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He felt homesick—and he missed Sam. Ruby’s reminiscences of Sam’s boyhood had dissolved some of Jason’s doubts, made him feel affectionate toward and protective of that long-ago Sam.
He checked his phone. Ten thirty and still no message. He was disappointed, but not worried. It would have been nice to hear Sam’s voice before he turned in for the night, but okay. Knowing Sam, he was still working.
As he turned to go down the hall to the bedroom, he noticed the closed door of Sam’s office.
Something about the way Sam always kept that door so firmly shut suddenly struck him. Maybe it wasn’t odd, but…well, yes. It was odd.
Why? Why was that door always closed tight? Even when Sam stepped out to use the john, he closed the door completely behind him.
Maybe it was second nature. His job required him to routinely deal with a lot of sensitive information and disturbing materials, and it was natural that he would be careful about keeping his office locked. Restricting access to his office was probably automatic. But this wasn’t Quantico. Jason wasn’t support staff or a civilian. They were sharing a house. They were sort of a couple now.
In fact, before they’d been living together, Jason would have answered confidently that they were a couple now.
There was no reason for that closed door to raise his suspicions, and yet…
He walked down the hall to Sam’s office and tried the handle. He half expected it to be locked, but the knob turned. He opened the door.
The room smelled of toner, paper, and faintly, comfortingly of Sam’s aftershave. Jason felt for the wall switch. The overhead lamp came on.
There were several mostly empty bookshelves, a credenza filing cabinet upon which sat a fax machine/printer—its tray spilling over with printouts—a matching desk covered with papers and files.
It looked like Sam’s desk at Quantico. It did not look like the desk of someone writing a book. Not that Jason knew what that would look like. He was exasperated though unsurprised to see Sam had brought his caseload with him.
He did not intend to snoop or spy. He would not have left the doorway at all except he happened to glance across and spotted his name scrawled on the whiteboard hanging opposite Sam’s desk.
WEST circled in black with numerous spider legs leading to other names, also circled, which lead to smaller notes in green and red. The note leading from the name MARTIN PINK, for example, read: lifer, solitary, restricted. The note next to ERIC GREENLEAF read: awaiting trial, monitored. SHEPHERD DURRAND had the notation unknown.
His heart dropped. In fact, he felt like he was falling down a black and bottomless distance. Dropping like a stone into the abyss. Jason did not move. He barely breathed. He could not tear his gaze from that whiteboard with that spiderweb of arrows and notes and circles surrounding his name. He knew what it meant, but he couldn’t seem to think past it.
Finally, he moved from the doorway and walked to Sam’s desk. He picked up the file lying on top. In some faraway corner of his brain he wondered if these were the originals or if Sam kept copies of all his cases. He read the name on the file.
BIRD, CARL.
He opened the file.
As grisly as the photos were, he barely noticed them. Barely noticed anything but the word POSSIBLE scrawled across the top of the file in red marker. He blinked. Read some of the notes that had been highlighted.
In 2002, Carl Bird, already serving a life sentence, had been found guilty of trying to put a hit on then Special Agent Sam Kennedy. At his sentencing—which was surely as ho-hum as it got, given his existing stretch—Bird had vowed to wipe out Kennedy’s entire family, including pets and “fucking house plants.”
Jason set the file aside. Opened the next one. GILYEARD, MULLIN.
Another red-handed POSSIBLE. In 2010, convicted serial killer Gilyeard had escaped from Arizona State Prison and started across country on a quest to kill Special Agent Sam Kennedy. He murdered a gas-station attendant in Arkansas and a waitress in Tennessee before being recaptured. Gilyeard also vowed to slay everyone and everything that mattered to Kennedy.
Jason realized he was shaking. He sat down in Sam’s chair. He was not afraid. He was sick. Not at the knowledge that his relationship with Sam made him a target in the eyes of some very disturbed people. He already knew that. What shook him to the core was the realization that Sam had lied to him.
“Is it possible someone you’re investigating might try to distract you by getting rid of me?”
“It’s not impossible.”
“You’d considered that?”
“Yes. I’m considering all possibilities.”
“Is it likely?”
“Very few people outside the Bureau are aware of our relationship. No, I don’t think it’s likely. But like I said, every avenue is being explored.”
No. In fairness, Sam hadn’t lied. He had admitted this was a possibility. But he had totally downplayed it, made it sound like the longest of long shots. When in fact, he believed it was a very real possibility. These files, these notes… This entire office was set up like an incident room. Worse. The scrawled notes and arrows, the highlighter and Post-it notes…it looked manic. It looked like the room of a conspiracy theorist. All that was missing was the cat’s cradle of colored yarn and thumbtacks.
