Without Measure: A Jack Widow Thriller

by Scott Blade

  “Turik was a good Marine. He killed his friend in cold blood. It doesn’t make sense.”

  Romey said, “It’s even more complicated than that.”

  I asked, “How so?”

  “Turik double-tapped Carl. Like he was the specific target.”

  I paused a long beat and sat back in the chair. I stared up at the ceiling. They seemed to be waiting for me to speak.

  Finally, I said, “I have to admit that it’s unusual. Mass shootings are common, however. This one falls under the same pretenses. Basically.”

  “Widow, the Fort Hood shooting, the Dallas thing, and the Orlando thing all have something in common. The shooters all had a past of mental instability.”

  “Not all of them.”

  Kelly said, “Yes, all of them.”

  “Not true. Some were religious-based shootings. And you forgot to mention Fort Hood had more than one shooting. Some shootings have been over jealousy. People will do all kinds of things.”

  They didn’t respond to that. Romey just said, “I guess we’re going to let you go, Mr. Widow.”

  I nodded.

  Without another word, they motioned for me to stand up. Kelly opened the door and Romey picked up her phone, switched off the recorder, and scooped up the tablet. She said, “Follow me.”

  I followed her back down the hallway past the three rooms to the front. I wasn’t going to a cell, which was a new one for me.

  Romey took me to the front and stood with me while we waited for Kelly, who disappeared down one of the offset rooms. He came back with my passport and handed it to me.

  Romey said, “Widow, this is an unusual set of circumstances. I’d like for you to stay in town for another day or so. Just in case I need to speak with you again.”

  I nodded.

  “Of course, I can’t make you. You’re a civilian now. But I’d like for you to. I’m sorry we dragged you into this.”

  I said, “Why’s there no media?”

  “What?”

  “This is like Fort Hood, right? There’s no media outside the gate? This seems like national news to me.”

  “The story hasn’t broken yet. We’re hoping to close this case fast, before that happens.”

  I nodded. It was amazing that the story hadn’t broke yet. Guess that’s one of the perks of having a half-forgotten military base in the middle of California wilderness.

  I said, “Turik killed five people. Killed himself. Nothing more to it than that. I’d say it’s done. It sounds that simple.”

  I said it, but I felt like she was holding back information. It was her case, not my business.

  She nodded and said, “We don’t want to end up like Orlando.”

  I looked down at the floor for a second, just noticed that her shoes were a little mud-covered. She must’ve been walking the yard around Turik’s body. Then I remembered numerous occasions where I had been in her shoes. Not exactly the same, but close. I’d scoured around crime scenes and dead bodies, too many to recall, which was a good thing in a way, because the faces were blurred in my memory. When I was new to NCIS, I’d investigated some murders before, and I remembered them all back then. Now, they faded away like it was all a bad dream.

  Then I stopped, tilted my head, and asked, “Orlando? Don’t you mean Fort Hood? That was the last military base shooting. And was similar to this.”

  She shook her head and said, “No. Not Hood. That wasn’t like this. I’m worried about mass panic. Like Orlando.”

  “I don’t get your meaning?”

  She looked up at my face and said, “Isn’t it obvious?”

  I shrugged.

  “Widow, Captain Turik was a Muslim.”

  “So?”

  “Orlando was done by a Muslim who claimed to be a part of ISIS,” she said.

  “Was there panic after that?”

  She looked at me with big, stunned eyes. She said, “For a guy who can crack codes by watching my typing, you sure are dense.”

  I shrugged. I’d heard that before. I said, “No one’s perfect.”

  “Of course, there was panic, but that’ll be nothing compared to what will happen here.”

  “How so?”

  “Turik was Muslim. If there’s an ISIS connection, the people here and all across the country will panic.”

  “Wasn’t the guy from Orlando not connected to ISIS? Not really?”

  “He operated on his own, but that didn’t matter. No one cares about that. He was an ISIS fighter, whether he ever set foot in the Middle East or not. You know that. No one will care.”

  I nodded and asked, “What kind of panic are we talking about here? Hamber is a small place.”

  She said, “It’s not just Hamber. This’ll be national news. Small towns everywhere will panic. The fact that he was a decorated soldier won’t matter. People will only talk about an ISIS fighter sneaking his way into the top ranks of the military. At best, they’ll be suspicious of all of our men and women in the service who are Arab. Worst case, they’ll suspect every brown person, and I don’t even want to think about what could happen. This is unprecedented.”

  I nodded and said, “I get your point, but you gotta give the public some credit. They aren’t dumb.”

  She nodded and said, “Thank you. I’m sorry that I thought you were a part of a conspiracy to assassinate five Marines.”

  She smiled. She had a dark sense of humor, which was an asset among cops. Humor helps to fight off the horror that comes with the territory, keeps cops sane.

  I smiled back, said, “I’ll be at the hotel for at least one more day.”

  She nodded. We shook hands and then she asked, “Am I supposed to salute you?”

  “Not in the military anymore.”

  “Not going to tell me your rank when you left?”

  “Still classified.”

  She smiled and we shook hands. She had a good grip. Her hands were soft in places and a little rough all at the same time.

  I asked, “Can I get a ride back?”

  “Kelly’ll take you.”

  I nodded, a little disappointed. I had hoped that she would take me. Maybe give us a chance to talk more.

  I stopped and said, “Listen, there was something I didn’t tell you.”

  She looked at me.

  “There was another guy in the diner.”

  “We know. There were a few other people. You’re the only suspicious one.”

  “No. I wasn’t.”

  She stayed quiet.

  “There was a giant. He came in after Turik and left after Turik left.”

  “No one mentioned him to us.”

  “I don’t know. He was there. Ask Karen, the waitress. She served him. No way would she forget him. He was huge.”

  She looked at me and asked, “Bigger than you?”

  “Oh yeah. At least six inches taller.”

  “Anything else unusual about him?”

  “Nope. Just a big guy.”

  She asked, “Age?”

  “I’d guess maybe forties.”

  Kelly shrugged and said, “I never saw anyone like that.”

  “That’s all I saw.”

  Romey said, “Listen, you remember anything else or want to help us, give us a call.”

  She signaled the desk sergeant to buzz me back through the security door. I went through, didn’t look back, but I heard Romey say, “Just wait there for Kelly.”

  Which I did.

  CHAPTER 12

  KELLY CAME around the front of the building in the Military Police Mustang and stopped at the sidewalk. He leaned out the window and said, “Come on.”

  I nodded, walked to the car. I wasn’t sure if it was the same one that they had brought me in or not. They all looked the same and I hadn’t paid attention to the car number, which was clearly marked on each door in blue font.

  I started to open the rear door, but he said, “Nah, get in the front.” Apparently, the bad cop act was over now and we were buddies.

 
; I went around the trunk and opened the passenger door, dumped myself down on the seat. Kelly accelerated and reversed the course that we came in on, only instead of turning to the gate at the main intersection, he swung a right and then a left and stopped in front of the command building. Which was a two-story, square thing made of red brick with obtuse corners, like the pentagon, only it wasn’t five-sided. I wasn’t sure how many sides it had from just looking at the front.

  The street was packed with more armed military police. Looked like two units. One was a group of five Marines, each with the same armor and hardware. They each stood in a table guard position, which was a four-point position. Each armed Marine stood at one of four opposite corners, with one guy who patrolled the perimeter.

  The second unit was all nestled on each end of the street, like a checkpoint. We drove through the southern checkpoint without having to stop and talk to the guards.

  Kelly drove up next to the command building and stopped the car in the middle of the street. He looked across me and asked, “See that building?”

  I nodded. My eyes felt heavier than ever. I only wanted to go back to the hotel and sleep a lifetime.

  “That’s HQ. Two hours ago, Captain Turik walked in there, checked in with security. He signed himself in. He walked up the stairs, entered Commander Carl’s office just as calm as could be. He took out his M45 service weapon and shot Carl right in the head, twice. The desk sergeant, a nice woman, entered the room and he shot her in the chest.”

  I kept staring at the building like I could see the inside, which I couldn’t. But I closed my eyes and listened, imagined the scene.

  Kelly said, “Turik entered the hall and shot the next two people he saw after that. Both unarmed. Both completely innocent. Both friends of mine.”

  I opened my eyes and looked back at him, stayed quiet.

  Kelly said, “Do you know what he did next?”

  “He shot the security guy?”

  He nodded and said, “He waited at the top of the stairs, against the wall. He shot the security guard right in the back. Like a coward.”

  “Where did he shoot himself?”

  Kelly pointed at the grass, center of the yard. A long line of police tape was staked in the ground at four corners. The whole area was about five-by-five feet, twenty-five feet squared. There was a puddle of dried-up blood in the snow and grass. I stared at it.

  “We got here too late. Our guys pulled up and jumped out. He pulled the trigger right in front of them. Just blew his own brains out all over the place.”

  “Your guys moved his body fast.”

  “No reason to keep it there. They saw him do it. We moved all of them already.”

  “Where?”

  “Hell, they’re in the morgue.”

  “Your hospital has a morgue?”

  “Of course.”

  I said, “What about forensics?”

  “We got a team in there now, but they aren’t going to tell us nothing we don’t already know.”

  I paused a beat and asked, “You got video?”

  “We don’t have any of him killing anyone, just entering and leaving the building.”

  I said, “Why no surveillance cameras inside?”

  “It’s a command building. Why would we?”

  I nodded, said, “It still sounds clear-cut.”

  “Yeah, all but the why.”

  I paused again and looked back at the road ahead, wasn’t sure if I should get involved. I had no reason. But I asked, “He got a wife? Kids?”

  Kelly put his gloved hand on the steering wheel and started to accelerate, slowly. He said, “No kids.”

  “Wife?” I asked again.

  “Yeah, but…” he paused.

  “But what?”

  “We can’t find her.”

  The car went forward and we passed back through the checkpoint and headed out the gate. We had to stop, just like before and the guard on the exit side came to the window, saw Kelly and saluted. With one hand on his rifle, he used his free one to wave us forward.

  He turned to the other guards and called out, “Vehicle leaving.” Which was weird to me. I wasn’t used to being announced when I was leaving a place, and I had been on a lot of bases, more than I could remember.

  I said, “That doesn’t mean anything. Not necessarily.”

  Kelly was silent until we were past the gate and back on the drive back to town.

  I asked, “You guys think she knew about it?”

  “No. We think she’s dead.”

  “You check his house?”

  “Of course. We entered. Searched every square inch of it. We can’t find her.”

  “Still that doesn’t mean that’s she’s dead.”

  “Turik shot five people,” he said and glanced over at me, turned back to the street. He said, “Then he killed himself. That’s seven rounds spent.”

  I nodded.

  “His weapon is missing eight rounds. One is missing. Unaccounted for. He shot it somewhere.”

  I stayed quiet.

  CHAPTER 13

  I WAS BACK AT MY HOTEL, but not in my room. I stood outside it, at the door. I tried the keycard and got a buzz sound, like an angry buzzer on one of those gameshows when the contestant says the wrong answer. I tried the keycard again and got the same sound, but this time I saw the light on the door turn red. I tried a third time and got the same.

  I clenched my fist and began counting to ten. I was ready to break the door down just so I could get to sleep.

  I turned and headed to the office.

  The guy behind the desk saw me coming. He stayed seated with his hands out of view, which I noted.

  I said, “My keycard isn’t working.”

  “Yes. I know.”

  I stayed quiet and waited for him to go on, but he didn’t. That was the end of the sentence. Full stop.

  “Why the hell isn’t it opening the door?”

  “I turned it off,” he said. He must’ve seen the rage boiling across my face because he started to tremble.

  “Why?” I asked. I stayed standing, feet planted firmly. I stared down at him.

  “Because we reserve the right to refuse service,” he said. He showed one hand to me, pulled it out from behind the desk and pointed at a sign on the wall. I glanced at it and then back at him. It said their policy in big block letters.

  “You’re refusing me service?”

  His hand was back down behind the desk. I suspected that he was holding a weapon down on his lap. Which was probably a gun.

  “Those were Army cops that arrested you?”

  I closed my eyes tight for a moment, opened them, and said, “No.”

  “No, they didn’t arrest you? I saw you in handcuffs.”

  “No, they weren’t Army cops. They were Marines. And they didn’t arrest me.”

  “I saw you in handcuffs, sir.”

  I shook my head and said, “That was nothing. They didn’t arrest me.”

  “I saw it. Right there in that window. I saw the whole thing. They took you to the parking lot in handcuffs.”

  “Yes, I was in handcuffs, but now I’m not.”

  “But you were. And I can refuse service to anyone for any reason.”

  “I paid for that room.”

  “Not my problem.”

  I stepped closer and put my hands on the desk, leaned forward. I said, “Look, I’ve been up all night. I paid for that room. I just want to sleep. I wasn’t arrested. They got the wrong guy. I just had to answer some questions. Now, give me a new key. Don’t make me get my own key.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked. He was trembling even more. He scooched back in his chair like he was trying to get farther from me.

  “It means what it means.”

  Then I heard the cock of a hammer from what sounded like a .38. And it was. He pulled out a black snub-nosed .38, showed it to me. He didn’t point it at me, not directly. He just pointed it in my general direction.

  I sto
od up straight, removed my hands from the desk. I kept them calm and out in front of me like I was surrendering. He didn’t say a word.

  I said, “You sure you want to be doing that?”

  He said, “I told….” And he didn’t finish because halfway through his second word, I sidestepped right—fast. My left hand dashed left, hard and in one movement, I swiped the revolver right out of his hand. I flipped it in a fast, second movement back to my right hand. Now it was pointed right at his face.

  He wasn’t trembling anymore; he was shaking—violently. He said, “Please. Please.”

  “Please what?”

  “Don’t shoot me.”

  “I could. I could blow your head off right here. And take my money back. What do you think?”

  He stayed quiet.

  I dropped my hand and retracted the gun muzzle from his face. I turned it and flicked my wrist. The chamber opened. I shook out the bullets into my open palm. I clenched my fist close and kept them in my hand. I said, “Relax. I told you. I’m not a bad guy. Those cops just wanted to ask me questions. It’s not a problem.”

  He stopped shaking, but still looked terrified. He said, “I want you to go.”

  “Even after that? You’re brave.”

  “I want you to go,” he repeated.

  “Fine. Give me my money back.”

  He stared on at me, but his eyes seemed out of focus like he was staring past me. I could see that he just wanted me gone. I could’ve threatened him, told him that he’d better let me in my room. And he would have, but that’s not the kind of guy I am. He was in the wrong, but I figured he did have the right to refuse service. But he wasn’t keeping my money. I paid sixty-five bucks for a room I had for two hours. No way was I going to leave without it. I’m not made of money. In fact, my bank account was getting thin. I’d have to start thinking about that. For now, I just wanted to sleep.

  I watched him reach into a cash register and pull out three twenties and a five. He handed them to me. I asked, “So where the hell is another hotel?”

  “South. But,” he said and paused.

  “But what?”

  “It’s far.”

  “How far?”

  “About fifteen miles or so. It’s out on the highway, just south of town.”

  Great.

  I sighed long and deep. I asked, “You got a bus station?”