Page 71 of Holmes, Margaret and Poe

It’s what worked for Parks, wasn’t it? That son of a snake bluffed and lied and corrupted his way to millions and a life of complete and total paranoia.

Davis lifted his head, smiled in satisfaction, and thought,I’m grateful I got to end that life before it went on much longer.

Then he touched the sensor to a circuit inside the Stinger and saw the needle on the meter swing positive.

Deeply, deeply grateful.

CHAPTER 63

AROUND EIGHT THE NEXTmorning, John Sampson, holding his coffee, pulled over, glad to see that Marion “Captain” Davis’s rental Chevy Cavalier was parked in Fiona Plum’s driveway.

Rebecca Cantrell had exercised her authority as a U.S. attorney to track Davis’s credit card transactions soon after her late lunch with John had abruptly ended. Overnight, she got Avis to activate the GPS transmitter in the rental car. Sampson had dropped Willow with Nana Mama, Bree, and Jannie early that morning, and the transmitter had led Sampson straight to the English teacher’s place.

Cantrell’s plan called for Sampson to sit on the coach while her team dug into his relationship with Leslie Parks. Drinking more of his coffee, Sampson thought,Is Captain Davis Ibrahim? Is that possible?

He called up the pictures Alex had sent him the day beforeand studied the bearded, swarthy man at the Red Sox game with the gunrunner.Or are you Ibrahim?

Flipping to the photo of Davis with Parks at the Pro Bowl, he wondered at the odds of the two of them connecting. And then he realized that Parks had to have met or known Davis before he left the NFL and went to Iraq.

But had the relationship continued in Iraq and later, after Davis was assigned to Fort Bragg? As everyone had noted, the military base and Parks’s prepper fortress were less than thirty miles apart.

But was Davis there in North Carolina the day the machine gun was fired at that plane? Was he there the day Parks died? Did the coach blow the man’s head off?

These kinds of questions swirled around Sampson’s mind as he finished that first cup and mentally prepared for a long sit. Still, Davis had to come out sooner or later.

Unless Davis and Fiona Plum were shacking up? Plum didn’t seem like his type, based on the pictures of the woman with whom he’d left the sports bar the week before. Then again, Sampson had never expected to be attracted to an alpha female like Rebecca Cantrell, and yet there it was, out of the blue.

He thought about the U.S. attorney and wondered if someone of her stature and responsibility had time for a relationship.Do I? I don’t see Willow enough as it is, and with Alex working full-time with the FBI at the moment, the Dead Hours investigation is mine alone.

He set the empty cardboard coffee cup in a holder, took the full one beside it, drank a little, and realized that if he and Cantrell were meant to be, it would naturally evolve on its own. That’s how it had been with Billie. Unexpected and easy.

If this is right, it will be like that,he thought, and scolded himself for mooning over a woman he’d not even had an entire lunchwith yet.But she said she’d fire me as soon as she could, right?A light rush of anticipation went through him like a welcome shiver.Maybe Alex is right. Maybe I can be happy again with someone.

He’d no sooner had that thought than the front door to the teacher’s bungalow opened. Fiona Plum came out carrying a book bag over one shoulder and pulling a carry-on suitcase with rollers.

Plum slammed the door behind her, went to a white Kia sedan, put the suitcase in the trunk, then leaned against the car and hung her head a long moment.

What’s going on? What’s she doing? Is she sick?

The teacher raised her head at last, got in the driver’s seat, and backed the car out. Sampson’s car had tinted windows, but he still slid down a little in his seat as she passed.

He got a good look at Fiona, who was normally very put together and bright-eyed. Her eyes were puffy and glazed. Her skin was sallow, and her mouth was open. She was chewing the air as if she was fighting off the urge to cry.

Sampson looked at his phone, saw the icon representing the rental car still blinking on the map of the teacher’s neighborhood, and made a split-second gut decision to abandon his eyes-on surveillance of Captain Davis for the time being.

He started the car, turned it around, and sped after Fiona Plum.

CHAPTER 64

CAPTAIN DAVIS FELT LIKEsomeone had swung an ax through his skull. He knew this feeling and didn’t want to open his eyes to figure out where he was, much less determine the amount of time he’d lost in the blackout.

When he heard a door slam, his eyelids fluttered open, shut, fluttered open again, then stayed open as he fought for focus. He didn’t recognize his surroundings at first, then realized he was curled up naked in a bottom bunk bed, the one the nieces used when they visited Fiona Plum.

How the hell did I …,he thought. He heard a car start and pull away, then a squeal of tires.Oh no, what did I do?

Davis sat up and almost puked but pushed the urge down. After the room started to spin a little less, he got to his feet, wobbling, wondering where his clothes were.

There they were, folded neatly on the bunk above him, beside a note written in a fine hand:

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