bedroom he had shared with his late wife, even though he knew Eleanor wouldn't mind. God, he would give anything for Sean to pop up to collect the meal she'd mentioned. Given the danger he feared she was in, he knew the possibility wasn't likely.
The other person who had recently mentioned having a drink with him someday-Fletcher Reed-reminded Winter of something he wanted to ask the lieutenant commander. He dialed information and called the shore patrol office at the Cherry Point base. A woman told Winter that Reed had returned to the Norfolk Naval Base, where he was stationed, and gave Winter the phone number. When he called it, a security officer asked for Winter's number and said he would notify Reed and have him return the call.
It took less than ten minutes for the phone to ring. Before the caller spoke, Winter clearly heard vehicles in the background.
“Got your message,” Reed said flatly.
“You get shipped out, or what?”
“I was on temporary duty at Cherry Point evaluating the patrolmen. Now I'm ass deep in petty crap and paper. It's the Navy. What can I say?”
“I need your help with something.”
“You need my help?” He laughed. “Unless you spotted a drunken sailor spoiling for a fight, I doubt I can offer much assistance.”
“Hear me out?”
“I'm listening.” Winter heard a lighter and imagined a cigar in Reed's mouth.
“What do you know about our flight that went in Thursday night at Ward Field?”
“I just heard it crashed,” Reed said. “Catastrophic failure or something, botched emergency landing. You said Ward Field?”
“Abandoned military base inland. What I am going to tell you is classified.”
Reed chortled. “Of course it is.”
“It needs to stay strictly between us.”
“Cross my heart.”
“You know anything about two bodies found Thursday night at Cherry Point?”
“The FBI was already on it by the time I got back. I haven't heard any more about it.”
Winter told Reed who the dead men were and gave him an overview of the FBI's evidence on Greg Nations. As Winter went over it, he was struck again by what little sense it made. “The only thing a WITSEC inspector like Greg could furnish Manelli with on a continuing basis would be an occasional location of a witness he was baby- sitting, which just doesn't add up,” he told Reed.
“Unless he'd been selling the intel to someone like an information broker who then sold it to people who wanted the witnesses not to testify.”
“Then how come no other protected witnesses have been killed?” Winter countered.
“Maybe it was about people who had left the program. Those people get killed from time to time, don't they?”
“I'd have heard about that through the USMS grapevine.” He told Reed that if Greg had an offshore account, the money had come from legitimate sources.
Reed pointed out how naive that sounded. “Basically you're not open to any evidence to the contrary to what you believe? I got nothing to offer, Massey,” Reed said finally.
“Fingerprints.”
Reed sighed. “I don't know what you're talking about.”
“I think the FBI screwed with their fingerprints,” Winter said. “Those killers sure as hell weren't Russian soldiers. If they were ours, the FBI knows it and for whatever reason aren't going to admit it.”
“How do you know that?”
“Come on, Reed. I think the FBI's showing Shapiro what they had was a trial balloon. Get the lies past Shapiro and me, and who else would raise a flag?”
“The FBI can't afford another scandal,” Reed agreed.
“For some people, fabricating evidence is no more difficult than you or me backdating a sales slip.”
“You're talking about a conspiracy between the FBI, the Russian government, the Navy, and the CIA. Hell, maybe even the Marshals Service. It sounds like the two hundred people who were in on framing O.J.,” Reed said.
Winter couldn't blame him for being skeptical. “They wouldn't all have to be aware of the entire picture to be directly involved. Just a handful of people at the top would have to know why they were doing what they were doing. They'd just have to control who knows what. You know how some people will follow any order.”
“Those four guys were definitely soldiers,” Reed mused. “Why not Russians?”
“How many Russians speak with a cracker accent? How many Russians have tattoos removed that leave a scar in the shape of a SEAL trident? I couldn't help but notice that the naked corpse was circumcised. What was he, a Russian-Jewish shock trooper?”
There was a long silence. Then Reed asked, “So all you want from me is to run four sets of fingerprints, which I wasn't supposed to keep? If I did accidentally hold on to a dupe set, as soon as I run them, the FBI will know all about it. This conspiracy cabal of yours involves the FBI.”
“Would it be possible to run them against military fingerprints, just within the Pentagon's database?”
“Maybe.”
“I think those four killers were once members of our military. I think the FBI already knows that because they have all the soldiers in the active database. If they were ours, I need to know who they really were. I need anything you can scrape up. If you draw a blank, at least I'll know I've done everything I can.”
“I'll see what I can do,” Reed said.
“You believe me?”
“I only believe that the tale you're spinning is slightly more intriguing than what I spent the morning doing- plaster-casting motorcycle tread marks on the seventeenth green on the officers' golf course.”
“Thanks,” Winter said.
“This is probably a waste of time, but just for the sake of paranoia, take down my private cell number and give me yours.”
63
Richmond, Virginia
Sean luxuriated in the tub for an hour. She didn't feel safe but, for the first time since she'd returned from Argentina, she felt relaxed. When she'd told Paul Gillman her abusive husband was a federal agent, she'd unconsciously cast Winter Massey in the role. But Winter was probably one of the least violent people she had ever met. He'd killed to save her life. It was a strange feeling to have such a strong emotional bond with a stranger. Winter was a complex individual who had gotten more interesting with every conversation. Why couldn't she have met Winter instead of Dylan? Would she, could she, have told him the truth?
Her skin was wrinkling so she got out, toweled off, and went into the bedroom, where her coat was hung over a chair. She reached into the pocket and removed the cash and the passport.
Sally McSorley's passport had a five-year-old picture of Sean Marks in it because it was the phony passport her mother had acquired for Sean's emergency kit. In the picture, Sean had auburn hair tucked behind her ears. Sean decided the picture made her look innocent. Had she ever been innocent? As a young girl in Catholic schools? As a college student? As the bride of a murdering son of a bitch masquerading as a human being? Had she ever had any choice? She wasn't going to waste time feeling like a victim-self-pity was a waste of energy.
She snapped open the revolver and looked at the shells in the cylinder. They might well come for her, but one thing was certain-she'd be one kill that somebody was going to have to work hard for.
After dressing, she picked up the backpack containing her computer, and slipped the pistol into her coat pocket. She considered dipping into the bundle of cash hidden inside a secret pocket in her duffel, a feature that Hoover had used to sell her the bag, but decided to leave it and her passport alone. After closing her door, Sean
