Murder at Willow Slough (35 page)

“He killed my guy’s killer, chief,” Casey pleaded. “Just let me be with him. Thank him, condole with him, you know? Not a real interview. Dammit, he’s the closest thing I’ve got to my buddy.”

Despite Slaughter’s stern advice, Kent readily agreed to it; Casey was the closest thing he had to his buddy.
***

The visit ended with a hug, Casey’s body light in Kent’s arms, which made Kent clutch a little tighter, then release and reject harder than he expected. “Sorry. I’m so whacked-out right now. Jamie’s told me about you, and…”

Casey wiped at an eye. Asked Kent to recommend a hotel. Kent gave the address on Washington Street, the key to their room. “Take care of him, man,” Casey begged.

“I will. I swear to God I will.”

Slaughter made a brief appearance before the TV crowd. The media relations person had already given the official line, and the questions directed at Slaughter weren’t ones he could answer without jeopardizing the case. The session was turning pointless, so he called a halt to it. A voice called out, “How’s the Gay reporter?”

Slaughter’s jaw set.He aimed for the CNN camera and said, “We have every hope for the swift and full recovery of Jamie Foster of The Ohio Gay Times, a courageous young journalist. He saved the life of every police officer on this task force and helped us nail a serial killer ring. Does that make him a Gay reporter? No.

“It makes him an American hero.”
***

Finally only Slaughter, Kent and a chaplain were left in the room off the ER. Slaughter maintained light physical contact, a hand on Kent’s arm. “Where there’s life there’s hope. He’s alive, Kent.”

Immediately Kent shook his head. “You know to Christ it should never have happened. I take full responsibility, chief. Bring me up on charges, I take full responsibility.”

When he got over his shock, Slaughter was both pleased and horribly sad. “For what?” he croaked. “A disabled mic and bad timing? You saved the guy’s life.” He watched Kent reject the whole idea.

“Kent, Blaney got the phone call, but couldn’t hear in that noisy bar; once he got the message, he went to notify you Ford was on his way. He had to leave his post, but only for a few minutes. It was exactly as you designed it. You got just the advance notice from surveillance you had ordered. No one could anticipate that that was when it all came down. Once the scene started you were on it immediately.” Kent looked away.

Slaughter drove it home. “Ford stepped inside that bar and waved a joint in front of the first loser he found. He only wanted the guy as bait anyway. What’d it take, ten seconds? Jamie saw it and responded immediately—too fast, really; he didn’t have the experience or training not to go chasing off by himself without backup—if he even knew his mic was knocked out. An officer would never have left the bar without confirming contact. Better to let the guy go than get killed himself. If there’s a mistake it’s that we didn’t stress that enough with him. That’s everyone’s fault, not yours. He overcommitted himself. He trusted the plan too much.”

“Don’t blame the victim,” Kent spat. “Chasing after Ford is what I set him up for.”

“I don’t blame the victim, and don’t blame yourself, sergeant. We both know why he did it, because he cares so much about his community. We saw the measure of the man tonight, by what he’s willing to die for.”

Slowly Kent nodded. “God, what a hero. The courage of ten men.”

“And thank God he’s still here, and we do have hope. Even though the operation got a little ragged after that, you accomplished your mission, we hope without further loss of life.”

A little ragged. My guy’s in there dying and you’re telling me it got a little ragged? Puh-lease. Kent remembered who taught him that pronunciation; who, where, when.

“Why didn’t his cell phone work? I’d have ordered him off before he ever went to the motel. The location was all we needed. He didn’t have to be there at all, we’d have taken care of it.”

“But the surviving victim would have been dead.”

“I know. God, Jamie. It takes a stud to catch a killer. Hi, stud.”

“When Ford gave him a deadline of 3:15, Jamie didn’t know where we were. So what could he do? He went ahead and traded for the trick. And succeeded, let’s not forget that. He succeeded! The kidnap victim’s alive and sleeping it off in this same hospital.

“You know how much Jamie wanted to nail those killers. And you got them, both of you did, and Jamie’s still alive. He may recover. Think about that. There’s still a chance for a happy ending here. Damn it, listen to me, man. Where there’s life there’s hope.”

Kent took it in. He couldn’t make sense of it. He tried; he must be insane. But when in doubt, he tried to trust his chief.

Gradually something else took over; it didn’t matter about the case anymore, what’s done is done. They got the killers. Maybe Jamie would die.

But if he lived? Dear God, if he lives…

Kent’s gut took control. He stared at George Slaughter, eyes transfiguring horribly. How will I ever explain to Jamie that I let him down?

“Why did he keep going, chief? He knew all we needed was the address.”

“No, we needed the address and more time.”

“Thank God we had the chopper.”

“I’m just realizing some things about him, Kent. He never walks away from a fight. He was very protective of his late lover, and he’s the same way towards his people. If someone tries to harm them, Jamie stands in the way, a gunslinger with a keyboard. He never loses. He’s taken on wealthy, powerful men. He never loses.”

“If he’s a gunslinger, why wouldn’t he take the fucking gun?”

“His weapon is words.”

“Don’t I know it.” But Kent had a duty to report his own negligence. Tell him, before you die yourself. It took a long time, though. “Chief, um, something else happened tonight.”

Slaughter nodded slightly, “Tell me.” Then, more forcefully, “Tell me, sergeant.”

Kent couldn’t look at him. But he did manage to say, “At the bar.”

Slaughter’s eyes crinkled. He exhaled, looked into mist, felt. “You want to go outside and talk?”

Kent nodded, weak. They left the chaplain behind and walked the corridor.

Finally Kent said, “He danced with some guy and… all of a sudden I had to… go to the bathroom. It was an emergency. I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. All I could think was I had to clean myself up. That’s the very minute the scene came down! Chief, I let him out of my sight. That’s why I should be up on charges. You have to. I beg you to. I take full responsibility. The most important person to this operation, and I let him out of my sight.”

“You got sick? You peed your pants?”

“I creamed my jeans! Chief, I’ve been with two dozen women in my life. I never once had a sexual reaction to a guy. Then in walks Brad Pitt and I lose it. I can’t believe this. It’s totally at odds with everything I know. Swear to God, I’ve always been Straight.”

“I know.” I should have seen this coming the minute you said Pitt’s name.

“I deserted him—at the moment he needed me! You heard him up there.‘I choose to follow my Commander.’Oh,Jamie.How could I be so fucking stupid!” Kent beat his head with his fists over and over.

Slaughter’s strong arm stopped it. He had to reach deep inside. “You weren’t the only one pushing him. I pushed him too, half a dozen of us, the whole group. We don’t send a civilian into a situation like that unless he’s the only one who can do it; and unless we have complete confidence in him. And we did, after he got in Carson’s face. It was a team decision. And he took responsibility himself. Respect him for that choice. If we second-guess ourselves, we second-guess him. And that’s not right. If you don’t feel this victory, his victory and yours and your task force’s, then his death, if it happens, is in vain. And damn you, sergeant, I’ll never allow that in my unit.”

Kent stared at the chief, then into space.

Slaughter looked at his handpicked man, handsome, tortured, and so young. Old experience, Vietnam, came unwillingly back. He fought it but it was right.

“Suppose this is war,” he said quietly. “Nothing makes men closer than having to rely on each other for their lives. So the worst happens; you might lose your best buddy. What do you do, sergeant?

“You honor him; you hate like hell to lose him, you’d rather someone ripped your arm out of its socket and threw it away.

“And then, goddammit, you fight on. Armless even, you fight on. For what you both believe in. For the time when there’s no more killing. That’s what Jamie wanted more than anything, the time when no one dies.” Kent watched the tough old face.

“He would hate to see you torture yourself. He knew what he was getting into. So let him be the soldier that he is! Jamie got the takedown on thirteen people on-site, maybe others. It’s his takedown. We just mopped up.”

Kent felt another sob explode in his chest. “And cut him down.” His eyes hurt, their rain resumed.

Slaughter rubbed Kent’s back, wordless.

“I know you’re right, chief. It’s just so hard to take in. Remember what he said about acting like Glenn Ferguson was our brother? Jamie and I’ve gotten close these last two weeks. His Mom and all, the Walkers, the insight he brought to this case—we’ve gotten close. Then I send my buddy to his execution? Augh!” Kent was right. There was no comforting that.

Like men they cried together, arm on arm. Slaughter tried not to think of a certain helicopter gunner, now just a granite name in D.C. But here and now was way too hard, and there was comfort in the old familiar ache.

***

A little after dawn, Julie Campbell found them. She had done all she could here, and maybe she should drive Sgt. Kessler home? “No way,” Kent monotoned.

“Chief?” Julie appealed. “There’s nothing we can do here but wait.”

“Campbell, you’re an idiot,” Kent snapped. “The work just started.”

Slaughter said, “Commander Kessler coordinates the ongoing investigation and the 24-hour armed guard. If there are surviving killers I wouldn’t put it past them to try and get at Foster. IPD’s got the facility; Kessler, you’re on the CI, same as before.”

He considered what to do with Campbell. She was not the highest priority at the moment. “Campbell, go home, get some rest,” he growled.

“You okay, partner?” she asked Kent, not touching him.

“Yeah, go home,” he forced himself to answer, and only because the chief was there. But he refused to look at her. “I’m sticking here. I’ve got orders.”

“Okay, well, good luck,” she said, moving reluctantly away.

Kent didn’t watch her retreat. Slaughter patted his bare back twice. “We need to get you in clean clothes, son.”

Kent looked down. His Levi’s were stiff with dried blood, and they crinkled whenever he moved. Would he ever wear them again? He couldn’t see washing them and acting like it never happened, just a pair of jeans.

“What size are you, Kent?”

“31/38 baggy, big shirt, XL.” He remembered the tag he’d spied on Jamie’s Levi’s, 27/34, Student. How could a grown man have a 27-inch waist?

Jamie, in his head: “By not eating greaseburgers, you moron.”

It made Kent smile, which made his face hurt. He thought his prayers all the harder.

Slaughter ordered a third-shift rookie to go to an all-night store to buy clothes. “Underwear too, a complete outfit. Get stuff that looks good, the best they have.”

Kent reached for his wallet. The hand-tooled brown leather was sticky; his money was soaked with blood.

He stared, disbelieving and grieving, as Slaughter handed the rookie three crisp hundreds, told him to put on his lights. “Yes, sir.”

Then a surgeon, Asian-American, came up to them in greens, pulled off a scrubcap, shook out her hair. “How is he, doctor?”

Kent’s heart pounded.

“He survived the surgery. That is very good news. We’ll keep him in recovery for awhile, then he’ll be taken to intensive care.” She looked awfully young.

“And the prognosis?” Slaughter asked, steeling himself.

“It’s extremely tough with this type pattern of multi-system failure.”

Before she could describe the technicalities of the wounds, something in the young cop’s face made her change course; the first dawning of a bedside manner. She’d seen distraught families before, they were a dime a dozen; this guy looked like he’d seen a real ghost.

“It’s the amount of blood he lost, and the transport time that are the variables. You were in some remote location, huh?” Slaughter nodded. “People don’t die of stab wounds usually, they die of loss of blood. If you hadn’t squeezed him shut, or hadn’t had the chopper, either one, he’d have been dead on arrival. So far he’s extremely lucky. The stab wounds were direct hits on the arteries. He lost 3500 cc’s of blood, over half his blood supply. That’s more than I’ve ever seen anyone lose and still survive.”

“God,” Kent mourned.

“But he’s made it this long. He’s young and strong and in excellent health. That’s a huge help. Right now, though, we have him on a ventilator, and we expect him to stay in coma for awhile.” Kent stared at the floor, shaking his head. She said softly, “Maybe a long time.”