CHAPTER 55

SEAN AND MICHELLE had spent most of the evening and much of the next day learning that collectively there were dozens of military facilities located in Georgia, Mississippi, and Alabama with hundreds of thousands of military personnel assigned to them. Too many, in fact, for that to be of much use in their investigation. They were sitting in their office when Sean had an idea. He called Chuck Waters and left a message. A few minutes later the FBI agent called back.

"The isotope exam you did on the hair sample?" Sean began.

"What about it?"

"Did it show anything else?"

"Like what?"

"I know that it can tell what your diet has been like for years, but can it also show any anomalies in that chain?"

"Anomalies?"

"Like a break in the chain, where it shows a different type of diet, at least for a period of time?"

"Hold on."

Sean heard some paper rustling and a chair squeaking.

"I don't see anything like that," Waters said.

"Nothing out of the ordinary?"

More paper rustled. "Well, I'm no scientist, but you know how we were discussing that the perp was probably rural because of the unprocessed meats and vegetables and the well water?"

"Yeah."

"Well, there was elevated levels of salt, which makes sense if these folks are preserving stuff, right?"

"Right. We already discussed that."

"Well, in addition to the elevated levels of that, there was higher than normal amounts of sodium."

"But, Chuck, sodium is salt. That would be from canning vegetables and curing meat. We covered that."

"Hey, Einstein, I know that. But they've developed new technologies that can let them distinguish between certain types of sodium found with the isotope exam. What the tests show is elevated levels of a specialized sodium product that is commercially produced but not readily available to the public."

"Would that be because they supply a certain government entity? Like the military? Like sodium in MREs?"

"If you knew about the meals-ready-to-eat angle why are you wasting my time?" Waters said angrily.

"I suspected. I didn't know for certain until you just told me now. And since you obviously knew already, it would've been nice if you had volunteered the info before now."

"I'm running an investigation here, King, not a consulting service."

"There are commercially available MREs. For like the survivalists. You sure it's not that sort of sodium?"

"The sodium level in the military MREs are higher than the commercially available stuff. But so it was military, so what? That only narrows it down to millions of people."

"Maybe, maybe not."

"What do you mean by that?"

"If the perps are military, can't you run the hair sample for a DNA match through the Pentagon's enlistment records? They require DNA samples from everybody now."

"I tried to, but their damn system crashed. Fighting two wars has apparently strapped their budget for computer maintenance. Won't be back up for a couple weeks."

"Great." Sean clicked off and looked at Michelle.

"So where do MREs get us?" she said.

"Now we know the odds are very high that the perp was military. It's at least good to confirm that. But we still have the little issue of tracking him down. It doesn't sound like we'll be getting a DNA match anytime soon."

"He couldn't still be in the military, could he?"

"And went on some R and R to conduct a little kidnapping? And got back to base with his face all scratched up and a bullet bruise on his chest?"

"So discharged?"

"Presumably. Either honorably or dishonorably. But that still doesn't help us. Because there are literally millions of former members of the military."

Michelle was staring at Sean's chest.

He looked down. "Coffee spill?" he said.

"He was wearing body armor. Sure, you can leave the military with some government stuff, but body armor?"

"You can get that on the street."

"Maybe, or you can just take it with you."

"Pretty tough to hide that when you're discharged."

"What if you left without being discharged?"

"AWOL?"

"Cuts down on the millions we'd have to check. Know anybody who can look into that for us?" she asked.

Sean picked up his phone. "Yeah, I do. A two-star I met when I was in the Service. I might be able to shake him down with an offer of Redskins tickets."

"You have Skins tickets?"

"No, but for a worthy cause I can get them."

CHAPTER 56

THIS IS HIGHLY IRREGULAR, Mr. Quarry," said the physician on duty.

"Not to me it's not," Quarry said back. "I'm here to get my daughter and take her home. Nothing more normal than that."

"But she's on life support. She can't breathe on her own." The man said this as to a child.

Quarry pulled out the papers. "I've been through this crap with the folks back in the office. I got full medical power of attorney and all that stuff. Basically I can take her anywhere I want to and there's not a damn thing you can do about it, mister."

The doctor read over the documents Quarry handed him. "She'll die if we take her off the machines."

"No she won't. I got that all covered too."

"What do you mean, all covered?" the doctor said skeptically.

"Every piece of equipment you got in her room keeping her breathing, I got too."

"How could that possibly be? It's all very expensive. And complicated."

"Medical supply warehouse had a fire about a year ago. They had lots of stuff that wasn't even damaged that they let go cheap because of health regulations. Ventilator with a trach tube. Vital signs monitor. Feeding tube. Oxygen tanks and a converter. IV meds dispenser unit. I checked it all out and it works just fine. In fact, I'll bet you a hundred bucks the stuff works better than the shit you got here. It's all pretty old. I should know, I been coming here many a year, and I don't think you folks have changed any of it."

The doctor gave a forced chuckle. "Now really, Mr. Quarry."

Quarry cut him off. "Now you just get her all ready to go. I'll get them to pull the ambulance up front."

"Ambulance?"

"Yeah. What? You expect me to take her home in my pickup truck? Use your damn head, man. I hired me an ambulance, a special one with life support equipment. It's waiting outside." He snatched the papers back. "Now you just make sure she's ready to go." He walked off.

"But how will you possibly take care of her?"

Quarry wheeled back around. "I know the routine better than you do. I know how to feed her, medicate her, clean her, exercise her limbs, and turn her to keep the bedsores away, the whole shebang. You think I just come here and look at the damn floor? By the way, you ever read to her?"

The man looked perplexed. "Read to her? No."

"Well I do. Have all these years. Probably the thing that really kept her alive." He pointed at the doctor. "Just get her ready, 'cause my little girl's finally getting outta here."

Quarry signed a mountain of papers absolving the nursing home of any liability and, at last, Tippi left her prison while the sun was still shining. Quarry squinted against the glare and watched as they loaded his daughter into the back of the ambulance. He climbed in his old truck, gave the nursing home the finger, and led the ambulance down the road to Atlee.

When they arrived home everything was ready. Carlos and Daryl helped the ambulance attendants carry in the gurney. Ruth Ann, tears running down her cheeks, and Gabriel, watched the procession. The adult daughter was returned to the same room she'd occupied as a young girl. Everything that had been in the room when she was young was now in it once more. Quarry and his wife had kept it all, ever since Tippi had headed out in life for what had turned out to be a too brief time. College, a stint at a marketing firm in Atlanta; and then sucking on a breathing tube at a nursing home when she was still in her twenties.