Джеймс Паттерсон - The Summer House

“Gina Zachary,” she says. “She was found here, shot in the back of the head. Looks like she was trying to protect her little girl…and, well, that’s her bloodstain over there.”

It’s small and cramped in this bedroom, the smells deeper and fouler. I’m breathing through my mouth.

“The bed,” she says, not bothering to point. Blood spatter is on the wall where the mattress butts up against it. “Stuart Pike. Shot dead here in bed. His name’s on the lease.”

Manuel speaks up. “He was in bed?”

“Yes,” the sheriff says.

“Okay,” Manuel says after a moment.

The sheriff says, “Something wrong?”

“No,” Manuel says. “Seems funny, that’s all. Downstairs the door gets blown open, there’s shooting, running up here, the Rangers are chasing up after them…and he’s still in bed.”

I keep quiet, and so does Connie.

Williams shrugs. “Maybe he was drunk. Or doped up.” She glances at her watch. “One more, right across the way.”

We go into the other bedroom, which has two beds. The air is only slightly better in here.

Williams points to blood spatter on the floor. “Last victim. Lillian Zachary. Older sister of Gina. Looks like she was hiding under the bed when she was dragged out and shot.”

I look at Manuel and Connie, and they’re just taking in the scene. A few seconds pass.

“Sheriff, anything else you can tell us?” I ask.

She rubs at her chin, checks her watch again. “We got two witnesses who put your boys on the scene or heading to the scene. Lady up the way was walking her dog Wednesday night, heard some shouts and gunfire. There’s a utility light at the end of the driveway. She saw a pickup truck come down the driveway, haulin’ ass. It stopped, and she saw the driver and a passenger. She got a partial plate number ’cause she was spooked by all the noise. We managed to trace it to a Ford F-150 Supercrew registered to Sergeant Jefferson, and she IDed him and another Ranger from a photo lineup we were able to later pull together. After we put out a BOLO for ’em, a Ralston police cruiser spotted the Ford at the Ralston Pub & Grub Friday night, and all four were inside, getting drunk.”

“All right,” I said. “And the other witness?”

“There’s a Gas N’ Go about a mile down the road. Owner of the store remembered two of your Rangers coming into the store, kinda wired up. They were dressed in regular Army camo gear, not civilian clothing. Two other fellas were out in the parking lot, smoking. Then they got into the F-150 and headed out, going in the direction of this place. Time stamp says they were at the store ’bout twenty minutes before the lady walking her dog heard the shooting.”

Manuel and Connie maintain their composure, but I can sense what they’re feeling. This is not looking good for the four Rangers.

I say, “That’s very thorough. Thank you, Sheriff.”

One more look at her watch. “I’ll tell you two other things before I get going. One is that we dusted the area and found prints belonging to two of your Rangers, Staff Sergeant Jefferson and Corporal Barnes. And we recovered shell casings, and they’re—”

A chiming sound cuts through the thick air, and the sheriff digs a cell phone out of a rear pocket, slides a finger across the screen, and brings it up to her face. “Sheriff Williams,” she says. I can make out the murmur of someone talking to her, and she nods and says, “Okay, okay…Thanks, Bobby, for pushing this one through. Appreciate it. You take care. Best to Mary and the kids.”

Her face looks worn as she puts the phone back into her pocket. “That was Bobby Pruitt over at the GBI’s forensics lab in Savannah. We seized Sergeant Jefferson’s 9mm Beretta pistol when he was arrested Friday night, and Bobby did me a favor, put the pistol right on top of the test list.”

“I thought the GBI were vampires.”

The sheriff says, “Not when they’re staying put in Savannah and helping me out with a solid.”

I think we all know what’s coming next, which doesn’t make it sound any better.

“Sorry, Major,” she says. “The shell casings we found here are a match to Sergeant Jefferson’s sidearm. The truth is, your Rangers were in this house that night and killed all these people, including that little girl.”

Chapter 14

AT HUNTER ARMY AIRFIELD—just south of Savannah—Special Agent Connie York parks their Ford rental in front of a three-story brick building, headquarters for the Fourth Battalion, Seventy-Fifth Ranger Regiment, and home to the four Rangers who are in a town jail in Ralston, nearly an hour away. The water tower for the post is visible nearby, and while most of the facility is open land with palmetto trees and southern oaks draped with Spanish moss, the Ranger complex is a post within a post, with high brick walls enclosing it, complete with wire and spikes on top to discourage any unofficial visitors.

Next to her, Major Cook stays silent. He’s been quiet on the drive over here after that horrid search of the kill house, although he was quick and pleasant during their earlier meeting on post with Colonel Brenda Tringali, head of the Third MP Group of the CID. She gave them additional information about the four Rangers—the usual and typical complaints of them being drunk and disorderly while off duty, though the initial complaints were never followed up because local law enforcement agencies didn’t want to get the Rangers into trouble. When they left her office, Connie said to Cook, “She seemed fairly cooperative, Major.”

And he said, “Of course she was cooperative. This case is white-hot and is going to cause one hell of a mess for the Fourth Battalion here and everybody else on post. Better we outsiders take the heat than her and her MPs.”

Connie switches off the car engine. Cook remains quiet, holding his cane in his hands.

“What are you thinking about, sir?” she asks. There have been times when she’s felt comfortable enough to banter and joke with him, but not this time.

“I’m thinking about what Sanchez asked, back at the murder house.”

Connie says, “About the civilian, Stuart Pike? The one found dead in his bed?”

“That’s right,” Cook says. “Sanchez made a good point. Why was he still in bed?”

“Maybe the sheriff is right,” she says. “Maybe he was drugged, drunk, or passed out.”

“Passed out enough so he doesn’t at least get off the bed when his girlfriend runs screaming into the bedroom, after the front door gets blasted open?” Cook replies, opening the door. “Come along. We’ve got work to do.”

An hour later, she and Major Cook are still waiting outside the office of Lieutenant Colonel Vincent Marcello, commanding officer of the Fourth Battalion. They are in a small outer office, sitting on a black leather couch, while at his desk an apologetic Major Frank Moore keeps on making excuses for his commanding officer.

Moore says, “I’m sure he’ll be free in just a few minutes, Major. I’m so sorry for the wait.”

Cook says, “No apologies necessary,” but Connie knows exactly what’s going on. She and Major Cook are just Army cops, dressed in civilian clothes, and the commanding officer here is putting the two of them in their place. All around them on the walls are photos of the Rangers with the Fourth Battalion, in action in places like Iraq and Afghanistan as well as earlier deployments to Panama and Grenada.

Several helicopters thrum overhead, and not for the first time as a CID agent, Connie thinks of herself as a fraud. She’s a tough cop, a good investigator, but she’s not a real soldier. She knows that. She and Sanchez are both warrant officers, an odd and mostly overlooked rank between an NCO and an officer, and even though they’re supposed equals, Sanchez always likes to rag on her that he’s got more field experience with the LAPD and six months more in the CID than she has.