Chapter 157
WHEN I EMERGED from the infirmary, lead apron in hand, Laura was hovering in the hallway.
“He’s still saying no,” I said.
“Fuck that,” she said, and took the apron from me. I watched her heave it across her belly and dart into the infirmary and behind the curtain. Bobby protested at first, but then I could hear his quiet sobs, and I thought that—in spite of the risk—she’d probably made the right call.
I wandered down to the wardroom, where Mary Lou was reading an outdated copy of All Hands magazine, and I collapsed into the chair beside her.
“That bad, huh?” she asked.
“Can I ask you something?”
“Sure,” she said, then closed the magazine and tossed it on the table.
“How does Paul fit into all this?”
She gave me a funny look.
“I got it, I’m not supposed to know what happened down there. And neither are you. But for a second, let’s drop the act.”
She nodded. “Paul was meant to check that the shielding was in place.”
“And he didn’t?”
“He signed off on it. But it wasn’t there.”
“Isn’t that super-rudimentary?”
“He says he doesn’t know what happened. That he was distracted, and he assumed the team had gotten the setup right.”
It took a moment for those three little words to sink in. He was distracted.
“Oh my God,” I said.
“What?”
I leaned forward and put my head in my hands. “This is all my fault.”
“Of course it’s not your fault,” said Mary Lou dismissively.
“I told Paul I wanted a divorce.”
“When?”
“Two or three nights ago,” I said. “He was upset and came down here to sleep on the ship. That’s why his name wasn’t on your list at the pier.”
“He may very well have been upset, but you’re not responsible for his actions, any more than he is responsible for yours.”
I wondered for a brief moment if she was implying that she knew my actions lately hadn’t been stellar.
“Besides,” she said, “whatever you told Paul the other night wasn’t new information.”
I asked her to repeat herself.
She looked me straight in the eyes. “Naval Intelligence has people working this whole island, and if you don’t think they’re keeping an eye on Teo Manca, you’re not as smart as I thought you were.”
“You’re saying Paul knew about Teo and me?”
She nodded.
“They told him?”
“They had to. You were compromised, and they worried he might be unwittingly passing information along to La Spedizione without realizing it.”
I couldn’t help it; I let out a short laugh. No wonder Paul had taken the news so well.
“How long has he known?” I asked.
“A couple of months?” said Mary Lou.
Teo and I had only been seeing each other for a couple of months, which meant that Paul had known the whole time, or close to it.
“Who else knows?” I asked.
“Joe Stearns, Chuck Wilkinson, Jim, and anyone who’s been following Manca.”
Suddenly, it dawned on me. “Does that include Angela Bornemann?”
“What makes you think she’s involved?”
I thought of that hot June night in the garden with Teo and how the old man had said Buonasera not to a woman who had been walking toward him at a good clip—for Teo and I would have heard her coming—but to a woman who probably had been leaning against the garden wall, waiting for us to finish.
“She’s turned up in some unlikely places,” I said.
“I believe that,” said Mary Lou with a roll of her eyes.
“Is she Naval Intelligence or CIA?”
“Like I would tell you.” As an afterthought, she added, “If I knew, which I don’t.”
I shrugged.
“Whatever she is, I think we can agree that she’s not really here to teach a bunch of navy wives how to haggle.”
“Right,” I said, and because I figured Mary Lou was never going to be this loose-lipped again, I asked about Daniel Bornemann and Janine Greer. “Were they together?”
She gave me a pitying look. “Of course they were.”
“I didn’t know. I mean, I heard stuff. But I wasn’t sure.”
“The heart wants what it wants.”
“So Janine just followed Bill back to the States, and that was it? No more Daniel?”
“Something like that.”
I let out a low groan. “Why are we all such disasters?”
“Look,” said Mary Lou, trying to reassure me, “no one’s made a big deal out of the stuff with you and Manca. And for what it’s worth, Paul’s been a real gentleman about it.”
“What do you mean?”
“Jim offered to send you home, switch Paul’s assignment to unaccompanied, no dependents. But Paul insisted you be allowed to stay.”
“He did?”
Mary Lou nodded. “He said he knew you two had some stuff to work out, but he wanted to try.”
“Really?”
“That’s what Jim told me. I figured that meant Paul was going to go home and lay all his cards on the table. That you’d end things with Manca or not, but there’d be some sort of resolution.”
“That’s not what happened.”
“Apparently not.”
“Paul never said a word.”
“You think he was hoping the relationship would just run its course?” she asked.
“Maybe,” I said, but I had my own theory, which I couldn’t share.
From somewhere above our heads, we heard chopper blades.
Mary Lou looked at the ceiling. “That’ll be the medevac team.”
We stood and walked back to the infirmary, where Wilson and a corpsman were readying Bobby and Kenny for transport.
A few minutes later, a couple of medics arrived, and together they worked to get the two men transferred from hospital gurneys to stretchers.
Wilson gave the medics some final instructions, then nodded in Laura’s direction.
“Mrs. Carpenter has special permission from the commodore to accompany Lieutenant Carpenter to Naples.”
Mary Lou handed Laura her purse and the overnight bag I’d hastily packed for her, and we followed the transport team to the helicopter pad, where a gleaming SH-3 Sea King sat waiting for them.
While the stretchers were loaded into the chopper, Laura took Mary Lou’s hands in hers. “I won’t forget this,” she shouted. “Thank you.”
“You’ll be all right,” said Mary Lou, which was different than promising Bobby would be.
Laura turned to me, and I gave her a huge hug. “I’ll get to Naples as soon as I can.”
She nodded, then started to move toward the chopper, where a medic was waiting to help her inside. At the last minute, she turned and shouted at me, “Hey, Eileen!”
“Yeah?”
“You might be a shitty navy wife, but you’re a really good friend.”