I regretted it immediately. It was as gruesome a sight as I had ever seen.
A woman’s lifeless body, executed at close range. Her left arm was nearly severed, but her torso seemed intact. Aside from her ginger hair, however, her head was barely identifiable as human. It looked as though her attacker had set out to rob the woman of any semblance of individuality.
“Nat—look here!” Meg called out as she moved closer to examine the massive bloodstains. She studied the scene for a second or two, then turned to me: “They cut a body part off whoever was in here.”
The senator was clearly long gone. Presumably abducted.
I nodded to Meg and we left the room to continue the search in tandem. The rest of the second floor was clear. The question was what the boys downstairs would tell me about the bodies they had found. This enemy was determined. Whatever they had done, they had done it with great violence.
“Friendlies coming down,” Meg called out, alerting Team Rhino that we were moving to join them.
“KIA in the house,” whispered Oliver. “No senator.”
He looked at me for a long second. “She isn’t here either, Nat.”
CHAPTER 45
Okay,I thought,time to call in the police.This clearly was more than we could deal with in any legitimate fashion. It was certainly a crime scene, and most probably some sort of national-security issue.
I pulled out my cell phone and dialed 911. I tried to speak as calmly and clearly as possible, but the voice on the other end belonged to a person in distress.
I could tell the communication process was not working when the emergency operator asked me if I was still on the ferry.
The ferry?
“No, ma’am—I’m over in Sconset. I’m standing on the beach outside Senator Harrison’s rented house on Baxter Road, where there has been a mass shooting.”
This sent the dispatcher into orbit. “Senator who? You’re not on the ferry?”
Why was the dispatcher asking about the ferry? Was the explosion we’d heard somehow connected to the ferry?It was becoming clear that more than one bad thing had gone down on this tiny island.The dispatcher was struggling and the connection was getting garbled, so I hung up. Hopefully someone would review the call and send officers out eventually.
Like the ambush in Iraq, it was up to me to step up and make some crucial decisions. My guys were pros, and I knew we could develop a battle plan much quicker than the local cops could.
First, though, I dialed Tristan Dent’s secure number. While I waited for him to answer, I had the team do another quick search around the house, looking for anything that might help us figure out who was behind the carnage.
“This is not a robbery gone bad,” I told Tristan after giving him an overview of the crime scene. “Hell, there hasn’t been anything even approaching this level of violence on Nantucket in probably a century. There are a lot of rich people here in the summer, but hardly anyone significant enough to attract a Mafia-type revenge hit. There’s no drug trade beyond recreational use, and no real reason for premeditated crime.”
“Somebody on that small island in the shitty, cold, North Atlantic has to know something,” Tristan said. “See what you can find in the house.”
“Will do. And let me know if you learn anything about that explosion we heard.”
Next I dialed Si Wilson. “Hey buddy, it’s Nat.”
“We heard a real loud bang or something from down near the harbor,” Si said. “Is something up?”
“No shit something’s up. Listen, for the next hour or so, I need you to keep your eyes open, keep watch on the nearby houses and roads. Especially your neighbor Harrison’s place. Don’t go anywhere or engage with anyone—just be my eyesand ears over there. I need to know what you see. Write shit down and be as detailed as you can. We’ll be over later.”
In a crisis, people not used to living in chaos tend to panic immediately. They move disjointedly away from threats. It’s the ones who seem unfazed that you need to keep an eye on. It was a long shot, but I hoped that Si might be able to catch a glimpse of some type of orderly movement somewhere.
“Tell your mom I said hi too,” Wolf called.
“Asshole.” I shook my head and chuckled.
Getting his first real assignment had Si as excited as a rookie stepping onto the football field for the season opener. He quickly ended our call so that he could start keeping an eye out for any movement around that side of the island.
My first instinct was for all of us to get back to my house on the double, but then I took a moment to reconsider. We weren’t in a gunfight, and a few minutes to gather the facts would pay bigger dividends in the long run. I instructed Meg and Oliver to peel off and do a final security sweep of the house, collecting anything that looked useful.
“I got a blood trail, boss!” Wolf cried triumphantly. Without hesitation, he shined the beam of his gun light down the steps of the porch and into the side yard. JP and I immediately spread out with our gun lights and followed Wolf’s slow and methodical inspection of the dark stains on the grass. They were heading away from the road and toward the ocean.
