Page 61 of PSYCHOlogical

Chapter Twenty-Three

Vincent

“Shut the door, staff sergeant,” Lt. Colonel Martin said. “I don’t need a wayward ear listening in on this conversation.”

I pulled the door closed behind me. The intensity in his eyes had all but vanished. A tinge of concern now glistened in them. It wasn’t a look I was accustomed to seeing from a man in command of combat marines.

“Have a seat,” he said.

“With all due respect, Sir, I’d feel more comfortable standing.”

He glanced at the top of his desk, and then at me. “Have you read this morning’s newspaper?”

“I have it delivered, but I haven’t seen it today, Sir.”

He picked up a folded newspaper and handed it to me. “It’s opened to the page I’d like for you to read.”

The feigned shock as I gazed at the headline.

MCB QUANTICO MARINE WRECKS CAR, COMMITS SUICIDE

STAFFORD COUNTY, Virginia, November 12 (AP) – A Marine Corps Base Quantico combat veteran died in an apparent suicide Saturday, following a high-speed wreck in which a local businessman was killed.

A phone call from a concerned citizen who had witnessed what they believed to be an inebriated man with a handgun led a Stafford County Sheriff’s officer to the home of Sergeant Robert A. Pike, 34, of rural Stafford County.

After repeated attempts to make contact with Pike were unsuccessful, police entered the Marine’s home and found him unresponsive. The active-duty sergeant was declared deceased by the coroner, the result of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound.

A mile and a half from Pike’s home, a local retired businessman, Hansen R. Wallace, 56, was declared dead at roughly the same time, the result of a high-speed one-vehicle collision.

Preliminary forensic evidence places Pike at the scene of the collision. Investigators believe he was in control of the vehicle at the time of the wreck that took the life of Wallace.

It is believed that alcohol was a factor in the collision.

I handed him the newspaper. “Unbelievable.”

“Un-fucking-believable is the understatement of the year, staff sergeant. I’ve searched my mind high and goddamned low, and I can’t—for the fucking life of me—come up with one goddamned scenario where Sergeant Pike and AD Wallace would have any fucking business occupying the same space on this earth at the same godforsaken time. I’ll ask you to search your mind and see what you come up with.” He placed his hands on his hips and glared. “Well?”

“Sir, I can’t come up with—”

“This thing stinks, staff sergeant, and it stinks to the high fucking heavens.”

“Stinks?” I asked. “How?”

“How?” he snarled. “Like fucking shit!”

“What about it stinks?” I asked. “According to that article, it looks like Pike must have been driving Wallace’s car, wrecked it, killing Wallace, and then committed suicide following the wreck.”

“I don’t believe one fucking word of that article,” he said. “Not one.”

“Why not?”

“Have you ever had the hair on the back of your neck stand up before you walked into an ambush?” he asked.

“Yes, Sir. I have.”

“Something about it just didn’t look right. Smell right? Seem right. Something—even though you might not have been able to immediately identify it—was out of fucking whack. Is that an accurate statement, staff sergeant?”

“Yes, Sir.”