but he’d heard enough.
So Eric knew the dead woman? She was a deputy prosecutor, no less. And, boy, did Jack get right in Eric’s shit about going inside the victim’s house!
This is great stuff. I can sell this.
CHAPTER EIGHT
It was one in the morning in downtown Harrisburg when the two men stuffed the two headless corpses in the trunk of a stolen Ford Taurus. The girl’s body hadn’t been a problem, but the guy was easily three hundred pounds and they were both out of breath by the time they finished wrestling the body into the trunk. They had driven seventy miles back to Evansville, where they dumped, and then gone back to the house. It was almost daylight before they finished cleaning up the client’s mess. Book napped while Clint drove around on county back roads, crossed Interstate 64, and turned north onto Highway 41 toward Terre Haute.
He woke Book when they hit the outskirts of the city.
“Easy breezy,” Book said, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.
“Yeah. Easy,” Clint said, checking the dashboard clock. He took the ramp down to Interstate 70. “I vote we go to Indianapolis. We can get something to eat and a few hours sleep before we get out of here.”
“Where are we?” Book asked.
“Terre Haute. Two hours from the airport in Indy.”
“Find a motel near the airport and we’ll leave this evening,” Book said.
They intended to leave the Taurus in the long-term airport parking and fly home. Clint knew distance was their friend—he’d learned that lesson in the military. Hit and run. No one would think to look for them, or the car, in Indianapolis. And by the time the Taurus was found, they’d be long gone.
As they approached Indianapolis, Clint noticed how much the city had grown. He’d last been here in 2006, just before enlisting in the Army. The Indianapolis Colts, with Peyton Manning at quarterback, were robbed of their bid for Super Bowl XLI by the Pittsburg Steelers 21-18. The RCA Dome was gone now, torn down a few years after that amazing victory to make way for the expansion of the Convention Center. He had no interest in going to the new stadium, Lucas Oil. It had been built after he was already shipped to Iraq. No memories there.
“Find a phone,” Book said.
Clint took the next exit and drove around a depressed area on the edge of town until they found a telephone booth with an intact phone. Book got out and stretched.
“I’ll call the boss and then make sure the money goes in our account,” Book said, and Clint laid his seat back and closed his eyes. A hotel bed would feel good.
When Book got back in the car, he wasn’t smiling.
“So?” Clint asked.
“So, we go back,” Book said.
Clint said nothing. He and Book knew how to follow orders. But something bad had happened, or they wouldn’t have to go back. In the two years they’d been doing this they’d never had to go back.
“They found the head at the dump,” Book explained.
“No way. We buried her parts all over the landfill, Book. No way they found her,” Clint said, but then he remembered the dogs. He’d kicked one of them and sent it scrambling, but maybe it came back. Maybe they should have buried the parts deeper. In any case, this was all Book’s screwup. He was the one that had insisted on cutting her body into pieces.
Clint had met Book in Iraq, where they were both armored gunners, and they had become fast friends. Spent some time in Afghanistan, too. Clint’s original plan was to be career Army. Book, too. But after watching several of their buddies dissected by IEDs—improvised explosive devices—Book had shared an epiphany with Clint. Why get killed for the pennies the Army paid when they could make serious dough as mercenaries?
Clint agreed. They had become very proficient at taking the lives of their country’s enemies. What did it matter if they killed someone besides Uncle Sam’s enemies? The money was better on the private side.
They were nearing the time to reenlist, so Clint and Book sent a dozen responses to ads in mercenary magazines. They had just deployed from Iraq back to Ft. Hood, Texas, when a letter came addressed to Book. There was no sender’s name or address on the envelope, and inside was a single slip of paper with a telephone number typed on it.
Two weeks before their scheduled departure from the Army, they called the number and spoke to