THE MIDDLE SIN Read online

  Frow­ning, she wag­gled the fin­gers of her ot­her hand.

  "Let's see. What ha­ven't we kic­ked aro­und? Oh! Hey! How abo­ut whet­her or not I've hop­ped in the sack with Slo­an?"

  Do­no­van didn't ta­ke his ga­ze from the ro­ad. "That's yo­ur bu­si­ness."

  "You're right. It is. And how you fe­el abo­ut the pos­si­bi­lity is yo­urs."

  She wa­ited. Threw an id­le lo­ok at the skinny pi­nes whiz­zing by. Se­ar­c­hed the du­nes on the ot­her si­de of Ro­ute 17 for a glim­p­se of the oce­an. Tur­ned a qu­es­ti­oning fa­ce back to the man at the whe­el.

  He'd shed the sport co­at he'd worn yes­ter­day and rol­led up the cuffs of his shirt. The gold-tip­ped ha­irs on his fo­re­arms glin­ted in the mor­ning sun. Thin­king abo­ut how tho­se arms had not re­ac­hed for her last night ma­de Cleo fe­el dow­n­right pe­evish.

  "C'mon, Do­no­van. We both know you got tig­ht-as­sed when Slo­an drop­ped that bit abo­ut us ha­ving bre­ak­fast to­get­her. Yo­ur che­eks still ha­ven't un­c­len­c­hed. Why don't you just ask what's go­ing on bet­we­en him and me?"

  Jack wan­ted to. He'd pic­ked up the pho­ne a half do­zen ti­mes last night, it­c­hing for an an­s­wer to that exact qu­es­ti­on. The sa­me res­t­ra­int that had stop­ped him then put an ed­ge in his vo­ice now. "We're both wor­king ca­ses he­re, Cleo. Im­por­tant ca­ses. How I fe­el abo­ut you jum­ping in the sack with Slo­an do­esn't play in eit­her of them."

  "Bul­lshit."

  "Is it?" He rip­ped his ga­ze from the ro­ad. "Then what abo­ut the lit­tle spe­ech you ma­de the last ti­me we jum­ped in the sack?"

  "The one abo­ut ke­eping the do­or open?"

  "That's it."

  Her chin jut­ted. She lo­oked li­ke she was spo­iling for a fight, but Jack sus­pec­ted he'd struck a ner­ve. "You're right," she con­ce­ded with so­met­hing less than gra­ci­o­us­ness. "The best we se­em to be ab­le to ma­na­ge is on­ce in a whi­le."

  Ye­ah, Jack tho­ught. And that was the prob­lem. "Pe­ri­odic" and "infre­qu­ent" just didn't hack it over the long term. He had the scars to pro­ve it. The truth ca­me hard, but he for­ced it out.

  "'Once in a whi­le' do­esn't af­ford me much ba­sis to co­me on strong abo­ut Slo­an, do­es it?"

  The ste­am went out of the wo­man be­si­de him. Sig­hing, she fol­ded her arms and slum­ped in the buc­ket se­at.

  "No, it do­esn't."

  He kept his eyes on the ro­ad. He didn't ha­ve to lo­ok at Cleo to know she was che­wing on the in­si­de of her lo­wer lip. She did that when she ne­eded to think thro­ugh things. One of her per­so­nal qu­irks.

  He co­uld ma­ke a list. The­re was the lip bu­si­ness. The surly tem­per when drag­ged from sle­ep. The ab­so­lu­te lo­at­hing of an­y­t­hing that re­sem­b­led pa­per­work. The des­c­rip­ti­ve-and of­ten li­be­lo­us- pri­va­te la­bels she as­sig­ned wit­nes­ses and sus­pects to ke­ep them stra­ight in her mind.

  The snuf­fling lit­tle snorts she ma­de in her sle­ep.

  The way wa­ter pe­ar­led on her long, sle­ek thighs when she ca­me out of the sho­wer.

  The gro­an that rip­ped from the back of her thro­at when she cli­ma­xed.

  Swe­at po­oled on Jack's palms. The fists he'd for­ced him­self to re­lax just mo­ments ago went whi­te at the knuc­k­les aga­in.

  They sta­yed whi­te as the last few mi­les sped by. Sun­light shot diz­zying pat­terns thro­ugh the tall pi­nes crow­ding the two-la­ne ro­ad. Co­as­tal du­nes ga­ve bri­ef glim­p­ses of the gre­en, rol­ling At­lan­tic. The qu­a­int fis­hing vil­la­ge of So­ut­h­port, North Ca­ro­li­na, fell be­hind them.

  A few mi­les past So­ut­h­port, Jack tur­ned off on­to NC 133. The two-la­ne ro­ad fol­lo­wed the Ca­pe Fe­ar Ri­ver to whe­re it em­p­ti­ed in­to the sea. It al­so led thro­ugh mi­le af­ter mi­le of marshy, un­de­ve­lo­ped co­as­tal bac­k­wa­ter to the lar­gest mu­ni­ti­ons de­pot in the Uni­ted Sta­tes.

  Mo­un­ta­ino­us sand berms sur­ro­un­ded the en­ti­re 18,000-acre si­te-to pro­tect un­sus­pec­ting pas­sersby from a ca­tas­t­rop­hic ex­p­lo­si­on, Jack gu­es­sed. That wasn't a com­p­le­tely im­p­ro­bab­le event, as he'd le­ar­ned in the re­se­arch he'd con­duc­ted last night.

  One of the links he'd fol­lo­wed had re­fe­ren­ced the 1917 ex­p­lo­si­on in the har­bor of Ha­li­fax, No­va Sco­tia. A ship pac­ked with mu­ni­ti­ons to sup­port the war in Euro­pe had col­li­ded with anot­her car­go ship. The re­sul­ting ex­p­lo­si­on le­ve­led the en­ti­re north end of the city, kil­led al­most two tho­usand re­si­dents and inj­ured ni­ne tho­usand mo­re. That hor­ri­fic ac­ci­dent re­ma­ined the sin­g­le most de­vas­ta­ting loss of li­fe due to man-ma­de we­aponry un­til Hi­ros­hi­ma.

  The de­ta­ils of that in­ci­dent we­re vi­vid in Jack's mind as he pul­led up at the so­uth en­t­ran­ce to the Sunny Po­int Mi­li­tary Oce­an Ter­mi­nal. The ci­vi­li­an gu­ard at the ga­te scru­ti­ni­zed his ID and cal­led to ve­rify his ap­po­in­t­ment with the non­com­mis­si­oned of­fi­cer in char­ge of the air for­ce con­tin­gent on si­te. The gu­ard al­so had Jack sign Cleo in, the­reby de­le­ga­ting to him full res­pon­si­bi­lity for her con­duct on post.

  First Bar­nes, he tho­ught wryly. Now this guy. The who­le world se­emed to think he co­uld ac­com­p­lish the im­pos­sib­le.

  "He­re." He pas­sed her a plas­tic-co­ated vi­si­tor's bad­ge. "Clip this on, stay clo­se to me on­ce we get to the port and don't go lo­oking for tro­ub­le."

  "You wo­und me, Do­no­van. I ne­ver lo­ok for tro­ub­le."

  "You ne­ver se­em to avo­id it, eit­her." He tho­ught of the Ha­li­fax ex­p­lo­si­on aga­in and shud­de­red. "We're go­ing to be aro­und bombs, Cleo. Big bombs. Lots of 'em. Just stay co­ol."

  She whip­ped up a kni­fe-ed­ged sa­lu­te. "Yes, sir! Wha­te­ver you say, sir!"

  Once they we­re in­si­de the ga­te, it was anot­her fi­ve mi­les to the ma­in com­p­lex. Cleo eye­bal­led the sign wel­co­ming her to the ho­me of the 597th Tran­s­por­ta­ti­on Gro­up, Uni­ted Sta­tes Army, and sho­ok her he­ad.

  "This is an army post? Silly me. For so­me re­ason, I tho­ught the navy wo­uld run a port fa­ci­lity."

  "Ac­tu­al­ly, it's a jo­int-use fa­ci­lity. The army's Tran­s­por­ta­ti­on Com­mand acts as exe­cu­ti­ve agent for the ove­rall mo­ve­ment of mi­li­tary sup­pli­es and equ­ip­ment to a tran­s­ship­ment po­int. That can be eit­her an aeri­al ter­mi­nal or, as in this ca­se, a de­ep-wa­ter port. If it's a port, the navy con­t­racts for car­go ships. Han­d­lers from each of the ser­vi­ces then over­see lo­ading of the­ir own car­go pac­ka­ges. Mer­c­hant-ma­ri­ne crews man the ships at sea."

  She slan­ted him a con­si­de­ring lo­ok. "You've do­ne so­me re­se­arch."

  "I don't li­ke go­ing in­to a ca­se blind." "Or in­to a po­ten­ti­al­ly hos­ti­le si­tu­ati­on. You al­ways had an es­ca­pe ro­ute map­ped out be­fo­re the bul­lets star­ted flying. Sa­ved our butts down in Hon­du­ras," she re­mem­be­red with a small smi­le. "We ma­de a go­od te­am on that op, Do­no­van."

  He drag­ged his ga­ze from the ro­ad cut­ting as stra­ight as a spe­ar thro­ugh the mo­un­ded sand berms.

  "Ye­ah, we did."

  USAF Mas­ter Ser­ge­ant Harry Ste­vens wa­ited for them at the small bu­il­ding that ho­used the on-si­te air for­ce con­tin­gent. A tall, tan­ned Ca­li­for­ni­an in bat­tle-dress uni­form, Ste­vens was mo­re than a lit­tle cu­ri­o­us why an air for­ce OSI agent had re­qu­es­ted a to­ur of his ope­ra­ti­on.

  Jack hadn't ad­vi­sed him of the pos­sib­le APP da­ta­ba­se bre­ach when he'd cal­led for this ap­po­in­t­ment. That in­for­ma­ti­on wo­uld co­me from Ste­vens's su­pe­ri­ors when a
nd if they de­ter­mi­ned he had a ne­ed to know. For now, all he co­uld do was fe­ed him the stan­dard li­ne.

  "I'm wor­king a pre­li­mi­nary in­qu­iry con­cer­ning one of the car­go ships ret­ro­fit­ted for the air for­ce."

  "Which ship?" the NCO as­ked as he es­cor­ted his gu­ests in­to his one-ro­om ope­ra­ti­ons cen­ter.

  "The Pit­sen­bar­ger."

  "The Pits? She was just in for rep­le­nis­h­ment fo­ur months ago."

  Cleo's ears per­ked up. This was her first in­di­ca­ti­on Jack was in­te­res­ted in a spe­ci­fic ves­sel.

  "The Pits," she com­men­ted. "Inte­res­ting na­me for a ship."

  "It's na­med for Air­man First Class Wil­li­am H. Pit­sen­bar­ger."

  Ste­vens led her to a wall fe­atu­ring three fra­med pho­tos and thum­ped one of a yo­ung tro­op in hel­met and flack vest stan­ding be­si­de the hatch of a chop­per.

  "Pits was a PJ."

  He lo­oked li­ke a pa­ra­res­cu­eman, Cleo tho­ught. Cocky. Self-as­su­red. To­ugh as bo­ot le­at­her. Her few en­co­un­ters with PJs du­ring her ye­ars in uni­form had en­gen­de­red a pro­fo­und res­pect for the bre­ed-and a sin­ce­re ho­pe she ne­ver had to ma­ke use of the­ir com­bat res­cue skills.

  "Pit­sen­bar­ger flew al­most three hun­d­red mis­si­ons in Vi­et­nam," Ste­vens was sa­ying. "On his last mis­si­on, his crew res­pon­ded to an army squ­ad un­der in­ten­se fi­re from the Vi­et Cong. He went down on the ho­ist and tre­ated six wo­un­ded. Whi­le the chop­per fer­ri­ed the first lo­ad back to ba­se, Pits sta­yed on the gro­und to ad­mi­nis­ter to mo­re."

  Cleo's sto­mach be­gan to twist. She gu­es­sed what was co­ming. The air for­ce ho­no­red de­ad he­ro­es by na­ming ba­ses af­ter them. It was be­gin­ning to so­und as tho­ugh they did the sa­me for the­ir small fle­et of oce­an-go­ing car­go ves­sels.

  "When the he­lo re­tur­ned for a se­cond lo­ad," Ste­vens con­ti­nu­ed, "it to­ok a hit and had to le­ave the sce­ne. In­s­te­ad of clim­bing in­to the bas­ket and le­aving with his crew, Pits sta­yed with the gro­und tro­ops. He tre­ated the wo­un­ded, gat­he­red am­mu­ni­ti­on clips from the de­ad when the de­fen­ders ran low, and grab­bed a rif­le him­self to help hold off the Cong. When they re­co­ve­red his body the next day, he was still clut­c­hing the rif­le in one hand and a me­di­cal kit in the ot­her."

  Cleo's thro­at went tight as she sta­red at the grin­ning yo­ung PJ. "How old was he?"

  "Twen­ty-one. He was awar­ded a pos­t­hu­mo­us Air For­ce Cross for that ac­ti­on. It was up­g­ra­ded to a Me­dal of Ho­nor af­ter a spe­ci­al re­vi­ew in De­cem­ber 2000. The award ca­me thro­ugh just in ti­me for the navy to na­me one of the new car­go ves­sels they de­di­ca­ted to air for­ce use af­ter him."

  He nod­ded to the fra­med pho­tos flan­king the yo­ung air­man's. "Our ot­her two ships are the Ma­j­or Ber­nard F. Fis­her and the Cap­ta­in Ste­ven L. Ben­nett. All three are na­med for men I'd be pro­ud to go in­to com­bat with."

  Cleo ne­ver mis­sed the mi­li­tary-ex­cept at mo­ments li­ke this. Du­ring her ye­ars in uni­form she'd bal­ked at do­ing things by the bo­ok and bent mo­re ru­les than she'd fol­lo­wed. But she'd ne­ver fo­und an­y­t­hing in the ci­vi­li­an world that ca­me clo­se to the ca­ma­ra­de­rie she'd ex­pe­ri­en­ced in the air for­ce. The­re was a fra­ter­nity, a brot­her­ho­od of arms that ca­me with the ab­so­lu­te cer­ta­inty you co­uld trust the tro­op next to you to do his or her job even un­der in­ten­se enemy fi­re.

  With a last lo­ok at the yo­ung PJ, she ac­com­pa­ni­ed Ste­vens to me­et his crew. The fo­ur NCOs who ca­me for­ward to sha­ke hands pos­ses­sed a com­bi­ned to­tal of mo­re than sixty ye­ars' ex­pe­ri­en­ce in mu­ni­ti­ons, tran­s­por­ta­ti­on and lo­gis­tics plan­ning.

  "This is only a small sli­ce of our te­am," Ste­vens ad­vi­sed. "Sin­ce it ta­kes up to a ye­ar to pre­pa­re for a rep­le­nis­h­ment ope­ra­ti­on, most of my tro­ops are at Og­den, wor­king the lo­gis­tics for the next ro­und. They'll lo­ad the re­qu­ire­ments in the da­ta­ba­se, so­ur­ce the we­apons pac­ka­ges, then ma­ke the buys."

  Jack didn't com­ment. Cleo, too, kept her mo­uth shut.

  "The en­ti­re APP te­am will as­sem­b­le he­re on-si­te a few months be­fo­re the ship is due in port," Ste­vens ex­p­la­ined. "I'll ha­ve fifty, sixty pe­op­le co­un­ting pal­lets and wor­king cra­nes as the mu­ni­ti­ons ar­ri­ve by truck or tra­in. We'll get ever­y­t­hing sor­ted and pac­ka­ged be­fo­re the ship docks, then work ro­und the clock un­til it's lo­aded and re­ady to go back on sta­ti­on."

  "How long do­es the ship stay on sta­ti­on?" Cleo as­ked.

  "They're con­t­rac­ted for fi­ve ye­ars, but they can co­me in whe­ne­ver the air for­ce di­rects."

  The NCO then pro­ce­eded to gi­ve his vi­si­tors a crash co­ur­se in the three-ti­ered mu­ni­ti­ons-sup­ply system. Cleo pretty much gras­ped the con­cept of star­ter, swing and rep­le­nis­h­ment stock. Ste­vens lost her, tho­ugh, when he des­c­ri­bed the three air for­ce mu­ni­ti­ons ships as ra­pid swing stock.

  He tri­ed aga­in, using terms she co­uld un­der­s­tand. "Our ships brid­ge the gap bet­we­en the mu­ni­ti­ons we can get to a lo­ca­ti­on im­me­di­ately via air­lift and what's ne­eded to sus­ta­in a long con­f­lict. Gi­ven the­ir dis­per­sed lo­ca­ti­ons, they can pull in­to just abo­ut any port and off-lo­ad the­ir car­go wit­hin ho­urs."

  His chest puf­fed out. "That's what hap­pe­ned in Af­g­ha­nis­tan. One of our ships went in with the first stri­ke and kept our pla­nes sup­pli­ed with bombs and mis­si­les thro­ug­ho­ut the at­tack."

  Cleo re­mem­be­red the TV clips of bombs bur­ro­wing in­to ca­ves and blas­ting ter­ro­rist stron­g­holds. She al­so re­mem­be­red how she'd che­ered every bun­ker-bus­ting blast. Mas­ter Ser­ge­ant Ste­vens and his crew de­ser­ved to puff out the­ir chests.

  "The­re's an army ship in port," he told them. "I can't ta­ke you abo­ard, but I can dri­ve you down to the dock. You'll get a bet­ter fe­el for what we do if you see it for yo­ur­self."

  Jack didn't ne­ed a se­cond in­vi­ta­ti­on. "Let's go."

  ***

  Cleo be­gan to get a sen­se of how big this ope­ra­ti­on truly was du­ring the trip to the dock.

  Ste­vens dro­ve them past ac­re af­ter ac­re of cra­ted we­aponry and equ­ip­ment. For­k­lifts rum­b­led back and forth as crews ope­ned the cra­tes, sor­ted the ma­te­ri­al and re­pac­ked it in ship­ping con­ta­iners abo­ut half the si­ze of tra­in box­cars.

  "Every item you see is bar-co­ded," Ste­vens ex­p­la­ined. "And each of tho­se ship­ping con­ta­iners is tag­ged with an elec­t­ro­nic iden­ti­fi­er. We track which items go in­to which con­ta­iner and whe­re that box is sto­red in the ship's hold. We can even fol­low the con­ta­iner's mo­ve­ment by ra­dio sig­nal as the ship cros­ses the oce­an. If ne­ces­sary, we can off-lo­ad dif­fe­rent pac­ka­ges at dif­fe­rent lo­ca­ti­ons."

  "Pretty im­p­res­si­ve," Cleo had to ad­mit, eye­ing the en­d­less strings of mi­ni-box­cars.

  "It is when you con­si­der a ves­sel li­ke the Pits can ha­ul mo­re than ni­ne hun­d­red of tho­se con­ta­iners-se­ven hun­d­red twenty be­low deck, the rest abo­ve deck in air-con­di­ti­oned, de­hu­mi­di­fi­ed pods to pro­tect the am­mu­ni­ti­on. That equ­ates to abo­ut twel­ve tho­usand short tons of car­go, or abo­ut fi­ve mil­li­on po­unds of ex­p­lo­si­ve we­ight."

  "Fi­ve mil­li­on, huh?"

  She was still trying to wrap her mind aro­und the no­ti­on of sa­iling ac­ross an oce­an sit­ting atop mil­li­ons of po­unds of ex­p­lo­si­ves when Ste­vens dro­ve in­to the port com­p­lex.

  "The ship you'll see in a few mi­nu�
�tes is an ar­my-pro­vi­si­oning ship. It's smal­ler than the Pits but still car­ri­es a pretty go­od ton­na­ge."

  When the­ir ve­hic­le ro­un­ded the end of a mi­le-long wa­re­ho­use a few mo­ments la­ter, Cleo dis­co­ve­red "smal­ler" was in the eye of the be­hol­der. Cra­ning her neck, she lo­oked up. And up. And up.

  "Holy shit!"

  It was the big­gest, blac­kest hull she'd ever se­en: twel­ve or fif­te­en sto­ri­es of ste­el pla­te, top­ped by fi­ve su­per si­ze cra­nes swin­ging stac­ked con­ta­iners from dock to deck as if they we­re Le­go blocks.

  9

  When Cleo and Jack de­par­ted Sunny Po­int al­most an ho­ur la­ter, her res­pect for lo­gis­ti­ci­ans had ta­ken se­ve­ral qu­an­tum le­aps and her neck had de­ve­lo­ped a se­ve­re crick.

  As Jack's ren­tal car ate up the mi­les back to Char­les­ton, she al­so de­ve­lo­ped a de­ci­ded re­luc­tan­ce to end that lit­tle ex­cur­si­on. Des­pi­te the­ir rocky start that mor­ning, it felt go­od to be wor­king with him. Dam­ned go­od.

  Appa­rently he was ex­pe­ri­en­cing so­me deg­ree of re­luc­tan­ce, too. That be­ca­me evi­dent when he pul­led up alon­g­si­de the Es­ca­la­de and ho­oked his wrists over the ste­ering whe­el.

  "What's next on yo­ur agen­da?"

  "I've got to me­et with the de­tec­ti­ve wor­king my mis­sing-per­sons ca­se. Ho­pe­ful­ly, by now he'll ha­ve sub­po­ena­ed the pho­ne re­cords of this myste­ri­o­us man Trish Jac­k­son cal­led from her doc­tor's of­fi­ce. How abo­ut you?"

  "I still ha­ve a few mat­ters to check out he­re in Char­les­ton."

  She wa­ited, won­de­ring if he was go­ing to spend anot­her night alo­ne in his ho­tel ro­om, with her bun­ked down just a few mi­les away.