Deadline

“South Carolina.”

Dawson and Headly looked at Amelia, who’d spoken as though thinking out loud. Realizing that she had their attention, she said, “I found a speeding ticket on our closet floor. It must have fallen out of a pocket when he hung up his clothes. I noticed it had been issued in South Carolina, so I asked him about it.”

“When was this?”

“Shortly before we separated. He’d already made Willard’s acquaintance, and even then I wasn’t keen on this new friendship. I hoped he’d gone to Beaufort to visit some of his old friends from Parris Island and the naval air station.

“When I showed him the ticket, he became irrationally furious. That’s why I remember it. He took it from me, tore it into pieces, and threw them away. He cursed me for meddling and told me to mind my own business. Obviously I’d hit on something he didn’t want me to know about. I suspected it was another woman. But perhaps…” She trailed off to let them draw their own conclusion.

Dawson looked at Headly and shrugged. “It’s something.”

Energized, they started toward

the exit. Headly said, “With Jeremy’s Social Security number, the DMV over there should be able to look up the ticket. Once we know where it was issued, we’ll have a starting point to begin a search. I’ll get Knutz on that.”

He punched a number into his phone. Dawson held the door and allowed Amelia and Headly to precede him. They emerged into the bright sunlight and headed toward the parking lot.

Headly, phone to his ear, turned his head to say something to Dawson from over his shoulder when suddenly a strange expression came over his face. Then his eyes went completely blank.

Dawson’s brain processed instantly what that vacant look signified, even as Headly’s knees folded beneath him and he toppled forward. Dawson gave a shout of horror and outrage as he pushed Amelia to the sidewalk and followed her down.

The second bullet missed her by a hairbreadth.

The one intended for Headly had found its mark.

Chapter 22

Carl Wingert was one of the few criminals in American history who had the gall to bring the fight to the authorities.

He and Jeremy had spent hours on the roof of a seven-story office building that, due to the recession, had run out of renters. The management company had gone bankrupt, and after being foreclosed upon, the building had stood empty and neglected.

Situated in an industrial park where other businesses had similarly succumbed to the bad economy, it was a quarter mile away from the jail complex. In between was a four-lane thoroughfare divided by a wide median planted with crepe myrtle trees.

Trees presented a problem in general, but from that roof, one of the tallest in the whole area, Jeremy could have taken several clear shots. Partially obscured by a ventilation shaft, they’d waited for an opportunity to strike FBI agent Gary Headly where and when he would least expect it.

The playing field had changed for Carl the instant he saw Headly in the photograph. The only reason the veteran agent would be here in Savannah working in conjunction with the sheriff’s office to solve the Stephanie DeMarco murder case was because Jeremy had been linked to the homicide and, even more damning, to Carl Wingert.

The authorities hadn’t publicly declared that Jeremy was indeed alive and the suspected culprit, or that he had a direct bloodline to a notorious fugitive from justice, but Carl knew that those dots of information had been connected. That was the only explanation for Headly’s involvement.

Whether or not Headly had linked him to Bernie Clarkson, he didn’t know. But even if he hadn’t, he would still be hot on Jeremy’s trail if only because he was Carl’s son. Either way, Carl resolved not to wait on the agent to find him. No, by God. The guy wanted him, the guy was going to get him. Just not in the way he planned on it.

Carl had reasoned that sooner or later Headly would show up at the sheriff’s office to confer with the blubber-gutted deputy and that when he did, Jeremy could pick him off, even from that distance.

The assassination of an FBI agent on the campus of the sheriff’s office and jail complex would create chaos. Panic and confusion would ensue. Before anyone figured out from which direction the fatal bullet had come, he and Jeremy would be long gone.

The plan had the stamp of Carl Wingert all over it. It was just audacious enough to work. Certainly there was an element of risk, but it was low enough that Carl was willing to take it in order to rid himself of his nemesis. By doing so, he would also let the rotten American society know that Carl wasn’t done with it quite yet. He may be old, but he was still a fear-worthy entity, a force to be reckoned with.

He regretted not having taken a bold action such as this decades ago, and blamed Flora and her whining for his years of inactivity. So his resentment toward Headly had had decades in which to ferment, and it now made his revenge even sweeter.

The hours they’d spent waiting on the roof for Headly to appear had given Jeremy time to assess the conditions, do his calculations, and practice his aim on uniformed personnel and visitors to the sheriff’s office and jail who entered and exited the various buildings on their various errands, little knowing that they were in his crosshairs.

Jeremy needed no coaching, but Carl kept up a stream of instruction. “You’ll have one chance to take him out, possibly two, but no more before they hear the report. Within seconds, we need to be on the fire stairs.”

When the time came, Jeremy was mentally primed. All he had to do was make the shot. Carl, who’d been watching the complex through binoculars, recognized Amelia’s car when it wheeled up to the entrance of the visitation center. He reported this to Jeremy. “See her?”

“On the car,” Jeremy said, his voice tense with concentration.

“This could be it.”