The Murder Option 2 Read online

  As her planning went on, she began to think of how the end should be. It came to her that interrogation was an absolute. She couldn’t just assassinate the colonel, there had to be a conversation. Let the colonel reveal the rationalization, the justification for not taking action. And get it recorded.

  That was the description her one really good therapist, who ran one of the most successful programs connected to UCSD, had put it. She’d told the women in Jesse’s group that being savagely raped, abused, was not always the same in its impact. To be taken on a street, in a park, at a party—all horrible, to be sure. But to be a soldier savaged by fellow soldiers, to be a defender of the nation, the Constitution, the country that you love, that is on a different par. That is a crime that is heinous on extreme levels. That is an insult beyond insults. And that is what they didn’t yet understand.

  That is why the colonel had to be first interrogated, to face that truth before being destroyed. As the doctor said, no civilian can understand the magnitude of the crime. It is far more than rape, which is terrible. It is far more than a drunken fool who wanted sex where he couldn’t earn it and far more than a powerful male coercing a subordinate.

  Horrible as all those were, to rape a fellow soldier in a combat zone is a crime that stands alone. It is, the doctor said—and she was a major who’d served three tours—an act of moral treason.

  Jesse never forgot that. Moral treason.

  So it was important to her that the colonel, and the committees dealing with the issue, face the mindset that had destroyed her and others like her. The mindset that had covered up that criminal moral treason.

  Jesse packed for the trip. Driving would take too long and be too stressful. She had to fly to Georgetown and get this done before the next hearings in three days. But that meant she couldn’t take a weapon.

  She knew the street culture well from having purchased drugs from time to time in both L.A. and San Diego. Getting a weapon in the sketchy parts of any major American city shouldn’t be a problem once you got vetted by dealers. They joked about a place in L.A. near a DMV where, for a price, you could get food stamps, a free government cell phone, an ID, and make arrangements for a gun all at the same place. The guys who hung out there were top-notch black marketers who usually had a van across the street where they monitored police calls and were in contact with watchers. It was like this sophisticated ops program right under the noses of the LAPD.

  She purchased a one-way ticket online to Reagan National, reserved a car, and made a reservation at the Georgetown Inn on Wisconsin Avenue. Then she packed her $7000 in cash savings. That was for street buys. Credit cards would handle the rest.

  Lastly, she wanted some kind of tiny body-cam. She figured she’d have to check out some local PI and get him to fix her up.

  Interrogate, record, assassinate—that was the plan.

  So at 8:15 on Wednesday morning, Jesse Wells boarded a plane at San Diego International/Lindbergh Field and headed across country to Reagan Airport in Virginia.

  As the plane lifted off, as she sat back in her seat, she smiled for the first time in a long while. She was heading back into combat, and this time she intended to come out the victor.

  4

  When the wheels finally touched down at Reagan National in Arlington, Jesse Wells realized how alive, how strong she now felt. A powerful sense of purpose was something she hadn’t felt in years. She knew it might prove an illusion, that maybe she was totally deceiving herself, but the feeling was overwhelming.

  She had much to do: settle at the hotel, begin getting familiar with the lay of the city, and do some recon, especially of Rock Creek Park, where the article mentioned that the colonel jogged.

  She also had to find a gun dealer. You want a gun dealer, don’t look for a gun dealer. Go to the drug dudes. Make a few buys. Get them comfortable. Once you’ve made some buys, return visits, then you can hook up with firearms in any city in the country. But she didn’t have a lot of time. Unlike New Mexico or Arizona, where you can just go to the Internet and meet anybody in a parking lot and buy a fucking .50 caliber, here you needed to buy in the dark, and for that you need to be street-vetted.

  After settling in at her hotel, doing a cursory run around her environment, she headed off to the seedier areas in Southwest Washington DC. But not without some form of protection. She found an army/navy military surplus store and bought an ASEK survival knife. Light, easy to hide. Then it was off to do some business.

  It’s a brave new world, she thought. Google, GPS, knowing your every move is somewhere recorded, no matter how deep you sink into the darkest corners.

  When a former soldier turned to needing drugs, becoming nearly homeless, floating in the mean streets from place to place, you learned about those mean streets and you got comfortable. You needed to talk and think street, and she was comfortable with that.

  She drove to a sketchy block, spotted a potential source and pulled up to the curb, lowering her passenger side window.

  “Hey girl, what’s you need.”

  “Something to cut the edge.” She smiled.

  He said, “If you narcin’, I can’t afford that shit right now. I got issues.”

  “I get you,” Jesse said. “I ain’t ridin’ that train, babe.”

  “Well, then you go on down to the corner, maybe Hopscotch is hanging out. But you playin’ shit, got wires up your ass, best move on. This not the place for that.” He walked off.

  She moved on slow down the street. In her rearview, she saw him on the phone. When she got a half block, she saw a short, thin black on his phone watching her approach. Probably had a cop-watch on every corner.

  She parked, got out, and walked over. Another guy sitting on the steps behind him, watching her approach.

  “Girl, what’s you got for Hopscotch?”

  “I got a need you can fill for a little cash. Make us both happy. Win-win.”

  He studied her, unamused but showing a bit of curiosity. He glanced up the street. “Maybe what you have ain’t sometin’ I’d want. But you got a look I don’t go for. Kinda hard. Maybe you working your undercover gig.”

  “I’m about as far from that as you can get.”

  He glanced at his friend, shook his head, turned back to her, and said, “You drive around these ‘hoods, white girl in her tight jeans, get out of your ride and walk up to a nigger like you got business. Somethin’ not right about the picture.”

  “I was a cop, no way I’d be out of my car. And we wouldn’t be wasting time on some small fry. And if I was a candy ass, I’d never even drive here. But I’m just a girl come into town a few days and need a little and know the deal. I’ve been doing business with brothers for years. Mostly in L.A. So either we got some business or we’re both wasting my time.”

  He actually grinned. Good looking guy when he smiled. She said, “I’d let you run a pat down, but you might get all worked up, and that wouldn’t be what I’m lookin’ for, knockdown handsome as you are and swinging something make most girls get to swooning.”

  That’s how the bullshit flirt-business talk started. They clowned back and forth for a couple minutes. But she could tell he knew his business, was smart, and his flirting was all about how she talked, what her phrasing was. Cops, even the best undercover, can be uncovered if you’re street smart. He was getting comfortable.

  But his friend, not so easy, got up and walked toward her. He was Latin and not amused by the banter. “Let me see if the buscona is wired.”

  He got a couple feet from her when Jesse produced the five inches of survival badness. She itched her nose with the point of the knife, smiled. “Bad idea putting hands on me, less you’re feeling a little fishy, wantin’ to be properly fileted. I’m good in the kitchen. Back off.”

  He stared at her like he was figuring how fast he could cover those last few steps, and whether she was really serious.

  She said, “I got rashes and don’t like spreading them around. We got business or I move on. I don’
t want trouble, and neither do you. Like the wops say, Nothin’ personal. And don’t think I’m shy. I’ve been trained in bad places, grew up cutting tougher skin game than you are, and been military in places you don’t want to see. I can handle a bit of roughhouse, and blood don’t smell bad to me for some reason. And it’s got a nice red, one of my favorite colors.”

  With her other hand, she pulled up her blouse and displayed a five-inch scar, compliments of an IED. “Be smart, or be cobra fast, cause I’m already lookin’ where I want to cut. I’ve seen worse than you and I’m standing upright, and they aren’t.”

  “Back off,” Hopscotch told his friend, who said something unpleasant sounding in Spanish and returned to the steps.

  Then they got down to some chitchat. Getting to know one another. He told her he had this hip-hop dance thing going on. Said one day she’d see him on So You Think You Can Dance. He did a couple moves. Made her laugh.

  “Let’s do some business,” Hopscotch said. “I’m getting to like you.”

  They made a deal. That would have been the first contact, but she had a sense that Hopscotch might be her guy. She said, “I’ve been working you a bit. I’ll take the bag, but I got a need for something else, and I need it in about a day.”

  “Watch this bitch,” his Spanish friend said. “She’s bad news from top to bottom.”

  Hopscotch lifted a hand to shut his friend up. “What’s you lookin’ for, girl?”

  “I got a problem needs taken care of and I’m lookin’ to enjoy doin’ it personal. But I couldn’t fly from the West Coast with a piece and I’m in a hurry.”

  “That what you want?”

  “That’s what I want. And not some cheap-ass knockoff junk made in some bullshit factory in Mexico with a Colt stamp on it.” She glanced at his friend, then came back to Hopscotch. “I’ll pay the rate and a bit more. You can’t hook me up, that’s cool. Just find me somebody can.”

  “What you gonna do for the brother? This isn’t as easy as a dime bag.”

  “Well, you won’t get a lip dance, but you get trip zeros over and above normal cost.”

  He laughed. “I like you, girl. You one bad lady. What am I looking for to make you happy?”

  “Pocket, light, close range is all that’s required. Any normal caliber. I’m not killing bear.”

  He stared at her. Smiled. “I got somethin’ might interest you right here,” he said. “You can get the money together. Be about three.”

  “Right here meaning what?”

  He smiled. “Right now be fast enough?” He reached behind under his shirt and came up with a gun. He handed it to her. “You like, I can sell you this and give you a good price.”

  It was perfect. Love at first sight. It was a small, light, comfortable snubnose .38 Special Smith & Wesson 438 Bodyguard, matte black finish, nonslip grip, and a shrouded hammer capable of single action. No chance for error. She checked the load, then went back to the car and took out her shoulder bag and the sale was made. Of all the deals she’d ever made on the mean streets, this one, in the shadow of the Capitol, had to be the easiest and fastest.

  Before leaving she said, with a return smile, liking this Hopscotch, “Aren’t you afraid of getting caught with guns out on the streets.”

  “We ain’t got no stop and frisk in this ‘hood, girl. Besides, Hopscotch is the law ‘round here.”

  “If I had time and was less mean lookin’ and you were interested, we could have a good time,” she said, “but I’m on a mission.”

  “Good luck,” Hopscotch said, “and you watch next season. I be on that show doin’ moves no one never seen before.”

  “I believe that,” she said. “I’ll watch for you. You get on the show, I’ll vote for you.”

  “You gotta vote maybe a hundred times to count.”

  She paused as she was getting in the car and said, “I’ll vote a thousand times. Auto dial on a dozen throwaways.”

  “I like you, girl. You get time off your mission, you come do some hoppin’ with Hopscotch.”

  Jesse smiled and gave him a wave as she drove off.

  5

  Jesse needed a body-cam to record the interview. She’d checked out the local PIs and found one who advertised as an expert in video surveillance technology, among other things.

  She called. They discussed her request, price, and the various models. He didn’t sell them, but he’d “rent” one for a reasonable price. “I’ll be right over,” Jesse said. “I need it today.”

  She met him at his office four blocks from the White House on Friday at 2:00 P.M. She told him she was doing a piece for a blog. He didn’t much care what she was doing since she wasn’t hiring him, just renting a piece of equipment. His gruffness wore off when she suggested she might be hiring him in the very near future for other jobs and had lots of contacts.

  He fixed her up with what he said was top of the line. It was a black ball cap with a Washington Redskins logo. The camera eye was so integral to the logo, she had to stare at it for a minute to spot it. It had a wireless monitor/recorder she slipped into her pocket.

  “You can get some good ones on the Internet,” the PI, whose name was Mike Rison, told her. “But this hat-cam is spy quality. Give you the best results.”

  He showed her everything she needed to know. She gave him a $500.00 deposit, half of which she’d get back on returning the hat-cam, then got to work.

  The colonel’s townhouse was on the edge of Georgetown in one of the trendier spots. For the next three days, Jesse made herself familiar with the Colonel’s schedule, morning jogs, Starbucks stops. Most military types were very regimented and ironclad in their habits. A strength and a weakness.

  What amazed Jesse was how much she actually knew about the methodology of tracking without realizing it. She had instincts honed on hunts with her father, on missions in the military, and on searches for the right drug dealers in San Diego and L.A.

  The colonel was an early morning jogger and used a portion of the Rock Creek Park jogging trail, as the article had said. So Jesse took up jogging in the favorite local pathways that included historic homes, a stretch along the Potomac and Chesapeake rivers and Georgetown University, where both Presidents Kennedy and Clinton had graduated. It was an area of deep Americana and a favorite of wealthy students, professors, and politicians. An elite enclave. The trail intersected with others and reached across the border into Maryland.

  The colonel would finish her thirty-minute run around 0700, get her coffee, and return to the townhouse. That was where Jesse decided to make the move. It was time. The hearings restarted on Tuesday.

  The townhouse building had private entrances. Brick. Very nice and very expensive. No security guards or extraordinary systems evident. Jesse didn’t worry a lot about being caught on street cameras but took precautions. She knew where they were, wore headgear, and changed outfits.

  Finally, having chosen the tactical details of when and where, Jesse felt comfortable. She was ready to strike.

  The colonel returned from her run that Monday morning to her side door entrance at 0645, carrying her Starbucks coffee.

  It was so easy. The target had no idea. Jesse moved in behind the woman who was now utterly vulnerable, much like the female soldiers under her command. Colonel Mayer, earphones still on, opened the door with key in one hand, coffee in the other.

  Jesse closed the space between them, pushed the .38 into the colonel’s back, and pulled one the headphones aside. “Don’t even think about it or you’re dead, Colonel. Let’s go inside. We need to talk.”

  “Whatever this is,” Colonel Mayer said, as Jesse pushed her inside, “just walk away and I’ll forget this happened.”

  “Argue with me, Colonel, you’ll die right here, right now. Move slow and don’t be stupid.”

  6

  They moved inside, Jesse keeping her gun hand well away from any aggressive action the colonel might attempt but close enough to keep the range short. They moved up a half-dozen steps,
into the living room off an adjoining dining room separated by a bar from the kitchen.

  “Sit down, Colonel. How was your run today?”

  “It was fine until now,” the colonel said. She was a very lean, stern-looking woman in her late forties. She had that ever present air of command authority about her, even in running sweats and sneakers.

  The colonel sat in a green, uncomfortable-looking, Victorian-style chair. She studied Jesse for a moment. “Do I know you?”

  Behind the colonel stood a tall hutch against the wall. It was filled with memorabilia from the military as well as dozens of photos with her meeting important people, including one with the president.

  “No. Not really,” Jesse said. “I was just a piece of collateral damage in your world. Insignificant. A nothing.”

  The colonel stared at her as if trying to remember but not making the connection. Or not wanting to display that she did.

  “Let’s have a chat,” Jesse said. “And don’t be stupid. Unless you want this to be your last moment on earth. And just when you’re becoming such a big deal.”

  “What do you want?” Colonel Mayer asked.

  “You don’t know who I am?”

  “I remember you. You’re the one who had the problem with some other soldiers. Accused them—”

  “Yes, you might call getting raped and treated like an animal a bit of a problem, for which you did nothing.”

  Colonel Mayer glanced at the gun, and then she said, “You don’t want to do something really stupid. I don’t know what your situation is, where your mind is, soldier, but this is not the right course of action.”

  “I’m no longer a soldier,” Jesse said. “What I am is the one with the gun, and the willingness to use it, and very good with one, I might add. What counts is what I think is the right course of action, not you. You have no authority at the moment.”

  “What is it you want?”

  Jesse didn’t know how she would feel confronting this woman after the years of anger and depression she’d gone through. She’d thought about it many times and wondered if it would be rage or something even darker.