by Ethan Cross
“Can you crack it?”
Joey gave a throaty laugh that ended in a snort. “That’s funny. There’s no way to crack it. At least not with the resources I have.”
“So it’s worthless.”
“Not entirely. There is something strange about the way the encryption is implemented. Normally when using a system like this, you’d encrypt the whole drive or just certain files that are sensitive. But on this baby, someone left the directory structure intact and encrypted all the files within into a single archive. So the entire top-level structure is readable.”
Munroe rubbed his temples. “Joey, what you just said makes about as much sense to me as a driver’s seat on a wheelbarrow.”
“Huh?”
“What does that mean? And why would it be that way?”
“I don’t know why anyone would structure it that way. But what it means is that we at least have some clue as to what info the drive contains.” Munroe heard the clicking of Joey’s keyboard. “The directory names are Compound 119, John Corrigan, Money Transfers, Site B, Trial Results, and Wyatt Randall.”
Now things were starting to make sense to Munroe. Easton wouldn’t have hidden a drive for him if he couldn’t learn anything from it. But the General was also likely worried about someone else finding the drive and accessing the sensitive information that it contained. The directory structure was left as a list of leads for Munroe to follow.
“That’s good, Joey. I need you to find out anything and everything you can about Wyatt Randall, Compound 119, and Site B.”
“What about John Corrigan?”
“I already have an idea about that one. I need you to book Gerald and I on the next flight to Leavenworth, Kansas. We’re going to pay John Corrigan a visit.”
Gerald said, “You know the guy?”
“I’ve heard of him. He’s currently on death row, and I believe his execution is scheduled for sometime within the next week. So the clock is ticking.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
Deacon Munroe had visited the United States Disciplinary Barracks many times, although his visual memories of the place were from the original facility. The stone wall and brick castle had been replaced by a new building that he had been told was indistinguishable at first glance from the campus of a high school. But the USDB that he remembered and still held in his mind was a hard place with a medieval ambiance, well-worn stone, and brick walls. The original castle used prisoners for its construction during an age when hard labor meant exactly that.
They had called ahead and arranged a meeting with Sergeant John Corrigan, a former Recon Marine team leader awaiting execution for the murders of his wife and two children. Munroe and Gerald arrived in the visitor’s area before Corrigan. Munroe could guess at his surroundings based upon the echoes of the room and the things he could feel. A cheap plastic laminate formed the meeting table and chairs. Tiled floors. Drywall. He could tell by the way sounds carried within the space. Two vending machines hummed in one corner. The modern institutional feel of a cafeteria, nothing like the old castle that kept appearing in his mind.
He heard the rattle of wrist and ankle chains as a guard ushered Corrigan into the room and forced the prisoner into a seat across the table from them. “Hello, Sergeant Corrigan. My name is Deacon Munroe. I’m a special investigator with the DCIS. The gentleman with me is my partner, Agent Dixon.”
“It’s Inmate Corrigan now. I haven’t been a Marine or a sergeant for some time.” Corrigan’s voice was strong and calm. He spoke the words as facts without a trace of bitterness.
“Once a Marine always a Marine, or so I’ve heard. I’ve also heard that General Easton visited you recently. I’d like to know what you and the commandant discussed.”
“I was very sorry to hear what happened to him. He was a good man.”
“He was my friend. And I think that you may have information relating to who killed him.”
Corrigan adjusted his chains and shifted in his seat. “I heard that he killed his wife and then himself. What could that possibly have to do with me?”
“The facts on the case are a bit blurry. Knowing the nature of your relationship to the commandant may help bring some of that into focus. So, please, what was it that you and he discussed?”
“It was a private matter.”
“Regarding?”
“Things that are private.”
Munroe had always excelled in questioning witnesses and suspects, but there was much to the job that relied on watching for nonverbal and subconscious cues of the person in the hot seat. He could no longer tell whether or not Corrigan was making eye contact. Whether or not he looked away when asked about a certain subject, and in what direction he looked. There was so much to be learned from a subject’s facial expressions, postures, and head motions. Munroe couldn’t use those things against Corrigan, but the sergeant’s nervous shifting in his seat and the twisting of his chains were things that Munroe could hear. And they told him that this whole conversation was making Corrigan very uncomfortable.
“It just seems very strange to me, Sergeant Corrigan,” Munroe said, purposely using Corrigan’s old title to subconsciously invoke the former soldier’s sense of duty. “Why would the highest ranking Marine in the country fly all the way out here to have a pow-wow with you? I’ve already spoken with your lawyer. He said that you’ve waved your rights to appeals and want the execution to move forward. He didn’t know anything about these private matters that you were discussing with the General.”
Corrigan’s leg shook at a steady rhythm beneath the table. “Like I said, it was between me and the Commandant.”
“Did the visits relate to Wyatt Randall?”
Corrigan’s leg stopped shaking. “I don’t know who that is.”
“Of course you don’t. My associate has some photos that we’d like you to look at.” Munroe had discussed this part of the questioning with Gerald, and following his instructions, he heard Gerald slap the photos of Easton’s crime scene in front of Corrigan one after the other, only allowing a brief second’s view of each. He heard Corrigan’s breathing change with each grisly image.
Then came the moment that Munroe was anticipating. The sound of Corrigan’s chains jumped, and he slammed the table, prompting the guard waiting by the door to intervene.
Gerald stopped the guard from restraining Corrigan. “It’s okay. We’re fine,” the big black man said in his deep bass.
“What the hell kind of game are you playing?” Corrigan said with venom in his voice.
Munroe had purposely mixed in a photo of Corrigan’s family that Annabelle had acquired for them, one displaying four smiling faces, the kind sent out as a Christmas card. Gerald pulled the pictures away and said, “Sorry. That must have gotten mixed in.”
“Why would you have that picture?”
Munroe answered, “It must have come from your file. We’ve been looking over it. I think that these cases are related somehow. I think General Easton may have been killed because he received some information about your case. I need you to fill in the gaps and help me stop whoever did this.”
“You can’t make me say anything. If you have any other questions, they can go through my lawyer.”
“You have nothing to lose, Sergeant. Easton has kids and grandkids out there right now that are preparing to put him in the ground. It’s your duty as a soldier and a man to help ensure that no one else gets hurt.”
“That’s right. I don’t want anyone else to get hurt. I’ve got enough blood on my hands.” Munroe heard the rattling of Corrigan’s chains and the sliding of his chair on the tile floor as the man stood. “Guard. I’m ready to go back to my cell.”
CHAPTER NINE
Four white walls, a gray concrete floor, a stainless steel toilet/sink/drinking fountain combination, a gray metal desk with a built-in oval stool bolted to the wall, and a small metal c
ot. This had been John Corrigan’s entire world since being convicted of murder and sentenced to death by lethal injection. He had resigned himself to an almost monastic existence with only a dozen books and a single picture occupying his cell.
The photo was the last family portrait that he had taken with his loved ones. It matched the one that the investigator from DCIS had showed him. His wife, Debbie, and two kids, Mark and Melissa, wore all pink in the picture. He wore a black button-down shirt and slacks. Debbie had bought him a pink shirt to match the rest of the family, but he refused to wear it. It wasn’t some kind of macho, masculine insecurity thing; he just didn’t like the color. At least that’s what he had told her. As he looked at the photo now, it seemed as if he was a darkness that had invaded the happy brightness of their lives.
Maybe that was accurate.
His hand strayed to their faces, tracing the lines of their smiles and the outlines of their features. Mark had Debbie’s hair and eyes and his strong jaw and dimpled chin. Melissa had his blond hair color and eyes, but her chubby cheeks and huge toothy smile didn’t resemble either of her parents. Maybe she was just an amalgam of both or her baby fat hadn’t melted away enough to let her future looks shine through. He would never know. He often tried to imagine what the kids would have looked like if their lives hadn’t been cut short and wished that he possessed some kind of artistic ability that would have allowed him to create aged versions of them. Then he could have stared at those pictures and tried to convince himself that the people from the drawings were alive in the world somewhere and would grow up happy and safe.
He had been a good father, or at least, he had done his best when circumstances allowed him to be there. Unfortunately, he was always off somewhere fighting in places with names that his kids couldn’t even pronounce. “When will you be back from Africanastan, Daddy?” his daughter had said in her tiny, high-pitched voice. He had missed most of their childhoods, but before their deaths, a possible opportunity had presented itself for him to become an instructor at MCB Quantico. They could have moved to Virginia, and he would have been home and safe every night. They could have been together and happy.
The tears rained down his cheeks, and he pressed his eyes shut. Random images of his family floated through his mind. His wife on their wedding night. His son at a soccer game. His little girl running down a hill covered with flowers on her grandparents’ farm. A rainbow-colored ribbon in the girl’s hair flapped in the wind and wrapped around her face as she picked one of the flowers and spun in a circle.
He opened his eyes and wiped away the tears. It was his fault that they were dead. He should have done as he was told, and then he should have kept his mouth shut. Now, General Easton and his wife had suffered a similar fate, and he suspected that he might not even live long enough for the executioner to stick a needle in his arm.
No one liked loose ends, and he was a loose end that had begun to fray and unravel. The General learned the truth and died because of it, and now this DCIS investigator might share the same fate just for speaking with him. That was if the man who had visited him was actually who he claimed to be. Corrigan was never sure who he could trust. It wouldn’t have been the first time that they had tested him in order to make a point about what would happen if he talked. His wife and kids may have been gone, but he still had his parents and a younger sister. He still had more they could take if he didn’t do as he was told.
John Corrigan looked down at his hands. He couldn’t see the blood, but he could still feel the stain.
CHAPTER TEN
Deacon Munroe wanted to slam his fist down on the dashboard of the Lincoln Town Car, but he restrained himself. His father, the esteemed Senator Robert Munroe, had drilled into him since he was a small child that brash displays of anger and raised voices were for the uneducated and a sign of poor breeding. Robert Munroe had practiced what he preached. Deacon had seldom heard his father raise his voice, despite Robert being one of the most ruthless and cruel men that Deacon had ever met.
The hum of the roadway told him that they had left the streets surrounding the USDB and were back on the highway, heading to the airport. The entire trip had been a waste. John Corrigan clearly wasn’t going to talk. And how could he threaten or convince a man that was days away from being executed?
“We need to find out more about Corrigan,” Munroe said. “I’m betting that he has enough knowledge to blow this case wide open, but we have to find a way to get through to him. Talk to his old friends, his family. Maybe he’s being threatened in some way. We could also track down the Marines that served on his team. Maybe one of them would be able to convince him to open up.”
“Great. More plane rides,” Gerald said.
“After all these years, I figured that you’d eventually get used to flying. Statistically, it is the safest way to travel.”
“For birds maybe,” Gerald said under his breath. “Deac, I wanted to apologize for bringing up Beth yesterday. I know that you don’t like to talk about her.”
Munroe hesitated. She’d been dead for nearly ten years, but his breath still caught in his throat when he heard her name.
“It’s fine. You were right. It has been a long time since she passed. I should be able to talk about her, and she would want me to move on. She was that way, always thinking of others first. But it still doesn’t feel right. Besides, next to you, Annabelle is my oldest friend. Even if things were different, I wouldn’t want to screw that up. And your sister deserves better than me.”
Gerald was quiet a moment. A Led Zeppelin song came on the radio, barely audible over the rumbling of the engine and the hum of the tires. Robert Plant crooned about going to California. “You remember that time when your daddy caught Annabelle in his bedroom, trying on your mother’s jewelry?” Gerald said. “He was fixin’ to take a willow branch to her, but you stepped in. I thought your daddy was the scariest man alive. Could not believe that you stood up to him. I don’t think he could believe it either. Real calm, he said that you would have to take her place. And you did. You show me another guy that would do something like that for my little sister.”
“I’m not that kid anymore. Not for a long time. Not even half of what he was.”
“Deac, let me tell you, life is—”
Something struck their car so fast and hard that Munroe felt like he had been smited by the hand of God himself. His mind didn’t even register what was happening. A cacophony of sound and sensation overwhelmed him. Metal screeched and buckled. Tires squealed. Gerald screamed. The world spun upside down. Breaking glass. The pain was everywhere, all-encompassing, consuming him. He felt it deep in his bones.
When the car finally came to a stop, he found himself hanging upside down by his seat belt. Only then did he realize that they had just been in a car accident, but his thoughts were still cloudy and incoherent. He fought to get his bearings.
The next sound brought the world into focus, his primal survival instincts kicking in at the loud crack of gunfire. His hands scrambled for the belt release, and finding it, he fell onto the car’s roof. Glass and debris cut into his face and palms.
Large hands grabbed him, and he fought against them at first until he recognized Gerald’s voice. “Come on! You have to get out of there!”
Another bullet ricocheted of the car’s metal undercarriage. Gerald yanked him free from the wreckage like a rag doll and shoved him violently into a sitting position next to the car. He fought to catch his breath and slow his heart. “What…”
The crack of gunshots from just over his shoulder stung his ears. “Stay down!” Gerald yelled. More shots followed the words.
Munroe felt helpless and afraid. Someone was trying to kill them, and he was nothing but dead weight. More of a hindrance than a help.
The opposing shots came from somewhere above them, and so he suspected that they had rolled down a hill of some kind, perhaps into a field or yard. His ha
nd touched the ground, and he felt grass beneath his palms. His ears strained to hear the sound of sirens and help approaching, but he heard nothing beyond the gunfire and a high-pitched ringing. He could feel the concussion of each shot, knew from the distinctive reports that there were two attackers.
More bullets struck the car. But this time the sound had changed. Instead of the individual cracks of a pistol, he heard the rat-tat-tat of a fully automatic submachine gun.
Gerald cried out and dropped to the ground beside him. He could hear the change in Gerald’s breathing. Each breath was a harsh, pain-filled gasp. His shaking hands scrambled over his friend’s body. He knew that Gerald had been severely wounded even before he felt the ragged, bloody hole in his friend’s chest. He applied pressure to the wound to stop the flow of blood. “What can I do?” he said.
Gerald replied with a gurgling choke, and Munroe realized that Gerald’s lung had been punctured. His best friend was drowning in his own blood.
Munroe tried harder to cover the wound, but the blood flowed out around his fingers. His mind fought for a solution. How could he treat a gunshot wound that had penetrated a lung? He thought back on his training in basic first aid. It seemed like there was something that could be done with the finger of a rubber glove and a needle, but he had neither of those things.
He felt so helpless. His best friend was dying in his arms, and he could do nothing to save him. Gerald needed a hospital, an ambulance, paramedics. Munroe felt his pockets for his cell phone but quickly realized that it must have fallen out in the crash.
