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Chapter 2
THE REAL KILLERS had taken a small risk by attending the final day of the trial in North Carolina. They wanted to see the end of this, couldn’t miss it.
Thomas Starkey was the team leader, and the former Army Ranger colonel still looked the part, walked the walk, and talked the talk.
Brownley Harris was his number two, and he remained deferential to Colonel Starkey, just as it had been in Vietnam, just as it would always be until the day one or — more likely — both of them died.
Warren Griffin was still “the kid,” which seemed marginally funny, since he was forty-nine years old now.
The jury had come in with a verdict of guilty less than two and a half hours after they were sent out to deliberate. Sergeant Ellis Cooper was going to be executed for murder by the state of North Carolina.
The district attorney had done a brilliant job — of convicting the wrong man.
The three killers piled into a dark blue Suburban parked on one of the narrow side streets near the courthouse.
Thomas Starkey started up the big car. “Anybody hungry?” he asked.
“Thirsty,” said Harris.
“Horny,” said Griffin, and snorted out one of his goofy laughs.
“Let’s get something to eat and drink — then maybe we’ll get into some trouble with the ladies. What do you say? To celebrate our great victory today. To us!” shouted Colonel Starkey as he drove down the street away from the Courthouse. “To the Three Blind Mice.”
Part One
THE LAST CASE
Chapter 3
I CAME DOWN to breakfast about seven that morning and joined Nana and the kids around the kitchen table. With Little Alex starting to walk, things were back in “lockdown” mode in the kitchen. Plastic safety locks, latches, and outlet caps were everywhere. The sounds of kid chatter, spoons clattering in cereal bowls, and Damon coaching his baby brother in the art of blowing raspberries, made the kitchen almost as noisy as a precinct house on a Saturday night.
The kids were eating some kind of puffed-up chocolate-flavored Oreos cereal and Hershey’s chocolate milk. Just the thought of all that chocolate at seven in the morning made me shiver. Nana and I had eggs over easy and twelve-grain toast.
“Now isn’t this nice,” I said as I sat down to my coffee and eggs. “I’m not even going to spoil it by commenting on the chocoholic breakfast two of my precious children are eating for their morning’s nourishment.”
“You just did comment,” said Jannie, never at a loss.
I winked at her. She couldn’t spoil my mood today. The killer known as the Mastermind had been captured and was now spending his days at a maximum-security prison in Colorado. My twelve-year-old, Damon, continued to blossom — as a student as well as a singer with the Washington Boys’ Choir. Jannie had taken up oil painting, and she was keeping a journal that contained some pretty good scribbling, and cartoons, for a girl her age. Little Alex’s personality was beginning to emerge — he was a sweet boy, just starting to walk at thirteen months.
I had met a woman detective recently, Jamilla Hughes, and I wanted to spend more time with her. The problem was that she lived in California and I lived in D.C. Not insurmountable, I figured.
I would have some time to find out about Jamilla and me. Today was the day I planned to meet with Chief of Detectives George Pittman and resign from the D.C. police. After I resigned, I planned to take a couple of months off.
Then I might go into private practice as a psychologist, or possibly hook up with the FBI. The Bureau had made me an offer that was flattering as well as intriguing.
There was a loud rap at the kitchen door. Then it opened. John Sampson was standing there. He knew what I was planning to do today, and I figured he’d come by to show me some support.
Sometimes I am so gullible, it makes me a little sick.
Chapter 4
“HELLO, UNCLE JOHN,” Damon and Jannie chorused, and then grinned like the little fools they can be when in the presence of greatness, which is how they feel about John Sampson.
He went to the refrigerator and examined Jannie’s latest artwork. She was trying to copy characters from a new cartoonist, Aaron McGurder, formerly of the University of Maryland and now syndicated. Huey and Riley Freeman, Caesar, and Jazmine DuBois were all taped on the fridge.
“You want some eggs, John? I can make some scrambled with cheddar, way you like them,” Nana said, and she was already up at her place. She would do anything for Sampson. It had been that way since he was ten and we first became friends. Sampson is like another son to her. His parents were in jail much of the time he was growing up, and Nana raised him as much as anybody did.
“Oh, no, no,” he said, and quickly motioned for her to sit back down — but when she moved to the stove, he said, “Yeah, scrambled, Nana. Rye toast be nice. I’m starved away to nothing, and nobody does breakfast like you do.”
