1813 EDT

Rabb Residence

Washington, D.C.

“Mommmm!!”

Mac folded her arms, not budging. “You can wait ten more minutes.”

“But I’m starrr-ving!”

“Benjamin, how many times are we going to go through this? On the rare occasions when Dad doesn’t call and say he’s going to be late, we wait for him and we all eat dinner together. Standard procedure. Got it?”

“Yes.” That response was thrown off with the kind of long-suffering eye roll only an almost-eight-year-old could perform. Ben slunk off toward the couch, looking like he might just keel over from hunger. Soon, though, the sound of the garage door opening sent him off like a shot, eyes lighting up.

As Harm came through the door, he was accosted by a blur of dark hair and green fabric wrapped around his legs. “Nice to see you too, kiddo,” he greeted, tousling his son’s hair.

From the kitchen doorway, Mac cocked her head to the side, not letting on the fact that seeing those identical grins on the faces of the men in her life was a highlight of her daily routine. “Don’t be too flattered. He’s mostly excited because now we get to have dinner.”

“Thanks for raining on my parade.” Harm set down his briefcase and cover and shuffled across the room to kiss her, with Ben still attached to one leg. Glancing down, he smiled at Ben’s brand-new soccer jersey, marked with black letters across the back: RABB 10. “Hey, the uniforms came in!” He turned to his wife. “Where’s yours, Coach?”

Mac smiled and pointed toward the living room, where another jersey – marked COACH RABB – hung from the back of a chair. “And you, Number 10, need to take yours off before dinner,” she instructed Ben, prying him off his father’s leg. “There’s no way you’re going to get spaghetti sauce on it before the first game.”

Ben dutifully ran off to his bedroom to change, and Harm took advantage of the opportunity to greet Mac properly. She snaked her arms around his neck. “So how was your fifth-to-last day in the office?” she inquired.

“It sounds like a countdown clock when you put it like that.” They wandered into their bedroom, and Mac took a seat on the bed while Harm changed out of his uniform in favor of a T-shirt and jeans. “Something a little out-of-the-ordinary did happen, actually. A lieutenant requested that I look into the investigation of his flight mishap.”

Mac listened as he elaborated, surprised that a two-stripe had had the guts to contact a two-star, but not surprised that Harm had chosen not to delegate it. Their lives had changed in many ways over the past few years, but the fundamental aspects of his character and hers remained unwavering.

“So what’s your next move?” she asked.

“I had Gardner get the reports. I’ll take a look at them after –”

“Mommm! Daaaad!”

“– dinner,” he finished with a chuckle. “Never get between a growing boy and spaghetti night.”

“He’s going to be just like you – six feet tall by twelve years old.”

“God, I hope not. When I was a kid, clothes and shoes alone cost my mom a small fortune.”

They made their way back to the kitchen, where Ben’s animated description of his school picnic made dinner take twice as long as necessary, in spite of his earlier protestations of hunger. Mac cast the occasional glance at her husband across the table, observing as he and Ben batted questions and answers back and forth. Yes, the same man she’d first met nearly twenty years ago – twenty? Could that be right? – but different as well. More open, less guarded. Happier, she’d like to think. Noting the dusting of gray at his temples, beginning to creep slowly into the rest of his dark hair, she realized anew just how big a part of his life he would be leaving behind when he took off that uniform on Friday. Would he find it as difficult as she had to surrender that much of his identity?

Once Ben had gotten his cookie and scrambled off to the backyard to shoot at his mini-soccer goal, and after the table was cleared, Harm took his briefcase into the study. Mac followed him, settling into the overstuffed chair across from his desk with a book. “Mattie called earlier,” she commented as she slid her reading glasses on. “She said she and Rob would be happy to watch Ben while we’re in the Bahamas in September.” It was a combination tenth-anniversary/retirement trip, one they’d both been anticipating for some time. The only substantial time Harm had been able to get away from JAG in the past two years had been a week spent at Disney World with Ben. Mac suspected that not a few sailors and Marines would dearly love to know that a photo existed of the renowned Admiral Rabb wearing Mickey Mouse ears.

Ten years. They’d now been married longer than they’d spent dancing around each other. There was a strange sense of security in that.

“Great,” Harm responded, studying the file in front of him. “She’ll be at the ceremony, right?”

“Said she wouldn’t miss it for the world. She’s going to pick up Jen Friday morning.”

Just visible over the top of the file, Harm’s eyes narrowed. “Tell Jen she is expressly forbidden from going into labor in the office.”

“Harm, she’s got four weeks until her due date, and Bethesda’s right up the road.”

“Did that stop Harriet?”

“Point taken.”

They both read in companionable silence for a while, content to simply be near each other. Ben banged the door when he came back inside, heading for his bedroom and probably the video game console located there.

The crease in Harm’s brow was deepening with every page he read, until Mac finally spoke up. “Hon? What’ve you got?”

“A lot of circumstantial evidence, I’d say, if this were a legal proceeding. Which it isn’t, so that complicates matters.” Harm rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Only about half of Lieutenant Marshall’s aircraft was salvaged from the water. Since the point of impact was just barely out of the path of the Seahawk, some of the wreckage was pulled under by the ship as it passed. Fighters weren’t designed to float. Without being able to look at the actual flight control systems themselves, the whole thing’s a big game of ‘what if.’”

She knew his expressions, though, and could see that he didn’t consider this to be the end of the story. “But?”

He spread his hands. “But it cuts both ways, or at least it should. I don’t see how the board had enough evidence to label it pilot error, either. I know they can’t just leave an investigation open, but even with no disciplinary action recommended, placing it all on the pilot …”

There was a distant glimmer in his eyes which Mac hadn’t seen in a while, and it triggered a flare of concern. “Harm,” she began cautiously, “is there any way this will get resolved in the next four days?”

He met her gaze, understanding the implication. “I’m not going to go Don Quixote on you. As of Friday, I’ll no longer have any authority to pursue this, so one way or the other, it’ll be over.”

“Uh huh.” She wasn’t convinced. “Like everyone’s just going to stop taking your calls the moment after you hand over the flag? If you wanted to continue pursuing it, I have no doubt that you could find a way.”

“Such faith.” He lifted an eyebrow.

“Experience is the best teacher. I know that this is what you do best. I just want to make sure that you’re not taking this on as a way to hold on past Friday.”

Harm nodded, conceding the point. “I won’t keep dogging this all summer, Mac. I promise. Next week I start making up for all the late nights and the missed soccer games. I owe that to both you and Ben.”

“It’s not about owing us anything, Harm.” Mac rose and crossed the room to perch one hip on the side of the desk. “I remember how hard it was for me to get used to the idea of defining myself by something other than my uniform. I know it’s not quite the same situation, but I want to be sure you’re really okay with taking this next step.”

“Letting go, you mean?” It had been long enough, and they’d come to terms with enough of it, that phrases like that from their past no longer stung. Instead, they evoked memories of a winding but incredibly worthwhile journey. He reached over to capture her lithe fingers in his hand. “It’s going to be an adjustment, and I’d be lying if I said I knew how I was going to feel about it all next week or next month. But we’ve both learned to do a fair bit of letting go and moving on over the years. I think we’re getting the hang of it.”

It was a good answer, one which she rewarded by leaning across the desk to deliver a sweet, simple kiss … which was interrupted by an young voice exclaiming, “Ewwww!”

Mac smiled against her husband’s lips and, over her son’s objections, proceeded on course.

Tuesday

1138 EDT

JAG Headquarters

Falls Church, VA

The sun was brutally hot, beating down on the ranks of the newly-arrived officers in training, if they could call themselves that yet. He’d spent most of his previous summers on a Pennsylvania farm, in the Bahamas, and – once – in Southeast Asia. All of them had been hotter than this, most likely, but this one felt like a unique brand of torture.

“Welcome to Plebe Summer, ladies!” bellowed the midshipman who sauntered up and down the ranks as the plebes struggled with push-up after push-up. “Here’s where you find out that you’re not half as tough or smart or cool as you thought. A lot of you won’t make it through the summer, and plenty more will wash out before graduation. Look around – who’s it gonna be?”

“Do we get a vote?” muttered the plebe on Harm’s right side, blond and stocky. “’Cause I’m voting for Midshipman Jackass here, personally.”

There were a few snickers, which only grew as the daring plebe started whistling ‘If I Only Had a Brain.’ The middie – now nicknamed Jackass for all eternity in Harm’s mind – heard enough of the mild commotion to make an example of it. “Right, this is all a big game, isn’t it? Get off your asses and start running, punks!”

They dragged themselves up and headed for the track, where the whistler fell in alongside Harm. “John Keeter,” he introduced himself. “Jack.”

Harm nodded once as they continued. “Harmon Rabb. Harm.”

“I’ve been told that should be my middle name.” Jack flashed a grin. “Loosen up, man. It’s gonna be a long four years—”

“No kidding.”

“—but we get more senior every day, right? Next thing you know, the class of ’85 will all be getting our bars and our wings.”

Harm turned his head toward the other teen. “You want to fly?”

Jack’s grin grew wider. “Doesn’t everybody?”

On second thought, there was the possibility that this wouldn’t be completely intolerable.

“Sir, I have COMNAVAIRLANT on line one for you.”

“Thank you, Gardner.” Harm punched the button to activate the speakerphone. “They keeping you busy down there, Keet?”

“What’re you doing up so early, Rabb?” demanded Jack Keeter good-naturedly. “Don’t you Beltway types sleep until noon?”

How a couple of goof-offs like them had ended up in positions of leadership in the Navy, Harm would never know. The current commander of the Naval Air Forces, Atlantic Fleet, Keeter had always had the look –and the skill – of a fast-burner, but on occasion he’d managed to make Harm look positively obedient by comparison. “Can’t afford to miss a moment, my friend. I’m a short-timer, remember?”

“How could I forget? I’m planning on embarrassing the hell out of you at your retirement bash.” Keeter intended to stick around in uniform for another couple of years; he’d cited alimony payments to his two ex-wives as his rationale, but Harm suspected that he just hadn’t found anything else he’d rather be doing just yet. “What can I do for you this fine day?”

“You can tell me what you know about the Class A Super Hornet splash off the Seahawk last month.”

He envisioned Keeter’s brow furrowing. “How’d that cross your radar? It was wrapped up weeks ago with no judicial action.”

“Humor me. I understand they couldn’t salvage all of the aircraft?”

“There wasn’t a lot to go on, no. The flight data recorder was damaged when the carrier ran into the wreckage, so the techs were only able to download data from the two sorties preceding the mishap sortie. That data showed nothing unusual, and the maintenance records show no flight control squawks during the two months leading up to the mishap.”

“So the conclusion was pilot error?”

There was a hesitation on the line. “Harm, you know what the Hornet can and can’t do.”

“I know what the original Hornet can and can’t do. I’ve never flown a Super Hornet, and despite what people say, it’s not the same bird.”

“Yeah, yeah. My point is, there isn’t a control failure mode that can produce the attitude that aircraft entered – an immediate ninety-degree roll, unstable in both pitch and yaw.”

“You mean there’s no known failure mode,” countered Harm. “Nothing against your investigators, Keet, because my JAGs obviously agreed with them, but this looks a lot like a declaration of guilty until proven innocent.”

“Which would be more significant if the pilot had been disciplined for this, but he wasn’t, and he’s off flight status already. Do I like the idea that there could be a mechanical cause that we can’t find? Of course not. But there’s only so much you can do with a few pieces of twisted metal and some lines of data.”

Harm rubbed at his jaw. “So Lieutenant Marshall takes one for the team?”

Keeter’s voice lowered. “I saw the kid’s X-rays, buddy. His flying days are over, no matter what the board says.”

That tweaked a nerve Harm had been trying to ignore for a while now. “We can’t assume that kind of situation can never change, can we?” he remarked coolly.

That sobered the conversation quickly. “Marshall is not you. There was no medical reason why he should have lost control of that jet. I understand what you’re trying to do here, but we can’t just reopen investigations like this. The resources involved have to be drawn from somewhere, and pulling board members out of their jobs with the fleet so that they can stare at the same information all over again is not productive.”

“I’m not suggesting the investigation be reopened. What I am planning to do is advise Lieutenant Marshall that he has the right to appeal his punishment.”

His old friend sounded convinced that he’d lost his mind. “Did you miss the part where I said he wasn’t punished? Yes, there’s a note in his record, which could theoretically mess with his flying status, but isn’t that a moot point now?”

“Maybe. But if the case managed to bring a technical deficiency to light, that note would disappear, and you’d have an answer without having to preemptively ground any of your jets for an inspection.”

“And I suppose you know just the lawyer for the job?”

Harm smiled. “As a matter of fact, I do.”

He heard Keeter’s unenthusiastic sigh. “Do you have any idea what kind of image this would project? The JAG himself disputing the findings of an accident investigation board? It’d make the Navy look like a bunch of bickering kids.”

“It would, which is why I’m not talking about myself.”

There was a pause on the line while his meaning became clear. “Aha. Not a bad move, my friend.”

“I knew you’d think so.”

1427 EDT

Same location

Ryan Marshall stepped into the conference room cautiously, unsure what he would find or what his purpose there was to be. He’d gotten a call that morning from the Judge Advocate General’s yeoman, requesting his presence at JAG Headquarters to discuss the status of his case. That had sounded positive, but puzzling, since he wasn’t sure he technically had a case.

Or maybe Admiral Rabb had called him here to read him the riot act in person for so thoroughly overstepping his bounds.

The person sitting at the table, however, was not the admiral. Instead, it was a dark-haired woman in a tailored civilian suit. She stood up and extended her hand with a smile. “Lieutenant Marshall?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I’m Sarah Rabb. My husband suggested that you might need some outside legal counsel in order to appeal the report of the accident board.”

Realization clicked in, a little belatedly. “You were a JAG too, right, ma’am?”

“I teach these days, so I don’t practice much anymore, but yes. I’ll be blunt with you, Lieutenant: my husband is set to retire three days from now, and I don’t want this hanging over his head after he hands over the flag Friday afternoon. I will say, though, that I don’t just want this resolved – I want it resolved correctly. From what Harm has been able to tell me, I believe culpability was misplaced in this investigation, but I don’t have the clearance to look at the report unless or until I’m your attorney. And if you make the decision to go forward with this, I need to remind you that any new findings could hurt you just as easily as they could help you. You’re risking disciplinary action if you decide to proceed.”

Ryan set his jaw. “With all due respect, ma’am, that would only be true if I had done something wrong. I didn’t.”

“So you do want to appeal the finding against you.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

She nodded curtly. “Then have a seat, and let’s start going through what happened.”

He explained every detail he could remember about the day of the mishap, from the moment he started his preflight checks to the instant he felt the slap of the salt water against his face. Mrs. Rabb – she told him to call her ‘Mac,’ but since she looked a little like his mom’s younger sister, that wasn’t likely to happen anytime soon – asked all the right questions, and it was clear that she had a wealth of experience in similar cases.

A petty officer interrupted them briefly to drop off a stack of files: the maintenance reports on his aircraft and the board’s report on the mishap. They’d only been exploring those for a few minutes when Mrs. Rabb pushed a file across the table at him.

“The Seahawk’s maintenance database shows some work done on your aircraft a couple of weeks before the mishap. Do you recognize that name?”

Ryan squinted at the digitized signature. “Ma’am, that’s Bradley, one of our environmental and electronics techs. I remember this – they were messing with the ECS, the environmental control system.”

“Messing with it how?”

“It wasn’t anything out of the ordinary, ma’am. Are you familiar with aircraft ECS at all?”

Mrs. Rabb took off her reading glasses and tapped the frames against her notebook. “Air is bled off from the compressor stages of the engine and run through a heat exchanger to cool it down before it’s sent on to cool the cockpit and the avionics. That’s all I know.”

It was more than most people knew, and he nodded, pleased. “Yes, ma’am. The heat exchangers tend to show their age after a while. They’re hard to keep at peak effectiveness. The system diverts more air to the avionics than the cockpit, because although I can still fly when it’s a little warm, the electronic equipment isn’t as accommodating. I wasn’t getting quite enough airflow in the cockpit, so they replaced some of the valves and the controller. That kind of thing happens a lot.”

“The controller?” The lawyer pursed her lips, thinking. “If for some reason the avionics were getting too hot as well, is it possible that an overheat situation could have caused the flight control problems you encountered?”

“I’m not sure, ma’am, but I know we have overheat sensors in a lot of the equipment bays, so I should have gotten a caution light if that was the case.”

“All right. I have a contact at NAVAIR who should be able to help me get some more information on the Hornet’s flight systems. I’m going to spend the rest of today going over this with her. I’ll keep you updated on what I find out.”

Ryan took that as a subtle dismissal and rose from his chair. “Thank you, ma’am. I don’t know what your normal rate is, but—”

“Consider this a pro bono case. I’m as interested in the truth as anyone.”

“Yes, ma’am. Thank you again.”

She was already tapping keys on her cell phone as he neared the doors, and just before stepping out of the room, he heard her say, “Kara, it’s Mac. I have a major favor to ask you…”

Commercial break …

Public service announcement: Friends don’t let friends marry Tom Cruise.

Part 3