Yet between her and Stone, those last months together had felt as if a malaise like a permanent summer had fallen over their marriage. Sure, she could blame his survivor’s guilt and their angst over his second deployment, but she couldn’t lay all the blame there. After all, she had been protecting her own sense of survivor’s guilt.
Figueredo headed northwest on the H-3, and she glanced out over the bay at the anchored sailboats. What motivated some to live on such an unstable surface? She couldn’t even sleep on a waterbed. Years ago, while visiting Stone’s aunt who lived in a charming cabin on the Lake of the Ozarks, they’d been given the downstairs basement bedroom with a waterbed. They’d still been newlyweds then, and Stone’s sister and her husband had joked about the newlyweds springing a leak in the waterbed. But Stone and Chase had been miserable in the bed. Every time Stone rolled over the motion made Chase so sick she’d had to make a pallet on the floor beside the bed. One night, Stone talked her into slipping out of the house and down to the dock. They’d stripped, climbed into his aunt’s boat on the lift under the boathouse, and made love on the triangle cushion at the bow. When Stone whispered, “We can make love on the water,” she’d giggled so loud that he’d had to put his hand over her mouth until she could control herself. Afterward, still naked, they quietly climbed down the steps and slipped into the inky water, Stone’s powerful arms keeping them afloat.
When her ears cleared from the altitude on the H-3, she turned to Figueredo and asked, “You said earlier today that White and Melanie Appleton were not having an affair? How do you know this, sir?”
“Can’t go there, Skipper,” he said, his expression still fixed on maneuvering around slow traffic.
Fine, she thought. If he wouldn’t talk, then neither would she. To hell with his direct order. She would keep Shapiro’s suspicions about White’s hard landing to herself another few days, at least until North had a chance to uncover what he could, and even then, she’d only tell Figueredo as a courtesy on her way to N.I.S.—that is, if it was true that White’s hard landing had been covered up.
A few minutes later they were pulling into the school parking lot. Molly was tethered by hand to Mrs. Kamaka until Chase lowered her window and shouted a hello to both of them. Molly, cautious at first because of the unfamiliar car, bolted from Mrs. Kamaka when she recognized her mother and was freely swinging her book bag into huge circles above her head all the way to the car.
“Whose car is this?” she asked and then looked up suspiciously at Colonel Figueredo, who had walked around the BMW to open the door for Molly. “Who are you?”
He opened the back door for her. “I’m a friend—”
Chase interrupted. “Honey, this is Colonel Figueredo from the base. The Jeep’s in the shop getting fixed. He’s just giving us a ride home.”
Chase was too stiff to turn her head, so Molly leaned in far enough to kiss her mother on the lips, and then she climbed inside the back. Apparently the colonel must have attempted to help the child with the buckling of her seat belt, because Chase heard her daughter say, “I can do it,” just before the belt clicked. Figueredo whispered to Chase, “She’s as independent as her mother.”
“No, she gets that from her father,” Chase said.
Samantha had just finished clearing the table and loading the dishwasher. Molly was already down for the night. “Here,” Sam said, arranging a pain pill and a glass of water on the dinette before Chase, who stared longingly at the pill. The evening had been torture. Fortunately, Figueredo had left immediately after dropping her and Molly at the house and after a brief conversation in the driveway with Samantha that appeared to Chase to be on the tense side.
Samantha was wiping off the kitchen island. Chase cleared her throat. “Sam, what’s going on with Colonel Figueredo? I mean, why is he showing up here and helping me out. I don’t want to sound ungrateful, but you’re my friend, which means I would be helping you if the circumstances were reversed, but Figueredo?”
Samantha folded the dishrag and draped it over the sink. She pulled a chair out from the dinette and sat across from Chase. “Joe’s an old friend of Hal’s,” she explained. “You know how it is—single officer, new duty station, and all this with you, with me helping out—well, he just sort of dived in.”
“But you two looked so tense with each other in the driveway this evening.”
Samantha shrugged. “Call me territorial when it comes to you. I told him I had planned on picking you and Molly up tonight. That’s all.”
Chase leaned across the table and patted her friend’s freckled hand. “You’re a good friend, Sam. I don’t know what Molly and I would have done without you since Stone’s death. Thank you for picking up Molly yesterday and for coming to the hospital.” She felt herself choking from emotion.
“You’d do the same for me, honey.” She handed Chase the glass of water. “I’ll sleep over tonight in your guest room.” And when Chase was about to protest the pain pill, Samantha added, “You’ve suffered enough. Now take that and go to bed.”
The next morning, still groggy from pain medication, Chase attempted to dress for work. She could hear Samantha and Molly in the kitchen, eating breakfast, their chatter floating down the hallway toward her. Molly was describing the hula skirt she wanted as a Halloween costume.
“Ready in fifteen,” Chase shouted down the hall. She was undecided over which uniform to wear for her meeting with Hickman. Still a little stiff and achy, the idea of maneuvering in a skirt and high heels all day seemed overwhelming, but she settled for the skirt. She pinned silver captain’s bars into the collar of her khaki shirt and slid into the dreaded high-heels. She checked her reflection while brushing through her short hair. Whatever news Hickman had, she was ready. After all, tomorrow was Saturday, and she and Molly had a whole weekend to find the perfect grass skirt.
After dropping Molly at school, Samantha drove Chase off base to the rental car company. When Chase slid behind the wheel of the white Toyota and winced, a concerned Samantha asked, “Are you sure you can drive?”
Drive, yes. Breathe, maybe not. Chase was exhaling in short breaths, but nodding. “I can make it.”
“Look, I can drive you to your meeting with General Hickman, wait out front, and drive you back.” But Chase was shaking her head at the whole idea.
“Okay, hardheaded.” That was the second time in as many days she’d been called that. Samantha closed the door, waved, and walked across the lot to her car.
Once back on base and halfway to Hickman’s office, Chase was startled by the flashing lights of a military police vehicle in her rear-view mirror. She glanced down at the speedometer. The needle was pointing on thirty-five, the maximum for the stretch of Perimeter Road that extended along the flight line. Maybe the speedometer was off. She signaled and steered the car to the shoulder. Sunlight reflected off the windshield of the MP sedan, the glare making it impossible to decipher the activity within the vehicle. She waited, her heart thumping within her chest as hard as the time she and her girlfriend had been stopped on the way to cheerleading tryouts during high school. The police officer’s sternness had caused a teenaged Chase to burst into tears. He’d apparently taken pity on her and had only cited her with a warning.
The door opened, and Chase saw that it was tall Major Sims, the provost marshal. She exhaled, overcome by a sense of silliness. After all, what did she have to worry about anyway? She wasn’t the same immature sixteen-year-old, speeding across town in her father’s Chevy Caprice.
As Sims exited the car, much of his body’s upper half disappeared from the rear-view mirror. She lowered her window. Through the side mirror, she saw him stop at the Toyota’s back bumper, lower the sunglasses, and push them back as he approached Chase’s open window.
“Good morning, Major.”
“Captain Anderson,” he said with surprise, and draped an arm on the door. “I heard you were in an accident a few days ago. Rental car?”
“Yes, sir. The brakes went out
on my Jeep.”
He straightened, and looked at the road ahead of and behind them. Marines were in a hurry but were slowing as they approached the flashing lights. A black Honda sedan passed. The major waved at the driver, a Marine—she could tell that much. Sims bent down again, one hand folded across the window track of her door. His knuckles were freckled, and the fine, blond hairs on his forearm were blowing back and forth with the windward breeze. “Lucky you weren’t killed.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Did you know your left brake light is out?”
“Is it? No, sir. I didn’t know.”
“You should tell the rental company to have it fixed A-SAP.” He patted the door, and straightened. “My father, he was Scotch-Irish. He used to say we’re all born with a certain amount of luck. He would tell us, Don’t use up what you’ll wish you had later.” She glanced up at him. His eyes were scanning the scene around them. He was a man compelled to know the tiniest detail about his surroundings—the military truck that was passing, the Cobra helicopter flying overhead toward the Pacific, the gravel he was kicking under her car.
“Good advice, sir.”
“Hickman’s expecting you this morning. Better get on over there.”
Chase looked back at the road. “Thank you, sir. Have a nice day.” His farewell was a pat on the side of the car. She waited until he climbed in his sedan and closed the door before she checked for oncoming traffic, signaled, and pulled onto the road again. A few hundred feet down the road, she glanced in the rear-view mirror and saw that his car was still parked on the shoulder, flashers still blinking. A half-mile later, he was suddenly so close that when palm trees shielded the glare of sunlight on his windshield, she could see that he was talking on a cell phone, a violation of base regulations. But who would dare reprimand the provost marshal?
Her body had stiffened from the short drive to headquarters, and she struggled up the few steps. The double doors at the top of the landing flew open, and two young Marines bolted through, bounding down the stairs with enviable ease. One carried a folded American flag. Both saluted as they passed her. If she didn’t hurry inside, she would have to stand at the position of attention during morning colors, which included the blasting of reveille and the national anthem. She leaned on the polished brass handrail, thankful it was not yet too hot to handle, and wielded her way up the stairs and through the double doors, just as the recording of a trumpet blasted into the island air.
Hickman’s office was in the far corner of the headquarters building. Her high heels tapped an indefinable Morse code against the polished corridor that was as shiny as a new dime. The walls between offices were decorated with framed military pictures of helicopters and jets during missions in Iraq. She passed the break room where three Marines, two women and a man, were gathered around the coffee machine, mugs in hand, chatting as they waited for a fresh pot to brew. The aroma tugged at her craving for a second cup.
In the Disbursing Office where payroll was handled, she recognized the young sergeant behind the counter as the woman who had nearly beaten Chase during the mile-and-a-half run of the physical fitness test (PFT) a few months earlier. The sergeant, several inches shorter than Chase, was soccer-player fast and had been determined to beat Chase who, for a year, had held the distinction of being the fastest female runner on the base. Chase had enjoyed the sergeant’s challenge, enjoyed the push the woman had given her, though she had enjoyed even more the pull ahead. Chase had felt the strain of every tendon in those final fifty yards. She’d pushed through the fear she wouldn’t finish before pulling up lame. In the end, she was still the woman to beat. How silly all that seemed now. The sergeant glanced up from her paperwork and smiled. Chase nodded.
A few feet past Disbursing, she came upon a closed door, the G-1’s office, what used to be Major O’Donnell’s office before his suicide attempt a few days earlier. His name was still on the brass plate outside his door. Someone anticipated his return. As far as she knew, no replacement had been proposed.
She stepped inside the aide’s office and her high heels sank into plush carpeting. The aide was not around. She guessed from the murmuring of deep voices behind the closed walnut door that divided the aide’s office from the general’s, that the two men were together. She pulled a notebook and a pen from her purse. She’d learned years ago, and not just because she was a public affairs officer, that it was improper and even disrespectful to call on a superior officer without a notebook and pen. To do so sent a signal that one didn’t feel the superior officer was likely to offer anything important.
The door opened and the aide emerged. He was a first lieutenant, several years younger than she, with the facial features one might expect to find on a recruiting poster. “Good morning, Captain Anderson.” In his hand was the calendar he used for scheduling Hickman. “The general’s expecting you.” He pushed open the door.
“Thank you, Lieutenant,” she said, her heart already beginning to pump faster. She studied the lieutenant’s face and body language for clues regarding the general’s present mood. The lieutenant appeared as always, professional and stiff.
“Captain Anderson, sir,” he announced. She wasn’t three feet in the general’s office when the door behind her clicked shut.
Hickman’s office was wall-to-wall paneling, nice and luxurious, not the thin sheets of paneling her father had nailed to the walls of their mobile home living room when, during the lean years after he’d lost his job because of the drinking, they’d been forced to move from their large country house to the poorest side of the county in a mobile home park. Still, their family had stayed together, her mother would sigh and say, and it had taken less than a year for her scared sober father to find a decent job and move the family into a nice, though modest, home closer to town.
She approached Hickman’s desk and assumed the position of attention, her notebook and purse by her left side.
“Captain Anderson reporting as ordered, sir.”
Behind his desk was a large picture window that offered a panoramic view of both ocean and flight line. She fixed her stare on a helicopter that was taxiing by.
When Hickman rose, they were eye to eye. Only a desk separated them. Since it was against military protocol to look an officer directly in the eye, she adjusted her stare to the right side of his head.
“Good morning, Chase,” he said, and walked from behind his desk. “At ease.” Her first name?
Chase shifted her body into the more casual position.
“Let’s sit over here,” he said, motioning toward a sitting area that included a leather sofa, end tables with brass lamps, a coffee table neatly displaying military magazines, and two upholstered chairs. In a year, he had not offered her this sitting option. Chase followed him across the office and waited for him to make his choice of seating. He chose a chair and motioned for Chase to take the sofa.
“How are things in Public Affairs these days?” he asked as she settled onto the sofa, placing her purse by her feet and the notebook on her lap. He was toying with her, of course. The small talk was a buildup to something she most likely didn’t want to hear. Nervousness was percolating through her body. She felt uncomfortably warm, even sweaty, beneath her shirt. She would have preferred one of the upholstered chairs to the leather sofa, which was now warming like a hot plate beneath her.
“Things are going well, sir.” She smiled.
“Everybody on your staff current with their PFTs?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You? How are you doing since your wreck?”
“Other than being a little stiff from the whiplash, I’m fine, sir. Thank you for asking.”
“Your daughter okay?”
Damn him, she thought. Why wouldn’t he just get to it? What was all this about? “Yes, sir. She’s quite well, thank you.”
“Would you like something to drink? Coffee?”
“No, sir. I’m fine.” Coffee was the last thing she needed.
“Chase—” There w
as her first name again. “We have a problem.”
She opened her notebook. “Yes, sir?”
He glanced down at her notebook and said, “Oh, you can put that away.” She closed the notebook and set it on the coffee table that separated the two of them. She kept the pen in her hand, a habit, something to keep her nervous hands steady.
“Here’s the problem,” he said. “I got a call yesterday from headquarters Marine Corps. Paul Shapiro with the Current is asking a lot of questions about our aircraft, in particular the 81.”
Chase could feel heat prickling from her chest to her neck and then up to her cheeks. Had Figueredo been talking to Hickman? “Running interference,” he’d call it. Or had Hickman discovered she’d met Shapiro at The Hungry Fisherman? Even Figueredo didn’t know about that. Innocent as it all was, she knew the general’s fondness for guilt by association. Her face was growing moist. When the general’s gaze diverted to the window, she seized the moment to swipe away the dampness on her forehead, folding her hands to her lap, ladylike, by the time he looked back.
He continued, glancing first at the pen in her hands and then to her face. “Shapiro wants the safety stats on the 81.” He paused. “For the entire fleet … can you believe that?”
“What reason did he give for the request, sir?”
“He’s causing us lots of problems, Chase.” Again with the first name, not to mention the dodge of her question. Was the latter because he assumed she knew the answer?
An Unlawful Order (The Chase Anderson Series) Page 11
