wrapped sofa and stared at the cardboard pillars that represented the sum total of his life. Suddenly, everything that he was, everything he would ever be, was in this room, in these boxes. His entire life was packed away, silent and static for all eternity.
He knew he should be making plans, decisions about whether to ship this stuff, what to do with Mac’s and Mattie’s things...but it all seemed so damned irrelevant. Who cared what happened to Mac’s belongings? She didn’t need them anymore.
And then there was that damned box of stuff from his desk. From the moment he spotted it and realized what was in, the blasted thing had been calling to him. It seemed no matter where he went in the apartment, it was always there, in the corner of his eye. He was acutely aware of it at all times.
The same way he’d always been aware of Mac.
He finally gave in. Filled with angry resignation, he stalked to the box, yanked the tape off and lifted the flaps. Just as he’d known they would be, the two photographs were right on top. His fingers trembled slightly as he gently lifted them out.
Heartache bloomed deep inside as he stared at Mattie’s smiling face. She had her whole life ahead of her. It was such a cliché, but it was true. Now she would never know the joys and sorrows of young adulthood. She would never realize her dreams...and neither would he.
Mac’s picture was even harder to look at. Her smile beamed forth as she stood at his side. For as long as he could remember, he had wanted her by his side in a different way. And now, after just the smallest taste of what that would have been like, it had all been ripped away from him. There hadn’t been time to talk about much of anything in the flurry of activity after they announced their engagement, but he had been planning to talk to her again about the options for trying to have a baby. He was waiting till they were settled in London, foolishly believing they had all the time in the world.
His heart gave a hard squeeze, driving the breath from his lungs. His throat burning with tears that wouldn’t come, he set the pictures aside with an abrupt thrust. He hadn’t wanted to open that box, to see their faces again, but some perverse need had made him torture himself like this.
As he turned away, something else inside the box caught his eye. It was right on top now that the pictures were removed. He hadn’t remembered packing it...probably shouldn’t have, really. It should have been shipped separately, in secured cargo.
Lifting out the slim wooden box, he stared at it for a long, long time. Maybe fate had played a role here, too, orchestrating things so this box would be here. His fingers played over the smooth grain of the wood. The key to the box’s lock was on the ring in his pocket. All he had to do was open it, sit down on the couch and gather his nerve.
But no, that didn’t seem right somehow. He didn’t want it to be here, in this empty place. Involuntarily, his gaze slid to the two photos. He wanted to be with them, and now maybe he soon would be, but this wasn’t the right place to accomplish that.
With a flood of decisiveness that had been sorely lacking for days, Harm yanked out his key ring, opened the gun case and slipped the 9mm automatic into his pocket. Spinning on his heel, he snagged a jacket off a stack of boxes and headed out the door.
Bud knew something wasn’t right the moment he stepped off the elevator. Capt. Rabb’s door stood slightly ajar, light spilling into the hallway. Cautiously, Bud approached the door, pushing it open and peering inside. "Capt. Rabb? Harm, are you in here?"
There was no reply, but nothing seemed out of place. At least, as far as he could tell. With everything packed into boxes, it was hard to know for sure. Still cautious and a little worried, Bud stepped inside. He was still under orders to keep quite about his suspicions, but had already decided to violate those orders if Harm was still so lost and despondent. Maybe Harm’s absence meant he’d turned a corner and was out with friends.
Bud was also under orders from Harriett to do everything he could to convince Harm to come for dinner. She was going to be terribly disappointed, but if Harm wasn’t home, there was nothing Bud could do.
As he turned to go, something caught his eye and made him do a double take. He instantly recognized the wooden case sitting open on top of a stack of boxes. Cold fear slid through him as he realized the significance of what he was seeing. There could be only one reason that case was open and empty. Harm hadn’t pulled it together enough to go out with friends tonight, not by any stretch.
Bud was halfway to the door before he realized he didn’t know where he was going. He had to find Harm immediately, but where to start looking?
For a moment, he tried to put himself in Harm’s place. If he had just lost Harriett and the kids, where would he go? He would want to be close to them, but with no graves to visit, where would that be?
The answer slammed into him like a Stinger missile. With utter certainty, he knew where Harm would be.
After five minutes of searching the crash site, Bud was beginning to think he was wrong after all. There was no sign of Harm anywhere. The site had been cleaned up, but there was nothing anyone could do about the angry black scar carved into the tarmac. Only time would diminish the dark shadow standing out stark against the lighter gray of the asphalt.
Bud looked everywhere, scanning the trees lining the edge of the airfield. It was almost dark, the shadows thickening and blending between the tall trunks. Some of them were scarred as well, burned by the fierce intensity of the fiery crash. Among them stood some trees that were completely untouched, flanking their fellows like sentries, determined to protect them from further injury. Just as Bud would do for his friend – if he could find him.
He finally spotted a small shape against the base of one of the undamaged trees. Harm sat with his back against the trunk, his knees drawn up in front of him. Head back, eyes closed, he blended so well with the shadows, Bud had to look twice to be sure it really was Harm.
The silence and sorrow surrounding the scene was so complete, Bud wasn’t sure how to intrude, but he knew he had to.
He approached slowly until he was close enough to see the gun, held loosely in Harm’s hand as it dangled between his knees. Bud tried to speak, but couldn’t get anything past the raw sting in his throat. He swallowed hard and tried again. "Harm?"
For a moment, Bud wasn’t sure Harm heard him, but eventually he stirred, although he didn’t open his eyes. "What are you doing here, Bud?"
Bud had never heard anyone sound so weary, so defeated. He hesitated a fraction of a second, then sat down, resting his back against the trunk beside Harm. "Looking for you. What are you doing here, sir?"
Harm gave a scoffing snort. "Don’t ‘sir’ me, Bud. I’m so far beyond that it’s ridiculous."
"Beyond deserving my respect?" Bud countered. "I don’t think so. Although, it might be a good idea if you gave me the gun."
Harm finally opened his eyes, slowly, as if the effort cost him everything he had. He examined the gun, turning it this way and that as if he’d never seen it before. "This gun? I think I’ll hang onto it for a while. You can have it when I’m done with it, though. In fact, you can have everything." With his left hand, he dug in his pocket and tossed a small object in Bud’s direction. "Including that."
Bud plucked the object out of the air, recognizing it immediately. Very slowly, he opened the tiny velvet box. "B...but this is..."
"Mac’s engagement ring," Harm confirmed, his voice still soft and empty. "I never had a chance to give it to her. Give it to Harriett, okay?"
"I...I can’t do that." Bud was barely able to choke the words out.
"Sure you can. Save it for your anniversary. As long as you don’t tell her where it came from, she’ll love it."
"No, I can’t, because you’re going to...." Seized by an abrupt grip of uncertainty, he hesitated, but he had to get through to Harm somehow. "You might still need this yourself."
Harm made that same scoffing sound. "For some other woman? Never. There was never anyone else for me, and there never will be." He sounded so utterly defeated. "Now, go home to your...family."
His voice broke on the last word. Suddenly, Bud had no idea how to break the news to Harm. Gen. Cresswell was right. If Bud’s suspicions were wrong, the false hope would crush Harm completely. But he couldn’t just keep his mouth shut and walk away. His best friend was contemplating suicide, for Christ’s sake!
Drawing a deep breath, Bud plunged in. "I...I have something I need to tell you. There’s no easy way to say this, but...I think Mac and Mattie...There’s a slim chance they might still be alive."
For a very long moment, Harm showed no reaction whatsoever and then very, very slowly, he turned his head. It was the first time he had looked at Bud since he walked up. In the deepening shadows, Harm’s eyes were more gray than blue, and as desolate as the ashes they resembled.
"It won’t work, Bud. You’re just saying that to get me to put the gun down, but it won’t work. She’s gone, Bud, and without her, without Mattie, there’s no reason for me to keep going."
"You’re right," Bud said carefully. "I did say it to get you to put the gun down. I said it because it’s true and I need your help to find them."
Bud could see the first inkling of life shimmer back into Harm’s eyes.
"It’s true, sir. I swear on everything I hold dear. Gen. Cresswell ordered me not to say anything because he didn’t want to get your hopes up before we were certain. I’m violating those orders right now, but I don’t give a damn about that. It’s true, there’s a chance they’re alive. It’s only a chance, but it’s better than sitting here planning to...well, planning what you were planning."
Abruptly, Harm set the gun aside and spun around until he was facing Bud. "I’m scared, Bud. I’m scared to believe you, but I’m even more afraid not to."
"I just wish I was certain."
"Tell me," Harm whispered. "Tell me everything."
Harm listened as Bud started at the beginning with his suspicions about the mysterious supposed witness. He tried – Oh, God, how he tried to stop it – but he could feel the hope beginning to bloom inside him. And then Bud uttered the last name Harm would have expected to hear.
For the rest of his life, Harm would struggle to define the feelings that surged through him when he heard that name – struggle and fail. Breath locked in his lungs, he sat and boiled in his own juices until Bud finally finished his story.
"So, Gen. Cresswell is trying to track Palmer’s movements after he arrived in DC. I don’t think he’s had any luck yet he would have called me."
Harm was on his feet with no conscious memory of moving. "If that son of a bitch is anywhere within five hundred miles, I’ll find him. Come on, Bud."
Bud pushed to his feet and Harm caught a glimpse of metal in his hand. Harm reached for it instantly. "It looks like I’m going to need that after all."
Standing in the stillness of the empty bullpen, Cresswell studied the latest intel. He had people all over Washington searching for anything they could find, but so far, nothing. This was the part of command he truly hated. He was a "doer". He didn’t like sitting around waiting for someone to report to him.
He heard the big double doors behind him but before he could even turn, he was hit by a wave of...something. It was the most incredible thing he’d ever experienced. He spun around as Capt. Rabb and Cdr. Roberts strode into the room. The aura of tension surrounding Rabb literally spread out before him like an enormous bow wave. Instinctively, Cresswell fired a look at Roberts. The young man glanced away, but not before Cresswell caught the guilt in his eyes.
"So, Captain," Cresswell said slowly, "I see you’ve heard about the recent...developments."
"Damn right I have, sir, and the only question I have is why I didn’t hear about them sooner." Cold chips of pure silver bored into Cresswell as Rabb glared down at him. "Bud says you ordered him to keep quiet."
"Are you questioning my command decisions, Captain?" Cresswell challenged.
"Yes sir." The return was quick, sharp and hard.
Cresswell regarded the tall, simmering captain. This was exactly what had been trying to avoid. The man was about ready to explode.
"I had my reasons." Hoping to shut Rabb down, at least a little, Cresswell turned and retrieved the report he had been reading. "But now that you’re in the loop, I might as well bring you up to speed. I have people going over airport surveillance tapes from Dulles, covering the hour after Palmer’s flight arrived. So far—"
"What about car rental agencies?" Rabb snapped. "He had to have transportation once he got here."
Cresswell took a slow breath, calming the urge to tear a strip off the captain for his insubordination. "Yes, I have people interviewing the rental agencies’ employees, and others checking the taxi companies as well."
Rabb spun to face Roberts. "Bud, get a list of every vehicle rented after Palmer’s flight got in. If he changed his disguise, the employees might not recognize him."
Roberts’ eyes widened with that deer-in-the-headlights look and he shot a glance at Cresswell, clearly recognizing Rabb’s breach of protocol. Very slowly, Cresswell nodded. It was a good idea and it would get Roberts out of the way for a few minutes. As the commander turned away, Cresswell took a very firm grip on Rabb’s elbow. "In my office, Captain. Right now."
Rabb followed silently, shutting the door behind him. In the smaller office, the intensity flowing from him quickly filled the room. It was the damnedest thing Cresswell had ever felt – and he could feel it, literally. Sheer, raw emotion cascaded off Rabb in palpable waves.
Gathering every scrap of command presence he owned, Cresswell faced him down. "In deference to your long service to the navy and to JAG, I’m going to keep you in the loop regarding the developments in the...situation...surrounding Col. MacKenzie, but I won’t have your emotional involvement hamper this investigation, is that clear?"
"Crystal, sir," Rabb replied flatly.
"I mean it, Rabb. I can only imagine what you must be going through right now, but I can’t have you going off half-cocked. Other people’s lives could be at risk. If Palmer has abducted Col. MacKenzie and Miss Johnson—"
"With all due respect, sir, if Palmer—"
"If Palmer has abducted them," Cresswell pushed on through the interruption, "you may have to face the fact that they’re dead afterall."
Rabb’s eyes flared with a deadly rage that, frankly, scared the hell out of Cresswell. "General, if they are dead and Palmer is the cause, I’ll find him and when I do, there will be three dead, not two."
Harm stepped out of Cresswell’s office a few minutes later, his own words ringing in his head. He meant it, too. If Palmer had hurt Mac or Mattie, Harm would hunt him down and kill him – or die trying. Either way, if Mac and Mattie really were dead, there would be a third death very soon.
The bullpen was eerily silent. Bud was still in his office, the phone sprouting out of one ear. He glanced up as Harm moved further into the bullpen and waved him over. There was a bright look of excitement in Bud’s eyes that had Harm moving quickly. Scribbling quickly on a notepad, Bud spoke into the phone. "Thank you. This is exactly what we’ve been looking for. Yes, fax over everything you’ve got. Thanks again. Yes, I will. Goodbye."
Bud’s gaze shot to Harm, his hand fumbling to hang up the phone. "That was a sheriff’s office in Maryland. You were right about the car rental agencies. I got a list of license plates for the vehicles rented from the airport just after Palmer’s flight arrived. On a hunch, I sent them to all of the law enforcement agencies in the area, and got a hit almost immediately. The sheriff’s office ran the list against their database and it turns out one of the rental cars was pulled over on a routine traffic stop only two days after the accident."
Bud finally stopped to take a breath. He fixed Harm with a long hard look. "Sir, the officer who stopped the car identified the driver from the artist’s sketch I sent out. He’s certain it was Palmer driving."
Harm spun on his heel so fast papers on Bud’s desk fluttered. He was already out the office door by the time Bud asked, "where are you going, sir?"
"Where else? To Maryland. If you’re coming, get your six in gear!"
Gen. Cresswell stepped out of his office in time to see Rabb launch out of Roberts’ office like he was coming off a carrier deck.
"Capt. Rabb!"
Rabb stopped, but just barely.
"Where are you headed?" Cresswell asked, crossing the room.
"Bud’s got a lead on Palmer. He’s in Maryland."
Cresswell couldn’t stop the gut clenching excitement that shot through him. "Where in Maryland?"
Roberts joined them. "We don’t know for sure yet, sir."
Cresswell fixed Rabb with a hard, pointed look. "Maryland is a big state, Captain. What were you planning to do, start at one end and work your way across?"
"If I had to, I would," Rabb replied, his own expression hard and unyielding. "But as it happens, we have narrowed it down a bit."
The missing "sir" at the end of Rabb’s sentence rang as loudly as the barely concealed sarcasm in his tone. Cresswell gritted his teeth, loathe to chew Rabb out in front of Roberts but unable to come up with another excuse to get rid of him.
Roberts, bless him, saved Cresswell from having to reply at all. "The sheriff’s office in Diamond Springs pulled Palmer over on a routine traffic stop two days after the plane went down. The deputy who made the stop is waiting for us."
Cresswell made a snap decision. There was only one way to keep a leash on Rabb. "Then what are we waiting for? Let’s go!"
The ride to the tiny hamlet of Diamond Springs, MD took far too long for Harm’s liking. Bud drove, so all Harm could do was sit in the passenger seat and try to keep a lid on the caldron inside him. White hot rage blasted through him every time he thought of the cruel joke Palmer had perpetrated, but at the same time, another voice inside reminded him that if Palmer really had kept Mac and Mattie off that plane, then they – and Harm – owed him their lives.
Gratitude to Palmer? Harm couldn’t take it. It was just too much to process. He simply couldn’t wrap his brain around everything he was feeling.
Shoving it all aside, Harm came up out of his thoughts enough to realize Bud was throwing him brief sidelong glances from the driver’s seat. When Bud’s gaze dropped to the seat between them, Harm realized he was impatiently drumming his fingers and probably had been for the whole trip.
Clenching his hands in his lap, Harm concentrated on staying still for the last five minutes of the ride into Diamond Springs. Focusing on something so mundane helped a lot. It only felt like five hours instead of five years.
At last, Bud pulled up in front of a small brick building with a large weathered sign reading "Sheriff" hanging slightly askew above the door. Harm was out and on the sidewalk before Bud and Cresswell even had their doors open. Remembering protocol at the last minute, Harm waited and let Cresswell precede him inside.
A woman smiled at them from the front counter and reached for her telephone before Cresswell could get a single word out. "Sheriff Thompson is waiting for you gentlemen. I’ll tell him you’re here."
All three officers exchanged a look, but didn’t have time to comment before a tall, heavyset man stepped out of a back office. He crossed to the counter and extended his hand across it to Gen. Cresswell. "Sheriff Bob Thompson."
"Gen. Gordon Cresswell. I believe one of your deputies spoke to Cdr. Roberts here." Cresswell gestured to Bud.
"That he did," the sheriff replied. He reached down and unlatched the gate in the counter. "It’s not often we get any attention from the navy around here. Come on back to my office."
Thompson led the way to his office, where a young, freckle-faced deputy was waiting. "This is Deputy Ferguson. He stopped the man you’re interested in."
Ferguson nodded. "It was just a routine stop. We don’t get many out of town vehicles around here, especially on our rural back roads, but he checked out okay. What does the navy want with him?"
"We believe he kidnapped...." Cresswell fired a quick glance at Harm. "...A member of my staff and a young girl in a wheelchair."
Ferguson let out a low whistle. "There was no one with him when I stopped him."
"What story did he give you?" Harm asked, anxious to get to the point.
"Said he’d rented a cabin at Diamond Lake."
"Did you check out his story?" Cresswell asked, beating Harm to it.
"Not really," Ferguson replied with a half-shrug. "I didn’t see any reason to. His driver’s license checked out against the rental car’s paperwork and he said he’d rented the cabin from Bill Moselisky. Bill does have a cabin at the lake and he does rent it out now and then."
Harm had heard enough. "Where is this cabin?"
Thompson pulled a map off the top of a nearby file cabinet and spread it out on the desk. All five men leaned over it as Thompson pointed to a spot on the map. "Right here, about thirty miles from town."
Harm straightened, his gut tightening with something cold and hard. "General, he’s got Mac and Mattie at that cabin. I know it!"