The Kill Box

by Nichole Christoff

  But even though it’s serious, the hunt for AWOL military personnel doesn’t play out like a primetime TV drama. When our servicemen and women don’t show up when they’re supposed to, they’re given the benefit of the doubt because things like flat tires and dead cellphones happen. But if what Shelby had said was correct, Barrett had gone off the army’s radar last Wednesday—so now a whole other protocol was in motion.

  No doubt Shelby had tried to reach Barrett directly. She’d probably gone to his house near Fort Leeds, New Jersey, when he hadn’t answered his phone. Since my place in Virginia was his last known location, she’d asked local police to check for him there. Now, no doubt with the post commander himself breathing down her neck, she was calling me. And as I’d been less than useful, she’d probably check out Barrett’s home of record next.

  The home of record is the permanent address listed in every military member’s file. Usually, it belongs to a parent or other relative. It’s an address that isn’t likely to change, even as a soldier, sailor, marine, or airman is deployed or assigned to another post, ship, or base.

  I was willing to bet Barrett’s home of record was his grandparents’ farmhouse. So as soon as she hung up with me, Shelby would phone Miranda Barrett. And depending on what the little lady told her, Luke Rittenhaus’s deputies might drop by for a visit.

  “Keep my number handy,” Shelby said as I grabbed my trousers and hauled them on. “And, ma’am, if you see him, remind him it would be better if he catches up with me before I have to officially catch up with him.”

  She hung up. I struggled into my sweater, shoved my hair into a ponytail. Grabbing my gun and overcoat, I went to find Barrett’s grandmother.

  Instead, in the kitchen, I found the pretty girl with the ponytail I’d seen at a distance propping pumpkins in front of the gift shop.

  Only, this time, she was filling the kettle at the sink.

  “Hi,” she said, flashing a dimpled smile. “I’m Kayley. Are you really a private eye?”

  “Yes,” I said, getting a kick out of her inquisitiveness. “More specifically, I’m a security specialist.”

  That sparked her interest and she opened her mouth to ask more questions, but just then, Mrs. Barrett bustled into the room.

  “Good morning, Jamie. I see you’ve met my favorite shopgirl.”

  “Mrs. Barrett!” Kayley rolled her eyes and laughed. “I’m your only shopgirl.”

  “Too true, my dear. Why don’t you go get started? I’ll bring the tea out in a bit.”

  If it was a dismissal, it was a kind one. And it gave me and Mrs. Barrett the chance I wanted to talk. I didn’t mince words as I told her about Shelby’s call. Or what it meant. I didn’t tell her what to say when the MP phoned, however. That was a decision Barrett’s grandmother would need to make for herself. Because, like Barrett, she’d have to live with the consequences of her choice.

  She took in my news and dropped into a chair at her table.

  “I don’t understand what that boy’s thinking,” she muttered.

  “Neither do I,” I admitted. “But I’m going to find out.”

  I left Barrett’s grandmother in her kitchen, sprinted across the chilly yard, and jogged up the staircase clinging to the side of the garage. Barrett must’ve seen me coming. Because when I raised my fist to pound on his door, he opened it.

  “You’re AWOL,” I informed him, “but I think you already know that.”

  Barrett turned his back on me, limped into the dusky apartment. I followed him as far as the edge of the rag rug in the sitting area. He headed straight for the bedstead, grabbed his jean jacket from one of the cannonball posts.

  Hands on my hips, I said, “Do you have any idea what kind of trouble your grandmother’s going to be in if the U.S. Army thinks she’s harboring you?”

  Barrett slid an arm into one of the sleeves. “Who called you?”

  “Shelby. She’s been to your house and had the cops stop at mine.”

  “I’ll call her.”

  But instead of fishing his cell from some pocket, he went to the window and looked down into the driveway.

  I said, “I don’t think your phone’s out there.”

  “I’m looking for my ride. Vance was supposed to be here at first light.”

  But I recalled Vance’s tremors after Barrett had nearly bashed in Eric’s head, and I was willing to bet he’d found a way to soothe them.

  “Barrett, Vance is probably passed out somewhere.”

  “He better not be. It was his turn to keep watch on Eric’s place all night.”

  “Keep watch? For what?”

  Barrett crossed the room to me. He grasped my hands in his. He hadn’t touched me in so long.

  “Jamie, I know you can’t see it, but Eric is close to becoming another statistic for veteran suicide. Can you drive me to his place?”

  I shook my head. “He was so angry at the farm yesterday—”

  “You don’t have to talk to him. Just drop me off—”

  “—and he was violent in his office the day before—”

  “Exactly. I’ve got to get him to talk to a counselor. The Veterans Administration can put him in touch with psychologists, psychiatrists. He’ll hurt someone if he doesn’t hurt himself first.”

  “Sheriff Rittenhaus will have your hide for even approaching Eric—”

  “I won’t let it get that far—”

  “—and Shelby—”

  “That’s why I’ve got to go right now!”

  “Adam—” Pushed beyond all patience, I yanked my hands from his, paced away and back again. “What on earth are you going to tell Shelby? What are you going to tell your commanding officer? That you went AWOL so you could stalk some guy you knew in high school because he’s a former soldier whose sister killed herself twenty years ago? And what if Eric pulls that shotgun on you again? Have you thought about that?”

  “He won’t,” Barrett promised. “But I need to talk to him. Just one last time, I swear. Then I’ll call Shelby and get this AWOL business worked out.”

  Could it be that simple?

  Maybe.

  Up to this point, Barrett’s record as an army officer was exemplary. His commander could choose to be lenient. But would Barrett be free of the guilt and shame that had saddled him since Pamela’s attack if he just got one more shot at convincing her brother to seek help?

  I doubted it—and I told him as much.

  Not that he listened.

  He stormed from the apartment, thundered down the steps outside.

  “Where are you going?” I demanded as I pounded down the stairs after him.

  “You know where I’m going. I’m going take that old beater Gram calls a pickup truck and drive to Eric’s. Hell, I’ll walk there if I have to!”

  “No,” I said, not wanting him to upset his grandmother any further. And not trusting him to contain himself when he confronted Eric. “Get in my car. I’ll drive you.”

  Barrett was silent as we rode into town. And as we drove through it. But when we reached the outskirts on the far side of Fallowfield, Barrett pointed at a blinking sign that arrowed at a long, low-slung seedy motel.

  It was the Starlite Motel.

  “That’s Eric’s room on the end,” Barrett told me. “Room twenty-four.”

  I pulled into the parking lot, cruised past the motel’s desolate office. A placard pinned to the door spelled out weekly rental rates. And promised air-conditioning and free color TV.

  “Wow,” I muttered. “Perfect place to watch the moon landing.”

  It probably had been. The roofline overhanging the walkway running along the row of rooms was a spike-studded zigzag reminiscent of Sputnik and the early days of Space Age–inspired architecture. But to rise to looking retro, this motel would need a complete remodel.

  Living here must’ve been quite a comeuppance for a real estate agent like Eric Wentz. Perhaps he lived here because business was bad. Or perhaps a room here was all he could afford becaus
e he footed the bill for his mother’s care at the facility he’d mentioned. I didn’t know. But given the beautiful Queen Anne where he and his father had their offices, and the farmhouse that had seen better days but wasn’t beyond repair, I’d have never expected to find him in digs like this.

  I parked in front of No. 24. Barrett got out of the Jag. He made no objection when I got out, too. In front of No. 19, a bent old woman pushed a housekeeping cart along the lip of a cracked concrete pad designed to keep rainwater out of the rooms. She paid us no mind and I suspected that was part of the policy around here.

  The door to Eric’s room had been bright red at one time. Now it was scuffed and scarred and the color of salmon sidewalk chalk. It was also ajar.

  “Eric?” Barrett called.

  He rapped on the jamb.

  When we got no reply, I nudged the door open with my toe.

  Barrett hooked my arm before I crossed the threshold. “You can’t just walk in there.”

  “Why not?”

  He couldn’t come up with an answer.

  I went, leaving him to trail after me.

  Nobody had pushed back the drapes so the room was deep in shade. The bed was unmade and the rumpled sheets gave off a stale, musty odor, as if the housekeeper I’d seen outside typically stored her linens in somebody’s basement. Across from the foot of the bed, a low dresser supported a television set that was older than I was. Courtesy of its cable box, it was tuned to ESPN. The anchors droned on about some football game or other. Beside the dresser, a wastepaper basket was stuffed with takeout containers from Charlotte’s diner. From their smell, I’d have said Eric enjoyed onion with all of his meals.

  But there was no sign of Eric himself.

  At the back of the room, a pink porcelain sink had been set into a Formica countertop. Both were chipped with age. A lengthy light fixture ranged above the accompanying mirror. Its low-watt bulb flickered on and off and bathed the reflection of my just-rolled-out-of-bed face in ghastly green. Barrett’s image, shaggy and unshaven, didn’t look much better. Huddling around the sink like refugees, Eric’s toiletries consisted of a travel-sized tube of toothpaste, a short stick of deodorant, a can of generic shave cream, and the thin chips of soap this run-down motel provided.

  Just looking at these things made me sad.

  The bathroom door was slightly open. The shower wasn’t running; my ears told me that much. Through the gap between the door and the frame, I could see the glare of another bulb, this one too bright for the small space.

  “Eric?” I called.

  He didn’t answer.

  And a feeling I couldn’t name ran its icy fingers down my spine.

  I nudged this door open, too. And there he was, Eric Wentz, sprawled in the bathtub, awash in his own blood. But he couldn’t see me staring at him.

  Because his slack mouth was full of the twin barrels of his shotgun.

  And even from where I stood, I saw enough to know both of them had been fired.

  Chapter 13

  The sight of Eric in that tub was like a slap in the face. And so was the raw scent of human blood and gore. Involuntarily, I clapped a hand over my mouth and nose.

  But I wasn’t the only one who noticed the smell.

  Too late, I sensed Barrett peering past my shoulder. I turned, intending to banish him from the bathroom. But before I could tell him to go, he took off.

  He didn’t get farther than the bedroom, though.

  And there I heard him retch.

  Death was no stranger to Barrett. He was a soldier, and the two had met often enough. But Eric wasn’t a casualty of war. He was Barrett’s boyhood friend, devastated by the death of his teenage sister and troubled by his military service. And Barrett had felt responsible for him for decades.

  I, on the other hand, could look at Eric without personal history or years of sentiment clouding my eyesight. So I made myself focus on him again. And mentally, I catalogued everything I saw.

  Eric lay in a heap in the bottom of the tub, his heart’s blood turning black where it had flowed all over the fiberglass. His gun was in his mouth, sure enough. But gunfire is as hot as hellfire, and no scorching circled what remained of his lips.

  Still, the contents of his brain box splattered the shower’s back wall. Chunks of tile and the mud bed beneath it had been blown away in the blast. However, the middle of the mess was centered almost six feet from the floor, suggesting Eric had been standing when the shot was fired. How he’d fallen and kept the gun in his mouth, I had no idea. But to my way of thinking, that was only the first troubling tidbit. Because a second blast marred the wall almost two feet below the first. Which meant a second shot had been fired as Eric slid down the tile on his way to the tub.

  All in all, the setup made my hackles rise. Because, at first glance, this looked like a suicide. Except I was pretty sure it wasn’t.

  Without touching a thing, I retreated to the bedroom. I found Barrett slumped in the rickety desk chair. He cradled his head in his hands.

  He’d dumped the takeout containers from the wastepaper basket, tossed his own cookies into it. I snatched up the bin, slipped an arm through his. And I hauled him to his feet.

  “Come on, soldier. We’ve got to get you out of here.”

  “I’m not leaving Eric like this—”

  “Listen to me. Rittenhaus can’t find you here. Not after Eric waved that shotgun in your face.”

  “No!” Barrett ripped his arm from my grasp. “I won’t go!”

  But I was the daughter of a man who’d risen to the rank of major general on his way to becoming a U.S. senator. To my father, no had never been an acceptable answer. Consequently, it wasn’t acceptable to me.

  With enough steel in my voice to found a Midwestern city, I said, “Adam, I’m telling you you’re leaving this room. And whatever happens, I’ll handle it. Now move.”

  Barrett eyed me like he’d never seen me until that moment.

  Before he could get fussy again, I hustled him into my Jag and stashed the wastepaper can in the trunk. Stepping into the room again, I snatched up a tissue, used it to shield my hand as I called 911 from the room’s phone and anonymously reported a suspicious death. Though the dispatcher tried to keep me on the line, I dropped the receiver onto the nightstand, hopped in my car, and sped to the nearest safe place I could think of: Charlotte’s diner.

  Barrett and I pushed into the café, and the heads of all the locals swiveled toward us. When they saw Barrett’s familiar face, they exchanged arch glances. I didn’t like the look of that, but before I could figure out what it meant, they returned to their conversations.

  I elbowed Barrett onto a stool at the counter. Behind it, Charlotte was taking an order from a customer. Maybe it was the slump of Barrett’s shoulders, but she left her customer in midsentence and hurried down to us.

  “Adam, are you okay? Jamie, what happened?”

  But she was the sheriff’s girlfriend. And the sheriff had sworn he’d lock up Barrett if he so much as blinked at Eric. So I ignored her question and started asking a few of my own.

  “Can you do me a favor, Charlotte? Or better yet, can you do one for Adam?”

  “Of course.”

  “Then keep him here. Feed him soup or something. And don’t let him leave. Can you do that?”

  Charlotte nodded, and in their clip, her coppery curls bounced like crazy.

  I spun on my counter stool, just as three of Rittenhaus’s patrol cars screamed past the diner’s plate-glass window. An ambulance followed a moment behind. Not that an ambulance would do Eric Wentz any good now.

  Given that I’d phoned in a suspicious death, the sheriff himself was probably in one of the cars. He wouldn’t be happy to learn his caller had left the scene without sticking around to answer his questions. But while his obligation was to Eric and the law, mine was to Barrett. Barrett had gotten himself in enough trouble by going AWOL and harassing Eric all week long. He didn’t need to end up neck-deep in more.

/>   A few of the café’s patrons jumped from their seats and ran to the window to peer after the cruisers. The rest buzzed excitedly as they speculated about where the cars were headed. Only one customer didn’t seem to care at all.

  Seated in the same spot the little family had occupied the evening before, this guy didn’t look any more at home in Fallowfield than I did. For one thing, his wardrobe was all wrong. I hadn’t met many locals who wore black leather motorcycle jackets down on the farm, but even if he’d worn flannel and denim, I would’ve recognized this guy.

  Because he’d taken me to dinner last Friday night—and he’d kissed my cheek when I’d told him I wanted to go home.

  Special Agent Marc Sandoval.

  Marc flipped through the menu lying on the tabletop in front of him like all he wanted in life was a hot lunch. But I knew that wasn’t true. Just as I knew he wasn’t in Fallowfield by accident.

  If he was on the job, however, he wouldn’t thank me for walking up to his table and saying hello. So I promised Charlotte I’d be back to collect Barrett soon, slid from my stool, and made for the door. But from the corner of my eye, I caught Marc’s hand hovering over his phone where it rested beside his bill of fare—so I wasn’t surprised that as soon as the sole of my shoe struck the sidewalk, my cell rang.

  When I answered it, Marc said, “You’re a long way from home.”

  “I’m just helping a friend.”

  “Lucky guy.”

  “On the contrary,” I said, thinking of what Barrett had seen in that bathtub.

  “This friend of yours wouldn’t have a predilection for shooting heroin, would he?”

  I couldn’t even imagine Barrett and heroin in the same sentence.

  Vance, however…

  “No, but one of his buddies might.”

  “That’s a story I’d like to hear. Meet me tonight.”

  Tonight seemed so far away.

  But Marc didn’t take my silence as discouragement.

  He said, “There’s a place called the Roadhouse on State Route 691. It’s halfway to Syracuse, so it’ll take you some time to get there. Meet me at eight.”

  “If I can,” I pledged, “I will.”