The Captain's Mission. Debby Giusti

lieutenant drove up in front of the company headquarters just as Phil and the chaplain left the building fifteen minutes later. After introducing the two men, Lieutenant Bellows shared his own concern for the private.

      “Stanley’s young and impressionable. From what he said, this is the first time he’s seen someone die. I’ve got Staff Sergeant Gates with him now.”

      Phil turned to the chaplain. “Gates is one of Lieutenant Bellow’s squad leaders. He’s mid-thirties and fairly squared away. If he can’t reassure Stanley, I may ask you to talk to him tomorrow. He’s a good kid who loves the Lord and knows his Bible, but he’s still got a lot to learn.”

      The chaplain smiled. “I can relate to that. I’d be happy to pray with him. Inviting God into any situation usually brings comfort to those experiencing difficulty.”

      Although Phil didn’t personally agree with the chaplain, he knew Stanley would benefit from the outreach.

      Phil turned to the lieutenant. “Let me know what Gates has to say. If Stanley’s still upset, we can call the chaplain in the morning.”

      “Yes, sir. Some of the other men have been talking about Corporal Taylor. Evidently things hadn’t been too good on the home front since the company redeployed back to the States. Sounds like he and his wife were having problems.”

      “At Chaplains School, we talked about how marital problems escalate once the soldiers redeploy home,” Sanchez said.

      Phil nodded. “Unfortunately the separations are hard on family members as well as the soldiers.”

      “Which will probably compound the grieving process for Mrs. Taylor.”

      The chaplain was right. Phil kept thinking about Taylor and his wife as he and Sanchez headed to the parking lot. Phil had instructed Bellows to drive ahead and wait for him at the farm, assuring the lieutenant they wouldn’t be far behind him.

      Once on the way, Phil made a quick detour that took them past the CID headquarters. He scanned the parking lot, hoping to spot Kelly in case she wanted to follow them, but her Toyota Corolla wasn’t in sight.

      Maybe she had another stop to make. No reason for Phil to be concerned. Sergeant Meyers had given her directions, and she said she would meet them at the Taylor home. From everything he had seen tonight, Kelly could take care of herself.

      As difficult as the notification would be, Phil’s mood lifted ever so slightly when he thought of seeing her again. Then he clamped down on his jaw. What was wrong with him? The last person he should be thinking about was the CID agent. Yet, for some reason, Kelly McQueen was the only thing his mind wanted to focus on tonight.

      The sun had set hours ago, and darkness, thick as tar, enveloped South Georgia as Kelly left Fort Rickman and headed north along the two-lane road that led through Freemont and past the nursing home where her mother had lived for the last year of her life.

      A lump filled Kelly’s throat at the memory of sitting at her dying mother’s bedside. Coronary obstructive pulmonary disease had sapped her energy and left her gasping for air. In spite of the oxygen concentrator that had become her constant companion, her mother’s body had weakened until death seemed almost a welcome alternative to the fragile existence that had held her bound between this world and the next.

      Just a short distance beyond the nursing facility, Kelly spied her own home, which sat back from the road. Never expecting to be tied up for so long on post, Kelly had failed to leave a light on when she left the house earlier today. Now the brick ranch looked dark and foreboding and recessed with shadows from the sliver of moon that hung low in the sky.

      Passing her house, she sped north along the Freemont Road and into a stretch of no-man’s-land flanked by a thick forest of trees on each side of the asphalt. Kelly turned her lights to high beam and flicked her gaze over not only the pavement but also the shoulder and the edge of the forest.

      Deer often darted out from the underbrush, causing accidents and injuries to both car and driver. The only motion she saw came from the branches that swayed in the wind and the flutter of leaves that fell one after another from the canopy of boughs overhead.

      She checked her odometer. Five miles into the darkness seemed an eternity tonight. Maybe it was the anticipation of knowing the captain was already at the farmhouse. She wanted to be on the scene when he and the chaplain broke the news to Corporal Taylor’s widow. The initial reactions from loved ones could be telling, especially in a criminal investigation.

      At this point, Kelly had no evidence to indicate foul play. A training accident more than likely would be the final determination. Tomorrow she would review Phil’s operations order to determine if there were any safety issues with the plan.

      Phil Thibodeaux seemed competent and concerned about his soldiers. Hard to imagine he had made a blatant mistake, but the unit had been in the field for the past four days, and fatigue could be a significant factor. As much as Phil seemed to have his act together, looks could be deceiving.

      Her father’s face floated through her mind. Everything about that no-good Cajun had been a sham. Each time he had returned home, he had taken her mother for a ride, wiping out her money and her emotional stability. When he tired of pretending to love her, he hightailed it out of Savannah and headed west, more often than not back to his beloved bayou.

      Even as a child, Kelly had questioned her father’s here-again gone-again behavior. By puberty, she recognized him for who he really was—a conniver who thought only of himself. She’d asked God to take him out of her life, but God seemed occupied with other people’s problems instead of hers. When her dad had become abusive to her mother, she’d prayed he would be attacked by snakes and eaten by alligators in the Louisiana swamps he loved more than his own daughter.

      God hadn’t answered that prayer, either.

      Eventually she decided that since she couldn’t count on her earthly father, she shouldn’t rely on her heavenly one, either. Instead she vowed to never be subservient to a man, like her mother had been whenever her father came back to Savannah with his proverbial hat in hand and a string of excuses for being gone so long.

      Kelly shoved her hair away from her face. Luckily she had moved beyond the pain of growing up in a dysfunctional family and being the only one to have at least a smattering of common sense, which she needed to use today instead of returning to memories that should remain buried under a thick layer of Mississippi Delta mud.

      She glanced once again at the odometer. Another mile until she would reach the turnoff for the farm, if the first sergeant’s directions were accurate. Just in case he had guesstimated the mileage, she watched for a mailbox at the roadside along with a split rail fence, which supposedly were the only landmarks that identified the long driveway that led to the Taylor home.

      Up ahead, the road curved to the right. Kelly eased her foot off the gas. Halfway into the turn, a teenager dashed out from nowhere and ran across the road. For a second, he was spotlighted in the beam of her headlights.

      Shaved head, tattoos, body piercings and blood.

      Her heart jolted.

      Kelly stomped on the brakes and gripped the steering wheel as the tires skidded over the pavement, narrowly missing the boy.

      In the blink of an eye, he was gone.

      Adrenaline coursed through her veins and rammed her pulse into high gear. Gasping at the close call, she steered the car to the edge of the road and leaned back against the headrest. A roar of disbelief filled her ears at what had almost happened.

      Kyle Foglio?

      The teen had visited his lieutenant colonel father on post more than two years ago when Kelly had first hauled him in for questioning. Kyle had turned explosive, and the father had sent him back to be with his first wife, the boy’s mother, who lived up north. On one other occasion Kelly had run into the teen on Fort Rickman property, but that, too, hadn’t ended well.

      Doing an instant rewind of the near miss, Kelly watched in her mind’s eye as