Imelda gave them a speculative glance, then flapped her arms once or twice. “You got some kinda problem with that meal?”
Delbert very foolishly said, “Actually, I do. I like to eat healthier.”
Imelda bent toward him. “You’re not one of those health food pussies, are you?”
“I try to take care of my body,” Delbert replied stiffly.
“This is Army-issued food. If Uncle Sam says it’s good for you, it’s good for you.”
“It’s greasy. And it clogs the arteries.”
Morrow was watching this exchange, and I saw her quickly grab a sandwich and start chomping. Smart girl, that one.
Imelda straightened back up, and her eyes turned into blazing hot lasers that bored searing holes into poor Delbert’s forehead.
“Okay, fancy pants, I’ll remember that. I’ve got your number.”
Delbert’s eyes shifted in my direction. Unsure of her connection to me, he was imploring me to either intervene or give him a signal to fire at will. Like I’d be stupid enough to step into the middle of this.
“Who are you looking at?” Imelda barked. “Don’t you look away when I’m talking to you. You either eat that food or you’re gonna get bone-ass skinny these next few weeks.”
“I like salad,” he said with almost pitiful politeness. “Could you get me a salad?”
“Salad?” she roared, as though he’d asked for a plate of pickled horse manure.
“Yes, please.”
“I don’t fetch rabbit food.”
“Then I’ll get it myself,” he announced, then stood up and left.
Imelda flapped her arms a few more times, grumbled something that ended with one of my favorite anatomical organs, then stomped from the room herself.
Visibly relieved, Morrow placed her half-eaten meatloaf sandwich back on the plate. “Who won that round?” she asked.
“Who’s fetching the rabbit food?” I answered.
“She’s the real McCoy, isn’t she?”
“Last of the breed,” I replied, reaching over for my third sandwich.
“Did Delbert just start a war?”
“Hardly. She was only checking his mettle.”
“How’d he do?”
“Not bad. She saw you pick up that sandwich, though.”
“Was that a mistake?”
I scratched my nose. “Hard to say. Time will tell.”
These two thoughtful creases appeared between Morrow’s eyebrows. The truth is what I just said made absolutely no sense. Took her a moment, but she figured that out.
“You run a loose ship, don’t you?” she complained. “She was very disrespectful. I would have thought a former infantry officer would instill a little more discipline in the ranks.”
Did I mention before that Morrow is an astonishingly beautiful woman? Well, if I didn’t, she is. And there’s nothing like having a great-looking woman challenging your manhood, which was exactly what she was doing. Her perfectly shaped eyebrows were arched up, and her lips were kind of pointing downward, and the average guy would choose just that moment to flex his muscles and mutter something tough and virile to confirm he had something inside those jockey shorts.
I said, “That’s why stereotypes don’t come with guarantees.”
See, Captain Lisa Morrow was obviously scared to death of Specialist Seven Imelda Pepperfield. She just wanted to shame me into protecting her. Like I said, she’s a smart girl.
I finished my third sandwich and glanced at my watch. Unless I missed my guess, there should’ve been a witness waiting outside our door. It actually wasn’t a real hard guess to make, though, since that morning, before we’d left for the morgue, I’d asked Imelda to contact Lieutenant Colonel Will Smothers to request his presence at 1530 hours, which, to the uninitiated, is pretty much the same thing as 3:30P.M.
I walked over and opened the door. In fact, Smothers was standing there. And surprise, surprise, a bespectacled, slightly overweight, bookish-looking captain wearing JAG insignia stood slightly behind him.
“Please come in,” I told Smothers.
He walked by, and I quickly stretched my arm across the doorway, blocking his lawyer, whose nametag read Smith. “You won’t be needed,” I told him.
Smothers spun back around and faced me. “I want him here.”
“No,” I said. “This is just an interrogatory. I won’t be reading you your rights, and therefore nothing you say in this session can be used against you. This is merely a background session.”
Captain Smith screeched in a high-pitched whinny, “If he wants me along, I’m coming in.”
“Wrong. I’m the chief investigating officer. And if I say no lawyers, there’ll be no lawyers.”
There was a moment of wordstruck confusion as Smith and Smothers exchanged bewildered looks, both obviously wondering if I could do this. Frankly, I had no idea, but what the hell.
“No lawyers,” I said, grabbing the door and closing it in Smith’s stricken face. “Please have a seat,” I said as I turned around and faced Smothers.
The thing about interrogatories with potential suspects is that you lose if you don’t have the upper hand. Smothers outranked me, so I had to make up some lost ground. Besides, lawyers only get in the way. I know. I am one, and I’m always getting in the way.
I sat behind the desk, and Morrow and I stayed perfectly still. Smothers was trying to compose himself, which wasn’t easy because I had just torn the guts out of his game plan. Finally I withdrew a tape recorder from the desk drawer and turned it on. That’s always great for the nerves, too.
“Colonel, could you please state your full name and describe your relationship to the accused men?”
He squared his shoulders. “My name is Will Smothers. I’m their commanding officer.”
“Could you be more specific?”
“I’m the commander of the First Battalion of the Tenth Special Forces Group. The A-team commanded by Captain Terry Sanchez was assigned to my battalion.”
“Command? Elaborate on that word for me, please. What is your understanding of it?”
His brow became furrowed for a moment or two. “I guess… well, it means they work for me. That I’m responsible for them.”
“That’s a good definition. How long have you been in command?”
“Nearly two years.”
“How long was Captain Sanchez one of your team leaders?”
“Maybe half a year.”
“So you’ve only known him half a year?”
“No. He was on my staff before that. He worked in the operations office.”
“Was he in the unit when you arrived?”
“Yes. I think he got here about six months before me.”
“So you’ve known him two years?”
“Yes, two years. That’s about right.”
All of this was just a warm-up. Always start an interrogation by asking for simple, noncontroversial facts, to get the subject into the mode of answering quickly, almost automatically. Now it was time to dig for a few opinions.
“Would you say you know him well?”
“I suppose.”
“Who made the decision to place him in the team leader position?”
“Me. It had to be approved by the group commander, but I recommended him.”
“The group commander would be…?”
“Brigadier General Murphy.”
“Is Sanchez a good officer?”
“Uh… yes. A, uh, well, a very good officer,” he said, suddenly appearing eminently thoughtful. “In fact,
