Breakpoint Read online

  “My guess is a wire or cord was used. There’s something else, which may or may not have had anything to do with her death. Her blood test showed an elevated level of hCG. Human chorionic gonadotropin.”

  “Which means?” Juls asked.

  “The LT was pregnant.”

  33

  “How far along?” Julianne asked.

  “Without more invasive tests, which I haven’t been given permission by anyone—in the military or the family—to do, I’d say approximately four months.”

  “And the tour’s been ten months?”

  “Yes. We were supposed to be out for six, but got extended as part of the surge.”

  “So obviously the husband’s not the father. Unless they hooked up during a shore leave,” Dallas mused.

  “They could have,” the medical officer allowed.

  “We’ll have to check his records more thoroughly,” Julianne said. “Look to see if he took time away from the sandbox.”

  “Roger that,” Dallas agreed.

  “Did the LT come to you? Maybe for advice about abortion—”

  The doctor had been helpful, even pleasant, thus far. But his back stiffened at that suggestion. “Given that I’m sure every female sailor on the O’Halloran knows abortions are not a shipboard medical benefit, the topic didn’t come up.”

  “I don’t think Agent Decatur was suggesting you would perform an abortion aboard the ship,” Dallas said mildly. “It would just be helpful to know how she felt about the pregnancy.”

  “I wouldn’t know. Her roommate would be more likely to know details like that. I mean, women talk to each other about personal stuff, right?” Roberts asked Julianne.

  “Some women. About some things.” Although slightly annoyed at his lumping all females together, Julianne had certainly experienced worse chauvinism in her years in the Navy. “My sister’s pregnant. She still gets morning sickness from time to time. And not just in the morning.”

  “That’s common. Especially on an empty stomach.”

  “So she assures me. Did the LT ever ask for something for nausea?”

  “No. But again, she may have avoided the topic to keep from risking getting grounded. The more missions she flew, the better her record. But she might have gotten some OTC meds from the ship’s store.”

  “We’ll check.” Julianne figured they’d more easily find a single pearl in a single oyster in the sea surrounding the carrier.

  She moved on. “You said you heard things about the LT? What sort of things?”

  “Mostly the usual shipboard gossip that had already begun buzzing about her altercation with the LSO on the flight deck. Naturally her subsequent death, and now his going missing, has increased the buzz.”

  “I’d imagine so,” Dallas said. “There are a lot of ladders to go up and down every day.”

  “That’s putting it mildly. One of the major complaints I get is sore backs and knees. Especially knees—new sailors tend not to immediately learn how to avoid hitting them on the step above when they’re climbing.”

  “So I’ve discovered. How far is it from the flight deck to the water?”

  “Every carrier’s a little different. On this boat, it’s sixty-three feet.”

  “Hard to survive a drop like that, even into water,” Dallas observed.

  “True. Which is why they always use lowered elevators for swim call.”

  “Swim call?”

  “Another thing the captain does to break up the monotony,” the doctor said. “I know enough about bodily injuries not to try it myself, but I was on one of the watch-out boats for the last one we did.”

  “They deploy boats around the swim perimeter in case a swimmer needs help,” Julianne explained.

  “And to shoot any sharks that approach,” Roberts added.

  “Shark and awe,” Dallas murmured.

  “It’s a good break from the routine,” the doctor said. “But even from the elevator, it’s about thirty feet, which is quite a major jump. And the thing was, everyone gave LSO Manning a hard time because, when his turn came, he almost couldn’t do it.”

  “In the daytime?”

  “Of course. No way would any captain allow a swim call at night. Anyway, it turned out he had a fear of heights.”

  “What?” Julianne asked as the doctor paused.

  “I don’t know if I should share this.” He was decidedly uncomfortable. “It’s a matter of doctor-patient confidentiality.”

  “Your patient has been missing for how long?” Dallas asked.

  “Several hours. Probably since sometime last night.”

  “Then if they find him he’s probably not going to be in a position to object. So, what just crossed your mind?”

  “You’re very observant.”

  “You get that way when you’re undercover and bad guys want to kill you.”

  “I imagine that would be the case,” Roberts agreed. “So.” He exhaled a breath. “Manning later told me that he’d never experienced a fear of heights while working on the flight deck. But for some reason, being alone on that elevator over the sea just suddenly triggered it.”

  “And that would’ve been when?” Julianne asked.

  “Two weeks ago.”

  “So, it’s unlikely he would’ve taken a midnight stroll along the deck close to the waterline.”

  “Very unlikely,” the doctor agreed. “The deck’s a dangerous place on a good day. We’ve been having a series of storms come through. Including a nasty one last night.”

  “Which makes it even more out of character. So,” Juls said, returning the subject to a dropped thread, “you mentioned talk about Manning and Murphy. About mostly being the expected buzz about their public altercation. I’m interested in why you said ‘mostly.’ Was there more?”

  “Not anything I could swear to be the truth.” He rubbed his hand over his short-cropped hair, obviously uncomfortable with the turn the questioning had taken.

  Julianne, whom Dallas knew to be one helluva interrogator, kept her mouth shut, waiting for the doctor to fill the silence that was beginning to draw out.

  “All right,” he admitted finally. “Since you’ll undoubtedly hear it from someone else, there were rumors—and I have no way of knowing if they were true—that the pair were lovers.”

  Dallas and Julianne exchanged a look.

  “Do you remember who told you that?” Julianne inquired.

  “Honestly, I don’t know. Maybe one of the medics?”

  Roberts considered. Rubbed his jaw. “I think that was it. I believe I heard it at our morning prepatient meeting. But I’m sorry, it’s all been so crazy, I can’t remember who, exactly, brought it up. But no one seemed surprised, so I suppose there’s a chance that it was true. You’re dealing with a lot of people away from home for a very long time, at the age when their hormones are certainly running the highest.”

  Julianne could feel Dallas glance over at her. After their encounter last night, there was no way she was going to risk looking at him during a discussion of rampant hormones.

  “If it was true, and they continued their argument in her quarters, and he killed her, it’s possible that he jumped out of guilt,” Dallas mused.

  “Or to prevent going through a court-martial,” Julianne said.

  And wow, couldn’t he identify with that?

  “We’ll need to talk to your staff,” Julianne instructed the doctor.

  “Of course. Do you want them gathered in a group? Or would you rather take them one at a time?”

  “One at a time,” Julianne and Dallas said at the same time. Better to prevent them from coordinating their stories.

  “Fine. Can you give me an hour or so to rearrange the schedule?”

  “Sure. Since the COD took off without us, we’re not going anywhere unless we decide to try swimming back to Pearl,” Juls said. “Meanwhile, we’ll see what Murphy’s roommate has to say.”

  They were at the door when the doctor called out, “One more thing ju
st occurred to me.”

  “What’s that?” Julianne asked.

  “You should probably talk with the boat’s psychologist. Lieutenant Commander Annette Stewart. It’s possible either the LT or the LSO, or perhaps both, talked with her.”

  “Good idea,” Julianne said. “Thanks.”

  “He seems like an upright guy,” Dallas said, as they headed back through the labyrinth of hallways toward the medical wing.

  “Seems like,” Julianne agreed.

  “But does it seem kinda strange to you that he wouldn’t have brought up the shrink right away?”

  “We started out discussing cause of death.”

  “True. But once you got into the fear of heights, and the pregnancy, and all that messy emotional stuff, it seems he would’ve wanted to pass you off to her.”

  “Maybe he was just trying to be helpful. Or maybe it didn’t immediately occur to him. As he said, it’s not as if murder is an everyday occurrence on board.”

  “So we’re agreed the LT didn’t off herself?”

  “I wouldn’t be willing to bet my career on it. But yeah, I think we’re talking a homicide here.”

  “Which, although I hate to agree with those guys who had the bad manners to tail us, sounds more like NCIS territory.”

  “Yeah. It does. Unless there’s something else. Something we haven’t been told.”

  “What do you think that is?”

  “I’ve no idea.”

  Dallas liked the way determination had her sticking out her jaw. “You know,” he leaned close to her ear, speaking loud enough for her to hear over the roar of jets and the rumble of the engines, “anyone ever tell you that you’re damn sexy when you’ve got a stubborn on?”

  “That was an inappropriate remark,” she said as she continued down the narrow passageway in a long, purposeful stride.

  “Probably. But that doesn’t stop me from wanting to push you up against that metal wall and give you a long, deep, wet kiss.”

  “You wouldn’t.”

  She shot him a sidelong glance. Although she was doing her best to hide it, he had her nervous. Since Dallas suspected there were very few things that could make the former JAG officer nervous, he decided he liked being one of them.

  “No,” he admitted. “But only because when I do kiss you senseless, which I have every intention of doing ... and a lot more ... I don’t want it ending up on YouTube.”

  That stopped her. Splaying her hands on her hips, she tilted her head back and looked up at him. “What are you talking about?”

  “The cameras.”

  “What cameras?”

  “The video ones we keep walking beneath.”

  “Damn.” He gave her props for not glancing up. “You’re not making that up, are you?”

  “I’ve never lied to you, Juls. No reason to begin now.”

  “If there are cameras, there are tapes.”

  “More likely digital video.”

  “Whatever.” She brushed away his correction with an impatient flick of her wrist. “We need to see them.”

  “Might help,” he agreed.

  “You don’t sound all that positive.”

  “I’m not a cop. Hell, I’m not even a JAG investigator. But I have watched a lot of movies and read a lot of thrillers. So, even if they don’t record over the previous day’s video, if you were the bad guy, wouldn’t you want to make any incriminating evidence go away?”

  “In a heartbeat. But how many people would know how to do that?”

  “Anyone who works with computers and has access to the control center, wherever the hell that is. Or the doc.”

  “What?” He watched her process that. “Because his SWO points to the fact that he knows everything about this boat.”

  “Exactly.”

  A flicker of honest admiration warmed her eyes. “You know, O’Halloran,” she said, “You’re pretty good.”

  “About time you figured that out.” Because he had a goofy, almost overwhelming urge to take her slender lady hand and lift it to his lips, Dallas stuck his hands deep into the front pockets of his khaki pants and gave her his best slow, dimple-flashing “I want to do you” smile.

  “But if you think that’s something, just wait until you discover how good I can be when I’m being really, really bad.”

  The stolen flirtatious moment was over as quickly as it had begun. She shook her head and continued walking away. But not before he heard her attempt to smother a laugh.

  34

  Lieutenant Harley Ford was just arriving back at her quarters when Julianne and Dallas showed up. Her short, spiky black hair was wet, which, since it wasn’t raining, and judging from the workout gear she was wearing, Julianne guessed was from a shower.

  She gave them an up-and-down look. “I was wondering when NCIS or JAG would show up,” she said. “But you’re not in uniform.”

  “We’re technically civilian, working for an investigatory arm of Homeland Security.” Julianne flashed her ID. Dallas followed suit. “But I was in JAG.”

  “Figures.” She unlocked the hatch and walked into the room. “My ex-husband was a lawyer. I can usually spot them.”

  They hadn’t exactly been offered a gilt-edged invitation. But she hadn’t shut the metal hatch in their faces, either.

  “Military?” Julianne asked as she and Dallas followed the pilot into the quarters, which, while cramped, were more spacious than those most sailors received. Even aviators. “Your ex,” she clarified when the aviator shot her a look. “Was he military?”

  “Nah. He did something on Wall Street. Probably churning old ladies’ nest eggs. Honesty was never exactly his strong suit. Which, natch, I only found out after we got hitched.”

  She pulled the damp T-shirt over her head, revealing a gray cotton sports bra and a body as ripped as any Marine Julianne had ever seen. “I always thought that if he hadn’t been born into money, he could’ve ended up a shyster ambulance chaser advertising for phony accident-injury suits. Or even on the other side of the bars.”

  “Sounds as if you’re well rid of him,” Dallas said.

  She turned, a khaki shirt from her locker in her hand, and gave him another, longer look from the top of his shaggy hair down to his feet, then back up again. It was slow and decidedly sexual. Now there was the invitation they hadn’t received earlier.

  “Roger that,” she said. She shrugged into the shirt. “So, I guess you’re here to find out all Mav’s secrets.”

  “Did she have that many secrets?” Julianne asked.

  Hazel eyes glinted with what appeared to be scorn. “You know what they say about secrets. Once two people know, it’s no longer a secret. We were roommates. Not BFFs. The only thing we had in common was that we’re the only two females in the squadron. She kept her life private. I did the same.”

  “But you did know about her altercation with the LSO,” Dallas said.

  “Find me one person on this tin can who doesn’t know about that and I’ll buy you a steak dinner and all the beer you can drink.”

  “Do you think they could have been having an affair?”

  “Could have. She was ambitious enough. Unlike me. Hell, I only joined up to have the government pay to teach me to fly so I can move on to commercial jets when I get out of the Navy. Europe, Japan, Australia. Especially Australia.

  “I hear the guys are still real he-men down under. Unlike so many of those pansy metrosexuals America’s begun turning out by the thousands. Present company excluded,” she tacked on, perfect white teeth flashing in another unmistakable invitation.

  “Ambition and risking getting caught having a shipboard affair seem to be at cross-purposes,” Julianne said.

  “You’d think so. Wouldn’t you?”

  Before buttoning the shirt, she pulled the workout pants down legs as muscular as the rest of her body. Beneath them she was wearing a pair of bikini panties that matched her bra. Thinking back on those youthful bed checks her father subjected her to, Julianne figu
red that if the LT lay down on her back, there’d be no problem bouncing a quarter off those rock-hard abs.

  “Mav was driven. Everyone knew she had plans for becoming the first female carrier group captain.” She pulled on a pair of khaki pants. Julianne refused to look and see if Dallas seemed at all disappointed at the spectacular body being covered up again. “I suppose she might’ve slept with some guy if she thought it would get her up the ladder faster.”

  “And the LSO could have been one of those guys?”

  She shrugged. “He’s the one who writes up the reports. You do the math.” She paused. Shrugged again.

  “What?” Julianne asked.

  “Look, I’ll admit I wasn’t wild about her. She had a temper off the charts, she’d probably have taxied her F- 18 over her grandma Murphy if she thought it’d advance her career, and she was a racist to boot, which, while I’ll admit to not being the most politically correct person on the planet, didn’t sit at all well with me. But she was one hell of a good pilot. And it’s not good karma to speak ill of the dead.”

  “If someone killed Lieutenant Murphy, he or she needs to pay,” Dallas said. “Besides, what if her death wasn’t random? What if someone on this ship is targeting other sailors? Maybe aviators. Maybe women. If that’s the case, you could find yourself smack in the middle of the bull’s-eye as the killer’s next target.”

  “Well.” The LT blew out a breath. “I hadn’t considered it that way.” Her eyes narrowed. “You’re not exactly as much fun as you look.”

  “Sorry,” Dallas said.

  “Yeah, me, too. Okay, there were rumors the commander of our flight squad was doing a lot more than mentoring her. I always figured, even if they were doing the nasty, it didn’t have anything to do with me.”

  “These are pretty close quarters,” Julianne pointed out, looking around the small room.

  “Larger than most. Like I said, we’re the only two female aviators. That was worth a few perks.”

  “And now you have the place to yourself.”

  She actually laughed at that. “Don’t tell me you think I killed Mav because I wanted her locker?”

  “That might be a tad excessive,” Dallas agreed. He’d pulled out his drawl. “You don’t think it was suicide?”