Patriot Lies (Jack Widow Book 14) Read online

  Apparently, he had to be buzzed in.

  Widow knocked on the door and waved at the security guard. The guard stood up from his post reluctantly and walked over to the other side of the glass.

  Widow could see by the expression on the guy's face that he was going to have to argue with the man for a while before he was going to open the door.

  Luckily, he saw Aker in the background. Widow banged on the window loud, and Aker heard him and peered up.

  The lawyer was in his after-work attire and not a suit and tie. He wore a golf shirt and chinos. The shirt was tucked in.

  Aker saw Widow and said something to the guard, who turned and nodded. The guard went back to his post and pressed a button somewhere out of sight. The double doors buzzed.

  The guard waved for Widow to come on through.

  Widow pushed both doors open and stepped into the ICU.

  Aker met him, and they shook hands.

  "I'm so sorry," Widow said.

  He could see by the look on Aker's face that the man was genuinely hurt and confused. His friend and colleague was in the hospital for shooting himself in the head—supposedly.

  Aker said, "I don't understand, Widow. Why would he do this? What happened with you two today?"

  "I've not seen him since this afternoon."

  "Why did he do it? I don't understand."

  Widow looked around. He was expecting to see police around. It was a gunshot wound to the head of a former FBI agent. He expected the police to have questions, even if it had been assumed to be a suicide attempt thus far. But there were no cops around. Not in his line of sight anyway.

  Widow leaned in and said, "We went to the cops, gave them the evidence we had. There was a camera feed that got the whole thing on video. A traffic camera. The video had been erased."

  "Erased? I don't understand."

  "Tunney got the name of the last guy to access the traffic camera."

  Aker nodded along.

  Widow said, "It was the head fire marshal. We confronted the guy. He helped cover it up."

  "Cover what up?"

  Widow glanced around again. No listening staff. No listening cops. No sign of any listening ears.

  "There's more going on here."

  "Like what?"

  "I don't know the whole puzzle yet. But I know for a fact that Tunney didn't shoot himself."

  "The cops said he stank of alcohol. It was all over him. They said he drank himself into a stupor and went out to some abandoned gas station and shot himself."

  "He didn't shoot himself."

  "They found him hanging out of his car. His gun in hand."

  "What was the gun?"

  "I don't know. A handgun."

  "What's the make and model?"

  Aker shrugged.

  Widow asked, "Was it a thirty-eight?"

  "A what?"

  "Was it a Glock?"

  Aker thought for a minute until he answered, as if he was trying to recall what the cops had told him.

  "Maybe. What's the difference?"

  "Was he shot with a nine-millimeter bullet?"

  Aker's eyes lit up with recognition.

  "Doctors said they pulled a nine-millimeter bullet out of his skull."

  "They pulled a bullet out of his skull or fractions of a bullet?"

  "It was in tiny pieces."

  "That's a hollow-point round. The tip of the bullet is concave. The round flowers impact, dumping it’s power into the target. It breaks into shrapnel, doing serious damage."

  Once he had said it, he regretted it. He could see on Aker's face that it didn't make the trauma sound any better.

  He asked, "Will he live through it?"

  Widow thought back. His mother was shot in the head and left for dead.

  "I don't know. But what I do know is he didn't shoot himself."

  "What makes you say that?"

  "Tunney owned a thirty-eight. That's the weapon he carried."

  "Tunney owned more than one gun. That I know just from being his friend. Maybe he used one of them, the nine-millimeter ones. The Glock you mentioned."

  Widow shook his head.

  "No. He wouldn't do that."

  "How do you know?"

  "Suicide is a personal act. Plus, Tunney knew weapons. He wouldn't want to survive it. Not like this. He'd use his most trusted firearm to do the job. He might've owned a Glock. Probably does. But he would've used the weapon that was his EDC."

  "EDC?"

  "Every Day Carry."

  Aker nodded like he understood, but Widow could tell he didn't, not fully.

  "If he didn't shoot himself, who did? Why?"

  Widow paused and sifted a hand into his pocket and pulled out the flash drive.

  "Because of this."

  Aker stared at the small device. It was rectangular in shape. Small enough to fit in the palm of a hand, to be concealed from body frisks, but large enough to hold secrets that could take down an empire.

  Aker asked, "What's that?"

  "The traffic camera feed above Lincoln Park. The one that pointed in part to the bench that Eggers died on."

  "You watched it?"

  "I did."

  "And?"

  "Eggers didn't burn himself up. It was no accident. He was murdered."

  "Murdered? The video shows it?"

  "Yes. The whole gruesome thing. It's all here. You can see a vehicle loaded with guys pull up, jump out, restrain him, and light him up."

  "That's horrible. Are you kidding?"

  "No. It's real."

  Aker started to fidget nervously.

  "No. No. This isn't my job. This is for the police."

  "It's not your job, but it's your concern. Eggers was your client. My brother-in-arms. And now, they've shot your friend. We’ve both got skin in the game."

  Aker slowly nodded. At first, it started as a headshake, but thinking about it, he saw the light.

  "We need to give this to the police."

  "I agree. But there's another element."

  "What?"

  "They've tried to cover it up."

  "What? The police covered it up?"

  Widow went on to explain his visit to Metro with Tunney, the traffic camera feed gone missing, tracing it back to Haspman, and then his visit to Haspman, minus hiding in the back of the truck, taking Haspman's weapons from him, and not being invited in.

  "What do we do? I'm not a criminal attorney. I only work on estates and contracts. This is way over my head, Widow."

  Widow paused a beat. Aker was right. If these guys had this kind of reach, skill, and money backing them, plus the badges, then they would need help. And Shaw and Kidman were going to drag their feet. He knew that.

  "We might need outside help."

  "Like who? The FBI?"

  "No. Better. I have someone in mind."

  "Who?"

  "Better let me worry about it."

  "What about me?"

  Widow paused a beat.

  Then, he said, "Listen, you carry?"

  "What?"

  "A weapon. A firearm. You got one?"

  "Not on me. Why would I carry a gun?"

  "Got one at home?"

  "I do. Just for protection. I got a wife and kids at home."

  "Good. I think you should be careful. In fact, I think you should go home, get the wife, the kids, any pets, and go out of town for a while. Take the gun with you. Maybe go to upstate New York or Delaware or New Hampshire or any place else. It's a nice time of year."

  "What? Why?"

  Widow looked at Aker's eyes and then pointed at Tunney.

  "That's why. If these people can do this, if they can burn a man alive in public and nearly cover it up, then they can come after you. And they will."

  "Why? I don't know anything."

  "They'll come after you just to get at me."

  "They know who you are?"

  "I'm sure they do. Why do you think they did this to Tunney? This wasn't just an execution. It was
an interrogation."

  Aker turned away from Widow, staring at his friend lying there on a hospital bed with tubes and an IV drip, bandages wrapped all around his head.

  Widow also stared. Images of his mother, lying in a similar hospital bed, with a similar gunshot wound to the head, came flooding into his mind. He felt the anger of what happened to her come back to him. He wanted these guys as badly as he wanted to kill the guys behind his mother's death.

  Aker asked, "If we leave town, what about you? What will you do?"

  "I'm going to find them and make them wish they weren't born."

  Minutes later, Widow said goodbye to Aker and left the hospital. He went back the way he’d come in.

  Out in front, he checked the time on Aker’s phone. It was nearing eight in the evening. He saw a sign on the way out of the hospital that posted the visiting hours. They would've asked him to leave anyway. Visitor hours were over at eight. Then again, that probably didn't apply for ICU.

  The first thing he did was go into the burner phone's main options and found an about page. It gave information about the phone. It listed memory, storage capacity, make, and model of the phone manufacturer. It also listed the phone number, which was the information he was searching for.

  Next, Widow dialed a phone number that he hadn't thought of in years, but it was one of two he'd never forget. The first was his mother's old phone number. This wasn't that one. This was the emergency line for his old, secret undercover NCIS: Unit Ten, a unit classified beyond classified.

  The emergency line was the only number he knew by heart. He didn't know the reception number. Plus, there was no reception open right now, probably. There might've been someone sitting at a desk this late at night, but not likely.

  He dialed the number and put the phone to his ear. He waited through a ring and then an automated response.

  It was a man's voice, polite, non-robotic, but prerecorded. The message was ambiguous, but not like silly cloak and dagger, like in a bad spy movie.

  The voice said, "You've reached a Navy line. If you've reached this recording in error, hang up. Otherwise, leave a message and phone number."

  There was a beep.

  Widow gave his last known military rank, his name, and the serial number on his dog tags and his badge number, which was probably so long out of circulation they might be considering reusing it someday.

  He said, "Rachel Cameron. I need to come in. I'll be tomorrow morning. Oh seven hundred. I need help, Rachel."

  He hung up the phone and slipped it into his pocket.

  A breeze gushed over him, and he popped the collar of his Havelock and slipped both hands in his pockets. He decided to look for a new hotel room. He thought it best not to return to the other one, in case the guys in the traffic video were as good as he thought they were.

  His first stop was going to be the first convenience or grocery store he came across because he needed a new toothbrush.

  He headed out east from there, on foot, ready for a hot shower, ready for a warm, clean bed.

  Twenty-Eight

  Widow woke before the sun and showered and dressed and brushed his teeth with his new toothbrush, which was a regular, straight-handled brush. He stuffed it into his Havelock’s pocket and not his jeans because the tip was curved, but still sharp enough to poke him in the thigh every time he stepped.

  Before leaving his new motel room and grabbing a taxi out to Quantico, he palmed Haspman’s 1911 in his hand and debated what to do with it. He could toss it down a sewer drain or into a random dumpster, hoping no one would go dumpster-diving. He couldn’t leave it in the room, not without going to the front desk and paying for an extra night. And he couldn’t just abandon it there. He didn’t want the maid coming in and discovering it. He was pretty sure that hotel protocol was to call the police when a weapon was found in a room.

  The most obvious thing was that he couldn’t take it with him, not onto a military base.

  NCIS headquarters was located in the Russell-Knox Building, which was inside Marine Corps Base Quantico, not just any base. MCB Quantico housed a multitude of intelligence and military police organizations.

  The Russell-Knox Building hosted NCIS, Air Force Office of Special Investigations, and the Army Criminal Investigation Command, and probably more than that. That was just what Widow remembered.

  He was walking out to the lot to wait for a taxi he had called earlier when his phone rang. He looked at the caller ID screen. It read Private.

  He answered it.

  “Hello?”

  A female voice that he hadn’t heard in years spoke.

  “Jack Widow.”

  He instantly recognized the voice.

  “Special Agent in Charge Cameron.”

  The woman on the phone sighed.

  “It’s just Rachel for you, Widow.”

  The caller was his old CO from Unit Ten, the undercover unit he’d worked with until his last day with the NCIS.

  Her voice was the same that used to squawk orders in his earpieces or leave him coded messages during undercover missions. There were times, working for her, that she had frustrated him, but hearing her voice all these years later put a smile on his face.

  “Nice to hear from you, Cameron.”

  “You’re not military anymore, Widow. And I’m not your CO. I never was. I was your SAC. But I’m not now. You’re a civilian now. Just call me by my first name.”

  “I always called you Cameron.”

  “You’re never going to change.”

  Widow stayed quiet to that.

  She said, “It’s good to hear from you. But you know I have a personal cell phone. You can call me on that.”

  “Don’t have the number.”

  “That’s because I don’t date my subordinates.”

  “I’m not your subordinate anymore.”

  “I don’t date losers without jobs either. You still don’t have a job, right?”

  “No job.”

  “Still roaming the countryside, doing God knows what?”

  “I’m doing that and stuff he doesn’t know about.”

  “Oh, God! I bet! Well, Widow, I have to scold you for a second.”

  “Oh?”

  “You know damn well the number you dialed is an emergency number for NCIS operatives. Not for ex-agents.”

  Widow looked up to the street at the end of the motel parking lot. No taxi yet. It was late.

  He said, “I’m sorry about that.”

  “You should be. It’s an emergency line only. You can get me in a lot of trouble.”

  “Did I?”

  “No. Of course not.”

  “Of course, not because the guy working the phone works for you now?”

  “What do you want?”

  Widow took a breath.

  “I’m sorry to say that I am calling about an emergency.”

  “What’s up?”

  “Not over the line.”

  “You want me to call you on a different line?”

  “Not over the phone, I mean.”

  “How then?”

  “I’m coming in.”

  “You’re here? In Quantico?”

  “I’ll be there in an hour. Probably less.”

  If the taxi shows up, he thought.

  “I need you to call the security gate and sponsor me so I can get on base.”

  “Okay. Sure. Can you give me some idea of what this is about?”

  “It’s about a murder.”

  “You didn’t kill anyone, did you?”

  Not yet, he thought.

  “Never mind. Don’t answer that,” she said. “Sure. I’ll call it in. You’ll have to check in at the visitor center. Remember where it is?”

  “I remember. I only worked there.”

  “Okay. Just asking. I’ll see you when you get here.”

  “Cameron, wait.”

  “Yeah? I’m here.”

  “Can I bring a sidearm on base?”

  Silence.

>   Cameron said, “Widow, don’t bring a gun on base!”

  “I won’t. Just kidding.”

  She didn’t wait for a response. She hung up the phone. Widow slipped his phone back into his pocket and walked the length of the parking lot, waiting for his cab.

  He saw an opportunity to ditch Tunney’s weapon. Just then, a city dump truck pulled into the lot. It drove straight toward Widow because the motel’s main dumpster was directly behind him.

  No way anyone could dumpster-dive and find the 1911 before the truck emptied the dumpster. So he turned and ran toward the dumpster. He faced away from the view of the truck driver and took out the 1911. He wiped it quick with the flap of his Havelock and tossed it into the dumpster. He did the same with the magazine and the bullets.

  He made it just in the nick of time. He turned around and the dump truck was right there, ready to take the dumpster. The truck used a set of huge metal arms to reach forward and latch onto the container. The arms slid into two long tunnels on the sides of the dumpster.

  Widow heard the gears that controlled the arms. They grinded away and scraped metal. The dumpster lifted off the ground and up over the nose of the truck. The arms dumped the whole thing into an opening in the roof of the truck and then did the whole process in reverse until the dumpster was back down on the concrete. It was completely emptied, gun and all.

  Widow watched it. Then he turned away and headed back to the street.

  The taxi he had called showed up thirty seconds later, and he was on his way.

  Inside of thirty minutes, they crossed the state line into Virginia. The topography was spectacular. It was beautiful, just as Widow had remembered it. They drove down winding roads, passing thick clusters of sprawling trees on each side of the road. The ground and shoulders were covered in autumn leaves. Red and green and brown were everywhere.

  Fifty minutes had passed since they left Widow’s motel parking lot, and they drove by a line of cars trying to enter the base through the main gate. They lined up underneath a sign the width of the road that crossed over the top of the entrance. The sign looked like a long metal beam, the kind used in bridge construction. It was held up by two large brick pillars.

  They couldn’t enter the base, not through there.

  Widow told the taxi where to go. The driver pulled into a parking lot nearby, and Widow stepped out into a world he hadn’t visited in years. He was in the parking lot of the MCB Quantico Visitor Control Center, just outside the security checkpoint on Russell Road.