Standing Fast. Maggie K. Black

       THREE

      The lead investigator walked back into the room, giving Chase barely a moment to process Preston’s words before rising to his feet and saluting. Preston rose as well.

      Justin’s eyes scanned their faces. “Everything all right, men?”

      “Yes, sir,” Preston said.

      Chase did his best to keep his face impassive. Preston’s determination to nail him was immaterial. Chase knew he was innocent.

      As if he read Chase’s thoughts, Justin turned to him. “You’re free to go.”

      So he wasn’t being charged? Did that mean they didn’t have enough evidence? Or did they think that if they let him go and trailed him, he’d eventually lead them to the Red Rose Killer?

      “You are not being charged with any crime at the moment,” Justin went on, his face so steady he might as well have been carved out of marble. “We may wish you to come in for future questioning and appreciate your continued voluntary cooperation with our investigation. JAG can inform you of your legal rights going forward, including your right to cease cooperation and retain legal counsel. Don’t leave base without letting my office know. I believe the team has finished processing your home as well. You can collect your cell phone later this afternoon.”

      “Thank you, sir.” Chase saluted sharply.

      The other man returned the salute, and Chase was escorted from the building. But it wasn’t until he stepped inside the front door of his own Canyon bungalow that he let his shoulders slump and his bearing relax. Twenty minutes later he was showered, shaved and dressed in his crisp dark blue uniform, with its pale blue shirt, navy tie and laces tight on the leather shoes that were so well shined he could almost see the mess of the house that surrounded him reflected in them. He’d need to have the front door replaced before Allie came home. It still opened and closed all right, but the visible dent and damaged hinges would upset her. His bedroom and the living room had both been tossed, but nothing seemed broken—he was thankful for that—and his daughter’s room would only take a minute to set back to rights. Even the window screen would be easy enough to replace. He’d change the locks on the doors as well. A bigger problem would be repairing the baseboards and floor tiles. He’d carefully peeled back half a dozen of each to create little hiding places for electronic SD cards and thumb drives, as part of Queenie’s training, and this had no doubt seemed suspicious enough for deeper investigation. Now, patches of his floor looked like a sloppy and haphazard contractor had quit partway through the job. He took another deep breath, let it out slowly and reminded himself that the investigators had only been doing their job. They’d done it with the utmost of respect and professionalism too—for the most part. He ran his hand over the back of his neck.

       God, what do I do? Who’s out to get me? How do I find them?

      The red light on his answering machine was blinking. He pressed the button. The light and airy sound of Maisy’s voice filled his wrecked and damaged living room, as sweet and as comforting as a chilled glass of sweet iced tea.

      “Hey, Chase? It’s Maisy. Not sure when you’ll get this message, but Justin...uh, Captain Blackwood said you wouldn’t have your cell phone. Allie wanted to give you a call to let you know we were having a good morning...” There was the sound of whispering and the scuffle of the phone changing hands.

      Then he heard the voice of his daughter, Allie, sounding so tiny and little, and a sudden lump formed in his throat. “Hi, Daddy! Maisy let me have a special pink hair bow! And I had berries. And waffles. Queenie is here too. Say woof, Queenie! Queenie! Say woof, woof! Queenie doesn’t want to say hi. Bye!”

      There was the thump of the phone falling, another scuffling sound and a pause that lasted so long he wondered if they’d forgotten to hang up. Then he heard Maisy’s voice again. There was an unmistakable strain of worry pressing through her light and cheerful tone. “Allie ate a lot of breakfast. She’s good. Felicity gave me a scoop of dog food for Queenie. We’re just going to hang out here and have a fun day. Give me a shout when you—”

      The phone message cut off in a long beep. He sat down on the couch, feeling his heart beat hard against his rib cage. Then he played the message again, finding comfort in the sound of his daughter’s voice and Maisy’s reassurance. Did Maisy have any idea how much her act of kindness meant to him? His daughter had been screaming, his world had been falling apart and she’d been there for him, stepping into the chaos, reaching out her hands to his little girl, like a heroine plucking his daughter out of the rubble and into safety.

      He’d never met a more beautiful, kind and generous woman.

      * * *

      Real men don’t whimper and they don’t complain. Nobody ever solved a problem by sitting around feeling sorry for themselves. Unexpectedly, his grandfather’s voice echoed through the back of his mind. The Senior Master Sergeant had been in military intelligence long before Chase had been born and was proud of having gone to his grave never breathing a word of what his work had entailed. He’d been widowed when Chase was a baby, moved in with Chase and his parents and stepped into the role as head of the household, filling the void that was left behind by the hectic nature of his mother’s long and exhausting overnight shifts as an ER nurse and his father’s lengthy deployments overseas. He’d instilled in Chase at a young age that real men didn’t lose control of their emotions, ever, even if they were four years old and had broken their leg jumping off the garage roof.

      Chase gritted his teeth and stood up. This was no time for self-pity. Someone was out to get him, and he had to find out who. That was never going to happen while he was sitting around thinking about some pretty preschool teacher.

      If Security Forces wasn’t going to track down his alibi for the morning of the Red Rose Killer’s murders, he was going to have to do it himself. The fact that Preston had brought up his former boss, Captain Jennifer Reardon, in the interrogation had reminded him that there might be more than one way to track Ajay down. He dialed Captain Reardon’s office number. She answered on the first ring. “Morning, ma’am.”

      “Morning, Airman.” The captain’s voice was clipped and her words precise. He often thought she spoke the way a sniper fired. “What can I do for you?”

      He imagined word of his early morning arrest had already made it to her ears.

      “I’m trying to track someone down,” he said, “and I’m hoping you could help. When I was in Afghanistan, I became friends with a local contractor named Ajay Joseph...”

      “I can’t say I remember him,” she said briskly.

      That didn’t surprise him. There had been hundreds of American servicemen and -women on the base, as well as hundreds of local contractors. She hadn’t been wrong when she’d told investigators that he’d been a quiet man who kept to himself, though he seriously