The River Murders Read online

  My mom loved the deference. “Of course, dear. My house is your house. And now it’s Natty’s house, too.”

  My mom wandered down the hall to chat with someone. I took the moment to lean in close to Alicia. “I am so sorry about yesterday.”

  She didn’t say anything.

  “I swear I am, and I’ll make it up to you.”

  Now she took a moment and said, “Will you take me to a movie and dinner Friday? Like a real date.”

  “This Friday?”

  “Yeah. Is that a problem?”

  “I—er—”

  “You seem to stammer a lot when I ask you questions. What’s so important that you’re busy Friday night?”

  “I’m kinda leaving for Alabama tomorrow.”

  “What’s ‘kinda leaving’ mean?”

  “I got a new job and I have to leave for training.”

  She stared at me. “When will you be back?”

  “That’s a tough one. I’m not really sure.”

  Before I could give her more details, she said, “I have to get back to work now. I’ll talk to you later.”

  She turned and stomped off so quickly I couldn’t even say good-bye.

  My mom came back from the counter where she had spoken to another nurse. As we waited for the elevator, I gauged my mom’s mood. I was still reeling from Alicia. I said, “Do you think Natty and Alicia are attracted to each other?” It had been nagging me for too long. I had to get someone else’s opinion.

  “Of course they are. They’re both attractive, nice people. But you’re starting to sound like the conspiracy nut the Newburgh police think you are. Alicia is just being nice. She’ll be a great nurse. You need to grow up. She’s a keeper.”

  “So you don’t think I have anything to worry about?”

  My mom turned to me with a smug smile. “Not if you stay here.”

  I smiled and said to my mom, “Good effort. But I’m still leaving tomorrow.”

  CHAPTER 22

  WHEN I COULDN’T reach her, I left a message for Alicia. I tried to make it simple and to the point, but no matter what I said it sounded lame. I ended up with, “I’m sorry I have to leave. I’ll be back. And things won’t be as screwed up around my house. I’ll call you when I get there.”

  Certainly not the grand, romantic message I wanted to leave, but it would have to do.

  I was short on time and virtually out of money. Non-Metric Solutions was now my only option.

  I caught a flight to Atlanta then a bus to Huntsville, Alabama. I figured I could use a week of orientation and training. I had no idea what to expect. The first day was mostly filling out something like three thousand forms. And I had a cursory medical exam. Emphasis on “cursory.” I’m not certain the doctor administering the test would’ve noticed an artificial limb. I was breathing and I could walk in a straight line. That seemed to be the bar.

  We took a fitness test, which included a two-mile run, maximum push-ups and pull-ups completed in a minute, as well as a couple of other events. I didn’t notice anyone failing because of the fitness test. Don’t get me wrong, there were plenty of people barely strolling across the finish line of the two-mile run. I guess Non-Metric Solutions had too many openings to be too selective. It was almost the opposite of the SEAL training I’d gone through.

  I met some interesting people. A retired cop from Tampa named Greg Stout was there because he found himself bored with the free time. He’d work in Non-Metric Solutions’ investigations division, which looked at thefts and crimes that didn’t involve military personnel.

  The jovial, retired detective had an endless stream of jokes. That’s an important guy to have in a place like Afghanistan. Just before we started our two-mile run, he said, “I’ll see you at the finish line in about forty minutes.”

  “C’mon, you can do better than that.”

  Stout said, “I just had a physical. The doctor asked me if obesity ran in my family. I told him no one ran in my family. I’m going to stick to that.”

  I met a retired Secret Service agent named Jason Roche. He and Stout were also friends. Roche was a solid guy. The kind of person you could trust if someone started shooting at you. Calm and alert. But we all parted company on the last day.

  At the end of our training, Stout said, “Why don’t you fly with Jason and me out of Miami? We stop in Dubai, then into Kabul.”

  I held up my hands. “I don’t have a good pension coming in. I can save money by using some of my contacts with the military and catching one of their flights.”

  Roche said, “They gave us a stipend to travel.”

  “Which I’m going to save and send home to my mom for medical expenses.”

  Stout slapped me on the back. “You’re a good kid. I hope you can stay out of trouble in Afghanistan.”

  I caught a series of Greyhound buses to get to Dover, Delaware. That’s where I was promised a flight to Bagram Air Base. We had to stop in Germany on the way, and I wasn’t guaranteed plush seats or a specific timeline. But it was free.

  I showed my paperwork from Non-Metric Solutions at the gate to Dover Air Force Base. The airman standing guard was more impressed by my Navy ID and the fact that I had actually served in the military.

  I waited in the tiny terminal and noticed a group of elderly people, as well as a few service members, starting to fill the area. As I sat there watching the crowd grow, an Army master sergeant, about thirty years old, took the seat next to me. She looked at the crowd, then back at me, and said, “I can tell the difference between a contractor and a tourist.”

  I smiled. She was attractive with blond hair tied up tight to her head like the military preferred. She said, “Every time I travel to Europe on a C-17 there are at least a dozen retired service members and their spouses grabbing free airfare to Germany. If you’re not on a schedule, and you don’t mind the web seats, it’s a great deal.”

  “What makes you think I’m not a tourist, too?”

  “You’re twenty years too young to be a retiree, look to be in good shape, and you’ve got everything packed in a military duffel. Let me guess, you were in the service, got out, and life’s not as exciting or you don’t make enough money. Usually one of the two. You’re now a contractor.”

  “What are you? An Army psychologist?”

  She held out her hand. “Vicki Jensen, logistics.”

  I shook her hand. “You got me. Mitchum, Non-Metric Solutions.”

  “Is Mitchum your first name or your last?”

  I smiled again. “Both.”

  That seemed to satisfy the master sergeant. She said, “Headed to Bagram?”

  I nodded.

  “There are a ton of contractors there. From all over the world. There’s not a lot to do.”

  “I’m from upstate New York. There’s not that much to do there, either.”

  She had a dazzling smile. “Sounds like you’re going to work out just fine.”

  “What’s the worst that could happen? They don’t like me and send me home? I can deal with that.”

  “Technically, the worst that could happen is that you’re blown up by an IED or shot by a sniper.”

  “Believe me, I’ve considered all that. But this was my best choice.” I was relieved I didn’t have to go into any of my backstory. She seemed happy to wait out our extended stay in the terminal. The Air Force calls it “Showtime.” That’s the time you have to arrive to get on one of the flights. And it’s always hours before takeoff.

  There were worse ways I could’ve spent my afternoon.

  CHAPTER 23

  WE LOADED ON the giant C-17 cargo plane. The first thing I noticed and appreciated was the fact that no one complained. The seats were just pulldown web seats on the sides of the plane. The center of the jet was crammed with some kind of IED minesweepers. They looked like they hooked under the front of a vehicle. I didn’t see any engine on the minesweepers. Most of the civilian, retired military passengers were in their seventies. All of them looked thrilled to
be on vacation. It was great to see.

  The aircrew was an Air National Guard unit out of Memphis. I was happy when Vicki Jensen decided to sit next to me. At least I’d have someone to talk to.

  We chatted on and off for the first several hours of flight. I dozed off for an hour or two, but for the final three hours, I was wide awake and sitting in the straight-backed web chair. Not the most comfortable way to fly.

  Vicki had been lying on a bedroll she brought with her. I noticed all the active military people had something similar. You had to grab sleep where you could. She woke up an hour before we landed and sat next to me again.

  She said, “I didn’t join the Army to be in logistics and work on computers.”

  “Why’d you join? Avoiding a prison term?” I gave her a smile in case she couldn’t tell it was a joke. But she could.

  “I wanted to serve my country. A lot of people still understand that terrorism is a major threat to our way of life.”

  “Okay, that’s a really good answer. But what, specifically, did you want to do in the Army?”

  “I wanted to fly helicopters. Black Hawks to be specific. I thought I had it all down. I was in great shape. I don’t mind studying. I had one flaw I didn’t know about.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I have a minor, visual-spatial issue. Nothing I’d ever noticed growing up.”

  “So you have problems judging distance.”

  “You’re one of the first people to grasp that. So instead of just quitting, I applied my talents to the vital job of logistics. As a result, I get to fly in helicopters a lot. I know half the Army pilots at Bagram. I can make up some kind of minor errand and have my choice of five different helicopters to fly me there. Not as good as being a pilot, but still pretty sweet.”

  I smiled. I was always amazed at the enthusiasm young military personnel put into their jobs. It was something most people didn’t see.

  Vicki said, “What’d you do in the Navy? Why did you join?”

  I let out a laugh to cover my embarrassment. I just shrugged and said, “I joined because I lived in a little town in upstate New York. I wanted to see the world.” I hesitated, and decided to tell the truth. “I wanted to be a SEAL, but it didn’t work out.”

  “Training too hard?”

  “Something like that.”

  “And now you’re going to make your fortune in Afghanistan.”

  “Something like that.”

  “This will be my third deployment to Bagram. I’ll show you around. It’s a giant place. And can be confusing. At least for the first couple of days.”

  I settled into the seat as one of the aircrew yelled out to us, “We’re making our descent into Ramstein, Germany.” We had an overnight stop in Ramstein, then tomorrow on to Afghanistan.

  CHAPTER 24

  BECAUSE OF THE time change, we landed at Bagram about five in the morning. At least, on this leg of the flight, I stretched out on the hard floor and dozed off for a few hours.

  I was still stiff and tired when I checked in with the base contractor coordinator. The clerk issued me a room, which was a shipping container welded to several more shipping containers. There was a tiny, whirring air conditioner designed to take the edge off the heat.

  At least I had no roommate for now. I took the lower of the bunk beds against the back wall. I had a cheap, pressboard dresser with two drawers to place everything I’d brought with me. My whole life in Afghanistan fit in the dresser easily. When I thought about it, there wasn’t much more absolutely needed from my house. Maybe Bart Simpson and a few books.

  Then I walked over to the offices for the different contracting companies. There were dozens. One place contracted cleaning and maintenance facilities, another company contracted for certain types of food, another for equipment. There were several for security and detention, and the very last one in the row of offices was Non-Metric Solutions.

  Sitting behind the only desk in the sparse office was my friend, DP Lampkin. His official nameplate read DENNIS P. LAMPKIN. I’d called him DP for so long that I think I’d forgotten his first name was Dennis.

  DP jumped out of his seat and gave me a hug. He was about four inches shorter than my six foot two frame. He’d stayed in good shape and had an easy smile that still put me in a good mood. He was sturdy and looked ten years younger than his forty years. He now had the kind of shaved head that only buff black guys can carry off well.

  “What’s with the clean head look?”

  He ran his hand across the bare skin. “There was a lot of gray coming into my tight ’fro. My kids suggested the look. Definitely a lot easier here.”

  As I sat down, I noticed his Kindle. “That replace the fifteen books you carried everywhere?”

  “I still usually have a few books around, but I’ve got a ton on this baby.” He patted the Kindle.

  DP went through some of the possible assignments with me. Most were pretty basic. Standing a post, riding on patrol, or a little executive protection. I wasn’t worried about any of the assignments. I was worried about finding Rick Jackson and the Deep River contingent.

  I casually asked about other contractors. I didn’t mention Deep River by name.

  DP gave me a quick rundown of all the non-security contractors. Then he said, “There are five major security contractors. You’ll see their guys around. There’s no real rivalry. In fact, there’s more work than we can all handle. We trade people back and forth all the time.”

  “You mean I could end up working for another contractor?”

  “It’s not like you’d have a different job. We all do similar stuff. But yeah, it’s possible. And we all bill each other so everyone’s making money.”

  I had to sign a pile of new forms and show off my marksmanship on the range so I could be issued a Beretta 9-millimeter.

  When I came back to the office later, DP looked like a proud father of a newborn. He said, “Looks like you’re ready to go. I can probably get you a cushy job on the interior of the base.”

  I was staring at a map on the wall of the giant base. I pointed to a set of buildings far off from anything else. “What’s that?”

  “Nothing we have to worry about. It’s a detention center where they sort out who’s going where. Deep River handles that entire contract. The closest we get is patrolling the road in front of it.”

  “I wouldn’t mind doing that. Just driving patrol around the perimeter. Sounds like it’s just what I need.”

  DP shrugged. “Shifts are long and boring out there. You’ll be lucky if you talk to two people a shift.”

  “You got anyone else asking to do it?”

  DP chuckled and said, “That’s why I wanted you to work here. No hassles and you do a good job. Glad to have you aboard.”

  CHAPTER 25

  AS SOON AS I got settled in my room, I went looking for Greg Stout and Jason Roche. It would be comforting to see someone I knew from the States. This place was so alien to me. The base was a hard and dusty plain surrounded by the Hindu Kush. Sometimes, when the wind blew from the mountains, it was like getting a blast of air conditioning.

  It wasn’t hard to find the two retired law enforcement men. I led them over to a coffee shop near the PX where Vicki had said to meet her. I made the introductions and everyone exchanged numbers. Mainly, I was showing off that I had made some friends.

  Stout insisted on giving me a quick walking tour of the base. We left Vicki with her week-old copy of the Chicago Tribune and headed out.

  I could tell the pleasant, retired detective had already lost weight in the few days he’d been here. Their direct commercial flight was a lot more efficient than my free military flight. They were already old pros working on Bagram Air Base.

  Stout pointed over the cement barriers that surrounded the entire base. “Over there is the ancient town of Bagram. It may not look like much, but it was here before London was much of a going concern.”

  I’d seen a bunch of contractors, some in company uniform
s, but most in regular clothes. The one thing they almost all had in common was a sidearm. I had to ask, “What’s with all the guns?”

  Jason said, “Every contractor has the option of carrying a personal weapon. They have to go through training and prove they know how to use it. I think it goes back to an infiltration where the terrorist was able to shoot a number of contractors. Whoever runs the administration decided it was better to have more weapons than fewer.”

  “Doesn’t that lead to violent confrontations between the contractors?”

  Roche smiled. “I asked that same question. They told me none of the contractors would risk getting booted from this kind of job and pay. Besides, without alcohol available, it seems like everyone stays relatively calm. What’s that old saying? A well-armed society is a polite society.”

  Stout pointed out a relatively short air traffic control tower in the center of the base, nowhere near a runway. “That’s the old Russian air tower when they used the base during their invasion of Afghanistan. There are some more Russian buildings way out on the corners of the base. Most people just call them the Russian ruins. The tower now hosts ceremonies and parties.”

  Roche laughed. “The other ruins are way the hell out by the detention facility at the perimeter.”

  That caught my attention. But I didn’t say anything. I needed to get as much information as I could before I started making overt inquiries about Rick Jackson and the contingent from Deep River.

  I said, “So the two guys in the tower by that entrance are also contractors?”

  Both men nodded.

  “I figured they weren’t US military because they both have AK-47s.”

  Stout said, “All the Ugandans carry AK-47s. They pretty much cover the perimeter. You can see there are a couple of American contractors where the gate opens. The men on top are just extra firepower.”