They placed an anonymous call to Pine Mountain police before taking Julia to her parents' house. They didn't have to worry about how to explain the events at the house. Once she had calmed down enough to talk to them, Julia explained that the local sheriff - one of the few in the state who didn't know the Jarman family and therefore didn't give a damn about their money - had been well aware of Gus's character, and would probably be taking the position that he needed killing. Chalk one up for small town law enforcement, thought Hannibal. Good thing these guys never read the paper.
They dropped Julia at her parents' place. He didn't suppose her reunion with her parents would be exactly joyous under the circumstances, but at least they had gotten her out alive. Still, he was glad he didn't have to stick around to see it.
As usual, Face had scammed the four of them a house, this one on the beach. Face had told the house's owner that he was a studio location scout and that a film crew would need at least a month or so to complete their work uninterrupted. Or at least Hannibal thought so; he had stopped paying much attention to the details. As long as the place was big enough for the four of them and sufficiently off the beaten path that the MPs wouldn't come poking around, Hannibal took it on faith that Face had done his job well and that the four of them would be able to stay for as long as necessary. He hadn't been disappointed yet.
The team drove back without a word. Even Murdock dispensed with his usual running chatter. Although his men tactfully refrained from postmortems, Hannibal knew they were thinking the same thing he was: this had been one fucked-up job from beginning to end. He was pretty certain that B.A. and Murdock weren't blaming the snafu on him - they knew as well as he did that he couldn't always control every variable - but his own inner voice wasn't so forgiving.
B.A. pulled the van up to the house and cut the engine. The sound of the surf pulsed, filling the silence. "Go on upstairs," said Hannibal. "I'll be in after a while."
No one moved. Murdock finally leaned forward and put his hand on Hannibal's shoulder. "Why don't you come in with us?"
"It's all right," said Hannibal. "I won't be too long. Go on."
B.A. thumped Murdock on the arm, none too gently, and opened the door. "You let us know if you want us, Hannibal, you hear me?" Hannibal pretended not to notice the worried looks that Murdock and B.A. gave him as they went inside. Face, on the other hand, hadn't looked at him once since they had driven away from Jarman's house.
The team had tacitly agreed that Hannibal would get the downstairs to himself while the other three took the upstairs. Hannibal waited until he saw the lights go on in the bedrooms, and then took off his shoes and tossed them into the back of the van. He walked barefoot along the beach for a long time, through the twilight and into the dusk and past, letting himself sink into the sand.
He didn't know what time it was when he finally became too exhausted to walk anymore. When he returned to the house, now darkened, Face was sitting in an armchair in the living room, a glass in his hand. Hannibal picked up the bourbon bottle, now half empty, that was on the end table. "I hope you're at least mixing it with water."
Face still didn't look at him. "What do you want, Hannibal?"
"Where are Murdock and B.A.?"
"Asleep. Upstairs, if you want to debrief them."
"I wanted to see you." Hannibal put the bottle back down and gave a short sigh. "I figured you might want to talk."
Face finished the last of his drink. "I don't need to talk, Colonel. If you're going to give me a field demotion, why don't you just do it and get it over with?"
"You think that's why I came back in? To mete out some discipline?"
"How should I know?" said Face. He stood up, setting his glass down with a whack, and finally faced Hannibal. "You have all the answers. You always do, don't you? So why don't you tell me what you're doing here."
"Don't get snide with me. You know goddamn well why I'm here. I don't have to spell it out for you."
The two men glared at each other for a few seconds before Face lowered his eyes, unable to hold Hannibal's gaze, and turned his back. "Christ, you really don't get it," he said.
"Who the hell do you think you're talking to, Lieutenant?" said Hannibal. "I don't need to remind you how many tours of duty I did in 'Nam - you were there for most of them. Did you ever think it got any easier for me to lose someone?" Face didn't answer. "I have some idea what you're feeling now."
Face shook his head impatiently and turned back around. "I don't know if you really do, Colonel. This was a woman we were supposed to be helping, not a soldier. We did a shitty job of protecting her."
Hannibal stared at Face again, but this time Face held his stare. "Now who's looking to hand out discipline?" said Hannibal. "The situation got out of control and we had to make a quick decision. I'm not any happier than you are about what happened."
"I could have gotten to her if you'd have let me."
"That's possible, sure. It's just as possible that you would have gotten killed, too. That wasn't a chance I was willing to take."
"Maybe it wasn't up to you to decide to trade her life for mine."
"And maybe it's not your place to question my decisions, Lieutenant Peck."
"Cut the bullshit, Hannibal. This isn't about insubordination."
"Is that right? And what exactly is it about, in your estimation?"
"It's about what the fuck you thought we were doing out there - what you thought you were doing out there," said Face. "This wasn't about the four of us, and it sure as hell wasn't about you. It was about that woman we were hired to protect, and her sister who's dead because of us."
"She's not dead because of us, Lieutenant," said Hannibal. "She's dead because her brother-in-law was a sadistic, psychopathic piece of shit and because she and the rest of her family kept making excuses for him because they didn't want the money fountain to run dry. That's why she's dead."
"No. She's dead because you made the decision that your feelings were more important than her life. And if your feelings cloud your judgment so badly, maybe you should give some thought to finding a different line of work."
Hannibal was quiet for a long time. He sat down and took a cigar out of his pocket. "You'd better be sure you want to have this discussion, Kid." He bit off the end of the cigar and lit it with a wooden match.
"I think we need to, don't you?"
Hannibal watched smoke rise from his cigar as the flame from the match subsided. He put his arms up on the back of the couch and regarded Face mildly. "Did you know I was engaged once?" Face looked at him, surprised. "Yeah. I gave her a cheap ring I found at a pawn shop. She managed to act like I'd given her the Hope Diamond." Hannibal smiled at the memory, shaking his head. "I was all of 19; she was a year younger. Seemed like a good idea at the time. We had the kids' names all picked out - a boy and a girl."
"What happened?"
Hannibal shrugged. "A couple of things. Mostly her father - he didn't approve of Catholic boys. And I guess she finally stopped being able to kid herself that that crummy glass stone was any kind of diamond." He took his arms off the back of the couch and puffed on his cigar. "Anyway. The Korean War came along pretty soon. Seemed like as good a time as any to join the army."
Face nodded a little too nonchalantly and refilled his glass. "Do you know what became of her?"
"Sure. She married Mike Porter, from the next town over. He eventually became a dentist, I'm pretty sure. They had two kids. A boy and a girl, if I remember right."
Face reached for his bourbon, but seemed to think better of it. "Hannibal . . ." He leaned forward with his head down, his elbows resting on his knees.
Hannibal moved forward on the couch toward Face. "Face, look at me." Face didn't move. "Look at me." Face started to speak again, but his breath caught and he shook his head, still looking down. Hannibal gave another short sigh and leaned back. "Ok. It's not easy, I know. But you're right - we need to have this conversation."
Face sat up and picked up his drink, but Hannibal gently took the glass out of his hand, setting it back on the table. "I love you like you're my own, Kid," said Hannibal. "I'm pretty sure you know that. I've never said it in so many words. But you don't usually volunteer to stand in front of bullets for someone, unless - "
Face interrupted him. "I know, Hannibal. I do."
"All right." Hannibal gave a slight shake of his head. "I just wish that didn't scare you so badly."
Face took a deep breath and let it out unsteadily. "So do I." He got up, but couldn't seem to decide what he wanted to do once he was standing. "But it scares the hell out of me." He stood awkwardly near the chair. Hannibal couldn't help smiling just a little at the sight of his second in command, usually so self-possessed, looking down at the floor and scuffling his feet around like a child caught misbehaving. He stifled a desire to tousle Face's hair and suggest that they go out and toss a football around.
"All right. Talk to me," said Hannibal.
"I don't know," said Face. "You know how it's been." He paused as though he thought Hannibal might interject. "It's never gone well when I cared about anybody, or when anyone cared about me. Always wound up with someone getting hurt. Usually someone other than me. Look what happened today."
"Vivian didn't die because you cared about her or her sister. She got caught in the mess she helped make," said Hannibal. "She finally felt guilty enough to see past her own wants, but by then it was way too late. And then she died trying to prove to herself that she hadn't done anything she couldn't fix." He looked at the glowing end of his cigar. "I probably should have let her come with us; at least that way we could have forced her to stay in the van. Only reason she showed up there on her own was that she didn't like someone telling her 'no' point blank."
So much time passed that Hannibal wasn't sure if Face was going to say anything else. "You didn't like her," Face finally said. He let the phrase hang in the air.
Hannibal felt like having a glass of bourbon himself now. "Ah. Well, I suppose that's right. And that's something I have to live with." He stubbed out his cigar in the ashtray. "Add it to the list, I guess."
Face looked flustered. "I didn't mean - "
Hannibal gave a flick of his hand. "It's fine. You didn't say anything that isn't true. I do seem to have a talent for putting people in harm's way. You boys know that better than anyone." He wished the house wasn't so quiet. "All these years on the run, no end in sight. Sometimes I think you would have been better off . . . ." He stopped abruptly, holding himself still and concentrating on the sound of the waves. He realized that for the first time that day, he had started to shake.
Face put out his hand as though he was going to out it on Hannibal's shoulder, but then he pulled back. He walked to the window, looking out at the beach. "The three of us make our own choices, Hannibal. You're not forcing us to do anything. You never have. We stay with you because we want to. You know that."
He turned away from the window. "But for me, growing up without a father . . . yeah." He rubbed his mouth. "Sort of ironic that I felt safer in the middle of a war than anywhere I ever was before that. Vietnam fucked up my life and kept me from killing myself, all at the same time." His mouth smiled, though his eyes didn't. "This stuff cuts both ways, I guess."
In the moonlight, Hannibal suddenly noticed how drawn Face looked. "Kid, get some sleep. You're exhausted."
"Is that an order?" Face asked.
Hannibal couldn't quite read Face's expression. "No. No, it's not an order," he said.
The numbers on the digital clock flipped over with a soft snap; it was little after 3:00 AM. "Are you tired?" Face asked. Hannibal knew that his lieutenant didn't have to ask the question; the kid had spent god knows how many nights watching him pace all night after a job, especially one that didn't go as planned. But Face didn't wait for an answer. "Do you mind if I sleep down here?" he asked.
"No, but it might not be as attractive an option as you think," said Hannibal. "Believe me, the couch isn't especially comfortable."
"I don't need the couch. I'll sleep on the chair."
Face sounded so plaintive that Hannibal finally found himself with a lump tightening in his throat. He stood up and reached out almost blindly, putting his hand on the back of Face's neck. He half expected Face to pull away, but Face wrapped his arms around Hannibal, pressing his temple into the colonel's shoulder. Hannibal was startled for a moment - neither one of them was demonstrative - and then drew Face into a hug, holding him tightly. The clock's numbers flipped twice again before Hannibal let go and stepped back.
"Come on. You need some rest. The couch is already made up." Face started to protest. "It's all right, Face. You know I won't sleep anyway. Go on."
Face was asleep within seconds of lying down, his expression finally serene. Hannibal sat in the armchair beside the couch until the gulls started to cry, and then he finally slept. He dreamed that he watched children brandishing toy weapons, laughing as they played in a lush and cruel jungle.
