“When you want to attack, you remain calm and quiet, then get the jump on your opponent by attacking suddenly and quickly.”
— Miyamoto Musashi, The Book of Five Rings
Anne and Houston left the crime scene shortly after noon. He carried Danny’s file to his car; the last thing he wanted was for the department to confiscate it as evidence, tying it up before he could make a copy of it. He would turn it in as evidence once he had a chance to review the database in depth. They drove their individual cars to the police station where Houston parked his car and got into Anne’s. He tossed the file on the seat.
“What’s that?”
“It might be the reason the sniper targeted Danny.”
When Anne didn’t comment, he elaborated. “It’s a roster of scout/ snipers who have stayed in touch with each other, most of whom have attended one of their reunions.”
“They have reunions?”
“Yeah, a lot of military units have them.”
“I never would have guessed. What do they do at them?”
“Never having attended one, I don’t have firsthand knowledge. I assume they tell lies about their time in the service and get drunk—just like any reunion or convention.”
“Sounds like every man’s idea of a good time.”
“It’s a strange thing about military service. It seems that the older we get—the better we were.”
“So that’s what the reunions are about? Telling each other how great you all were?”
“More or less. It sounds boring to me. Then again, what do I know about having a good time? I’m just a cop.”
Anne smiled. “Well, if you ever do decide to check one out let me know so I can have a hangover remedy on hand when you get back.”
Anne pointed at his shirt. “I think that we need to get you cleaned up.”
“Why? Isn’t this what every well-dressed cop wears?”
“Our next stop is your place so you can get a change of clothes and a quick shower. Quite frankly, you’re ripe. You look more like a homeless person than a cop.”
“I’m shocked. I put my best cologne on this morning.”
“Just what every woman wants to smell on a man, eau d’tar with an ever-so-slight dab of BO.”
“If it’s so alluring, I’ll bottle it.”
“Don’t bother.”
Houston opened the file and scanned its contents. If nothing else, Danny was organized. The database was extensive. The names were alphabetized, creating a master roster, cross-referenced by their years of service and the state in which each member currently resided. Houston flipped to the page containing Edwin Rosa’s information. Beside Rosa’s name, Danny had written MIA, Mogadishu, Somalia, 1993.
Anne had been driving for fifteen minutes, allowing a now clean Houston time to be alone with his thoughts. She saw him staring out the side window. “So where to? You want lunch?”
“Oh, hell.”
“I was supposed to be at my sister’s at noon. Susie and I were going to do lunch.”
Anne turned on the car’s emergency lights and performed a tight U-turn. She handed him her cell phone. “Call them and explain that you got tied up.”
“My car is still at the station.”
“Not a problem, I’ll have you back to your car in no time.”
Maureen saw Mike’s car pull up and shook her head. It was so like him to be over two hours late. She turned and walked upstairs, stopped before the guest room door and knocked. A muted voice invited her in.
She opened the door and stood in the threshold for several seconds, watching her niece. Susie had pulled her hair into a ponytail and could have passed for fourteen. It had been over a year since Maureen had last seen Susie and, while she had matured into a beautiful young woman, she still clung to certain little girl habits. Maureen wondered how Mike had dealt with seeing his daughter as a grown-up rather than an awkward young girl.
Susie sat in front of the dresser, staring at a picture. Maureen’s heart caught in her throat when she saw that it was a photo of Pamela and Mike on their wedding day. The picture was one she had seen before. “Your father is here.”
“So?”
“Susie, dear, this is hard on all of us.”
“Must be really hard on him. Why else would he bring some stranger with him to tell me about Mom?” Anger temporarily pushed aside her grief. “Just tell him to go away and I’ll handle this alone, as usual.”
“Susie, she’s a police officer, your father’s partner.”
Maureen could not take her eyes off the photo, especially her former sister-in-law’s face. An older version of the young woman who sat before the photo, Pam too had been beautiful and on that long ago late spring morning, she had been so radiant that she outshone the sun.
It broke her heart when Susie picked up the portrait and studied it for a few seconds, then placed it on the dresser, taking care to place it in the exact spot and angle.
Maureen sighed and left the room.
As he walked to the house, Houston felt as if he were wading through a knee-deep swamp. Standing before the door, reluctant to press the doorbell, he kept telling himself there was nothing to worry about. After all, it was his daughter he was meeting, not some homicidal maniac. Before he could press the bell, the door opened and Maureen stood in the threshold.
“Not only are you late, but you look like you’ve just been through a meat grinder. What happened to your face and hands?”
Houston smiled and knew he looked sheepish. “Occupational hazard.” He shuffled his feet. “Why do I feel as if I’m about to be thrown into a threshing machine?”
“You look as if you already have been.” Maureen smiled and hugged him.
He returned her embrace, taking care not to put pressure on his bandaged hands, and grinned. “Yeah, but eventually I always show up.”
“Bad pennies always do. Get in here.”
Once Houston was inside, Maureen touched his arm and said, “It will be all right.”
“That’s easy for you to say.”
Maureen led the way into the living room and paused. He hadn’t visited his sister and her family for several years. His usual excuse was that he was too busy, but he knew that was not the reason. The truth was that he felt uncomfortable in Maureen’s impeccable world. The living room was an example of her quest for perfection. It was beyond neat; it was spotless, with everything in its place, and not so much as a speck of dust was visible. Typical Maureen, he thought. Even when they were kids, her room had always been immaculate—a stark contrast to the mish-mash of sports paraphernalia and dirty laundry in which he had lived. He smiled and turned to face her. “You still paint all your interior walls every six months?”
“Oh, I’m not that bad.” She gave him an impish smile. “Am I?”
“Well, I always thought you were the family’s token obsessive compulsive. Hell, sis, compared to you, I was a feral child.”
Houston walked deeper into the room, stepped over to the fireplace and stood mute, staring at the pictures on the mantle. The centerpiece of the display was a family photo; Houston was in his Marine uniform.
“Do you remember when that was taken?” Maureen asked him. “It was the morning you left for Somalia.” The fact that she felt it was necessary to provide him with commentary was not lost on Houston.
“Dad died a year later,” he said. “I couldn’t make the funeral.”
“That’s a lot of bull and you know it. The Marines would have let you come home.”
“The Marines had nothing to do with it.”
“Most of the family was very upset with you. However, I knew the real reason you didn’t come. You idolized him—and he you.”
“I didn’t want my last memory of him to be him in a coffin. I guess I thought if I never saw him like that it would be easier to pretend he was still around.”
“Nothing ever gets resolved by running, Mike—or by hiding behind a macho tough-guy persona.”
Houston sighed. Where his family was involved he had made a great number of mistakes—many of which could have been avoided. He took a deep breath. “Where’s Susie?”
“In the guest room. Go up and see her. When you weren’t here by one, I made something for us. I can make you a sandwich if you’d like.”
“I’m fine.” He looked at the top of the stairs. “I’ll just go on up.”
With each step up the stairs, Houston’s apprehension grew. He could not forget his daughter’s anger when he had visited her dormitory. Never in his wildest fantasy had he thought he would see a look like that on her face—at least not directed at him. He remembered her as a two-year-old daddy’s girl and preferred that memory over the image of her as an angry adult. As he approached the closed door, each step seemed like a mile. He forced a smile, knocked on the door and opened it before she asked him in.
Susie sat on the bed and when he walked through the door, she stared at him, her face a mask of accusation and anger. Without a word, she got up, pushed past him and left the room.
“Susie . . . ”
She ignored his call and dashed down the stairs.
Houston followed her. When he reached the living room, Susie stood beside Maureen. She glared at him as he descended the stairs. Maureen’s back was to him as she tried to intervene, hoping to avoid another bad scene. “Susie, for all your father’s faults, he does love you . . . ”
“I’m sorry I’m late. The sniper struck again this morning and . . . well you know how it is.”
Maureen turned and from her expression he knew that he’d said the wrong thing. Suzie’s face reddened with horrific anger. “Stop it, Dad. You and I both know your job has always come first—it always has and it always will. Why are you here anyway? You’ve already told me Mom was murdered. Isn’t there somebody who needs you to rescue them?” Her face torqued frightfully and she began to cry. Her tears made him feel that all he was to her was a symbol of loss. She turned away from Houston and wrapped her arms around her torso. “How could you leave me like that?”
He misunderstood her meaning. “You told me to get out . . . ”
“I’m not talking about the dorm.”
Houston stepped forward, turned her, and then draped his arms around his only child, keeping his injured hands from contacting her. When Susie pressed against his chest, he held her as she sobbed.
Fighting valiantly to maintain self-control, Houston swallowed the lump that stuck in his throat. Hot tears streaked his cheeks and he forgot about his damaged hands and pulled her snug against him. Ignoring the throbbing pain in his hands, he held his daughter. At that moment, Houston felt that maybe things would be all right between them. As quickly as it started, Susie’s anguish burned itself out. She pushed against his chest and pulled free from his arms. His hopes were dashed when she curled her hand into a fist and confronted him. Then she stopped, her arm poised, like an angry rattlesnake ready to strike.
Maureen stepped between them. “No . . . there’s been enough hurt and pain already. Don’t add to it.”
Susie’s arm slowly dropped to her side. She spun away and flopped into a chair.
Houston backed up a step and sat in a chair across from her. “Susie, I know I was wrong and I made some poor choices. Now I’m trying to make up for all that. I came here because I thought you might need me.”
“I might need you? Where were you for the past six years when I needed a father? You were off saving Boston. For you everything came before Mom and me. You didn’t come for my birthdays or even my graduation. How could you not be there? I kept scanning the crowd, searching for you, but you couldn’t—or wouldn’t—be there for me.”
She was right. He had not been there and, given the situation, to tell her that her mother had requested that he stay away would not help matters. It would only sound like an excuse.
“Susie, you’re right. There’s no arguing that I haven’t been anything close to a father for a long time. But we can talk about that later. For right now, let’s call a truce. I won’t act like nothing has happened for the past six years . . . ”
“Why shouldn’t you—isn’t that exactly what has happened for the past six years?”
“I screwed up. I won’t deny that. But right now we have more pressing issues to discuss.”
Susie stared at him. “I hope you haven’t come here expecting to take over the funeral arrangements, because if you have you can just forget it. Aunt Maureen, Uncle Lee, and I have already made the arrangements.”
“No, Susie, that’s not what I meant. We need to talk.”
“Okay, if you two aren’t going to kill each other I’ll leave you alone.”
“Mo, you need to hear this too.”
Maureen froze in place, a quizzical expression on her face. “I’m not sure I like the tone of your voice.”
“Please, Mo, sit and hear me out.”
Maureen sank into the couch across from the combatants. “I’m listening.”
“What I have to say is going to make you angry and at the same time may frighten you, but you have to know. Two days ago a sniper assassinated four people on the Boston Common.”
“That’s been all over the news,” Maureen said.
“The same person or persons killed Pam. The reason I was late getting here was because I met an old friend for breakfast—a guy I was in the Corps with. He had a list of former military snipers who live in this area. As he was leaving the restaurant, the sniper killed him and shot at me.”
They stared at him.
“I think that whatever he’s after involves me.”
“What?” Maureen was aghast. “Oh my God, does this have anything to do with you being a sniper in the Marines?”
“We’re looking into that. But . . . ” he turned to face Susie, “he knows who you are.”
He knew he had lost any ground he may have gained with Susie when her mouth opened and she paled. “And you came here? What if he followed you?”
“The house is under watch.”
“That explains the police cruising past the front of the house for the past day and a half,” Maureen said.
He turned to Maureen. “If he knows Pam and Susie, he may also know about you and Lee, Mo.”
Maureen’s face became ashen. She leapt from the couch. “The kids—they’re at day camp . . . ”
“Where?”
“At the church.”
Houston walked into the kitchen, snatched the wall phone from its cradle and entered the number for Anne’s cell phone. He waited a second and then said, “Hi, Anne. We got a problem. My sister’s kids attend summer day camp at the First Congregationalist Church in Winchester. How soon can we get someone over there?”
“I can run over there, but it’s going to take a while before we can get anyone on-site.”
“Okay. Get there as soon as you can. In the meantime, I’ll try another avenue.”
“Jimmy O doesn’t have to deal with bureaucracy. He’ll have people there in less time than it will take us to find out who we need to talk to.”
“Mike, isn’t that a bit extreme?”
“Under normal circumstances, I’d agree with you. But he’s already in this up to his neck. I’ll explain it later.”
It took Houston less than a minute to get Jimmy O on the phone. He laid out the situation and felt instant relief when O’Leary said, “There will be someone there in fifteen minutes.”
“Jimmy,” Houston knew he had to be careful how he phrased what he had to say, “I doubt the church members will allow anyone they don’t know near the kids. In fact, they’ll probably be less than thrilled about any strangers walking in.”
“Don’t worry,” O’Leary said, “they’ll keep their distance. No one will even know they’re there.”
Houston replaced the phone and returned to the living room. “The kids are taken care of.” Not wanting to deal with Maureen’s objections to Jimmy O being involved, he said, “My partner is arranging for increased security at the day camp.”
“I’m sorry, Mike, but I don’t trust your so-called police security. I’m calling Lee at work. I want him and the kids to come home right now.” She began to pace, shaking her hands as if they were dripping wet, a sign Mike knew well from their childhood.
Susie glared at Houston. “Are you saying that some creep with a grudge against you killed Mom?”
Houston turned to his daughter. “Yes, I’m afraid I am.”
“You’ve finally done it, haven’t you?”
Houston braced for the shot that he knew she was about to take.
“After all these years, you’ve finally done what you always said you’d never do—you’ve brought your job home.”