Regan stared at the body of the Afghan translator who'd murdered her CID partner in a terror safe house in Charikar thirteen days earlier. Why was Tamir Hachemi even on the ship? Shouldn't he be stateside, well on his way to Leavenworth by now?
"Gangway!"
The owner of the deep, disembodied voice behind Regan didn't bother waiting for her to move. Instead, a pair of oversized paws clamped about her upper arms, physically hefting her up and carrying her three steps into the compartment before dropping her back down on her boots. Based on the camouflaged uniform and stethoscope hooked around the petty officer's neck as he passed, she assumed he was a corpsman. A shorter, wirier Navy lieutenant with matching camouflage and stethoscope—plus a bulging, stereotypical black bag—was a step behind.
To Regan's shock, Agent Riyad was not. The NCIS agent had spun around and was headed in the opposite direction—out of the space.
By the time Regan had refocused her attention on the crisis at hand, the ship's doc and hulking corpsman had converged on the translator's body, nudging the equally beefy pair of Marines out of the way as they took over CPR. The corpsman was at the translator's chest now, the doc at his head. Regan had learned enough from Gil to know the clear tubing Dr. Mantia retrieved from his bag would be used to intubate Hachemi. Once the doc had the translator's airway reestablished, the corpsman took over, working the attached airbag, steadily squeezing oxygen into Hachemi's lungs as the doc moved down to their remaining priority—Hachemi's heart.
From the frown darkening Mantia's face, it still wasn't beating.
Fortunately, another corpsman—this one a petite Filipina petty officer—chose that moment to barrel into the conference room and across the linoleum with a portable, suitcase-sized crash cart in tow.
Within moments, the doc had the defibrillator rigged and charged as the male corpsman parted the front of Hachemi's navy blue overalls in a single rip, exposing the translator's hairless chest. The doc brandished the paddles and, "Clear!"
A dull thud resounded through the compartment, followed by silence.
A good fifteen minutes and a steady slew of shocks followed with nothing in between but the ever-present creaking of metal and the near non-stop medical lingo that passed between Mantia and his assistants as the doc ordered a pharmacy of medication into the translator's veins. The doc finally reached out, staying the hand of the corpsman still steadily working the balloon. Mantia shook his head and sat back on his haunches, glancing past Regan's shoulder to meet Riyad's stare.
Until that moment, she hadn't realized the NCIS agent had rejoined them.
Resignation and defeat scored the doc's frown. "Time of death, zero seven fifty-eight. He's your responsibility now. Sorry."
The corpsman reached out to gather up the gear they'd used to try to resuscitate the translator.
"Stop." Regan jerked her chin toward the array of vials and expended syringes now littering the deck. "Leave everything exactly where it is."
At least until she'd photographed it.
She'd get started just as soon as everyone else cleared the room.
The doc nodded and stood. He glanced at his bag. "May I—"
"Yes." She pointed toward the defibrillator. "You can have that back, once I've arranged for disposition of the body."
Another nod. "I've got a ship-to-shore call to make. I'll return with a body bag."
Regan waited for the doc to clear the space. Both corpsmen filed out behind him, dejection in their every step. Hachemi might have been a traitor—and these sailors had undoubtedly known that—but it was always rough for medical personnel to lose the fight, no matter the patient. Especially when they'd invested so much of themselves in the effort.
Regan bristled as Riyad drew the Marine corporal aside. It was clear from his body language that Riyad intended for her to remain ignorant of the contents of their chat. Before she could cross the compartment, the NCIS agent ordered the corporal to the captain's cabin to brief the man.
Regan held her tongue as the kid complied. The corporal would return soon enough, and she could take his statement then.
She was itching to take Riyad's too. Where the heck had he disappeared to while the crisis was in full swing? More importantly, why?
Unwilling to grill him in front of the remaining Marine, Regan turned to study the compartment. As conference rooms went, it was unimpressive. Though there was plenty of room for the oversized U-shaped briefing table, most of the chairs were missing. The four that remained were skeletal metal numbers with unforgiving seats. The chairs were positioned in two separate groupings, with the first two facing her from the far side of the U at the head of the conference room. Both chairs appeared to have been thrown back from the table, as if their occupants had moved in haste.
The second two chairs were still mostly facing each other along the starboard bulkhead at one end of the U. Like the first pair, these chairs also appeared to have been thrown back from the opposite sides of the table. Despite the constant motion of the ship, two Styrofoam cups—one half full of black coffee, the other empty—sat on the table between the facing chairs.
Good Cop/Bad Cop?
If so, from the still glistening splatter of lightened coffee across the side of the table, as well as the upper right corner of the back of one of the chairs and a two-foot swath of deck nearest her boots, the time-honored interrogation technique had failed.
The evidence might mesh with Riyad's personality—especially bad cop—but he'd been below in the stateroom with her.
Chief Yrle was a possibility. The woman did carry a master-at-arms rating. She was, in effect, the warship's sheriff. But if Yrle had screwed up that morning as Riyad had so rudely asserted, would he have let the chief near one of the US government's most prized terror detainees?
Not likely.
That left the Marines as the most obvious choice.
Unfortunately, Riyad had sent the corporal on an errand. She hadn't gotten close enough to the kid before he'd left to note the possible splatter of coffee mixed in with any blood that could admittedly have also been transferred to the camouflaged fabric of his uniform as he'd performed CPR. It was the potential presence of high-velocity blood droplets on that same uniform—droplets that by their nature could only have been splattered during the translator's actual beating—that would seal the man's guilt.
Regan was about to turn to the Marine staff sergeant still awaiting orders beside the door to study his uniform when Riyad crossed the deck and crouched down beside the body. His left hand stretched out.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?"
His fingers paused as that frozen, murky stare settled on hers. "I was about to—"
"Touch the body before I've had a chance to photograph it? And without gloves?" Not on her watch. Jurisdiction be damned. "Agent Riyad, this compartment is now an active crime scene and that—" She pointed to the airbag. "—is evidence. It and everything else in this room must be handled and cataloged as such."
Ire torched the man's stare, cooking off the ice.
Regan ignored it—along with the grim satisfaction she caught pressing into the remaining Marine's lips. She had the distinct impression that, like Chief Yrle, the staff sergeant had recently tussled with Agent Riyad about something…and lost.
She let the insubordination go.
Unlike the man now rising to his feet, she was a steadfast student of the school of Praise in Public, Pummel in Private—unless it involved the prevention of evidence tampering. Speaking of which…unless they took serious steps and soon, that tampering was about to commence from an entirely new quarter.
Regan turned toward the frantic shuffle of boots outside the compartment. As she feared, a deep bellow followed.
"Captain's on Deck!"
The Head Rubbernecker had arrived. Right on time, too.
Soldier, Sailor, Marine, Airman or civilian, it never failed. Death fascinated them all. Whoever sat at the top of the food chain always wanted his own, unobstructed view of the kill, too, no matter how grisly. From the set of Riyad's jaw, even he knew the consequences of extraneous boots mucking up the scene.
"I'll go." She was Army. Nothing to lose.
Not in the long run.
Though to be honest, an Infantry or Artillery bird preening on the opposite side of that door wouldn't have changed her mind, let alone tempered her coming instructions.
Yet another reason why she'd turned down the Army's offer of a commission as a Military Police lieutenant following her coma. As a warrant, she could get away with her own particular brand of verbal murder during the course of an investigation. It was a perk she'd enjoyed to no end on occasion—and would again.
Not to mention, her strength lay in working investigations day in and day out, from the ground up, not overseeing them. The latter of which, as a Military Police officer, would become her lot in life.
To Regan's surprise, Riyad followed her out into the passageway, swiftly overtaking her to reach the captain first.
Evidently, Super Sleuth still didn't trust her.
"Sir, the translator's dead. Under the circumstances, I recommend Agent Chase be escorted to her quarters and removed from the ship—immediately."
Wow. She'd anticipated a bayonet to the back at some point today. But an open and preemptive slash right across the jugular? And in front of witnesses?
That took serious balls.
Riyad's appeared to be forged from the same steel that made up this rhythmically rocking ship.
Fortunately for her, the captain seemed to possess an iron set of his own. He extended a hand toward her as he pointedly ignored Riyad's comment. The man's grip was warm, firm and—in light of the situation—surprisingly friendly. "Brad Armstrong. Welcome aboard the Griffith, Agent Chase. I've been hearing your name quite a bit these past weeks. Been wanting to meet the woman who took down the terror cell." The CO's stare shifted to the now closed conference room door just past her left shoulder, then came back. "Just wish it could've been under better circumstances."
"Thank you, sir."
He made no move toward the door. "What do you need?"
It seemed she'd misjudged the man. She couldn't be happier.
Riyad was not. "Sir, I—"
"Don't possess the experience to oversee a murder investigation." Armstrong turned to the NCIS agent, softening what amounted to Riyad's own public rebuke with what appeared to be a genuinely sympathetic shrug. "Sam, I know you're motivated. And I know this is serious. But you're FCI, not a detective. Agent Chase has worked countless death investigations. We both know we'll need her skills, especially now. Nor can we afford to let the scene deteriorate—especially with all this rocking and rolling—while we wait another day for someone else to get here."
Riyad opened his mouth again, closing it as the captain's hand came up to forestall follow-up argument.
"The decision's been made—at the Pentagon, no less. That's why I'm late. Just got off the horn. Agent Riyad, your concerns regarding Agent Chase's objectivity have been noted and negated at the highest levels—Army, Navy and beyond. She's got the lead on the translator's death. You're to assist. Understood?"
There was a swift undercurrent cutting through that last, though damned if she could discern its source.
But Riyad had.
He offered the captain a brusque nod.
If Armstrong recognized Riyad's lingering displeasure, he ignored it. The captain's answering nod encompassed them both. "Agent Chase, Agent Riyad, I'll be on the bridge should you need me. Keep me appraised."
She'd definitely misjudged the man. "Yes, sir."
Riyad stood fast as the captain left, his foul mood now directed solely upon her.
Regan forced herself to ignore it. "FCI?"
"Foreign Counterintelligence."
A spook? He was a goddamned spook? He wasn't the only one now pissed. And when she added on that he'd spent the bulk of the earlier crisis in the CO's cabin, whining about her?
Regan scoured her soul for patience. "You said you were with NCIS."
"I am."
Right. Some specialized Navy/FBI/CIA-ish/Homeland Security offshoot most likely. One look at the man's features was enough to confirm that, along with his last name: Riyad. "Sam" might be an American citizen, but a significant percentage of the blood flowing through his veins was of Saudi origin. "Just how long did you work crime scenes before you specialized?"
"Six months."
She pulled her breath in deep. "And in that time, how many death investigations did you pursue?"
"One."
"Let me guess—vehicular manslaughter."
To her bemusement, the same slight flush that had tinged Riyad's cheeks after he'd barged into her stateroom earlier returned.
Jesus. She'd been joking. But that flush wasn't. No wonder he'd made a grab for that airbag. The man wasn't incompetent—he was utterly and completely inexperienced.
And he wanted her gone?
Regan opened her mouth and promptly closed it as the remaining thread of patience she'd been clinging to snapped. She no longer trusted herself to stand here and talk to this so-called agent. Not until she'd had a chance to calm down and get a handle on exactly what lay on the floor of that conference room. She whirled around and headed across the ever-shifting deck, stopping beside the door as the corporal returned.
A swift perusal of the Marine's uniform allowed her to collect Corporal Vetter's name, but revealed no evidence of coffee or high-velocity blood splatter concealed amid the digital camouflage. Just the larger bloodstains marring the fabric at his knees, wrists and upper torso. The sort he'd have acquired during his zealous efforts at CPR.
Had Riyad been attempting Good Cop/Bad Cop after all, right before he'd confronted Chief Yrle in that stateroom?
She'd have been forced to consider the possibly after all, but for the fact that Riyad's black polo, cargo pants and boots weren't sporting coffee or high-velocity blood splatter either. And while the man's hands were callused and scarred in several spots, they were devoid of recent injury. Nor would he have had the time to change his clothes in between dragging Chief Yrle from the stateroom and returning to spar with her before the medical emergency had been passed over the loudspeaker.
Regan caught the corporal's waiting gaze. Captain Armstrong must have briefed him as to her status as lead case agent, because the Marine had automatically deferred, not to the spook she'd left behind, but her. "Corporal Vetter, head to the master-at-arms shack and have your uniform bagged for evidence. While you're there, please tell Chief Yrle I require her presence and a death scene kit. Have her stop by my stateroom. There's a stainless-steel suitcase on the lower bunk. I'll need both ASAP as well as a complete statement from you upon your return. I need to know exactly what transpired in that conference room before I arrived."
"Yes, ma'am."
She turned to the staff sergeant and carefully examined his uniform as well. As with the corporal, there was some evidence of larger bloodstains at the wrists and upper torso, but no coffee and no high-velocity splatter. The lack of the latter on both Marines told her all she needed to know. A third person had fled before her arrival.
She nodded to the senior Marine. "Staff Sergeant Brandt, I'll need your uniform bagged as well, though you can wait for the chief's supplies. Until then, position yourself outside this door. No one—and I mean no one—enters without my permission. This conference room is an active crime scene; I expect you to treat it as such."
"Yes, ma'am."
She spun back to Riyad as the staff sergeant took up his post. "Who's missing?"
The spook's jaw locked. Almost imperceptibly, but the tension was definitely there.
Why? Why would an FCI agent care who—
Regan instinctively shifted her attention as another door opened two yards down the passageway, on the opposite side. Curiosity sparked, then swelled as Chief Yrle stepped into the corridor—sans obvious signs of splattered coffee or blood—and immediately turned to reseal the dimly lit compartment she'd vacated…as if she too was attempting to conceal something. No, not something.
Someone.
For a single, blinding moment, Regan had caught a glimpse of a massive camouflaged form with a distinctive trio of two-inch shrapnel scars just beneath the edge of the man's roughly whiskered jaw, and then they were gone. As was he.
It didn't matter.
She'd already recognized their owner.
John Garrison. The recently reunited lover who'd been ordered from her bedside eight days ago, less than three hours after she'd woken from her coma in Fort Campbell's ICU. The same lover General Palisade had sworn was safe just yesterday morning.
But he wasn't.
Because John was here, aboard the Griffith. He had been since he'd left her hospital room. She was certain. Just as she knew that, deep down, John was the missing man she sought. The one whose uniform would reveal signs of coffee and the telltale evidence of Tamir Hachemi's splattered, high-velocity blood.