The Escape (John Puller, #3)(22)

He had fits and starts and crumpled-up paper, and endured starting over multiple times. Finally the image gained traction, the root system set in, and the features began to grow, like a plant rising, seeking the light. Plants could not survive without sunlight; indeed, photosynthesis was the key to their survival.

Well, Puller would not be living much longer without this image coming to full fruition.

He worked away for another half hour and then reached the point where the heavy lifting was finished. Now he was simply filling in the edges.

He sat back, put down his pen, and held the paper up to eye level.

Staring back at him was a man. A man Puller had not seen until very recently. A man he still did not know.

That man now lay, he was fairly certain, in a morgue at Fort Leavenworth, as investigators attempted to figure out who he was. And what he was doing at the DB the night Robert Puller escaped. And why he was now dead. These were good, pertinent queries.

Puller was fairly certain that he knew what the man was doing there. He clearly knew exactly how the man had died.

Yet he didn’t know anything beyond that. And he had to know. He had to know all of it. This puzzle could not remain unfinished. Not if he wanted to survive.

And because something always leads to something else.





CHAPTER





11



JOHN PULLER HAD his marching orders. He had asked Daughtrey, Schindler, and Rinehart a few more questions and gotten a few more answers that might or might not lead to something. But at least he had the authority to operate out in the open. An email had come through from his CO empowering him to work on this investigation with the accompanying and necessary electronic trail of higher signatories. The suit and the stars definitely had the juice they claimed to have. He felt like he had just been rebadged.

He didn’t like slinking around trying not to be noticed. He wanted people to know he was on the case. He wanted to intimidate. Intimidated people with a guilty conscience often made mistakes. The only difference here was that the target of his investigation was his brother. Robert Puller was brilliant. Was he going to make mistakes? Didn’t he know John Puller Jr. better than anyone?

He knows how I think. How I tick.

But then I know the same about him.

However, these thoughts didn’t make him feel good. They made him feel sick.

He cleared security at the DB and walked up a flight of steps to the visitors’ room. He asked to see the officer in charge, displaying his credentials and relaying his purpose for being here.

The woman met Puller in her office. She was Captain Lenora H. Macri, in her thirties, short, trim, with salt-and-pepper hair worn in a bun. She looked wound as tight as a coil of wire and her expression did not appear cooperative in the least. This was not particularly good for him, because she was now the DB’s acting commander.

“What can I do for you, Chief Puller?” she began curtly.

“I’m investigating the escape of Robert Puller.”

“Right. Your brother.” She left the statement there, with all its inherent complications and insinuations. Then she added, “I find it extraordinary that you’re involved in this case in any way at all. I have duly noted my misgivings with the appropriate channels.”

“Which you have every right to do.”

“And which I don’t need you to tell me,” she retorted. “Blood is thicker than water, and what we need is objectivity. I fail to see how you can bring an unbiased perspective to this investigation.”

Puller shifted in his seat. “I’m a CID agent. My mission is clear, Captain Macri. Bring him back, brother or not. I’ve been authorized to do this. If you have a problem cooperating with me, I need to hear it now.”

She held his gaze. “I have no problems, Mr. Puller. I think any potential problems will rest largely with you. Now, how can I help?”

She had done that rather neatly, thought Puller. Not only covered her ass with the “appropriate channels” but also put the onus on him to disprove her opinion of his being involved at all while at the same time appearing cooperative. Only a captain now, but she must be bucking hard for her next promotion.

Aren’t they all?

Puller went over the facts as he understood them and asked for her confirmation of them.

“They’re accurate,” Macri said. “Except for the shots fired and the explosion.”

Puller blinked at her. “Shots and an explosion? No one mentioned that.”

“Well, maybe you didn’t ask the right questions. I’m volunteering that information in the interest of full disclosure. The shots and explosion prompted the calling in of reinforcements from the fort.”

“Did you determine the origins of the shots?”

“No.”

“And the explosion?”

Macri said, “I said explosion because that’s what it initially sounded like.”

“You were on duty?”

“Yes, I was. But many people heard the noises. They were quite distinct.”

“So it wasn’t really an explosion?”

“As I just said, it initially sounded like one. However, we found no evidence of one actually going off.”

“Then perhaps it was the same deal with the shots.”

“It probably was, because we also found no evidence of any shots fired.”