The Last Hour (Thompson Sisters) by Sheehan-Miles, Charles (reading well .txt) 📕

Alex gave Detective Johnson a withering look, then turned to Dylan and whispered, “Be nice. Don’t get in any more trouble.”

“All right,” he said to her. “I’ll stay calm.”

Alex kissed him. “I’ll be with Carrie.” Then she stood and slipped out of the room.

Tension descended. Dylan looked back and forth between Smalls and Johnson and said, “All right. Question away.”

Johnson took out a notebook and leaned forward, then said, “Why don’t we start out with your name, and your relationship with the victims.”

Dylan winced at the term victims. “Dylan Paris. Ray and I went through basic training together. We were assigned to the same unit at Fort Drum, New York, and then deployed to Afghanistan. He ended up as my fire team leader when he got promoted to Sergeant. He married my wife’s sister, so we’re family.”

“You’re close?”

Dylan blinked then said, “Very. I never had a brother, but ... I see Ray as a brother. I trust him more than anyone else on earth.” His voice was raw as he spoke the last few words. It was hard listening to that. Because I felt the same way, and it was obvious from the tension in his shoulders and jaw to the slight shaking in his hands, that this accident, if that’s what it was, was tearing Dylan up. I walked over to the window and looked outside as the questioning continued. We were on the fourth floor, and I could see down to the streets below. Heavy traffic out there. It was summer time on a Saturday night in downtown DC. People were headed out to bars and clubs, parties and plays and a hundred other activities. Living their normal lives, going on with all of the things that people did. It was hard for me to connect all of that to where we were, in this hospital, waiting to find out if I was going to live or die, waiting to find out if and when Sarah would wake up.

“All right, Mr. Paris. Given what you’ve told me, I’m gonna let go of the fact that your borderline assaulted a police officer. But any more bullshit like that happens again and off to jail you go. Understand?”

“Sure,” Dylan said, his voice still rough. This cop was a complete asshole.

“When did you learn about the accident?”

“About noon. The social worker in the emergency room called Alex.”

“Your wife?”

“Yes. So we jumped in a cab and headed straight to the airport, while she called to get a flight. We were able to get the first flight out of JFK.”

“What do you do for a living, Mr. Paris?”

“We’re both students at Columbia University.”

I turned around. I was behind Smalls, near the window, and I looked over her shoulder as she took notes in her own notebook.

“Mr. Paris, I want you to think carefully. Can you think of anyone who would want to harm your brother-in-law?”

Dylan sat there, staring at him. Then, quietly, he said, “Some of the survivors from our platoon were pretty angry with him. But I can’t imagine it going this far. Why do you think it was intentional? Who was driving the other vehicle?”

Johnson raised his eyebrows and said, “Mr. Paris, right now I’m the one asking questions.”

Dylan’s eyebrows drew together, and he responded, “Detective, you’re telling me someone may have attempted to murder my brother-in-law, when we all thought it was an accident. I think we deserve some ... some….”

Dylan’s fist clenched, and his face went red. Aww, Christ. His aphasia always kicked in when he was stressed or angry, and just made it worse. Finally, he spit out the word, “Explanation.”

Smalls said, “As soon as we come to some conclusions, we’ll let you know, Paris. It’s too early, and I’m sure you’d agree that the last thing we want to do in an investigation is jump to conclusions.”

Dylan gave her a bitter look and said, “Yeah. You’re right about that.”

Johnson asked, “Why do you use the term survivors?”

Dylan shook his head then ticked off his fingers as he said, “Lee got shot our first week in the country and was evacuated. Kowalski was killed by a grenade. An IED killed Roberts and fucked up my leg. Weber was killed by a sniper. Staff Sergeant Martin got shot. Six out of sixteen men killed and wounded in the first four months of the deployment. I was gone by then, and didn’t know them, but two of the replacements were killed too, later on.”

“And why were the survivors angry with your brother-in-law?”

“Have you been living under a rock, Detective?” Dylan looked at Smalls, his face incredulous.

“Just answer the question, Mr. Paris.”

Dylan shook his head and said, “Because about a month after I was evacuated, Sergeant Colton shot a civilian. And Ray reported it. The investigation’s been dragging on most of the year now.”

Johnson sat back, his face unreadable. Finally he said, “I think that’ll be all for now, Mr. Paris. You can go. I’ll be by in a few minutes to collect your sister-in-law.”

“All right,” Dylan said, getting to his feet. He walked to the door, his limp more pronounced than usual. He was getting tired.

The moment the door shut, Johnson was on his feet. He walked to the window, an angry expression on his face, and turned toward Smalls.

“All right, Major. You want to explain why you didn’t tell me this was about that war crimes trial?”

Smalls crossed her arms over her chest and raised an eyebrow. “Detective, you came in here half-cocked, ordered us to leave, then got into a physical altercation with a witness. At one point did you stop and ask us?”

“So our victim was your star witness? There was a GPS tracker on that car, Major, and it was originally purchased by the other driver. And the kids who got hurt ... they were ... what, innocent bystanders? Just unlucky to be in the same accident?”

I was holding my breath at this point. Who the hell was driving that jeep?