“Okay. Good. Detective Cohen is on his way. And the Feds are sending in specialists. A terrorist task force and an abduction team. You okay to wait for them to arrive? Say, thirty minutes?”
“Of course.” Suck it up, Marine. “I’m just going to bum a cigarette from someone and let my dog stretch his legs. I’ll be back.”
“Here.” Engel pulled out a pack of cigarettes and a book of matches. “Keep them. I got a stash in my car. Wife tells me we should be buying stock.”
I took the pack and forced a smile. “Thanks.”
But his wary look remained. I felt his gaze on me as Clyde and I headed out into the field.
I shook out a cigarette and lit it as we walked, sucking in the sweet burn. Five months of restraint up in smoke. The morning sun drilled through us as if focused by a magnifying lens. Spots danced before my eyes in the white light, and Clyde’s tongue unfurled like a roll of carpet. The voices of the police and the chatter of their radios faded as we walked; closer by, insects droned, and the tall grass whispered against our legs. The smell of concrete dust hung in the air along with the wet-dirt odor of weeds. Overlaying that, the chemical burn of the bomb swirled in the wind’s eddies like a vortex, trying to suck me into the past.
I pulled a tennis ball out of my bag and threw it hard, giving Clyde some exercise in a space newly cleared by SWAT. He didn’t seem to be suffering any emotional fallout from the blast. But just in case, I hoped a game of fetch would shake him out of it. And it gave me a chance to check him for any injuries I might have missed.
I threw the ball a few times, and Clyde gamely ran it down. He looked good—no break in his stride, no hesitation. But the day was climbing toward the upper nineties; I whistled him back and found a wedge of shade next to a ruined wall thick with vine. Clyde and I shared the lieutenant’s water, then Clyde circled and made a place for himself among the weeds. I snugged in next to him on the damp ground, leaned against the wall, and enjoyed another cigarette. A few minutes was all I needed, I told myself. Just long enough to gather myself.
But it was a lie. My hands shook, my knees trembled, and my thoughts were so scrambled it was like a second bomb had gone off inside my head.
I startled when Clyde came to his feet.
The Sir walked toward us from the crowd of first responders, his body a shimmer of light, his stride smooth despite the ruin of his legs. For months, the only place I’d seen him had been in my nightmares. Now he crossed the field, gave Clyde and me a nod, then hunkered down next to us, spectral hands dangling between ghostly thighs.
Our ghosts were our guilt. Nothing more. I pulled in my feet and hugged my knees.
Through my two tours in Iraq working Mortuary Affairs, the Sir had been my everything—commander, mentor, confidant. Then one night he’d asked for my help covering up an atrocity. At the time, I’d been certain we were doing the right thing. That the ends justified the means. But everything had gone to hell after that, and a lot of people had died. Loyalty and betrayal had become so knotted up inside me that I didn’t know where one ended and the other began.
“Why are you here?” I whispered.
“I’m wondering what you’re going to do about this child.”
“I’m a railroad cop,” I reminded him. “I’m going to tell people what happened, then go on with my day.”
The Sir worked out a crick in his neck as if he could actually feel it. “You going to let a bomb stop you from doing the right thing?”
“Survival is not without its appeal.” I pulled on the cigarette, enjoying the irony.
“Survival is a short-term strategy. Don’t confuse it with living. Life isn’t about whether you live or die. Because we’re all gonna die—not a damn thing any of us can do about that.”
“Right,” I snapped. “The war didn’t help me figure that out.”
“Rather,” he went on, “life is about the grace. About making sure that while you are alive, you’re living for something bigger than yourself. Frankly, Corporal, you’ve had your head up your ass, thinking these last few months have been a life.”
“You’re wrong. I’ve been working, training Clyde. Going to community college. Maybe falling in love. That is living.”
For a dead man, his look was penetrating. “What you’ve been doing is eating, shitting, watching crap on TV, and pretending to fall in love when you’re too scared to actually do it. Even your damn job is all about hiding from yourself. You can give that bullshit to your counselor, Corporal, but not to me. It’s time to go outside the wire.”
Clyde’s ears flicked. In the field, the Six drifted into view. Dead men with tattoos and shattered skulls and eyes of flint. They’d fought ferociously for their lives. And I’d killed them anyway.
I kept my eyes on them. My earlier uncertainty about this investigation had hardened into miserable resolve. “Clyde and I are done with death investigations. We left that in Iraq.”
The Sir snorted. “You want to spend your life as a damn fobbit, shaking in your boots while someone else does what needs doing?”
A fobbit—a Marine who hides inside the wire while his buddies go out and do the tough work. My anger rose like a slap.
“I’m no fobbit, sir. In Iraq, I went out every single time. But the thing is, if I step into this, I’m not sure I’ll find my way back. I’m—” I sucked in air. “I’m tired of killing.”
He shook his head at me. “We do what we have to do. And we learn to live with it later.”
“Easy for you to say,” I sniped. “You’re dead.”
The Sir pressed. “You let a child down before. How you going to feel if you stay inside the wire while all of this is going down?”
That one hurt. I drew on the cigarette, sucked heat into my lungs, stared off at the bomb techs in the distance. “Alive, for starters.”
“You believe that?”
I smashed the cigarette against the wall. “I liked you better when you didn’t talk much.”
“My wife used to say the same thing.”
We were both quiet then, stung by life’s small moments.
After a time I said, “Truth is, sir, I think I’m turning certifiable.”
He shrugged. “If you’re hell-bent on going crazy, Corporal, be my guest. But right now we need every boot on the ground, so I suggest you take the slow train getting there.”
“No offense, sir, but it’s a bit late for that. I am talking to a dead man.”
Was that a hint of a smile? “Crazy isn’t all bad.” He stood. “Ooh rah, Marine.”
He strode off into the field, his desert uniform stiff with dust and blood. He walked through the six men, who turned and followed him. Halfway across the field, they disappeared.
Clyde and I looked at each other. “You think I’m a fobbit?” I asked.
Clyde stayed silent.
“Thanks, partner.”
Cohen’s sedan pulled in between a pair of patrol units. He parked, threw open the driver’s door, and leapt out. He mouthed my name as he took in the dust and the bomb unit and the SWAT vehicles. Was that how I’d looked when I found the Sir lying dead—my eyes wide with horror?