'Your source has it right,' Troy replied. 'So what? Lots of missions are flown with last-minute intel.'
'Were you ever briefed on where those F-16s came from and who was flying them?'
'Sandringham,' Troy said, acting bored.
'Do you know who was flying them?'
'It doesn't matter to me,' Troy said, recalling his dinner with Aron Arnold. After that night, it really didn't matter. He had learned to divorce the job from his emotions.
The CIA man opened his thin briefcase and took out a folder with some photographs.
'As you have gathered by now, the CIA has been keeping an eye on Firehawk. It may interest you to know that we did reach the wreckage of that F-16 that you shot down.'
'You guys went to a lot of trouble, then,' Troy said, taking the photos that were handed to him. 'It was pretty deep in the jungle.'
At first it didn't register.
Faint recognition became solid recognition as he reached the third photo.
The images were close-ups of the cockpit of an F-16. The canopy had come off, and the pilot remained still strapped in his seat. His head was tipped at an angle that suggested a broken neck. His eyes stared lifelessly into space, his mouth was opened slightly, and dried blood covered his chin and left cheek.
The name strip on his flight suit read 'H. Coughlin.'
Chapter 32
Troy sat in the lobby tearing open a padded envelope.
Inside were his cell phone and his gun, the magazine having been removed and emptied. When he and the CIA men parted company, they said that they'd leave his things at the front desk, and they had. That they'd emptied the magazine told him that they didn't completely trust him. That they did not take his cell phone battery told him that they didn't care who he called. They'd be listening.
The meeting that morning had not happened.
No routine camera surveillance of any part of the hotel showed the three men together. No routine camera surveillance of the lobby recorded a padded envelope being handed to a bellman, who wrote the name and room number on it in his own handwriting and handed it in to reception to hold for Mr. Loensch.
In a meeting that had not happened, Troy learned that he had killed the man with whom the story of his life had been tightly intertwined since they were both in OTS. That seemed like a very long time ago.
Had Harris known that Hal Coughlin was flying for the Sandies?
How could he?
The meeting that morning had not happened — the CIA men had said so. But they had also given him instructions for contacting them when — not if — he wished to not have a second meeting.
Jenna Munrough.
He realized that she had not crossed his mind since he had crossed paths with the CIA.
Yesterday, though, Troy had had little else on his mind, knowing he would soon be seeing her. Months ago in Las Vegas, he had taken the high road, refused her advances, and had often regretted this decision. On his last visit to the Firehawk home office, he had allowed himself to be seduced by this Ozark tigress. It was hot, wild ecstasy, but he had often regretted this decision. He regretted the dishonesty of what his delicious encounter meant to an unknowing Hal Coughlin, the man whose ring Jenna wore.
Then, he'd killed this man.
In less than an hour, he'd walk into the Firehawk headquarters, and he would come face-to-face with Jenna. Did she know it was him?
What would she say?
What should he say?
How could he look into those blue eyes of hers knowing that he had killed her fiance?
The man who was scheduled to receive a corporate commendation that was to be the equivalent of the Distinguished Flying Cross, the first in Firehawk history, entered the building not the same conquering hero as on his last visit, but a wary, conflicted man. This afternoon, he would play the role of conquering hero in front of Firehawk's adoring home office staff, but the man inside the shell inhabited a murky world of guilt.
There were layers upon layers of guilt that began with leaving Hal Coughlin for dead and ended with actually killing him. Amid the layers was the fact that he had decided to tell no one at Firehawk that he had been approached by the CIA. Of course, that meeting had never happened. Indeed, it felt like a bad dream.
Fortunately for him, it was in a crowd of people that Troy next looked into Jenna's eyes. There was an informal buffet luncheon ahead of the presentation, and Jenna was there.
She smiled broadly, but there was no hug.
'How are things?' Troy asked.
'Oh, y'know… so-so,' Jenna replied, setting down her paper plate of potato salad. 'Did you know that Hal died?'
'Oh,' Troy said.
Jenna took his look of surprise that this was the first thing she said as surprise at hearing that Hal was deceased.
'Yeah, it was over in Malaysia where you were,' Jenna continued. 'He was working on a hush-hush project for Escurecer. They had just gotten a contract to supply an air combat component for Sandringham Partners. He went over with the first batch of F-16s. They had just arrived in country when Firehawk went to war with Sandringham.'
'That must have been awkward. for you, working at Firehawk and having him… on the other side…..'
'Yeah, it was.' Jenna nodded sadly. 'Even though we broke up before he went.'
'I didn't know that.'
'That's because you never read my damned e-mails,' Jenna said, shaking her head. She wasn't smiling. This was not playful banter, but the despondency of an emotionally exhausted woman. The fiery Jenna he had known before had been superseded by one far more circumspect.
'Yeah… Hal and I broke up. It was not long after you and me… and no, I never told him about us. It was just one of those things. I could tell that he was losing interest… that the fire was gone. Now it's Hal who's gone.'
Troy could see a tear forming in the eye of a woman he had never seen cry.
'Can I ask you a question?' Jenna asked, quickly dabbing at the offending eye with a paper napkin.
'Yeah…'
'You were flying a lot in the war, and you shot down one of the Escurecer F-16s, right?'
'Yeah… but we didn't know they were Escurecer. They were flying out of a Sandy base. I sure as hell didn't know that one of them was Hal… I feel like shit.'
'You should,' she said. 'I know it's war, I know it's your job and all, and I know that he may have been shooting at you… but you still should feel like shit.'
'I do,' Troy said sadly.
'So did I,' Jenna admitted. 'I cheated on him…. with you. Didn't think I'd feel like I did because of that… but I did. Then I broke up with him because I couldn't… emotionally… and then I heard he was dead… I'm not a crybaby… never been a crybaby, but y'know… I felt… and then I found out you had been. I'm just totally, y'know… wasted.'
'I know what you mean,' Troy said sympathetically.
'How?' Jenna said bitterly, as if to say that there was no way that he could possibly comprehend her regret and her guilt.
They just stared at each other.
'Congratulations on your award,' she said at last, turning to walk away.
SOMEHOW, TROY MADE IT THROUGH HIS PRESENTATION, receiving a commendation for his part in what
