Finding North

by Christian, Claudia Hall

  F

  Chapter Three

  Sunday afternoon

  May 15 — 3:18 p.m. MDT

  Buckley Air Force Base, Aurora, Colorado

  “We’re almost ready,” Alex’s assistant, US Army Sergeant Alexander Roger Ulysses “Dusty” Cummings III, said.

  The team had been milling around the large workroom while Sergeant Dusty worked through the technical details with the base IT technicians. The entire team had been returned to base when Alex had almost drowned. While no one wanted to work on a Sunday, not one of them had complained.

  “Take a seat,” said Alex’s chief in charge of personnel, Major Joseph Walter. “Leena, can you get Vince?”

  “Any idea where he is?” US Navy Petty Officer Leena Carmichael asked. “I looked, but I couldn’t find him.”

  “My office for that magazine interview,” Alex said. “They’re doing it over the phone, and it’s quieter there. He should be just about done.”

  “On my way,” Leena said.

  After a long shower, a round of IV antibiotics, Alex managed to negotiate with her mother. The five-month breakfast birthday party for her twins was a huge success. With a baby on each knee, Alex finally had a chance to read the memo from French Intelligence.

  They had been looking for the owner of the bookstore, where she and Paul had taken The Gadfly for an appraisal. The bookstore owner took pride in the fact that his family had opened their store every day for more than a hundred years. But the morning after the Fey Special Forces Team was murdered, the bookstore owner had locked the door and never returned. Interpol had obtained custody of the bookstore owner from his beach-front home in Cameroon on Friday. He was quietly moved through official channels.

  The French government had gained custody of him yesterday. In a few minutes, he would be transitioned to French Intelligence, where her uncle, the head of French Intelligence service, Direction Centrale du Renseignement Intérieur, Dominic Doucet, would get first crack at speaking with him. Dominic’s interrogation of the bookstore owner would start in three minutes.

  In order to limit the spread of information — and risk — Alex had planned to watch the interrogation alone. Colonel Howard Gordon, her superior officer, had overruled her. He’d insisted that the team was already at risk, regardless of what they knew. Their only protection was in knowing everything. Alex had nodded her head, but she remained unconvinced.

  She sat down near the front of the team’s large workroom. Sergeant Dusty had set up the connection to the video camera in the facility where the bookstore owner was being held. The video feed would project onto the large white board in the front of the room. As they took their regular seats, her team laughed and joked around her. Raz set a sharpened yellow lead pencil and a pad of paper in front of Alex before sitting down in the chair next to her.

  “Here we go,” Sergeant Dusty said.

  He clicked a switch, and a small room appeared on the white board. The walls of the room were covered with what looked like photographs. There was a small table with two chairs in the center of the room. Two French soldiers wearing balaclavas to cover their faces dragged a small, elderly man into the room. The soldiers dropped the man near the table in the center of the room and turned to leave. The man scrambled after the soldiers.

  “Don’t leave me here,” the bookstore owner begged in French. “I am not without resources. Get me out of here, and we’ll . . .”

  The soldiers shook off the bookstore owner, and the elderly man fell onto the tile floor. The door’s lock gave a loud “click,” and the bookstore owner ran to the door.

  “I will pay you!” the bookstore owner continued to beg. “I have money, influence. I . . .”

  The man noticed the images on the walls. His mouth fell open, and he screamed in horror. He tripped and fell onto the ground again. The man pushed himself into a corner of the room with his feet. He tucked his head into his knees and covered his head with his hands.

  “No, no, no, no, no, no, no,” they heard the man say in a low, moaning voice.

  “Any idea what’s on the walls?” Alex’s second-in-command US Army Captain Matthew Mac Clenaghan, in charge of missions, asked.

  “Life-sized pictures from the vault after the assault,” said Joseph.

  “How can you tell?” Leena asked.

  “I took them,” Joseph said. He went to the screen to get a closer look. “This one’s new.”

  Joseph pointed to an image near the door.

  “That’s Y,” Alex said. “Yvonne, Dom’s assistant.”

  “After the ambulance blew up,” Raz said. Having grown up outside of New York, Raz’s voice still held the harsh edges of a Queens’ accent. “Last year. Paris.”

  “He’s fixated on one picture.” US Navy Chief Petty Officer Royce Tubman walked to the screen to point to a photo on the wall. “Who’s that?”

  “Paul,” Alex and Joseph said in unison.

  Joseph pointed to the wall opposite from where the bookstore owner hid his eyes.

  “You can see his boxer shorts,” Alex said. “He was practicing his dance moves when . . .”

  An uncomfortable silence came over the room. Alex never talked about the assault that had killed ten members of the Fey Special Forces Team, her team. Alex had barely survived. Most people believed she didn’t remember it.

  “What’s this?” Alex walked to the screen and pointed.

  Joseph moved to look at what she’d seen.

  “That wasn’t there when I checked to see if he was alive,” Alex said. “What is it?”

  “Looks like his dress shoes,” Joseph shrugged.

  Joseph had been the Fey Special Force Team’s staff sergeant. The assault happened just six weeks before he was to return from paternity leave.

  “He wasn’t wearing shoes,” Alex said. She rubbed her forehead against the growing pain in her head. “He’d just taken off his pants. He was in socks.”

  “That’s weird,” Joseph said. “When I got there, to the vault, and took this picture, he was wearing dress shoes. I’d never seen him in dress shoes. I remember thinking it was odd at the time. I think that’s why this picture shows them so prominently.”

  The apparition of Alex’s best friend, Sergeant Jesse Abreu appeared near the front of the room. He turned to Alex and shook his head.

  “Paul didn’t own dress shoes,” Jesse said.

  “I don’t think Paul owned dress shoes,” Alex said. “Remember he was going to get married in his jeans and red Converse All-Stars?”

  “Why would any man wear dress shoes and no pants?” Vince asked.

  “It’s a good question,” Joseph said. “With everything that was happening, I must have missed it.”

  As their staff sergeant and the only survivor of the team, Joseph was on a plane to Paris five minutes after they were discovered by Raz and his boss, Alex’s mentor and biological father, Benjamin. Joseph had spent the next six weeks making sure that Alex was safe and sending his friends and teammates home to their families.

  “I wonder what happened to those shoes,” Alex said.

  “Why?” Joseph asked.

  “They’re a clue,” Alex said. “They had to come from somewhere.”

  “You’re sure they weren’t there when . . .” Joseph started.

  Alex nodded. On the screen, the door to the room opened, and Alex sat down. Dominic Doucet came into the small room.

  “I know you,” the bookstore owner said in French. “You work for the French government.”

  Dominic gave the bookstore owner an unreadable look.

  “I have rights,” the bookstore owner said. “I am a French citizen. I have rights. You can’t . . .”

  “What makes you think you’re in France?” Dominic said in French. He pulled a chair away from the table and sat down.

  “I am still a French citizen,” the bookstore owner said. “I have rights! I want to . . .”

  “What makes you think anyone here gives a crap?” Dominic’s voice sound
ed almost amused.

  “I am a French citizen. I . . .”

  “You’re not in France,” Dominic said. “You’re not even in Cameroon. You’re in a place where no one will ever find you. When I say ever . . .”

  Dominic pointed to the video camera.

  “ . . .what I really mean is, no one knows where you are,” Dominic said. “Not the people watching, not the soldiers who brought you here, not even myself. You are lost to the world, and no one is looking for you.”

  “I . . .” the bookstore owner started talking but stopped. His face turned ashen, and he swallowed hard. “Why am I here?”

  “Recognize any of them?” Dominic nodded his head to the walls.

  “I . . . uh . . .” The bookstore owner licked his lips. “No, I don’t know any American soldiers.”

  “You should,” Dominic said.

  “Why is that?” the bookstore owner asked. “I make it a policy not to know Americans.”

  “Then why did you murder them?” Dominic asked.

  “I’ve never killed anyone,” the bookstore owner said.

  “As sure as you pulled the trigger,” Dominic said. “This one?”

  Dominic got up from the chair. He walked to near the door and touched the image of Yvonne.

  “She was my assistant,” Dominic said. “A citizen of France, a public servant, killed last year as a result of your actions.”

  “I’ve never seen her before,” the bookstore owner said. His voice rose with indignation and arrogance.

  “How about this one?” Dominic asked. He walked across the room to the photo of Alex leaning against the door to the vault, with Jesse’s head in her lap. “I bet you’ve seen her before.”

  “I didn’t take that one,” Joseph said.

  “I did,” Raz said. “And the one of Y.”

  Alex held her hand out to him, and he took it. On the screen, the bookstore owner seemed to be pretending to be thinking.

  “Maybe,” the bookstore owner said. “I do like adventurous adult films. Isn’t she the star of . . .”

  “She is my niece,” Dominic said.

  The bookstore owner swallowed hard. There was a sharp tap on the door.

  “Great. The Americans are here,” Dominic said. He got up from his seat and went to the door. “I’ll leave you with them.”

  “No!” The bookstore owner scrambled across the tile floor. He clung to Dominic’s leg. “Don’t leave me with them.”

  “Why shouldn’t I?” Dominic asked.

  “Please don’t leave me!”

  “You know what the Americans call it?”

  Dominic put his hands on his hips and looked around him. The bookstore owner shook his head.

  “Rendition,” Dominic said. “Tidy name, don’t you think? They pick a country that couldn’t care less if people are tortured, humiliated, abused, or killed. You’d be surprised at how many countries simply don’t care. The Americans find those countries, pay them well, and build a site like this. All that’s left is to pick up scum like you and . . .”

  “Scum?” The bookstore owner looked genuinely offended. “How dare you?”

  “They use ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’ here.” Dominic shrugged. “Nice name for ‘torture.’ The Americans have a way of naming things that’s . . . special. Well, what do you expect from the country that created Disney?”

  Dominic snorted a laugh.

  “You have to admit it.” Dominic nodded. “Those Americans are good with marketing.”

  Unsure of how to respond, the bookstore owner opened and shut his mouth.

  “They will do things that will make you beg for mercy in two seconds. No more,” Dominic said.

  Dominic tapped on the door. The bookstore owner began screaming incoherently. The lock clicked open, and the door moved.

  “I’ll tell you anything, everything,” the bookstore owner said. “Just don’t let them . . . I have a weak heart. I am the sole caretaker of my ninety-seven year old mother. I . . .”

  “Who did you tell?” Dominic’s voice was calm and soft.

  “Tell?” The bookstore owner sounded puzzled.

  “This man?” Dominic walked to where the image of Paul’s dead body adorned the wall. “This is Sergeant Paul Tilly. He was a decorated soldier, graduated top of his class in engineering at the Citadel. He’d just been recruited to work with the US Army Corps of Engineers. He would have started nine months from . . . His girlfriend was pregnant. They planned to marry when he returned from his trip.”

  Alex’s hand clamped over her mouth. Tears streamed down her face. Joseph looked grim. On the screen, the bookstore owner began to visibly shake.

  “Sergeant Tilly was a nice person, a kind person,” Dominic said. “He was the kind of guy who went to bat for anyone in need. Every year, he’d pick a cause — saving the whales or buying trees in the Amazon or children sold as prostitutes or whatever spoke to him. He’d raise money — and awareness — for this one issue for an entire year. He’d badger his friends to run campaigns to save the monkeys or whatever. One year, he championed the Gypsies, the ‘Roma,’ as he called them. I told him . . .”

  Dominic’s face shifted to a soft smile as he remembered. For a moment, he fell silent.

  “Gone,” Dominic snapped his fingers. “Just like that, he’s gone. And here you are.”

  Dominic fell silent. The bookstore owner watched him closely. Dominic took a breath and nodded. He walked to the picture of Jesse and Alex.

  “My niece?” Dominic asked. “This is her best friend. He was shot with one burst of sixteen rounds and a second of twenty-six, separated by four minutes. Forty-two bullets. He died in her lap. He was the child of a Mexican prostitute who just happened to be working in San Diego when he was born. She had him and left him. He fought his way into the US Army. He broke his back to become a Special Forces soldier. And this . . . is what he gets . . . FROM YOU.”

  Dominic’s voice echoed in the small room.

  “I . . . I . . . I . . .” the bookstore owner said.

  “I’m not going to mention my niece,” Dominic said. He was breathing hard, almost panting. A medium-sized, fit man, his shoulders moved up and down as he sucked air into his lungs. His voice dropped to a whisper. “I cannot be held accountable for what I will do. She was my brother’s eldest daughter. She was my friend, my fly-fishing companion, my . . . She was one of my favorite human beings. Ever. More than fifty years of life, and she was my favorite person. And she . . .”

  Dominic opened his hand so the tips of his fingers pointed toward the wall.

  “ . . . because of . . .”

  Dominic held his hand, palm up, to the bookstore owner.

  “Her friends, her father — they are watching,” Dominic said as he pointed at the video camera. “They beg for justice.”

  He shook his head and walked to the door. He’d just reached the door when the bookstore owner spoke.

  “There was a standing order,” the bookstore owner said.

  Dominic rested his head against the grey metal door. He took deep breaths to calm himself.

  “Anyone a copy of E. L. Voynich’s The Gadfly came into my hands — from anyone — I was to call,” the bookstore owner said. “I’d sold him ten, maybe twelve, and then . . .”

  The bookstore owner pointed to Paul. Terrified, his finger shook uncontrollably.

  “He . . . he . . . he was supposed to come, bring the book, but . . . he . . .” the bookstore owner shook his head.

  “He was dead,” Dominic said. He turned to face the man. “Dead men don’t sell books to bookstores — even quaint, old bookstores in the heart of Paris.”

  “No, this is before . . .” the bookstore owner pointed at the walls. “I gave him an appraisal. Quite a lot of money, actually. He wanted to think about it, speak with his ex-wife. He was supposed to come back. He was supposed to bring the book. I’d called my buyer while the soldier was in the store. ‘I think I have it,’ I’d said. He was excited, happy. I was
expecting the soldier to . . . My buyer . . . my buyer . . . he . . . was expecting me to give him the precious book, but I . . . couldn’t. The soldier never came back.”

  “What do you mean?” Dominic asked.

  “He and the girl, your niece, and the boy from Mexico, they came in with the book. They wanted an appraisal. The soldier was getting married, and . . .” The bookstore owner nodded. “I took the book to the back and called my buyer. It was the book he’d been looking for all those years — the book with the writing in two hands. It was the book he wanted, the book he’d waited for. I knew I could sell it for a good price, so I offered the soldier a good price. After all, he was getting married. But, of course, Americans don’t trust the French — even honest businessmen like myself are suspect. They wanted to think about it. They were supposed to come back.”

  The bookstore owner stood up. He went to Dominic and leaned close.

  “They were supposed to come back,” the bookstore owner said in a low voice. “They were supposed to bring me the book.”

  “What happened next?” Dominic asked.

  “My buyer . . . he became . . . agitated. Paranoid. He was sure the book had fallen into the ‘wrong hands,’” the bookstore owner said. “He started threatening me. He thought I’d sold it to someone else. He decided I’d taken it to the authorities. He was . . . horrifying. Crazy. My mother is old. I am all she has, and . . .”

  “What did you tell him?” Dominic asked in a low tone.

  “I . . . Nothing,” the bookstore owner shook his head with such violence that sweat flew off the ends of his hair. “Nothing.”

  The bookstore owner’s hand unconsciously went to his heart.

  “What did you tell him?” Dominic repeated the question in the same low tone.

  “Nothing,” the bookstore owner said. “I had lots of business, busy bookstore. I can’t track every . . .”

  “WHAT DID YOU TELL HIM?” Dominic yelled.

  Chapter Four

  The bookstore owner blinked. Dominic shrugged and put his hand on the door’s handle.

  “I . . . he . . . The girl . . . she and the Mexican boy came in a lot,” the bookstore owner said. “They liked to look at ancient maps. The boy from Mexico, he liked old churches. He bought old guides to ancient churches. They would go out and find these churches — ruins, really. They brought me photos and . . . I start getting the maps out when I saw them coming up the hill from Le Fée Verte. She . . . I . . .”