Damaged

by Alex Kava

  TUESDAY, AUGUST 25

  CHAPTER 46

  The pounding came from someplace other than inside Platt’s head. Of that he was certain, though the back of his head throbbed. He opened his eyes and took a few seconds to remember where he was.

  Hotel room. The Hilton. Too many free mai tais. Rum gave him a killer headache every time.

  He pushed himself off the sofa and that’s when he remembered Maggie. The thought spun him around to look back at the bedroom. Awake, he realized the pounding came from the front door of the suite, not the bedroom.

  Platt grabbed his shirt from a nearby chair but didn’t bother with his shoes. It was probably just hotel staff. He noticed the telephone’s flashing red button. He didn’t remember the phone ringing but he could have missed it.

  By the time he opened the door he had his shirt on but not buttoned. The black man in a green polo shirt looked puzzled.

  “Yes?” Platt asked.

  The man stared at him, backed up and checked the number beside the doorframe, then looked over Platt’s shoulder to get a glimpse inside. Not much success. He was shorter than Platt.

  “I’m looking for Maggie O’Dell.”

  “Are you from the hotel?”

  “Ah, no. Homeland Security.”

  “Door-to-door check?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Do we need to leave?”

  “Is Maggie here?”

  “Charlie?” Maggie called from behind Platt.

  With a glance over his shoulder, Platt saw her come out of the bathroom. Her hair was wet and she wore one of the hotel’s white robes. The fresh scent of soap wafted through the entry and as distracting as it was, Platt couldn’t take his eyes off Charlie, whose eyes had widened. His jaw hung open. It was classic.

  “I’m sorry,” Platt said. “You’re Charlie Wurth. When you said Homeland Security, I thought you were here to tell us that we had to leave. I’m Benjamin Platt.”

  He held his hand out and waited while Wurth processed the information, still trying to figure out what he was seeing. Platt spotted the paper bag in Wurth’s right hand. He could smell the pastry as Wurth moved it to his left hand in order to shake.

  “Come on in, Charlie. Keep Ben company while I put on some clothes,” Maggie told him. “I overslept.” Then to Platt and with a smile, she said, “I actually slept.”

  “I’ll bet,” Platt heard Wurth say, but under his breath.

  Maggie was already headed through the bedroom door and Platt swore he saw a bit of a skip in her step.

  CHAPTER 47

  The sky looked as dark and murky as Scott felt. He’d taken a long shower because for some reason he could smell decomposing flesh almost as if the scent had been smeared on his skin. He put on crisply pressed trousers and shirt. No tie today. He ate breakfast with Trish. She’d prepared blueberry pancakes and sausage. She was in a good mood. Go figure.

  As soon as he got in his Lexus he could smell it again. There was no mistaking the scent of decomposing flesh.

  At the first intersection he pulled to the side of the road, got out, and started searching the vehicle. A splash of gasoline and a smudge of oil dirtied the plastic he’d laid in back before transporting the generator, but there was nothing else. He kept his vehicles as spotless as the funeral home.

  He tried to ignore the smell. Get his mind off it. He turned up the local radio station.

  “Isaac’s coming, folks. The Weather Channel’s Jim Cantore was reporting from our own Pensacola Beach this morning. The eye of the storm is about a hundred miles away. Winds at 160 miles per hour. That’s a cat 5, and this thing is in warm open water with nothing to slow it down. In fact, it’s picked up speed and is moving at fourteen miles per hour instead of ten. That means it’ll be sooner than later. We’ll be seeing the outer bands about noon and this monster will be making landfall sometime tonight.

  “City commissioners for Escambia and Santa Rosa counties have declared a state of emergency and shelters across both counties will start opening this morning. I’ll be giving you their locations in just a minute. Folks, we’re getting a big piece of this storm, and it’s looking more and more like we’ll be in the northeast quadrant. That means it’ll be bad. Really bad.”

  Scott shut it off. Hell, at least he’d be ready. He was exhausted but he was back in control.

  Earlier he’d received yet another phone call from Uncle Mel’s family. Now they wanted to wait until after the storm.

  “Is that okay? Will he be okay?” they had asked, but Scott could tell Uncle Mel was no longer their priority. There was a storm to survive. Funny, he thought, how the dead are forgotten when the business of living distracts us.

  At least they weren’t forgotten by Joe Black. Again, there were no signs of a vehicle but Scott could tell from the alarm system that Joe was still inside. Where the hell did he park? There was an apartment parking lot on the other side of the trees, but he’d have to walk through the brush and tall grass that separated the two properties. And when did he start dumping his coolers in Scott’s shed? Liz seemed just a little too interested. Is that where he had first started smelling decomposing flesh? Had Liz smelled it last night?

  Scott walked through the back door and the scent was even stronger. He caught himself cringing. What had Joe left for him today?

  “Hey, buddy.” Joe came down the hall from the walk-in refrigerator.

  Scott noticed empty hands and no splatters. He restrained a sigh of relief. Instead he glanced into the embalming room. Clean. So what was he smelling?

  “I probably won’t see you until after the storm,” Joe told him, slinging a backpack over his shoulder.

  “Making a run for it?”

  Joe laughed. “You might say that. I have one more pickup and then I want to get my boat out of harm’s way.”

  “You have a boat?”

  “I told you that.”

  But Scott knew he hadn’t. He would have remembered.

  “Makes it a lot easier,” Joe explained, “to get around afterward when the roads and bridges are out. But I need to move and dock it at least a hundred miles west of here.”

  “Biloxi? New Orleans?”

  “In that vicinity.”

  “I just heard it’s moving in a lot faster than they predicted.”

  “Gotta go, then. I’ll see you in a couple of days.”

  Scott watched him leave and found himself wishing Joe had invited him along. Then he started hunting for the source of the smell. At one point he even sniffed himself, pulling his shirt open and taking an inside whiff. He checked the walk-in refrigerator but the scent didn’t grow stronger. Maybe once he got to work he would be able to ignore it.

  He rolled out a stainless-steel table with the cardboard box containing Uncle Mel. He still needed to embalm the guy. Just as well do it before the storm. He’d sold the family an expensive casket even though they didn’t want it open for the memorial. Actually the expensive sell was always easier with families that didn’t want a traditional viewing. It was their way of compensating for their guilt of not wanting to take one last look.

  Scott arranged everything he needed in the embalming room. He gowned up and opened the cardboard box, ready to begin.

  “That son of a bitch.”

  Uncle Mel’s knees were cut away and both of his hands were missing.

  CHAPTER 48

  From the bedroom balcony Maggie could see that things had changed drastically overnight. The waves churned higher, crashing farther up the shore. The sky had turned into a thick gray ceiling, several layers of clouds, low and moving, each layer at its own speed. Not even noon and the heat was stifling, the humidity oppressive. She had just dried her hair and it was already damp. Her shirt stuck to her skin.

  She found Platt and Wurth in the suite’s living room, eating doughnuts. One of them had made coffee and the scent filled the room. Before she had a chance to sit, Platt was up getting her a Diet Pepsi from the minibar while Wurth unwrapped a chocolat
e doughnut to set in front of her. She held back a smile as well as any comments about the men waiting on her.

  “Outer bands may start hitting the area as soon as one this afternoon,” Wurth updated her. “Landfall is definitely gonna be tonight. Probably after dark.”

  “Isn’t that sooner than predicted?” Maggie asked.

  “Yep. Storm’s picked up a little speed. No more islands to slow it down.”

  Platt had stayed drinking his coffee near the desk and now something distracted him. Maggie saw him pick up the plastic bag she’d left on top of her file folders. He was fingering the scrap of metal inside.

  “That’s what the coroner plucked out of the severed foot,” she told him, looking at the doughnut in front of her.

  She loved chocolate doughnuts but she hadn’t eaten one since that day at Quantico, less than a year ago, when a box of doughnuts had been delivered with a terrorist’s note at the bottom. Charlie Wurth couldn’t possibly have known when he brought over breakfast that his gesture would threaten to crack the seal on one of her leaky compartments. She broke the doughnut in half and took a bite.

  “Oh, I almost forgot,” Platt said, pointing at the hotel phone.

  “There’s a message for you.”

  She looked at Wurth.

  “Not me. I have your cell phone. Though I understand you probably weren’t answering that last night, either.”

  She wanted to laugh at his insinuation but he wasn’t joking. No raised eyebrow. No typical grin. Was it possible Charlie Wurth was jealous? She shook the thought out of her mind, took another bite of the doughnut, pleased that it actually tasted good to her. Then she went to check the message.

  “It’s Liz Bailey,” she told the men. “I’m going to call her back on my cell.” She left them to retrieve the phone in the bedroom. She hadn’t heard a ring last night. She really must have slept hard.

  Before she could dial, her cell phone rang.

  “This is Maggie O’Dell.”

  Hesitation, then a woman’s voice. “FBI agent O’Dell?”

  “Yes.”

  “I was given your number by the Escambia County sheriff.” A pause. “About my husband. I’m sorry I didn’t even tell you my name. I’m Irene Coffland.”

  The torso’s wife, Maggie thought before she could stop herself. But after a while it was hard to not think in those terms.

  “Mrs. Coffland, thank you for calling me.”

  “I don’t know what I can tell you that would be of help.”

  Maggie wasn’t sure what Sheriff Clayton had told Mrs. Coffland. She had to know, however, that they had only a piece of him. Tough news for anyone to receive. Maggie proceeded gently.

  “Can you tell me what you remember about the last few minutes before your husband disappeared?”

  “I’ve already told the local authorities as well as your sheriff.”

  “I’m sorry. Look, you really don’t have to talk to me. I know this isn’t easy.” Maggie knew that if Mrs. Coffland called her, she wanted to talk. Sometimes when you told people they don’t have to, they suddenly wanted to tell you. A cheap bit of reverse psychology.

  “We had driven back to our home. After the hurricane. Things were a mess. We were worried about looters.” The woman sighed. “What a thing to worry about. Things. They’re just things. We were cleaning up. Vince had just started the generator. It was getting dark. Our neighbors had returned and we were all in our backyard when we heard a boat in the bay.”

  “A boat?”

  “Yes. The men thought it must be looters. Vince told us to stay put. He got his rifle and headed down to the water.”

  “Alone?”

  “My husband was a retired police chief. Forced retirement after his heart attack. There was no question he could handle himself. And he wanted Henry to stay with Katherine and me. Everything had been so quiet but the generator made an awful lot of noise. We heard some shouts but they sounded like greetings. Definitely not a ruckus. We relaxed a bit. Thought it might just be another neighbor. Maybe the authorities. He was gone ten, fifteen minutes. Then we heard the boat start up again. We waited for Vince.”

  Another pause, this time Maggie could hear her clearing her throat. “He never came back. We looked all night. Called the local authorities. After the storm they had too many other important things to do. So many people were unaccounted for. My husband simply became just one of dozens.”

  “Did you ever find out if the authorities had a boat in your area?”

  “No, they said they didn’t. But I will tell you this, Vince would have fought hard if he thought whoever was on that boat was a threat to any of us.”

  “I’m not sure I understand what you’re saying, Mrs. Coffland.”

  “We heard what sounded like greetings. An amicable exchange. Vince either recognized the person on that boat or he didn’t feel threatened by him.”

  As Maggie ended the call she considered what she’d learned. Vince Coffland’s killer had access to or owned a boat. Probably one small enough to trailer. That would explain how Vince Coffland disappeared off the Atlantic coast and ended up in the Gulf of Mexico. She could check the Pensacola Beach marina, though without a name or even a description of the boat she knew she wouldn’t have much luck.

  She punched in the number for Liz Bailey as she heard a phone ring in the other room. Platt answered his phone as Liz Bailey answered Maggie.

  “Hello.”

  “Liz, it’s Maggie O’Dell. Sorry for not getting back to you sooner.”

  “Actually, I’m not sure if this means anything but I saw an exact replica of that fishing cooler we found in the Gulf.”

  “Wasn’t it pretty standard? Especially down here.”

  “It wasn’t just the cooler. It had the exact same tie-down.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Looked like it. Same blue-and-yellow strands. Same thickness.”

  Maggie hesitated. Could it be a coincidence? Her old boss, Assistant Director Cunningham, used to tell her there was no such thing as a coincidence. There was a very good chance that the person who owned this cooler also owned the one found in the Gulf.

  Before Maggie responded, Liz continued. “What sort of got my attention was where I saw it. You know, considering what we found inside the first one.”

  “Where exactly did you see it?”

  “In a shed back behind a funeral home.”

  CHAPTER 49

  Platt answered his phone, still focused on the bit of metal inside the plastic bag.

  “Colonel Platt, this is Captain Ganz.”

  Platt stopped. “Captain Ganz.” He couldn’t think of anything else to say to the man. Fortunately he didn’t have to reply.

  “I owe you an apology, Colonel.”

  Silence. Perhaps he wanted it to sink in.

  “You found something?”

  “The other two soldiers who died last week also show traces of Clostridium sordellii. We’ve started testing the other patients. So far, nine out of ten have the bacterium. We’re still not quite sure where or how it got into their bodies, but you must be right. It has to be through the bone grafts or bone paste. Right now I need to save these soldiers.”

  More silence. Platt waited it out.

  “Ben, I’ve been a jackass in the way I treated you. If you haven’t left Pensacola yet, would you consider coming back and giving me a hand?”

  Platt didn’t hesitate. “Of course.”

  “This hurricane won’t be a party. We have generators but not for everything.”

  “I understand.”

  “And we don’t have the antibiotics we need.”

  “This isn’t your ordinary bacterium.”

  “Tell me where you are and I’ll have my driver pick you up.”

  “He can pick me up at the Hilton. Have him ring me twice when he gets here and I’ll meet him in the lobby.”

  Platt got off the phone just as Maggie returned.

  “You’re leaving. Going back.” She said
it with no hint of surprise.

  “Yes. Sometimes there’s no pleasure in being right.”

  “You got that right,” Wurth said, getting up, ready to leave.

  “I’m going to stay on the beach this morning,” Maggie told Wurth.

  “That’s not a good idea.” He looked at Platt. “Tell her that’s not a good idea.”

  Platt shrugged. “What makes you think she’ll listen to me?”

  “They’ll be closing Bob Sykes Bridge,” Wurth told her, “and the Navarre Bridge at one o’clock. There’s no other way off Pensacola Beach.”

  “It’s okay. Liz Bailey promised I’d have a way off.”

  “And what, might I ask, is it you hope to accomplish by staying?”

  “Come on, Charlie, you brought me down here for a case. You can’t blame me for wanting to do some footwork.”

  “Speaking of foot”—Platt held out the plastic bag with the metal bit—“I think I know what this is. It’s shrapnel.”

  Maggie took the bag and looked at it again. “As in shrapnel from an explosive?”

  He nodded. “I’ve removed my share of this stuff from soldiers in Afghanistan. I’ve been staring at this piece for the last hour trying to figure out how it ended up in a severed foot found in the Gulf of Mexico.”

  CHAPTER 50

  Liz came down the steps from her bedroom and dropped her duffel bag in the foyer. She was about to tap on the master-bedroom door to say goodbye to her dad when she heard him in the kitchen. She found him down on his knees, rummaging through one of the lower cabinets. He had food packages scattered on the floor around him. And more surprising, he was dressed in his navy jumpsuit, his canteen uniform.

  “Dad, what are you doing?”

  “Oh, hello, darlin’. I didn’t wake you, did I?”