She had had many assignments over a government career spanning more than twenty-five years. Her academic background was spectacular and she held advanced degrees, despite being a young mother. She had worked herself up to a managerial position, though he doubted she had the horsepower or connections to get to the SES level before she retired, but she might. She had had stints overseas and had been in war zones. She had even served on interrogation teams in the field and was an expert on techniques to get information from people who did not want to provide it. Well, he could certainly see her tightening the thumbscrews on someone. And perhaps her affinity for weapons had helped her there. He went back further in her record. She had had stints in Eastern Europe and South Korea, among others. And, as she had mentioned when he was in her home, many years ago she had been part of a START verification team for nuclear arms reduction with the Soviet Union.
She had joined the WMD Center four months ago. Puller could have thought of five far more likely professional homes to which she could have been assigned.
So why WMD?
He looked up the leadership for the center. It wasn’t a military person. The current head was Donovan Carter, a civilian and an SES, or member of the elite senior executive service, which roughly paralleled the rank of general or admiral in the armed forces. And Puller knew that Carter also headed up the far larger DTRA, which held a very prominent position in keeping America safe from WMDs.
Puller knew Carter professionally. They had never worked directly together, but they had met on several occasions.
Carter had come on board at the center and DTRA at roughly the same time that Susan Reynolds had been assigned there. So they were at Fort Belvoir together. DTRA employed a lot of people, and Fort Belvoir was vast, and Reynolds was only a small component of this enterprise.
There’s another critical time component. They set me up and got rid of me at STRATCOM right before my next promotion.
He was slated to go from a major to lieutenant colonel. From there his trajectory was predictable in rank: colonel, one-star, two-star, and on up. What was unpredictable was the timing. There were standards for how long between promotions, including minimum time in a particular grade, training requirements for duty performance. And there were additional hurdles to jump for special promotions. This was meritocracy at its finest. And Puller had always been a fast riser, marked for the stars on his shoulders almost as soon as he had left the Air Force Academy at the top of his class, the second-ranked classmate far behind.
And then a possibility hit him.
As a lieutenant colonel at STRATCOM he was to be transferred to Bolling AFB in Washington, D.C., and assigned to the Joint Forces Central Command’s Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance, or ISR, a component of STRATCOM.
Puller knew that all these acronyms would drive most civilians mad. But for most of his adult life it had been all he had known, becoming a language he could navigate as easily as he could recite the alphabet or know the order of medals and ribbons on the front of a uniform.
At ISR he would have been under the tutelage of a two-star. He also would have had a direct pipeline into the intelligence infrastructure of the United States by virtue of the NSA being only a short drive north into Maryland at Fort Meade.
Could it be possible?
He went back to take a look at Donovan Carter’s c.v. It didn’t take him long to find it. Two years ago to the week, Carter had been assigned to ISR.
Then he checked Susan Reynolds’s work history.
And then it all came together like embers finally igniting and producing a flame.
She had been assigned, along with Carter, to ISR. Now Carter was at the WMD Center and so was Reynolds.
So had they set him up so he wouldn’t get the promotion and be moved to Bolling, where he would have been working with Donovan Carter? If so, why? And who had taken his slot at Bolling?
Something crept out of a storage place in his brain and marched out in front of his eyes. He checked his laptop just to confirm that he was right. There was no room for mistakes now.
When he saw it come up on the screen the jigsaw pieces started to fit together even more precisely. Carter, Reynolds, and this person.
Puller’s slot at Bolling had been taken by a man who then held the rank of colonel. He had since been promoted to brigadier general. A few days ago his career and life had ended in Kansas.
His name was Timothy Daughtrey.
CHAPTER
45
JOHN PULLER WAITED until he got up to his room before opening the attachment on the email. He sat down in the chair and read through the letter once, and then, being the good soldier he was, he read through it twice more, filling in gaps that the prior readings had left.
He set the phone down and stared over at the wall opposite. He never knew his father could be so eloquent through the written word. He could give orders like no one else, concise and incapable of misinterpretation, the Ulysses S. Grant of his generation. But to convey the feelings, the emotions that he had in the letter to the court-martial, well, it was as extraordinary as it was unexpected.
He had never seen this side of the old man. He doubted anyone had, including his brother. Chiefly his brother. Puller hadn’t gone the officer route, and his father had never forgiven him. Yet Bobby, who was an officer, had gotten the brunt of their father’s derision. Puller had been a grunt with a rifle in the trenches. He had fought for his country, been wounded for his country, and been, in his father’s eyes, a soldier’s soldier. His brother had been, in his father’s words, “a g-d flyboy playing typist,” the last word being a derogatory reference to his brother’s immense talent with technology.
But in this letter Puller Sr. had dug somewhere deep to find the words to persuade a military tribunal to give his son the possibility of life instead of a certain death. He had said things about his older son that Puller had never heard the old man say before. It was like they were two different men, in fact. But there they were, in his father’s bold handwriting. How he had been able to do this while his mind was slowly being eaten away by the disease that was diligently claiming him was beyond Puller.
He put the phone away in his pocket and packed his things in his duffel. He checked out and met Knox in the lobby. He noted that her face was red and she looked exhausted.
“What, did you go for a run while I was up in my room?”
“Why?”
“Your face is flushed and your eyes are red. And you look beat.”
“Might be coming down with something. And I’ve got pollen allergies. And I only had three hours of sleep.”
“Okay,” he said as they walked to the car.
She said hastily, “I’ll be fine. I took something. It’s why I ducked into the pharmacy.”
“Then I’ll drive and you can grab some rest.”
“Thanks, I appreciate that.”
They loaded the car and climbed into the front seats. The clouds had thickened, blackened, and rain was starting to fall.
“Nice time to catch some shut-eye,” said Puller. “Just listen to the raindrops beating on the roof and you’ll pass right out.”
“Yeah.” She snuggled down into her seat with her jacket draped over her and said, “By the way, where are we going?”
“Back to D.C.”
“Why?”
“Why not? You want to go back to Kansas?”
“Not particularly. I think we’ve done all we can there.”
“I need to go back at some point and pick up my cat.”
She smirked at him. “It still surprises me that you have a pet, Puller. And a cat. And it was lying on the bed next to dead Daughtrey like it was no big deal.”
“AWOL is cool under pressure. And she’s low-maintenance.”
“Like her owner?”
“It’s probably why we get along so well.”
“It’s a long drive to D.C.”
“Not a problem. I’ll take the wheel the whole way. Give me a chanc
e to think.”
“So when we get to D.C.?”
“The first priority will be checking out what happened to Niles Robinson.”
“Sounds like a plan.” She closed her eyes.
“Let me know if you need a food or bathroom break.”
“All I need is some sleep.”
Puller reached the highway, headed north, and accelerated.
“You asleep yet, Knox?”
“Not now, no.”
“Sorry.”
“Something on your mind?”
“You have any enemies?”
“Don’t we all have enemies?”
“Anyone in particular with you?”
“Not that I can think of right now.” She straightened in her seat. “And why are you asking me that?”
Puller tapped the steering wheel as he stared straight ahead. “I got a text.”
“About what?”
“About you.”
“What about me?”
“That you’re not what you appear to be. That I shouldn’t trust you.”
Knox glanced away, frowning. “Who sent the text?”
“I don’t know. I called the number but no one answered. I’ll try to trace it, but it might be a burn phone. In fact, I’d be surprised if it weren’t.”
“So that’s why you were acting that way this morning?”
“Yes.”
“So you believed the text even though you don’t even know who sent it?”
“I’m not sure what I believed.”
“That’s bullshit. You did believe it. Even after we were attacked in that alley and almost killed.”
“If I did believe it I would have done something about it. And I sure as hell wouldn’t have told you about it.”
“But you didn’t tell me right away.”
“No, I didn’t,” he conceded. “But I’m not a perfect man, either.”
She crossed her arms and sank back into her seat. “Well, I’m not a perfect woman, that’s for damn sure.”
“Anything bothering you? I’ve got time to listen.”
“Nothing on my end.”
They drove a few more miles before Knox said, “I might tell you about it sometime, Puller.”
“That’s fine.”
“And maybe the text was right, maybe I’m not who I appear to be.”
“Text or no text, I never thought you were who you appeared to be, Knox.”
She shot him a glance. “Then why—”
“Let’s just leave it at that for now.”
“I don’t get you, Puller, I really don’t. Every time I think I’ve got you figured out you throw me a curve.”
“You said I was predictable.”
“But I’m coming to learn that you’re not. At least not in all ways.”
“A good soldier never stops learning.”
She snuggled back into her seat again and shut her eyes. “Did you read the letter your father had written?”
“Yes.”
“And?”
“And it’s made me understand that none of us are who we appear to be. Now get some sleep. I’ll wake you when we get close.”
A few minutes later her breathing became regular and her arms slid to her sides.
The rain picked up and so did the wind. Puller had a job keeping the car straight on the highway but managed it with both of his big hands clamped around the wheel.
Once they were past the worst of it, his mind could wander from the demands of driving in a storm to the written words of a three-star fighting legend who was supposed to have lost his mind at a VA hospital.
If Puller Sr. had meant everything that he had written in that letter maybe there was hope.
For all of them.
And he wanted his brother to be able to read those words.
He wanted that very much.
It could make up for a lot. Perhaps, even in an imperfect world, it could make up for just about everything.
CHAPTER
46
AS THEY APPROACHED the D.C. area a little over six hours later, Puller woke Knox by gently nudging her in the side. She came to as he would, calm, alert, and ready to go, or pull the trigger, as the case might be.
“It didn’t occur to me,” he said. “Where are you staying?”
“You can drop me at the W Hotel downtown. It’s centrally located. I’ve stayed there before.”
“Right near the White House. You going to have a powwow with the president?”
“It’s not on my schedule for today, no.”
Puller glanced sharply at her. The way she said it, she seemed serious.
“The W it is.”
“What about you?” she asked.
“Heading to Quantico to get some fresh clothes and other stuff I might need. And to check in.”
“I’m going to do the same at the hotel.”
“So how will they take the fact that you’ve shot two people and killed one?”
“I think they’ll take it rather well considering the alternative. But I know I’m going to have a roomful of forms to file. And I’ll have to go back to North Carolina and Kansas to deal with it at some point.”
“I’m hoping they can find the guy you shot in Charlotte.”
“Yeah, that would help. Maybe he’s lying dead in some other alley down there.” She added sarcastically, “They can do another follicle test. If there’s ice there, he might be from Alaska. Or maybe Siberia.”
Puller’s phone buzzed again. He checked the screen while they were stopped at a red light. He slipped it back into his pocket.
“Anything important?”
“General Rinehart and Mr. Schindler want to meet.”
“Where?”
“They came back east too. Dinner at the Army-Navy Club downtown. Eight-thirty tonight. You up for it?”
“I don’t think they want to meet with me.”
“I don’t care if they do or not. You’re on my team. So you get to come and report in too.”
“I hear Rinehart can be a bear.”
“Any guy busting his hump for the fourth star can be a bear. I’ll need to get my dress blues. I can pick you up a little after eight and we can drive over together. Sound good?”
“Sounds good, Puller. And I’m flattered.”
“About what?”