The Kill Radius

by Nichole Christoff

  Being thirty-eight years old, I’d reached the age where most soldiers looked more like boys than men to me. But if I took this skinny lad for a mere kid, the mistake would be a serious one. He was indeed young—probably only a year or two out of high school—but he was a highly trained professional, capable of killing to protect and defend.

  With one hand, he accepted Barrett’s Department of Defense ID, my driver’s license, and the paperwork declaring I was A-okay to step foot on the post, but even as he flipped through the documents he never let go of his weapon.

  “Looks good, sir,” he said, returning the papers to Barrett. “Hope you had a good flight, ma’am.”

  “Thank you, soldier.”

  “Jamie, this is Specialist Damon Maddox,” Barrett said, taking the time to be polite.

  Past the young man’s shoulder, through the bulletproof glass of the small guardhouse behind him, I watched curiosity get the better of a couple more guards. One of them nudged the other and both craned their necks to get a glimpse of me. Evidently, the arrival of Barrett’s sweetheart had been a much-anticipated event.

  Not unkindly, Barrett added, “I’ll introduce you to those slackers in the guardhouse later. How much did they lose, Damon?”

  “Aw, how’d you find out about the bet, sir?”

  “ ‘Youth and skill are never a match for old age and treachery,’ ” Barrett quoted.

  “Well, those losers bet that your girl would be a blonde, so they’re out sixty bucks each. Czajack bet on redhead, but he’s an idiot. My money was on brunette, so I got some cash coming to me.” Damon beamed before common sense and his party manners caught up with him. “Oh, no offense, ma’am.”

  “None taken,” I said. “How big was the pool?”

  “Seven hundred twenty dollars, ma’am.”

  “Wow.” I was duly impressed. “I guess it’s a good thing I didn’t wear a hat.”

  Damon laughed out loud. It was a hearty sound, open and honest, and I liked him for it. But then he grew serious, shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other.

  “I almost forgot,” he said. “Colonel Durante’s been looking for you, sir. He says he’s got to have those stats on tire tread depth. He says if that report isn’t on his desk before the end of the day you can kiss your weekend—”

  “I get it.” Barrett’s face betrayed no aggravation—or any other feeling—whatsoever. “If the colonel calls down here again, tell him I’m on my way in.”

  “Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.” He glanced over his shoulder at the chuckleheads in the gatehouse. “Sir, if there’s anything we can do to help you out with Old Man Durante…”

  “No, I’m on it. Besides, you’ve got other things to worry about. Like picking up your date on time.”

  “Oh, sir, wait till you see her. Did I mention she’s a model?”

  And the lusty spark in Damon’s copper-brown eyes suggested she must make one pretty picture.

  We drove off with Damon snapping a salute as Barrett pulled away from the gate. It was protocol, of course, but the enthusiasm the young man put into the gesture did my heart good. Clearly, he and his fellow soldiers liked Barrett—even if the brass these days didn’t.

  “Funny,” I said, eyeballing my wristwatch yet again. We had three minutes to get Barrett to the Military Police building. “During all those late-night phone calls, you never mentioned this Colonel Durante by name.”

  “Must’ve slipped my mind.”

  “Barrett—”

  “Honey, all I’ve been able to think about these past four months is you up in Washington and me all the way down here.” Barrett paused at an obligatory stop sign, swung onto a road lined with live oaks and redbrick administration buildings. “And I’ve got to say, you’re a lot prettier than Durante, so…”

  “I’m serious, Adam. Is this Durante giving you an especially hard time? There are regulations against that kind of thing and—”

  “And what?” Barrett growled, his patience finally giving out. “Durante’s not any harder on me than anybody else would be—and he’s not any harder than I deserve. I went AWOL, Jamie. I earned what’s happening now and I’ll earn my way out of it.”

  “How?”

  Barrett didn’t answer my question because there was no answer to give. He was stuck, and he knew it. With a tight jaw, he swung onto the asphalt loop in front of a rangy redbrick building. The brown-and-white sign staked on the neatly trimmed lawn spelled out 405TH MILITARY POLICE COMPANY. We’d arrived, and that was a good thing because we were out of time.

  “Look,” I said. “I didn’t come all this way to argue with you about the past.”

  “I know.”

  “I’ll see you tonight.”

  “At the Lady Luck.” Barrett reached across the seat. He took my hand in his. “At eighteen hundred hours.”

  “Six o’clock it is.” I slid over, took his place behind the wheel.

  Barrett’s smile came and went, as brilliant and brief as a shooting star. With a single backward glance, he jogged into the building. The sliding glass door, tinted against the Southern sun, slid closed behind him and he was gone, living up to his responsibilities without complaint—and I loved him for it because that hadn’t changed, either.

  Chapter 2

  After I said goodbye to Barrett, I should’ve gone to the hotel room he’d booked for me. I should’ve unpacked my bag and hung up the cute little number I intended to wear to Dining Out. I should’ve relaxed in a frothy bubble bath and maybe even taken a nap. But I didn’t do any of those things. I threw Barrett’s truck into gear and made a beeline for the Back Gate.

  It had been years since I’d crossed Fort Donovan, and while some things had changed, most remained the same. The Back Gate was one of them. It had earned its name not only because it was situated at the rear of the post, but also because it opened onto the road that paralleled coastal Mississippi’s Back Bay.

  This gate was just as well guarded as the main one, but it wasn’t nearly as pretty. There were no flowers or fancy displays of firepower here. That stuff was for the townspeople zipping along the Parkway and tourists who wanted to gawk at something when they visited the area. No, the Back Gate was old school, with chain link, razor wire, and concrete barriers. It was also the gate most soldiers used to nip off the post for a quick haircut, a fast sandwich, or other kinds of services.

  The gloss of the casinos and the elegance of the antebellum homes on the Gulf didn’t reach this side of town. Instead, crumbling brick buildings, constructed when incoming servicemen would soon be outbound for France and the Great War, fronted the faded asphalt street and crowded the cracked sidewalks. Several sported garish signs promoting cash advances for financially strapped soldiers in exchange for exorbitant interest rates. Barbers offered affordable haircuts, and so did beauty parlors where big hair had never gone out of style. Grubby pawnshops tempted passersby with shiny things to send to sweethearts back home.

  And then there were the lingerie stores.

  Faceless mannequins posed behind plate-glass windows, scantily clad in red lace, black leather, pink satin, or feathers. Each figure was overtly female and each mimicked the proportions of a Barbie doll. All had long, lustrous hair thanks to wigs of black or blond or even royal blue nylon, and the color of their plastic skin, whether dark or light or in between, had never been seen on an actual person.

  The names of these establishments were cute and coy at the same time. On the first block I passed Pretty Kitty. Across the street was Rosebud’s, while Fantasia occupied the property next door. And they had one more thing in common.

  In flashing neon lights, every one of these businesses proclaimed: LIVE LINGERIE MODELS.

  For the most part, the women employed at these locations—and they were usually women—merely modeled the wares for the predominantly male clientele. Sometimes, this clientele was permitted to touch the merchandise. And from time to time, in back rooms and second-floor flops, paying customers got to do a lot more than
that.

  Historically, prostitution has always been a problem around military installations. Anywhere lonely men had money to spend and time on their hands, pimps and madams seemed to open shop. Of course, the local authorities in Beauville and elsewhere routinely cracked down on this kind of activity, and soldiers caught breaking the law would have consequences to face once they were back on the post. But raid after raid had never closed all of the Back Bay’s lingerie stores, and as long as both supply and demand existed, I supposed they never would.

  I continued past the shops and down the main drag, turned onto a cross street of modest homes beyond the crush of town, and turned again onto a winding road that meandered along the bay. Tucked here and there among the loblolly pines were cottages, built in the 1920s and ’30s. Many were picture-perfect, a few could’ve used a face-lift, but at least one was nothing more than a tarpaper shack. As I drove past it, a trio of kids leapt from the porch. Squealing, they raced across the muddy yard in a serious game of tag. They didn’t wear coats or shoes despite the rainy chill—and I’d seen enough of the haves and the have-nots of this world to recognize that these kids didn’t own any.

  Not far from the bay itself, I slowed, scanning for an address I knew by heart. When I was a brand-new military spouse, the place had been my home away from home as my then-husband logged long hours training at Fort Donovan and—though I didn’t know it at the time—in other women’s beds. Consequently, I’d been alone a lot. And lonely. To make matters worse, no matter how hard I chased down job openings, I couldn’t get hired to save my life. Chronic underemployment has always shadowed military spouses, thanks to frequent moves, interrupted education or work history, or professional licensing that doesn’t transfer from state to state, and that was my first taste of it.

  One gloomy Monday morning, when no one was interested in my freshly printed university degree, my relatively short résumé, or even the fine penmanship I’d provided on application after application, I tidied my tiny kitchen, poured yet another cup of tea, and wondered how the hell I’d fill all the hours in the day. I came across a copy of the Beauville Gazette my husband had abandoned on the sofa, and with nothing better to do, I paged through it. That’s when I found an announcement that changed my life. It read:

  WANTED: INVESTIGATIVE ASSISTANT

  MUST HAVE GUMPTION

  APPLY IN PERSON

  And that was all there was to it. There was no phone number to call, no point-of-contact named, and no office address listed—but I wasn’t about to let a lack of information stop me from pursuing something so intriguing. I snatched up that newspaper, grabbed my car keys, and struck out to track down just who had placed that advertisement.

  At first, the ginger-haired gentleman in the newspaper’s Classifieds department was reluctant to tell me anything. I learned his name was Howard, however, because his mother had written it on his brown-bag lunch, and because I’d accosted him so early in the morning, he hadn’t had a chance to tuck it into the fridge. Howard was polite, if firm, and painfully shy, and I noticed he sucked in his tummy every time I smiled at him.

  That gave me an idea.

  After presenting Howard with a box of freshly baked donuts and swearing I’d never tell his mother he’d cheated on his diet, I finally persuaded him to show me the receipt for the ad. It had been placed and paid for by someone called Ray Walther. And while this Ray Walther didn’t have a listing in the white pages, I found his name, as bold as brass, in the yellow ones.

  This led me to a storefront sandwiched between a shop selling tie-dyed clothing and crystals to cleanse any chakra and a video rental place with peeling posters for sketchy movies falling away from its windows. On the glass door between those two establishments, flaking paint spelled out RAY WALTHER INVESTIGATIONS in big, block letters. Just reading those words made my heart beat faster.

  To my dismay, it turned out Ray Walther Investigations was closed on Mondays. But I’d come too far to go home without meeting the elusive Ray Walther himself, so I went to the courthouse. In the recorder’s office, I found Ray’s name on the deed to a house.

  Without a second thought, I drove straight to that house, marched up the steps, and rapped on the front door. The guy who answered my knock was a thick-necked, hard-nosed, forty-something-year-old retired soldier if I’d ever seen one. Clenching the smoldering stub of a cigar in the corner of his mouth, he looked me up and down as I stood on his doorstep and grimaced.

  “Ray Walther?” I’d said.

  “Who’s askin’?”

  I’d waved the Gazette under his chin. “I’ve come to apply for the investigative assistant’s position.”

  Ray had hesitated, removed his cigar from his mouth, and flicked its ash into the breeze. “How old are you, kid?”

  “Twenty-three.”

  “You know anything about private investigations?”

  “Not yet.”

  He’d looked me up and down again, taking in my scuffed boots, well-worn jean jacket, and death grip on that newspaper ad.

  “Sorry, kid. I just don’t think you’re right for the job.”

  Later, I’d learn that Ray hadn’t turned me down because he’d harbored some dinosaur’s opinion of what women could do. Rather, he belonged to a generation that would consider it unseemly for a man of his age to spend his days—and sometimes his nights—in the company of a sweet young thing like myself. Of course, on that dreary Monday, I didn’t know what he was thinking; I only knew my father, the general, hadn’t raised me to take no for an answer.

  “Are you saying I don’t have gumption?” I’d demanded.

  “What?”

  “Gumption. Your ad says it’s a requirement. But maybe all your applicants have got gumption, too.” I’d cast a disparaging glance along the vacant porch and toward the empty road. My car was the only vehicle parked on it. “If that’s the case, let’s talk about my other qualifications.”

  Ray had chuckled, and his laugh had sounded like an American muscle car revving up for a street race.

  “All right, kid. I’ll give you a shot, but if this looks like it’s not gonna work out—”

  “Don’t worry. If it looks like it’s not gonna work out,” I’d told him, “I’ll let you know.”

  That day, I became more than Ray Walther’s investigative assistant. I became his apprentice. And as the weeks went by, I knew, for the first time in my life, despite any commentary from my exacting father or my self-absorbed husband, that I could do more than meet someone else’s job description—and that I could be more.

  In short, I’d found my passion.

  And I’d found my passion because I’d found Ray.

  Even now, rolling up to Ray’s old Craftsman bungalow felt like a homecoming. Framed between a pair of twisted oaks dripping with coils of Spanish moss, the house sat perched on earthy tan pilasters, just in case any floodwaters should sweep this way. Terra-cotta tiles glimmered wetly on the roof and the cedar steps of the porch reached wide to embrace me.

  I hopped from Barrett’s truck, dug into my bag for the small token I’d brought for Ray’s wife—and my best friend in the world—Corinne. Six months after I’d begun working for Ray, he and I had cleared so many cases he needed to hire a full-time billing clerk. Corinne Nguyen had come calling for the job.

  Corinne was barely nineteen back then, and Ray had resisted hiring her, but after the next applicant arrived drunk and Ray caught the third, who was twice Corinne’s age, pilfering from the petty cash box, he gave in. It was Corinne’s own ability, however, to multitask and never take guff from a non-paying client that got her promoted to office manager.

  In the meantime, Ray had begun to fall in love with the smart and sunny Corinne, and that sweetened him up some. For my part, I got to enjoy watching both of them struggle to deny their attraction. Wearing their hearts on their sleeves, they each thought they were hiding their feelings from the world—and from each other. But they couldn’t lie to themselves forever. And no one threw
more rice at their wedding than I did.

  I tucked the slender, gift-wrapped box meant for Corinne into the pocket of my tweed jacket and jogged up the steps, eager to surprise my friend by showing up unannounced. Welcome lights blazed in the bungalow’s front windows, casting a warm glow onto the deep porch. I lifted the wrought-iron knocker and bumped it against its strike plate one, two, three times. Inside the house, the floor creaked, but strangely, no one answered the door. I knocked again.

  “Who is it?” Corinne’s voice demanded.

  Her tone held a note of challenge in it—and something else.

  That something sounded like fear.

  Pumping a healthy dose of good cheer into my reply, I called, “I’m just a Yankee who’s lost her way.”

  “Jamie!”

  The door flew wide as if a force of nature had blown it open. And that was pretty much the case. Except this particular force came in a small package.

  Corinne was as dainty and delicate as a sparrow, but she was also as strong as an ox. She threw her arms around me and hugged me tightly—but not too tightly. Because Corinne was eight months pregnant and her full belly took up a lot of space between us.

  “I didn’t expect to see you until our dinner party date on Sunday!” she exclaimed.

  “I know, but I couldn’t resist dropping by,” I said—and I realized my friend was wearing her bathrobe despite it being early afternoon. “I hope this isn’t a bad time.”

  Corinne blushed, gathered the shawl collar of the pale-blue satin robe to her throat. “No, no, I…Actually, it’s fine. I’m glad to see you. You look great.”

  I wouldn’t win any beauty pageants after my bumpy flight, but Corinne certainly looked wonderful. A happy marriage, her healthy pregnancy, or both had brought roses to her high cheekbones. She seized my hand, towed me into the foyer, and locked the deadbolt behind us.

  “Frankly,” she said, hanging my blazer on the antique hall tree standing at attention beneath the staircase, “from the way you haven’t been able to stop talking about this Adam Barrett guy, I thought you’d jump off that airplane and drag him straight into bed.”