He checked his watch. “It’s twelve-fifteen. Considering how anxious Creighton was to meet us, I’m surprised he isn’t here.”
“Alton,” said Mallory. “He said he was being followed. What if he is here but something’s wrong?”
“Could be, but there’s no sign of a break-in. Let’s see if his car is here.”
They circled around to the side yard adjacent to the one-car garage. Mallory peered through a window. “Yep, it’s in there.”
Alton frowned. “I have a bad feeling about this. Try the phone number on the card he gave you last night.”
Mallory dialed the number and listened until the call eventually went to voice mail. She disconnected and pocketed her cellphone. “Let’s try the door again,” she said.
They moved back to the front door. Mallory set off at a half jog but slowed to allow Alton time to catch up. An injury sustained during his tour of duty in Afghanistan as an Army Captain had left him permanently lame in his left leg.
They reached the door and pounded once again. After a long wait, Alton reached out and twisted the doorknob. “Locked. I hate to break in. Let’s see if there’s a back entrance.”
They hurried around to the backyard and discovered a small cement patio fronting a backdoor with eight glass panels. Alton reached for the doorknob and experienced a moment of surprise as the knob twisted. He swung open the door and looked at Mallory. “Did Major Creighton seem like the kind of guy who would leave his backdoor unlocked?”
“No,” she replied, “especially after what he said last night about being followed.”
They crept into the house, scanning the surroundings before moving further into the interior.
“I wish you’d brought your Glock,” said Alton.
“I wasn’t exactly planning on working a case down here, but I know what you mean.”
They traveled from a den at the rear of the house into a dimly-lit dining room, then entered the kitchen.
“Empty,” said Alton. “Let’s check out the other rooms.”
They moved down a hallway leading off the den. The first bedroom on the right had been set up as an office. Overflowing bookshelves lined the walls, and a large desk with a computer monitor and printer filled most of the opposite wall. But like the rest of the house, no one occupied the space.
Alton motioned to the only other bedroom, directly across the hall. They entered the room and looked around, but it too was empty.
“Looks like the bed has been slept in,” said Alton, pointing to the disheveled comforter, “so he was here this morning.”
“Maybe he never makes his bed.”
“True.” Alton noticed a door leading off the bedroom. “That’s probably the bathroom. Let’s check it out.”
They moved towards the doorway. Usually, Alton enjoyed the tranquility of silence, but in this instance, it felt strangely oppressive.
A frightening sight greeted them in the bathroom. Creighton lay sprawled on the floor next to the toilet, his eyes closed and his face an ashen white. A pool of pungent vomit had spread over a half-dozen tiles.
“Major!” said Mallory, kneeling beside the stricken figure. “Can you hear me?”
Creighton’s eyes fluttered open for a moment before closing again.
Alton knelt down on the other side of the stricken figure. “Major Creighton, can you hear me? What happened?”
This time, the major’s eyes remained closed.
“He looks drugged,” said Alton. He shook the man. “Major! Wake up!” Alton snatched his cellphone out of his front pocket and called emergency services.
As Alton provided directions to the dispatcher, Mallory continued her efforts to revive the man. “Major Creighton, can you tell me what happened?”
Finally, the man’s eyes cracked open a little. He seemed to be trying to speak, but only incomprehensible sounds issued from his lips.
“Alton, hang on for a second,” said Mallory. “I can’t hear him.”
They both knelt close to Creighton’s head.
“Major, what did you say?” asked Mallory.
Creighton took a deep breath, as if gathering his strength. “Farid Safi,” he whispered. “Farid Safi…Pasha Tech.”
Alton looked at Mallory, who shrugged. He looked back at Creighton to find the man’s eyes rolling back in his head and his complexion turning a distinct shade of gray. Alton finished the emergency call and lowered his ear to Creighton’s chest. “He’s not breathing. Let’s start CPR.”
The former soldiers worked in silence, Mallory providing a series of breaths while Alton performed chest compressions. After a seeming eternity that in reality was probably only five or six minutes, Alton could hear the wail of an ambulance siren pull up in front of the house.
Seconds later, a pair of EMTs smashed through the front door.
“We’re in here!” shouted Alton.
The medics burst into the room. The Blackwells moved aside to give them enough space to assess their stricken patient.
“We’ve been giving CPR for about six or seven minutes,” said Alton as the EMTs set about checking Creighton’s vital signs. The medics murmured to each other and worked over the patient in a display of finely-tuned teamwork. After a few more minutes of CPR, the short one stopped and filled a syringe, then injected it directly into the patient’s heart. He placed a stethoscope over Creighton’s chest and listened for a moment. He removed the instrument and gazed at Alton and Mallory with somber eyes.
“I’m sorry,” said the EMT. “He didn’t make it.”
CHAPTER 5
Alton sat at the desk in the second-floor guest bedroom of Beverly’s home, while Mallory took a seat on the bed. A few dust motes danced in the beams of afternoon sunlight between them.
“Still want to keep this a secret from your mom?” asked Alton.
“For now, yes,” said Mallory. “We don’t know what this is all about.” She frowned. “Speaking of that, what did the major mean? ‘Farid Safi, Pasha Tech.’ Is it the name of a person or a place or something else?”
“Good question,” said Alton, swiveling his chair and opening up a search engine on his laptop. “Let’s start with Pasha Tech and see what we can find out.” He typed in silence for a few minutes.
Finally, Mallory spoke up. “Any luck?”
“I found a deli in Bangalore by that name. I don’t think that’s what Creighton was referring to. I’ll keep looking.”
Mallory laughed. “Good idea. Before you get back to it, let’s discuss the other thing Creighton said, ‘Farid Safi.’ If it’s a person’s name, I can research it in the FBI’s databases.”
“It sounds like a personal name to me, but who knows for sure?”
“I’ll start with running a search on Google. If nothing comes up, I’ll assume it’s a personal name and send it over to NCIC for a crosscheck.”
Mallory booted up her laptop, and the spouses worked in silence for a few more minutes.
“You having any luck over there?” asked Alton.
“No. I see a lot of men with that name, but nothing else—no businesses or organizations. I think we go on the assumption that Creighton was referring to a particular person.”
“I agree. So you’re going to send the name along to NCIC to see if someone matching that name has a record?” The FBI’s criminal database seemed a good place to start.
“Yep,” said Mallory. “And I’m going to run a search on social media to see if ‘Farid Safi’ and ‘Pasha’ without the ‘Tech’ are mentioned in the same profile.”
“Good idea.”
“What about you? Any luck finding information on Pasha Tech?”
“Not really,” said Alton, frowning. “I’ll keep working, too.”
They had to discontinue their research a few minutes later to dine with Beverly. During the meal, Alton did his best to keep his appearance normal, but he could see Mallory struggled with the ruse.
Apparently, Beverly had also noticed. “You’re quiet tonight
, Sweetie,” she said to her daughter. “Everything okay?”
Mallory cast a wan smile in her mother’s direction. “Sorry. I’m fine. I worked a case late Friday night, and we left to come down here early the next morning. I think it’s catching up with me.”
Beverly shook her head and smiled. “That’s a long drive, too. You all are always on the go. I wish I had as much energy as you two. I don’t know where you get it from.”
“Who are you kidding?” said Mallory, grinning. “You have as much as the two of us put together.”
“Perhaps. I admit, I used to carry on like you all, but now I’ve learned to relax.”
“I try to get Alton to do that all the time,” said Mallory, casting a smile in the direction of her husband. “Got any tips for him?”
“Not really. I think it’s just a matter of what’s happening in my life. In the past, I had kids and a job and a husband to keep up with. I had to be type A just to survive. Now, I don’t have the crazy job stuff, and my only difficulty with family is not seeing them as often as I’d like. It’s easy to slow down when your life is peaceful.”
“That’s…uh…nice,” said Mallory, casting a glance at Alton. She seemed to regain her appetite and stabbed at a bite of pot roast on her plate.
Alton recognized the look Mallory had thrown his way. She was worried. He was, too. They were likely going to bring a storm into the sunshine of Beverly’s peaceful life. Their previous questions remained. Would raking up the sediment of unpleasant memories be in Beverly’s best interests? Was it his or Mallory’s right to even make such a decision on her behalf?
He sighed and took a bite of his own dinner. He and Mallory would have to make a decision—soon.
CHAPTER 6
Alton listened to random announcements over the hospital PA system. He used his phone to check his e-mail for the fifth time and discovered no new messages had arrived in the last three minutes.
“Agent Blackwell, Dr. Evans will see you now,” called the administrator from behind a countertop desk.
Alton and Mallory rose and entered a door with a placard reading, “Samuel Evans, Medical Examiner.”
The pathologist greeted them each with a handshake. “I can’t believe how fast the FBI latched on to this case. I just got the body yesterday afternoon.”
“The sooner we investigate, the more likely we are to apprehend the criminal, if there is one,” replied Mallory. Knowing the ME’s office would disclose the details of Creighton’s death only to family members, she had provided her FBI credentials to gain access to the autopsy report. Perhaps she had stretched the truth—there was no official FBI investigation, at least not yet—but using the normal channels to request this information might yield results weeks later, if ever. “Dr. Evans, have you had a chance to perform the autopsy?”
“Yes, first thing this morning. You said it was a rush job, so I rushed.”
“Were you able to determine the cause of death?”
“Well, that gets a little tricky. All the physical evidence points to poisoning, but I can’t find any trace of an actual poison in his blood, not on my initial screens, at least.”
Alton spoke for the first time. “Could it be some type of toxin your tests don’t detect?”
“Sure. We test for the most common ones, but there are thousands. We can’t check them all. But given the rapidity of Creighton’s decline and the lack of any other obvious organic causes, I’d say poisoning was your best bet.”
“Do you know if the police examined any dishes or glasses he may have used yesterday?” asked Alton. “Perhaps there’s residue left on them.”
“Yeah, they’re supposed to send me some samples later today. But we have the same problem: if the poison didn’t show up in my tests of Creighton’s blood, it won’t show up on my tests of his dishes, either.”
“So the problem isn’t having a sample to test. It’s knowing what to test for,” said Mallory.
“Exactly,” replied Dr. Evans. “But if I get a positive match, you’ll be the first to know.”
On the way back to Beverly’s house from the medical examiner’s office, Alton turned to Mallory. “Considering what we saw at Creighton’s house yesterday, I agree with the doctor, even lacking a positive test. Creighton must have been poisoned.”
“Yeah, I think so,” said Mallory.
“You know, this may be a good time to tell your mom the reason we were going to see Creighton—that your dad’s death may not have been natural.”
“How do you mean?”
“It may be easier to break the news if we lead up to it with Creighton’s death. We can tell her what’s happened, and then bring up why we were going to see him.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Alton could see Mallory nodding.
“It’s as good a time as any, I suppose,” she said.
Alton and Mallory met Beverly for a late lunch.
The retired general brought a plate of sandwiches onto the side deck and placed it on a wrought-iron table with four matching chairs stationed around it. “Well, let’s dig in. I don’t know about you all, but I’m starving.”
After a few bites, Mallory lowered her turkey and cheese sandwich. “Mom, I have some sad news to share.”
Beverly looked over in surprise. “What is it?”
“At your birthday party, we met an old friend of yours and dad’s, Max Creighton. He asked us to come see him yesterday, but when we got there, he was really sick.” She hesitated a moment. “Mom, I’m really sorry. We tried to help him, but he died.”
Beverly sat quite still. “Max Creighton, you said?”
“Yes.”
“I’ve never heard that name in my life.”
CHAPTER 7
Mallory looked shocked. “Wait…you mean you don’t know Max Creighton?”
“No,” said Beverly. “Should I?”
“He said he worked on an important case with Dad. I assumed you knew him, too.”
Beverly shook her head. “No, sorry. It’s sad that the man died, but I didn’t know him. I certainly didn’t invite him to my birthday party.” She furrowed her brow. “You must have just met him on Saturday. What were you going to see him about?”
Mallory looked at Alton, then returned her gaze to her mother. “Mom, he said Dad’s death wasn’t accidental.”
Beverly froze, and her face took on a white complexion. She took a deep breath, seeming to gather herself. “Did he say why he believed that?”
“He said it seemed odd that such a young and healthy man died,” said Mallory.
Beverly seemed lost in thought. The chirping of foraging robins seemed oddly out of place. “I always thought the same thing myself. Cutter was too young and fit. But the doctors said he had taken too much of his sleep aid. They said that an accidental overdose, combined with drinks at the officers’ ball, must have done the trick. They even did an autopsy but didn’t find anything suspicious.” She shook her head ruefully. “We always joked about someone from one of our past cases coming to hunt us down. But still…I admit Cutter’s death seemed odd, but there was no evidence of foul play.”
“Creighton said new information had just come to light a few days ago,” said Alton. “Unfortunately, he died before he could tell us exactly what that new information was.”
Despite the melancholy mood into which the news had cast her, Beverly nonetheless seemed curious about the case, emboldening Alton to press the conversation forward.
“Cutter worked in Army CID, right?” he asked, referring to the Army’s Central Intelligence Division, the military’s equivalent of the FBI.
“Yes,” she replied. “He was an investigator. That’s how I met him. I started my Army career as an auditor in the Army’s Quartermaster’s Corps. When I worked that job, all the cases of fraud I uncovered had to go through CID so they could decide whether we had enough evidence to turn the case over to JAG for prosecution. Cutter was my CID point of contact. After turning over my fifth fraud case to him, he asked
me out.”
“Once you all married, did you talk shop much after hours?” asked Alton.
“We did some. After all, it was what brought us together. But he didn’t discuss every single case. Neither did I.”
Mallory rolled her eyes and produced her first smile of the meal. “Are you kidding me? You guys talked about your cases nonstop…at least it felt like it when I was a kid.”
Alton laughed. “Beverly, you said you don’t recognize Max Creighton’s name. Do you remember what cases Cutter was working on just before he died?”
Beverly screwed up her brow in concentration. “Everything from back then is kind of a blur, but I don’t recall any of his cases being particularly important.”
“Alton,” said Mallory, “you’re thinking someone may have killed Dad because he was on to something in one of his cases?”
“It’s one possible explanation out of many. But if it’s true, it suggests the case was particularly important, one worth killing a law officer for.” Alton steepled his fingers. “Creighton said the security surrounding the case he worked on with your dad was tight, even by the standards of the NSA. Maybe your dad couldn’t discuss the case with anyone, including your mom.”
“That could explain his silence back then,” said Mallory. “Maybe some time in the last few days, Creighton got a new lead in the case, one that suggested Dad was murdered. Why else would someone kill Creighton hours after he tracked me down on Saturday?”
“It’s too bad he died,” said Beverly. “Who knows what he could have told us?”
“I have an idea of one way to find out,” said Alton.
“How?” said Beverly. “He’s dead.”
“But he said he worked for the NSA. Mallory and I have a contact there who may be able to shed some light.”
CHAPTER 8
As soon as the Blackwells retired to their upstairs bedroom in Beverly’s house, Mallory turned to her husband. “You want to call Agent Vega, right?”
Tears of God (The Blackwell Files Book 7) Page 2
