Дэвид Балдаччи - The Escape

That had been the last time he had ever seen her. When he had come back inside hours later she was gone. A search was conducted, but she was never found. His father had never spoken her name after that.

Jacqueline Puller had been Jackie to her friends, of which she had more than his father ever would. People feared his father. People loved his mother. Not a day went by that he didn’t think of her. Not a single day.

He conjured that face at the window. The smile, the wave. All of it full of love and reassurance, with nothing to predict such a catastrophic and mysterious end.

The image began to fade as the voice intruded.

“Puller? Puller?”

Something shook him by the arm.

He came out of this memory, opened his eyes, and looked up. For one vastly unsettling moment Puller thought his long-lost mother was standing in front of him.

But it was Knox standing there draped in a towel, her hair pinned up and damp.

“Are you okay?” she asked, looking genuinely worried about him.

He cleared his throat, gathered his composure, and nodded as he abruptly stood, causing her to jump back as he almost stepped on her bare foot.

“Sorry, just have a bunch of stuff on my mind.”

“Gee, I wonder what that could be?”

She smiled and he forced one to his lips. He picked up her phone and handed it back to her. “I think this is yours.”

“You sure you don’t want to keep it?”

“I’m sure I don’t need to.”

She set the phone on the nightstand and eyed the chair, the floor, and then the bed. “I guess we better discuss sleeping arrangements.”

“Look, I can just sleep in the lobby. There’s a couch there.”

She said in a mock playful tone, “What, you don’t trust yourself spending the night in a woman’s hotel room? What about the Rangers’ legendary self-discipline?”

He glanced down at her towel-draped figure. Then he abruptly looked up. “I trust myself.” He took in a whiff of air. Her hair smelled of vanilla. He felt an odd sensation creep up his spine. He shook it off, with difficulty.

“Then what’s the problem?”

“I can sleep in the chair or on the floor.”

“You can sleep in the bed, I’ll sleep in the chair.”

“Knox, it’s your room.”

“And you’re a lot bigger than me. And I’ve slept in far worse places, trust me.”

She grabbed some things from her suitcase and went back into the bathroom. A minute later she came out dressed in shorts and a tank top, her hair down around her shoulders. She snagged a pillow off the bed and a blanket from the closet. She curled up in the chair and put the blanket over her.

“You sure about this?” said Puller, who had been watching her uncomfortably.

“For the last time, yes. Can you hit the light?”

Puller swiped the switch with his hand. Then he got into bed, lay back against the pillow, and lifted the sheet up to his chest.

Knox sat up in the chair. “What were you thinking about when I came out of the bathroom?” she asked. “Your brother?”

“No. Somebody else in the family.”

“Your father?”

“No,” he said, his tone blunt.

“Okay, I get the message. I’ll stop asking.”

They lay there in silence for a few minutes, the only sound their breathing.

“It was my mother. I was thinking about her.”

He glanced over. Knox was looking at him.

“Is she still alive?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” he replied.

“What happened to her?”

“She disappeared when I was a kid. She was waving at me from the window of our house while I was outside playing. She was just there and then she was gone. Never saw her again.”

“Puller, I’m so sorry.”

“I’ve…I’ve never told anyone about this. At least not since it happened.”

“I can understand that.”

“I’d appreciate it if you didn’t…”

“Puller, if there’s something I can do, it’s keep a secret. I would never tell anyone. I swear.”

“Thanks, Knox.”

“But why did you start thinking of her now? Because of your brother?”

“No. It was your being in the shower. And the singing.”

She looked embarrassed. “I was singing in the shower? Jesus, sometimes I don’t even know I’m doing it. I’m sorry. I can’t even carry a tune.”

“No, you were fine.” Then he grew silent.

She said, “Is that the last memory you have of your mother, apart from seeing her in the window? She was singing in the shower?”

Puller nodded, because he couldn’t speak right now.

“I had no idea, Puller. I never would have–”

“I know,” he said interrupting her. “It’s okay.” He paused. “Some family, huh. Brother on the run. Mother disappeared. And my father’s sitting in a VA hospital still thinking he’s heading up an Army corps.”

She said, “My grandfather had Alzheimer’s. It’s a…terrible disease. It wipes everything important away from the inside out.”

“Yeah, it does,” he said curtly, and then there was silence once more.

“Good night, Puller.”

“Good night, Knox.”

THE NEXT MORNING they descended into an overcast D.C. and landed a few minutes early. Before they’d left Puller had taken AWOL to Fort Leavenworth and left the cat in the care of a vet who maintained a kennel there. Puller had arranged for an Army car to be waiting for him at the airport in D.C. They loaded their bags into it and drove off from the airport.

“Two witnesses,” Puller said.

“Two witnesses,” Knox repeated.

“You got anything?” he asked.

“I checked into the INSCOM database on the drive to the airport. Susan Reynolds has worked at Fort Belvoir for about four months. At the time your brother was arrested she worked at STRATCOM in Kansas City.”

“Where she worked with my brother, or at least knew him by sight,” commented Puller.

Knox pulled a notebook from her bag and flipped through the pages. “Shireen Kirk said that Reynolds testified that your brother copied something from a computer onto a DVD.”

“I guess that’s a no-no at STRATCOM.”

“It’s a no-no in most secure facilities. But Reynolds said she saw your brother do it, and then he pocketed the DVD and left the facility with it.”

“I wonder if they ever determined what files he accessed and downloaded? Or allegedly did?” added Puller.

“I suppose they would have had to check that if they introduced it into evidence against him at the court-martial.”

“And I wonder what happened to the DVD? If it ever existed?”

“It really would be helpful to get a transcript of the court-martial proceedings,” said Knox.

“Shireen said it would take a court order. And it would have to trump national security, which was the reason the file was sealed in the first place.”

“Well, your brother has escaped from prison. So if we accept the prevailing argument that he is in fact guilty, then his being on the loose with all the secrets he has in his head constitutes a national security problem. We could argue that if we are going to help catch him, we need to know about the crimes he was convicted of. In detail. For instance, this Iranian agent that he allegedly met with. If we can get a lead on him, it might bring us to your brother.”

“He’s not guilty, Knox!”

“I understand that. But the point is we need a way to get the files, Puller. And if we have to play the national security angle, well, hell, let’s play it.”

Puller flashed her an admiring look. “That’s pretty clever, actually. How can they argue against that, right? They need to give us whatever they have, to allow us to apprehend him before he hurts this country.”