by Zack Klika
If Jennifer figured out where Colonel Wright was hiding the weapons, then of course she would have confronted him instead of turning him in to Sanchez. She wanted revenge, not court proceedings.
Riley knocked hard three times and Lee answered with a smile.
“Come on in,” he said and stepped to the side.
Riley set her things down next to the coffee table and took a seat at the couch. Lee grabbed both of them a few beers and sat next to her.
“You sure you want to help?” Riley asked.
“Listen, if I had known what they did to Jennifer, I would have told Conn right away.”
It was difficult for her to be upset with him. People hear of murder every day, but it’s a different story when you hear all the details.
“Let’s get to work then.”
Riley pulled out Jennifer’s and Andrew’s files. She had printed off everything she had on Jennifer and brought it with her.
“Help me with this,” Riley said, grabbing one end of the coffee table.
Lee went to the other end and helped move it into the corner. Riley started laying photos out on the plush carpet. One by one, they started to form a picture of an investigation that had gone off the rails. There was actually very little physical evidence to suggest Wright was with Andrew the night he died. But photos Jennifer had taken of him at the fights with Buck proved there was some merit to her theory.
By the time Riley was done, there were twenty different photos and documents organized on the carpet. Riley gave Lee the rundown of everything she knew.
“Weapons?” Lee asked, shaking his head. “All of this because of some stolen guns and shit?”
Riley picked up the inventory sheet that had been in Andrew’s file.
“It’s quite a bit actually,” Riley said and handed the sheet to Lee.
He looked it over and then made an awful surprised face. “Goddamn. An estimated twenty-one million dollars’ worth!”
Riley stared at the floor, her eyebrows furrowed in concentration. Lee scratched the back of his neck, apparently unsure what to make of the photos he was looking at. There were some photos of Jennifer in front of a museum on base and some photos of Andrew’s rollover accident she hadn’t seen before.
There was a knock at the door.
“That’s a friend of mine,” Riley said.
Lee gave her a suspicious look.
“He’s military police.”
Lee crossed the room in three long strides and opened the door. He took a step back when he saw Thomas in the doorway, then slammed the door shut in his face.
“That’s the motherfucker that was in my apartment,” Lee shouted. “We gotta get out of here.”
Lee was scrambling for his things when Riley stopped him with a firm grip to his biceps.
“I meant to tell you about that. He was just following orders from his boss, the same guy helping me.”
Riley found it amusing how scared Lee looked. She had heard through Thomas what happened to Danny Smith. For someone who stabbed a man to death, he seemed ill suited even to kill a fly. Lee went back to the door and let Thomas in.
“Thanks,” Thomas said and squeezed by Lee, who probably realized how ridiculous he looked before because now he was puffing his chest out at Thomas.
Thomas extended a hand to Lee. “I’m Thomas.”
“Yeah,” Lee said, walking back to the couch without shaking his hand. “I recognize you.”
“Sorry about your apartment. I had to check for any of Buck’s or Danny’s things.”
Lee just nodded, then went back to looking at the photos and documents on the floor.
“Anything you can tell me about Jennifer that I don’t already know?” Riley asked Thomas.
Thomas flung his backpack next to the door and plopped down on the couch.
“She was all in from the minute she stepped foot on base. She didn’t hang out with anyone in her unit. She went to work, and when she was done for the day, she did her routine surveillance.”
“What about this museum she photographed?” Riley asked.
“That came from her laptop, so it’s new to me and Agent Sanchez.”
“Did you or Sanchez check it out?”
“I haven’t, and I don’t think Agent Sanchez has either. We were ordered to halt our operation.”
Riley had done a piece on the museum during her first few months with the Fort Campbell Daily. It was a fluff piece for families who were visiting loved ones that weekend for some event Riley couldn’t remember. The museum had been renovated and boasted some three hundred new pieces from wars past and present. It was a big success. Still was.
“Okay. I’ll check it out tomorrow.”
“I’ll come too then,” Thomas said.
“No. I need you to find out where these photos were taken,” Riley said, handing Thomas two pictures of the back forty.
“Jennifer must have taken those recently,” Thomas said. “They could be anywhere.”
“Are you here to help or not?”
Thomas nodded and took the photos.
“What about me?” Lee asked.
“I need you to go to Buck’s place and see if you can find any clues about where the stolen weapons are being stored. Something the cops may have missed. You know how guys like him think.”
Lee shook his head and laughed.
“I would have never gone to the speedway that night if I knew how guys like him think.”
“Either way, there might be something there Sanchez and Conn missed.”
Chapter 51
Wednesday, 10/18/17
Early-morning light peeked through thick clouds. Frost from the night still clung to the tree branches. Buck’s house looked the same as it had the last time Lee saw it. Maybe the grass was a bit taller. That was to be expected when a person was murdered and could no longer mow his lawn. Lee made his way up the creaking steps.
Yellow police tape blocked the entrance to the home. Lee pulled it at the corner and eased in. He had no idea what he should be looking for. His plan was to be as thorough as a cop would be. Halfway through searching the home, he started eyeballing cabinets and drawers. It was a big house.
Making his way to the living room, he shuffled through some mail on a side table that ran along the wall by the stairs. A few bills, some junk mail and grocery packets.
Specks of dust floated through the shafts of light coming from the partially drawn curtains. Lee looked through the seat cushions, found some spare change, and moved on to the two armchairs. After he pocketed the change he found, he went over to a bookshelf in the corner of the room that mostly had manuals for car maintenance.
A repair manual for a 1970 Plymouth Barracuda looked more worn than any other book on the shelf. Lee wondered what would become of that beautiful piece of history. Below the books, there were some DVDs. He popped a few open and only found DVDs. He looked behind the fun house mirror that had bothered him on his last visit. Nothing.
One of the three bedrooms had been turned into a gym. There were some free weights and a row machine but nothing else. Danny’s room was pretty filthy. Dirty clothes littered the floor. A small flat-screen TV sat on a dresser, an Xbox One hooked up to it. Lee wondered how in the hell people lived like this. There was a deer’s head mounted above the bed. Not safe, Lee thought. Most of what was in the dresser was stuff you’d pick up at a Walgreens. Condoms, aspirin, Now and Laters. Some old photos from high school. Stray .22 bullets. Lee checked under the bed and found nothing.
Buck’s room was much cleaner. His bed was even made. Lee noticed there was no TV. All of his clothes were hung up neatly in the closet. Mostly worn jeans and old T-shirts. A few hoodies folded and placed on a rack to the right that came up to Lee’s waist. Below the rack were a few pairs of sneakers and some boots. The dressers were filled with underwear, socks, and some long johns. Nothing out of the ordinary.
Lee sat on the bed and opened the single drawer on the nightstand. There was a Bible, some ph
otos of him and his family—not bad-looking folks—and a box of bullets. Lee wasn’t sure what kind. The box said “.357” on it. He picked up the Bible without a reason really and noticed that it seemed heavier than most he had held. He flipped the cover and saw a revolver placed inside the carved-out book. Easy to miss, he supposed.
His views on guns had not changed. But it would be a nice gift to Jarvis after all the shit Lee had put him through over the past week. Jarvis said he didn’t mind, but people always said that. Lee did not want to be that guy who took advantage of a friend’s kindness. He put the gun back in the Bible and took it with the box of bullets.
His search of the home had been fruitless. Lee was halfway down the steps when he heard a scraping that sounded like it came from the back porch. He listened for a moment, then eased down the rest of the steps. The back door was wide-open. The noise coming from the porch sounded like someone was digging through almonds with a plastic scooper. He was ten feet away from the opening when he stepped on a loose board that made a loud creak. The noise cut out and Lee just stood there in tense silence. Then a new sound took hold of him. Melodic taps on wood got closer and closer. Lee backed up slowly. The taps sped up.
He was about to turn and make a dash for his car when he saw Buck’s rottweiler enter the doorway and stare at him with black eyes that signified neither love nor hate. The only time Lee ever saw the dog was when he was chained up and catching rays. Lee mentally prepared for a dash to his car. The dog lowered his head and walked back out of view, diffusing the situation so Lee didn’t have to. The sound of almond scooping was back.
The sound was actually coming from a bag of food that the dog had torn into. He was up to his eyes in puppy chow. The backyard seemed to be half the length of a football field but wider, stretching to woods in every direction he looked. It wouldn’t be right to leave the dog at the house, even if he had survived almost a week on his own.
“Come on, boy,” Lee said, clapping and whistling by his back seat with the door open.
The dog ran down the steps and dove straight in. Lee balled up the chain he found in the front yard and drove off, his new friend’s head hanging out of the open window in the back.
Chapter 52
Mr. Bradley was a thin man and close to five and a half feet tall. He was a veteran and had served proudly in the Korean and Vietnam Wars. Riley knew all this because he had just finished telling her. She enjoyed listening to veterans’ stories, whether of war or love. Most of the ones she met were more interested in hearing her stories, though. There was an unspoken respect between soldiers.
“I remember you from somewhere,” Mr. Bradley was saying and tapped on his head with an index finger. “Steel trap up there. I remember a face forever.”
“I’m with the Fort Campbell Daily.” She smiled. “I ran a story on the museum after it was renovated.”
He nodded enthusiastically. “Yes, yes. That’s it. That picture you took of me behind the plane outside is on my wall next to a photo of my wife and me at the altar. She loves it. Says I don’t look a day over sixty in it.”
Riley smiled. She never knew how old a senior citizen was. Seventy. Ninety. It was hard for her to tell the difference. She knew she was about to find out how old he was.
“Go ahead and guess how old I am.”
Better to keep him in good spirits.
“Sixty-four,” she said.
The old man laughed.
“Younger, huh? I knew it,” she said.
“I’m seventy-six,” he exclaimed, a bit louder than he had probably meant to, but he did not seem bothered by the few visitors in the museum who looked over to him.
“You’ve taken care of yourself.”
“Fifty push-ups every morning since I was seventeen,” he said and flexed his right biceps.
“Impressive,” she said, looking around the museum. There was too much history forced into the small building. It deserved more space. “Do you think you could help me with something, Mr. Bradley?”
“What’s that?”
Riley pulled her phone from her pocket and pulled up a photo of Jennifer.
“Do you remember seeing this soldier in here?” She held her phone out to him.
He leaned and squinted for a split second before a broad smile shot across his face.
“Of course. That’s Jennifer. She’s quite the history buff.”
Of course she was. Jennifer became more impressive with every second that passed. Riley admired her for who she was, not the classes she passed or the history she knew. Jennifer had sought justice, and had gotten so close. Riley didn’t mind picking up where she left off. And if Mr. Bradley had not heard about Jennifer’s murder by now, there was no point in telling him.
“When was the last time she was here?” Riley asked.
He thought about that for a few seconds.
“I think it was last Monday. She came in and wanted to know about the abandoned bunkers in the back forty.”
“Bunkers?”
“Mm-hm. I told her about the only ones not used anymore. The Birdcage.”
The name sounded familiar, but Riley couldn’t place it. She shook her head in a way that signaled she had no idea what he was talking about.
“At the height of the Cold War, in the late 1940s and well into the late 1960s, the United States stockpiled nuclear weapons at thirteen sites around the country. One of those sites is here at Fort Campbell. It’s abandoned now, but during its use, it was one of the most secretive and guarded places in America.”
Mr. Bradley applied some ChapStick. He was going to build up to the good stuff.
“Underground bunkers held the atomic warheads and got the name Birdcage because of the high chain-link fences surrounding them. The bunkers extended deep underground, and tunnels extended deep into the area’s natural hillsides. There were blast-proof doors and vaults designed to keep the secrets safe. And safe they were.”
“Who uses them now?” Riley asked.
“No one. They’re abandoned and off limits. Rumor has it they’re radioactive.”
Riley froze, overcome with an exhilarating sense of fulfillment. Mr. Bradley had just given her the final puzzle piece.
Chapter 53
Thomas had no idea where he was anymore. From an aerial view, the back forty’s roads probably looked like a maze. Trees had blocked his vision on either side of him for the past two hours, and the bends in the road made it look like there was nothing but woods all around him, which was, in fact, the case.
His pickup truck bumped up and down the gravel and dirt road. He looked at the photos Riley had given him and then back out of his windshield. The photos could have been taken anywhere. The washing machine was the only thing that was unique. At least there was that.
Old pieces of broken furniture, trash bags, mattresses . . . the leftovers of someone’s four-year stay at Fort Campbell. The area looked like the beginnings of a dump yard. Thomas had no idea so much trash would be in the back forty. He figured there was always someone patrolling the area to stop littering of this scale.
A bend in the road opened up to the back of a grassy hill that had four large humps on it. The hill was encircled by a dirt road that was connected to one other road besides the one Thomas had just traveled down.
The truck screeched to a halt as Thomas laid his size-twelve desert boot on the brake pedal. Directly to his left, almost completely covered by branches, was an old washing machine. If he had not looked over at that exact moment, he might have missed it.
When he got out of his truck, a gust of wind shot through the trees and made an awful sound that sent chills down his spine. He zipped up his cold-weather jacket to the very top and made his way down into the small trench that separated the wood line from the road. Mostly filled with rocks, but fallen leaves covered most of those.
Making it to the other side, after almost rolling his ankle twice, Thomas pulled back the branches from the washing machine. He pulled the photo out from his pocke
t and held it next to the washing machine. He had found it. Thomas smiled and nodded, pleased with himself. He made his way back to the truck and continued down the dirt-and-gravel path.
He stopped again when he reached the front of the hill. At first he hadn’t been sure what the four humps in the hill could have been, but now he saw they were the tops of bunkers that had been covered with a manmade hill. Each bunker entrance was closed off by two large steel doors, around which a large amount of cement could be seen.
At first glance, it looked like the bunkers had been built protruding from the hill. That was not the case, though. Rain and other elements of Mother Nature were taking their toll. Eventually the face of the hill would deteriorate so much that the layer of grass above would wash away completely.
Thomas walked up to the bunker on the far right and saw that a massive rusted padlock was on it. He figured no one had been out here for a long time if the lock looked that bad. He continued down the line, looking at the other bunkers’ padlocks. The padlock on the last bunker, at the far left, didn’t look old at all. In fact, the lock looked brand-new. So new that he could see his reflection in the chrome plating of the lock. He took some photos with his phone and hopped back in his truck. He wondered what kind of reward he would get from Riley for finding the washer.
Fantasizing about the possibilities of the night, Thomas started the truck. As soon as the engine kicked to life, a sharp pain shot through the left side of chest. The roar of the engine must have muffled the shot. He looked at the hole in his windshield, then down at the bloody hole in his chest.
Chapter 54
Sanchez was lost in thought for most of the car ride to the Clarksville police station. It was cold outside, but the sun had heated up the interior of his car to the point that he felt clammy in his clothing. He turned the air conditioner on low and took in the cool streams that shot at his face.
Wrapping up loose ends was one of the worst parts of the job. The idea was to keep your net small so that it could be pulled in and stored quickly. The net seemed lost to the sea now. He wasn’t sure what Conn knew about the cover-up of Andrew’s death, but it had to be something if she had a friend in CID look into his case file.
