Chapter 71

CHAPTER 71

T HAT NIGHT DEVINE CHECKED HIS weapons: the Glock, with extra mags, a K-bar knife from his Ranger days, the metal baton he’d kept from Hastings and company’s attempted beatdown of him, and a backup pistol Campbell had given him, a compact Glock 42 that weighed less than a pound with a full mag.

Guns obviously had been an important and integral part of Devine’s long military career. They made things less and more complicated. Perhaps more of the latter than the former, at least in the long run. But no problem was ever solved in the long run with a pull of a trigger. It merely tended to create new dilemmas; yet it wasn’t bad for short-term challenges.

He sat on the bed that the Odoms had shared. The room was uncluttered and scrupulously clean and contained little touches of femininity and playfulness, no doubt courtesy of Alice Odom. As Devine looked around the spare quarters, he thought back to the photo of the Odoms he had seen. A family, all together in love with no idea what the future held.

He stood and checked the front area of the trailer through the gap in the blinds. The darkness held nothing but silhouettes of trees. He couldn’t even see any telltale clouds of chilled breath from the clusters of armed personnel he assumed were out there in the cold. He then ventured around the small room, opening drawers and examining things. He stopped when he saw the old-fashioned photo album stored in one drawer. He was surprised that people from the Odoms’ generation would even have one.

When Devine pulled it out and opened the album, he understood that he was both right and wrong.

The pictures were of a younger Alice Odom, and her mother and father and her brother, Danny Glass.

Glass Sr. was a short, burly, red-faced man with features full of bitterness. His wife was petite with a countenance of extreme unhappiness wedged under her fake smile.

Danny and Alice were next to each other and looking into the camera with what seemed to be genuine happiness. The teenage Danny was holding little Alice’s hand.

Devine wasn’t sure when the photo was taken, but “little” Alice was nearly as tall as her mother. Danny Glass had a full head of dark hair that mirrored his father and mother. Alice’s auburn hair was a trait that her daughter had inherited.

Now they were all dead, except for Danny Glass. That was probably why he was clinging so hard to Betsy, the only link he had to his beloved sister.

Continuing his impromptu search, Devine next found in a cabinet a manila file marked HEALTH . He found in the pages, to his surprise, not the usual routine medical checkup reports he had expected, but rather material on IVF treatments from well over a decade ago. Apparently the Odoms had had difficulty getting pregnant. There were also some wellness checkup forms from when Alice had been pregnant with Betsy, and vaccination records that showed Betsy had been inoculated against the usual childhood diseases.

The last piece of paper puzzled Devine. It was the only one in the file having to do with Dwayne Odom. Devine read over the test results.

How could that possibly be?

The next moment his phone buzzed, and he looked at the message he’d just gotten from Emerson Campbell. It was in response to a photo that Devine had sent him previously. The info filled in a lot of holes for Devine and also gave him an idea. He set down the medical file and focused on the details Campbell had just provided.

A minute later his phone buzzed once more and he read the text.

It gave a place and a time and was signed PJ .

He went to check on Odom. She was asleep.

He looked in on Shore and Rose and asked them to keep watch while he was gone. Shore pulled the Glock and Rose his knife.

“We got her,” said Shore. He was looking Delta Force serious.

Devine nodded, stepped outside the front door, and climbed into his car.

As he headed down the road he felt the presence of people there, watching.

Let’s hope they’re all on our side.

Since they had clearly seen just him and not Odom get in the Subaru, no one had followed him, which was a relief.

When Devine arrived at his destination, he saw a wink of light coming from about a hundred yards away.

His hand slipped to his waistband and the big Glock came out.

Devine maneuvered his way from tree to tree until he was within ten feet of the light.

“I was wondering when you were going to show up,” he said.

Jackson stepped out into the open. She was dressed all in black, and until she removed her face covering, she was nearly invisible.

“I saw Anne Cassidy today. She even spoke to me. If I hadn’t been working so hard to keep from gutting her, I would have been laughing my ass off.”

“But she didn’t know it was you?” said Devine.

“I almost wished she did recognize me. Then I could have just ended her right then and there.”

“We all have regrets.”

“The hardware I saw in that town was impressive. You’d think someone was going to start something big,” she added with a knowing expression.

“Yeah, you would,” agreed Devine. “Is that all you came to tell me?”

“The Kings have a large home outside of town. I visited it.”

“And?”

“And I visited it,” she said curtly. “I saw the two guys with you. Capable?”

“One is former Army. The other is a great chef.”

Jackson hiked her eyebrows. “Well, let’s hope he gets an opportunity to flambé somebody, but it’s not exactly the way I would have played it.”

“You play the hand you have,” replied Devine. “And you fight with the army you have.”

She said, “Speaking of chefs, there seem to be too many cooks in the kitchen on this one. It was a fundamental problem in my life as a fed.”

“I can’t disagree with you there, based on my recent experience.”

“My advice to you is throw out the official manual and go with your gut when the shit hits. And it will.”

“Thanks for the input.”

“Okay, to business. Anne was meeting with a guy named Nick. I happened to overhear the conversation.”

“You get a good look at him?”

“Better than that, I took his picture.” She texted it to him.

Devine looked down at the handsome man with a cruel expression. “Any idea who he is?”

“Nicholas Dawkins.”

“How do you know that?”

“He paid the check. After the bitch left, I went over and had a gander at the bill. You should have your people do a deep dive on him. The man’s interests are… interesting.”

Devine glanced up. “What were they talking about?”

“Well, first of all, they’re planning on taking power in this country. And then doing stuff that will piss off even their own supporters. But as Nick said, once he’s in power, they will have no choice but to toe the line, if they want to remain free and breathing.”

“Spoken like every other wannabe dictator in history.”

“They’ve also apparently caught a rat in their midst. They’re holding him prisoner in the government center.”

This news stunned Devine. “What! Who is it?”

“No names were mentioned.”

“Who did the person rat out?”

“It seems that intel has been leaking to a third party and they tracked it down to this person. They’re probably beating details out of him before they kill him.”

“Okay,” said Devine, processing this. “Any idea who the third party is?”

“Take a wild guess.”

“Danny Glass.”

“Smart boy gets a gold star. I hacked the construction records of the government building. Seems there’s a holding cell on the basement level. I can text you details if your people might be interested.”

“We are,” said Devine.

“Any idea yet who snuffed Odom’s parents?”

“Tomorrow I plan on testing a theory in Ricketts. And I can check out your info, too.”

An expression of surprise lined her face. “Into the lion’s den? I thought you were persona non grata there.”

“Sometimes the best retreat is an offensive.”

“Did they really teach that at West Point?”

“The classroom can’t really show you what it’s like when the guns are firing for real. Like you just advised me, throw out the manual and go with your gut.”

“Every time we meet, I see how we’re more and more alike. Want some backup when you venture into the lion’s den?”

He eyed her steadily. “In for a dime?”

“Something like that,” replied Jackson.

“Then yeah, I do.”