Jack of Spades

by Diane Capri

  Kim raised her eyebrows. “So he wasn’t at the pier at all?”

  Jake shrugged. “That’s the impression I had, but I guess thinking back on it, he didn’t really say.”

  “Did he say where he was headed?”

  Jake shook his head. “Sorry. No.”

  Kim took a deep breath and made the decision. “You should know that two bodies were found on the beach south of the pier. One was Owen. The other was Oscar. The local authorities say there were two bullets in Oscar’s body. Both came from Owen’s gun. But that’s not what killed Oscar.”

  Jakes eyes grew wide. “He drowned?”

  She shook her head. “His windpipe was crushed. Brutally smashed, in fact. Medical examiner won’t know more until they do the autopsy, but he said it looks like Oscar was strangled by huge, powerful hands.”

  Jake paused to think about it. “You think Jack killed him? How would he even have done that?”

  “Do the math.” She shrugged, using Gaspar’s all-purpose gesture, and laid out the facts. “The two brothers were big and heavy, which means they were hard to move. They were a long way apart when they died, but their bodies were found together on the beach, quite a distance from the pier. Owen was shot and killed in the windsurfing shop, and we know Reacher moved his body because he told you so. Oscar apparently survived two bullet wounds and a pounding by the Pacific Ocean. But what killed him was a crushed windpipe. Probably after he washed ashore.”

  She waited to let him draw his own conclusions.

  Jake was silent a long time. When he spoke again, he said, “How’s Patty and Shorty?”

  Kim cocked her head. Jake knew more about his uncle now, and she wasn’t sure how he would process it. “They’re both going to be okay. Shorty was banged up and he swallowed a lot of seawater, but he managed to stay afloat and rode the riptide around until it dumped him back on the beach. They’re both in a room on the sixth floor if you want to see for yourself.”

  Jake nodded. “I’ll do that before I leave here.”

  Kim said, “What are you going to do when you’re released?”

  “I’ve been thinking about that. Especially since it’s not likely I’ll win the lottery with that ticket I bought in Tulsa,” he said with a grin. “If I’m going to see the world, I’ll need someone else to foot the bill, you know?”

  Kim nodded. She had the feeling she knew what he was going to say next before he said it.

  “I joined the army before I left Laconia. I have time to change my mind. Undo it, you know? But being a lawyer’s not for me. I don’t have the patience for it,” he said, as if he was practicing the speech he planned to give his mother. “Besides, it’s what Reachers do. We’re military men. Hell, I might even become a military cop. Who knows?”

  “When do you report for duty?”

  “I’ve got a few weeks yet. I’ll take some vacation time. Fly back home after the snow melts to see my mom first.” He blushed and ducked his head. “She won’t like it. I’m not looking forward to telling her.”

  He extended his hand to shake hers. “Oh, forgot to ask, did you find the duffel?”

  “Right where you said it would be. You did a good job, Jake. Use me as a reference when you’re ready to move into police work. The good guys could use another one like you,” she replied on her way out.

  The Boss’s phone vibrated on the way down in the elevator. “Otto,” she said when she picked up the call.

  “Reacher’s in the wind again. No reason to hang around there. You’re booked on a flight out of John Wayne Airport,” he said.

  “Copy that,” she replied and disconnected the call. She’d be glad to get home. She sent a quick text to John Lawton, inviting him to breakfast in Detroit.

  She grabbed a taxi at the hospital’s main entrance. She returned to the hotel and asked the taxi to wait while she grabbed her bags and used the video checkout.

  On the ride to the airport, she saw she had two voice messages. The first was from Smithers. It was long and involved and most of it was stuff Gaspar had already sussed out and reported to her. Smithers confirmed what Trevor had done to Margaret Reacher and to Old Man Reacher. Margaret was going to be fine.

  Smithers said they were starting to get IDs on the bodies they’d recovered at the motel. One was a guy named Casper Lange. Businessman from South Africa, partners with Desmond Trevor, who was also missing. Smithers said he’d kicked that one upstairs to the Boss because of the international implications. Which was just as well. The Boss could handle it anyway he wanted. At least she’d be spared the paperwork on Trevor.

  Smithers didn’t ask her what had happened with Jake or with Reacher, which saved her the task of ignoring his questions. But she figured he wouldn’t be as quick to help her the next time they met, either.

  She was satisfied that both Trevor and his partner had already paid the ultimate price for Old Man Reacher’s murder, even though Smithers didn’t know that.

  The second voice message was from Jack Reacher. It was, as always, succinct.

  “Thanks for saving the kid, Otto. I guess I’m the closest thing he’s got to a father now. I won’t forget this. I owe you one.”

  * * *

  FBI Special Agent Kim Otto’s Hunt for Jack Reacher continues in

  PREPPER JACK

  Click Here for Details

  Have you read all of Diane Capri’s Hunt for Jack Reacher books so far? More adventures with Otto and Gaspar are coming soon!

  Pre-Order PREPPER JACK so the next book shows up on your ereader as soon as it releases.

  https://smarturl.it/PrepperJackKobo

  The Hunt for Jack Reacher Series:

  (in publication order with Lee Child source books in parentheses)

  Don’t Know Jack • (Killing Floor)

  Jack in a Box (novella)

  Jack and Kill (novella)

  Get Back Jack • (Bad Luck and Trouble)

  Jack in the Green (novella)

  Jack and Joe • (The Enemy)

  Deep Cover Jack (Persuader)

  Jack the Reaper • (The Hard Way)

  Black Jack • (Running Blind / The Visitor)

  Ten Two Jack • (The Midnight Line)

  Jack of Spades • (Past Tense)

  Prepper Jack

  MORE FROM DIANE CAPRI

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  For a complete list of Diane Capri Books visit:

  http://dianecapri.com/books/

  (Click each title to buy or download a sample)

  The Jess Kimball Thrillers Series:

  Fatal Enemy (novella)

  Fatal Distraction

  Fatal Demand

  Fatal Error

  Fatal Fall

  Fatal Edge (novella)

  Fatal Game

  Fatal Bond

  Fatal Past (novella)

  Fatal Dawn

  The Hunt for Justice Series:

  Due Justice

  Twisted Justice

  Secret Justice

  Wasted Justice

  Raw Justice

  Mistaken Justice (novella)

  Cold Justice (novella)

  False Justice (novella)

  Fair Justice (novella)

  True Justice (novella)

  Night Justice

  The Heir Hunter Series:

  Blood Trails

  Trace Evidence

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Diane Capri is an award-winning New York Times, USA Today, and worldwide bestselling author. She’s a recovering lawyer and snowbird who divides her time between Florida and Michigan. An active member of Mystery Writers of America, Author’s Guild, International Thriller Writers, Alliance of Independent Authors, Novelists, Inc., and Sisters in Crime, she loves to hear from readers and i
s hard at work on her next novel.

  Please connect with her online:

  http://www.DianeCapri.com

  Twitter: http://twitter.com/DianeCapri

  Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/Diane.Capri1

  http://www.facebook.com/DianeCapriBooks

  FROM LEE CHILD

  THE REACHER REPORT:

  March 2nd, 2012

  The other big news is Diane Capri—a friend of mine—wrote a book revisiting the events of KILLING FLOOR in Margrave, Georgia. She imagines an FBI team tasked to trace Reacher’s current-day whereabouts. They begin by interviewing people who knew him—starting out with Roscoe and Finlay. Check out this review: “Oh heck yes! I am in love with this book. I’m a huge Jack Reacher fan. If you don’t know Jack (pun intended!) then get thee to the bookstore/wherever you buy your fix and pick up one of the many Jack Reacher books by Lee Child. Heck, pick up all of them. In particular, read Killing Floor. Then come back and read Don’t Know Jack. This story picks up the other from the point of view of Kim and Gaspar, FBI agents assigned to build a file on Jack Reacher. The problem is, as anyone who knows Reacher can attest, he lives completely off the grid. No cell phone, no house, no car…he’s not tied down. A pretty daunting task, then, wouldn’t you say?

  First lines: “Just the facts. And not many of them, either. Jack Reacher’s file was too stale and too thin to be credible. No human could be as invisible as Reacher appeared to be, whether he was currently above the ground or under it. Either the file had been sanitized, or Reacher was the most off-the-grid paranoid Kim Otto had ever heard of.” Right away, I’m sensing who Kim Otto is and I’m delighted that I know something she doesn’t. You see, I DO know Jack. And I know he’s not paranoid. Not really. I know why he lives as he does, and I know what kind of man he is. I loved having that over Kim and Gaspar. If you haven’t read any Reacher novels, then this will feel like a good, solid story in its own right. If you have…oh if you have, then you, too, will feel like you have a one-up on the FBI. It’s a fun feeling!

  “Kim and Gaspar are sent to Margrave by a mysterious boss who reminds me of Charlie, in Charlie’s Angels. You never see him…you hear him. He never gives them all the facts. So they are left with a big pile of nothing. They end up embroiled in a murder case that seems connected to Reacher somehow, but they can’t see how. Suffice to say the efforts to find the murderer and Reacher, and not lose their own heads in the process, makes for an entertaining read.

  “I love the way the author handled the entire story. The pacing is dead on (ok another pun intended), the story is full of twists and turns like a Reacher novel would be, but it’s another viewpoint of a Reacher story. It’s an outside-in approach to Reacher.

  “You might be asking, do they find him? Do they finally meet the infamous Jack Reacher?

  “Go…read…now…find out!”

  Sounds great, right? You can get it HERE. Check out “Don’t Know Jack,” and let me know what you think.

  So that’s it for now…again, thanks for reading THE AFFAIR, and I hope you’ll like A WANTED MAN just as much in September.

  Lee Child