Free Wrongful Death by Robert Dugoni Page A

his chest and fall off the machine. If he saw the guy alive again, it would be a miracle.
    He wheeled the cart into the laundry room, left it, and retrieved his belongings from his employee locker. When he walked out the back of the building, the cold night air made his skin tingle like a slap across the cheek. God, it felt good to be cold again. If there was a hell, Iraq was the simulator for it. Thomas had never experienced that kind of heat before. Then the sand would start blowing and grains would stick to parts of your body you didn’t even know you had. The best part of coming back home was coming back to weather that rarely got above 80 degrees, and the only sand to be found was if you went looking for it at the beach.
    He pulled the knit Seahawks cap down low over his ears and started the walk down Market, crossing through the Republic parking lot as he did each night to cut the corner to his bus stop. The muscled guy who’d been running on the treadmill stood in the lot wearing a blue ball cap, his hands cupped to hismouth, flicking a lighter. It sparked three times without drawing a flame.
    He looked up as Thomas approached. “Can I get a light?”
    Thomas pulled his lighter from his pocket. Smoking was another bad habit he’d brought back from Iraq, two packs a day. Only cigarettes weren’t cheap like they’d been over there. They were expensive as hell. He flicked his lighter and cupped the flame.
    The man lit up and stepped back, blowing a patch of blue smoke into the night. “Thanks. You need one?”
    Thomas had a few minutes to catch his bus. “Yeah, why not? Keep me warm against this cold,” he said, making conversation.
    “Don’t I know it, brother.”
    The guy shook a butt from the pack. Thomas pulled the cigarette free and pressed it between his lips, about to flick his lighter when the man stepped forward and flicked his own—a gold-plated type with a flip-top that immediately produced a blue flame.
    The man shrugged and snapped shut the top, making a metallic ting. It sounded like a bell.
    THREE TREE POINT, WASHINGTON
    EARLY THE FOLLOWING morning, Jenkins appeared at Sloane’s home with two cups of coffee.
    “I’d thank you,” Sloane said, “except it’s too early to talk.”
    “Tell me about it,” Jenkins said. “I’ve been up for an hour and a half. Get dressed. We have an appointment.”
    “The guy in Tacoma?”
    “Haven’t heard back from him yet. This is better.”
    “It better be.”
    Fifteen minutes later, Sloane drove his Jeep south on I-5. He’d always considered the car roomy, but Jenkins looked like he’d beensqueezed into the passenger seat. His head brushed the ceiling, his legs were uncomfortably bent, and despite the brisk morning temperature, he had the window down, elbow out.
    “This guy was their captain?” Sloane asked.
    Jenkins nodded. “Robert Kessler.”
    Sloane assumed that officers would tend to be more reticent about giving information that could be harmful to the military. “And he’ll talk to me?”
    “Said he’d thought a lot about what happened that night. Ford was apparently the only guy he failed to bring home. I got the impression it still eats at him.”
    “Did you tell him I’m thinking about filing a lawsuit on behalf of the family?”
    “I told him you were Beverly Ford’s attorney. Most people figure out the lawsuit part on their own. I don’t imagine he thinks the family hired you to put together a scrapbook.”
     
    FORTY-FIVE MINUTES LATER, Sloane drove past Fort Lewis and exited the freeway. They descended a winding road into an area heavily wooded on both sides of the road. Rail spurs paralleled the pavement and eighteen-wheel trucks passed in the opposite direction.
    “Who does this guy work for?” Sloane asked.
    Jenkins handed him a scrap of paper from his coat pocket.
    “Argus International?” Sloane asked, reading.
    Jenkins wasn’t impressed. “You know it?”
    “Don’t you watch the news?”
    “Not if I can help