Free Hard Rain by David Rollins

across the tabletop.
    ‘Jesus, Anna . . .’ I was prepared to accept that Masters and I were finished. But now the reason for the ending was sounding more like an excuse. If, like me, he was also based at Andrews AFB, then what was all that crap she’d given me about the physical distance between us being so goddamn destructive? Masters busied herself with the mess she’d created, probably thankful for the diversion. Her fiancé was at Andrews Air Force Base? The asswipe could be sitting in an office just down the hallway from mine. There was even a good chance I might know the jerk.
    Masters screwed the top back on the shaker and rubbed the palms of her hands together to brush off the salt.
    ‘What’s his name?’ I asked.
    ‘No, Vin.’
    ‘So anyway,’ I began, ‘the devil visits this lawyer’s office. He rests his pitchfork on the desk and says, “Hey, Mac, why don’t you let me organise a few things for –”’
    ‘Why don’t you ever let up?’ Masters interrupted.
    ‘Your fiancé’s working out of an office in DC and you’re at Ramstein. Say, this sounds familiar.’
    ‘He’s leaving the Air Force – joining a private firm – so that we can be together.’
    ‘He’s moving to Germany so that you and he can –’
    ‘No, Vin . . . I’m getting out too,’ she said.

Five
    T here weren’t many places I could go after a revelation like that. So Masters was leaving the Air Force. Shit . . . now I wanted to get up and leave, even if it was just the coffee shop. But the reality was that, like it or not, the two of us were joined at the hip. Stuck in this country, investigating a high-priority case. I chewed without tasting anything.
    ‘This is going to be difficult, isn’t it?’ Masters said.
    ‘Nothing a lobotomy wouldn’t fix. You first,’ I suggested.
    ‘You and I need to forget we have a history.’
    ‘Like I said, you first.’
    Masters wiped her lips with a napkin.
    ‘You met this fiancé of yours in Istanbul,’ I said. ‘When, exactly?’
    ‘Vin, I’m not –’
    ‘So anyway, the devil says to this lawyer, “Yeah, I can fix things for you. Your income? I’ll increase it ten-fold. Your partners? They’re gonna start loving you. Your clients will give you the respect you think you deserve; you’ll get four months vacation each year and you’ll live to be a hundred, finally dying on the job with a young mistress – I’ll organise her, too.”’
    Masters’ arms were folded and she’d fixed me with that flat stare I knew so well.
    ‘“In return, I’ll just take your wife’s soul, your children’s souls, their children’s souls and they’ll all rot in hell for eternity.”
    ‘To which the lawyer says, “So what’s the catch?”’
    ‘You can be a real asshole, Vin. You know that?’
    ‘This would be one of those rhetorical-type questions, right?’ I said.
    One of her hands balled into a fist. ‘Okay, you asked for it. You already know I met him three years ago when I was here as a tourist. We were in a tour group. We started talking. He happened to let slip that he’d just made lieutenant colonel. We were both in the Air Force – that gave us an instant bond. We hit it off, spent a couple of weeks together here in Istanbul. It didn’t go further because he was involved with someone, but we kept in touch over the years. Then, out of the blue, he turned up at OSI, Ramstein. Seems the Office of the Secretary of the Air Force volunteered us to help the JAG prepare a case for the Department of Defense. Things just happened between us, and they happened fast.’
    Again, I didn’t say anything because there was nothing to say.
    ‘I’m sorry, Vin,’ Masters continued.
    The front door of the café burst open and a bunch of noisy people swirled in. From the way they dressed and from all the chatter and laughter, I pegged them as locals. I turned to face Masters. I wanted to get angry, but I didn’t have the grounds. Apart from the fact that we had decided to