“Your lucky
day.” The suit pointed to the blue curtain, slightly pulled back. “First
class.”
“You flying
with us?” I said.
He nodded, put
his hand on my shoulder and pushed me toward the curtain.
I stepped
through and walked to the front of the plane. “What’s your name?”
“Where do you
think you’re going, Noble?”
I turned, held
out my arms. “Taking a seat.”
“Back here.” He
pointed at three seats in the middle of the aisle, last row in first class.
“You sit in the middle. I’m on that end,” he pointed across the row. “Big man
right here,” he patted his hand on the back of the end seat nearest us. “My
partner will stay right there, across the row from him.”
“You know,” I
said, taking my seat, “I’m more dangerous than him.”
“I don’t doubt
that one bit, Noble.”
“What’s your
name?” I asked again.
“McMurray,” he
said. “You can call him Otto.” He pointed at his older partner, who hadn’t said
a word the whole time.
Otto looked up
from his newspaper and nodded. His deep-set dark eyes revealed nothing. He
brushed his silver hair back and returned to reading.
“What are the
chances we can get some coffee?” I said.
Otto laughed.
“Stewardess.” He tapped his fingers on his blue rubber armrest and waited a
beat. “Guess you’re out of luck. They’ll board the plane in half an hour or so.
Try then.”
We barely
talked the rest of the night. I fell asleep before we reached the Atlantic
Ocean and woke up over Georgia. Bear started his relaxation exercises when the
pilot announced we were making our final descent to Atlanta’s
Hartsfield-Jackson airport. A few minutes later we were on the ground.
The stewardess
announced first class could depart first. Bear and I stood. Otto remained
seated. McMurray stood.
“You guys get
off here,” McMurray said.
“You’re not
escorting us any further?”
“I was told to
get you to the U.S. You’re someone else’s problem now.”
I shrugged.
Followed Bear off the plane. We walked down the jetway. I expected to find an
armed escort when we stepped into the gate. It was empty. We made our way past
the mostly empty seating area and headed toward the center of the terminal,
where the escalators to the tram were located. Aside from a few early
passengers, the terminal was barren. I checked my watch. Not even four a.m.
yet. Another hour and the place would be packed with early morning travelers.
“Coffee.” Bear
pointed toward one of the only open stores in a section between gates.
I followed him
over, ordered a black coffee and a cream cheese Danish, and then paid for both
of our orders. After the girl handed me my change, I stepped further down the
counter where I found a lid and grabbed a handful of napkins. I snapped the lid
on the cup and lifted it to my face. The hot steam escaping from the lid burned
my upper lip and outer edges of my nose. I inhaled anyway. The heat faded,
giving way to the full, dark aroma of the coffee and its promise of caffeinated
energy.
Hard and loud
footsteps echoed behind me.
Click-clack.
They stopped a few feet away.
“Jack Noble.
Riley Logan. Don’t move a damn muscle.”
“Christ,” Bear
said under his breath.
I turned my
head toward him. My eyes followed the speckled countertop then lifted to meet
his. He shook his head, straightened his back and lifted his hands over his
head.
I looked over
my shoulder. Two men dressed in jeans and button up shirts stood ten feet back
and aimed their handguns at us.
“I said don’t
move a damn muscle,” one said. “Eyes forward. Arms up.”
I reluctantly
placed my coffee, of which I still hadn’t had a sip, on the counter, and then I
raised my hands.
The lady behind
the counter stood motionless, mouth open, arms held out to her side. Our eyes
met. A tear rolled down her ebony cheek. I gave her a halfhearted smile. She
looked away.
Two men closed
in from the side. They were dressed the same as their partners. They approached
us slowly and cautiously, guns drawn.
“Nice and
easy,” one said as he approached me from behind. “One arm behind your back.”
I lowered my
arm. He grabbed it.
“Now the
other,” he said.
I did as he
said.
Cold steel
gripped my wrist and pinched my skin as the handcuffs tightened and locked.
“Do we really
have to go through this?” I said.
“Shut up,
Noble,” one of them said.
I dropped my
head and considered the odds. It was two versus four. Not so fair after all,
for them at least. A hand at my back guided me to the side. I turned my head
and watched three of the men converge on Bear while the fourth kept a gun aimed
at me.
Bear cooperated
by bringing one arm down, then the other. They cuffed him, turned him and led
him toward me, one man on either side of him, their hands gripping his elbows.
One of them
stepped forward. He had brown hair and a square jaw. He holstered his weapon.
“This is going to go nice and easy, guys.” He pointed down the terminal. “To
the escalator, board the train, get off. Don’t make eye contact with anyone.
Don’t talk to anyone. Don’t talk at all. Got it?”
I nodded.
Didn’t look to see if Bear did or not.
He continued.
“At Arrivals turn right toward the North Terminal. Continue past the baggage
claim and head outside. A van will be waiting for us.”
I wondered why
he talked to us like equals instead of prisoners.
“If something
happens, and we get separated, you meet us at the van,” he said. “If we find
you anywhere other than the van or on your way there, we have orders to shoot
to kill.” He paused, his eyes batting between the two of us. “Can I trust you
guys for a few minutes?”
“Yeah,” I said.
He nodded at
one of the others, who then removed our handcuffs. “Let’s go.”
We followed him
through the terminal, down the escalator and into the train. We sat in the
back. They stood in front of us. The train stopped at terminal A. We all exited
and followed the signs to the escalators that led to the empty Arrivals gate.
It seemed that nobody had any loved ones arriving that early, or maybe they
just didn’t care at four a.m. We passed the baggage claim and walked through
two sets of tinted automatic doors, coming to a stop outside.
The air felt
cool and refreshing. Orange light flooded the sidewalk and six lane divided
road between the building and the parking garage. A dark van with tinted
windows idled nearby.
One of the men
pointed and went over to it and opened the back door. He gestured toward us,
and Bear and I followed and got inside.
“Middle row,”
he said.
We sat in the
middle. I didn’t recognize the driver. He must have been waiting in the van the
whole time. One of the men joined him up front, in the passenger seat. The
other three sat in the row behind us. The van pulled away from the curb,
followed the curved airport road and merged into the early morning traffic
heading northbound on I-85.
*
* *
Half way
through Atlanta we merged onto I-20, heading east. After leaving the city, the drive
felt long and pointless. Our escorts didn’t talk. We had no idea who they were.
No names, ranks, or affiliations were given. Although, I had a feeling these
guys were CIA.
When I tried to
talk to Bear, it was met with a command to shut up. I resigned myself to
staring out the window at the redundant scenery.
Darkness faded,
and the gray clouds gave way to the rising sun. The sun painted the sky shades
of orange and red. The sight held me captive for half an hour.
I leaned
forward and stuck my head between the driver and passenger seat. “Where are we
going?”
The man in the
passenger seat turned his head to look at me and said nothing.
I sighed, sat
back.
We reached
Florence, SC around nine a.m. I asked if we could stop for breakfast. We
didn’t. Instead, we merged onto I-95 northbound. I hoped that meant we were
heading to Camp Lejeune. I feared it meant we were heading to Langley, which
would be bad.
Our CIA command
was held deep below the Air Force base. We’d be under their command down there.
Camp Lejeune
was located on the coast of North Carolina. It was home to several Commands,
including the Marines Special Operations Command, and was often used for
amphibious assault training. Camp Lejeune also served as our unofficial command
under Colonel Abbot. We weren’t stationed there, though. We weren’t stationed
anywhere. However, we did have to report quarterly if we weren’t on an extended
deployment.
I leaned
forward again, looking at the driver and then the passenger.
“Where’re we
going?”
The man in the
passenger seat turned his head. “Lejeune.”
“That’s where
we were heading, anyway. You guys saved us the cost of a rental.”
He turned away.
Said nothing.
I sat back and
took a deep breath. Only one thing bothered me.
“Lejeune,” I
said to Bear.
“Yeah,” he said
then paused for a moment. “Brig’s there.”
That’s what
bothered me. The Marine Corps Brig was located there, and it was capable of
housing up to 280 inmates.
*
* *
Four hours
later the van rolled past a red brick sign that read, “CAMP LEJEUNE: HOME OF
EXPEDITIONARY FORCES IN READINESS,” and stopped in front of the base’s main
gate. The man in the passenger seat stepped out of the van then opened the side
door. Two of the men in the back seat got out. They ordered us out and walked
us to the corrugated steel guard rail that surrounded the guard house in the
middle of the road.
We stepped over
knee high guardrails. A baby faced MP waited for us. He nodded to our escorts
and they turned and got back in the van.
“Move to the
front,” the MP said. He pointed past the red stop sign and extended red and
white gate crossing the road. “They’ll be up to get you soon.”
We moved to the
other side of the building. I leaned back against the brick exterior and stared
down the deserted tree lined street that led to the main base. Things hadn’t
changed much since the last time we were here. That was six months ago. Just
before our deployment to Iraq.
Bear leaned
over. “This garbage stinks.” He kicked one leg up, placing his heel against the
brick wall behind us. “Abbot should have met us out here.”
“I thought he
would,” I said. “He’s the reason we’re here, though, and not the island.”
“Think he knows
we’re here right now?”
“I hope so,
Bear. I honestly do.”
A dark sedan
approached from the base, slowed down and made a U-turn in front of the guard
station and stopped in the middle of the road, and then both front doors
opened.
“Turn around,”
an MP said as he emerged from the passenger side. “Hands on the wall.”
I turned to
Bear, rolled my eyes, then continued around to face the wall.
The MPs were on
us a few seconds later. They were cautious and calm. They didn’t shout or use
force with us.
“Just a
formality,” one of them said. “Nice and easy. Let’s get this over with.”
I didn’t resist
when they pulled my arms down behind me and handcuffed me. Neither did Bear. A
few minutes later we were in the backseat of their cruiser.
“Take us to
Colonel Abbot,” I said.
The driver
looked up and made eye contact with me in the rear-view mirror. “He’s not
here.”
My heart sank.
Abbot was our only contact on base.
“Know where he
is?”
The driver
shook his head.
“I’ll need to
get in touch with General Keller then.”
“You realize
you’re detained, don’t you?” the other MP said.
I exhaled and
shrugged.
“Just take it
easy. You guys will be settled in soon.”
I kept hope up
that they were taking us to the barracks and putting us up for the night. But
the further we drove, the more I knew that wasn’t going to happen. The car
finally stopped in front of the brig. The MPs got out. The back doors swung
open.
“What are we
being held for?” I asked.
“Not our
concern,” the MP said while pulling me out of the car by my elbow.
I pulled back.
“Let’s not go
down that route. OK, Noble?”
I eased up,
swung my legs out of the vehicle and planted my feet on the ground. The MP pulled
me up and dragged me over to where Bear and his MP escort waited by a door that
led inside the brig.
“Let’s go,” the
MP said.
He led me
through the door into the building. We walked down a wide, dimly lit industrial
gray painted hallway past several administrative offices. Signs next to each
door indicated a name or division. We passed through two sets of security doors
then stopped in a cold square room, painted white with a foot wide gray stripe
about four feet off the ground. A pale, skinny MP stood behind a counter at the
far end of the room. He looked me up and down, did the same to Bear, then
disappeared from sight.
“Strip,” one of
the MPs said. “We’ll worry about your hair and beards tomorrow.”
Bear and I
removed our clothes.
The skinny MP
reappeared a few minutes later and handed us a pair of green sweat pants and a
gray shirt, slippers for our feet, and some toiletry items. We quickly dressed
and gathered up the other items. The MPs led us out of the room, down a darker
and narrower hall and through one more set of security doors. We entered one of
the housing areas. They split us up, leading Bear up a set of stairs and me
down a set.
It was quiet,
eerily so. The air was sterile and smelled of disinfectant. The place was
everything you would expect a Marine prison to be.
We stopped in
front of a cell. The wall was solid except for a small hole cut in the middle
of the door. I held my breath in anticipation.
“Don’t move.”
The MP let go of my arm and unlocked the cell door. Opened it and turned to me.
“Go in.”
I stepped
through and heard the door close behind me. The walls of the room were painted
gray and a single light fixture was fixed in the middle of the ceiling. A
toilet and sink sat in the back left corner. In the middle of the room was a
small table with two permanently attached chairs. A small window in the middle
of the back wall allowed sunlight to flood into the room. On the other side of
the room, next to the window, sat a metal bunk bed. The top bunk was empty. A
man with a shaved head lay on the bottom bunk, ankles crossed, one hand behind
his head, the other on his bare stomach. A colored tattoo of a phoenix covered
his hairless chest. His eyes shifted from the crossbars of the top bunk to me.
“Who’re you?”
“Noble.”
“Never heard of
you.”
“That’s the way
I like it.”
“What’re you in
for?”
“Murder. You?”
He shrugged.
“How’d you get
to keep all that crap on your face?”
I scratched at
my short beard. “It bother you?”
He swung his
feet over the side of the bed, planted them on the floor and stood. He was
about the same height as me with a similar build.
“Yeah, it
bothers me.”
“It won’t for
long,” I said. “They’re shaving me tomorrow.”
“How bout I
take care of it now?”
I held my
ground, prepared for him to attack. Turned out, I didn’t have to wait long.
He took a step
and reached out with a wide right hook intended for my face.
I ducked the
blow and exploded upward, driving my right fist into his jaw. A crack confirmed
that I had either broken or dislocated his jaw, perhaps both.
He hit the ground
like a bag of sand and his head smacked against the concrete floor with a thud.
I waited a few
seconds to see if he’d regain consciousness. He didn’t. I picked him up and
dumped him on his mattress, positioning him the way I found him. Then I walked
over to the door, stuck my face dead square in the center, which was open to
the outside except for four iron bars.
“That all you
got?” I yelled through the hole.