Chương 14
Sarah enlarged the image.
“This was a repair boathouse,” she said. “There’s a lift well through the center floor.”
Priya leaned closer.
“If the lower storage room was built from the old boat bay, there may be a vertical maintenance opening.”
“Can a team enter through the roof?”
“Too visible.”
“From beneath?”
“Water access under the dock may connect to the lift well.”
The tactical commander redirected divers to inspect.
Sarah’s phone vibrated.
A text from an unrecognized number appeared.
SHE MONITORS RADIO. EAST WALL SENSOR. LOWER DOOR WIRED.
Mercer.
A second message followed.
TELL CHLOE MARCUS TRIED TO STOP AFTER BALTIMORE. I DID NOT LET HIM.
Sarah showed Priya.
The number traced to Elena’s missing phone. Mercer had it or had accessed it briefly.
The message complicated Marcus without clearing him. He had tried to stop. Then he had continued.
A third text appeared.
ROOK HAS REMOTE TRIGGER. DEVICE IN HER COAT.
The task group had a possible position for Rook but no clean sightline.
Sarah typed: CAN YOU MOVE HER?
The reply took nearly a minute.
YES. COST UNKNOWN.
Sarah wrote: DO NOT ACT YET.
Three dots appeared, vanished, returned.
YOU ALWAYS WERE SLOW TO TRUST.
She stared at the sentence.
Then: GOOD.
Divers found the underwater opening. It was partially blocked by collapsed timber but passable for one person at a time. The lower door contained wiring consistent with an explosive device, though its size and function were unclear.
A direct assault might trigger it.
A sniper could not confirm Rook’s location.
The ten-minute deadline fell below four.
Sarah asked to approach the front under the stated demand.
Denied.
She argued that Rook expected it and might expose herself.
Denied again.
Then Mercer called the command line.
His voice came through clearly.
“Sarah, she wants your credentials.”
“I know.”
“You cannot bring them.”
“I know.”
“She will kill Elena.”
“Not if she still needs the source list.”
“She believes you can access it.”
“Can I?”
Mercer breathed painfully. “Not with your badge.”
“What else does she think I have?”
Silence.
Sarah understood.
“Your token,” she said.
Mercer had taken a hardware authentication device from the Fort Belvoir secure area Sunday. That explained the unexplained visit.
“Yes.”
“Where is it?”
“On me.”
Rook had brought him to access the source system remotely, but he needed Sarah’s biometric confirmation to complete the request.
Two compromised officers, each holding half of a protected process.
Mercer had designed the protection himself.
Rook’s voice sounded in the background. “Tell her to come.”
Mercer said, “Do not.”
A gunshot cracked through the phone and across the inlet almost simultaneously.
The line remained open.
Sarah heard Mercer fall.
Tactical officers reported no visible target.
Rook said, “Nine years of service, and he still thought refusal was a moral achievement.”
Sarah’s entire body went cold.
“Is he alive?”
“For the moment.”
“You need his token.”
“I have it.”
“You need his authentication.”
“Pain makes people flexible.”
“Not Daniel.”
“You know him less well than you believe.”
Sarah handed the phone to Priya and began removing the borrowed jacket.
“What are you doing?” Priya asked.
“Giving her what she expects.”
“No.”
“The divers need time to reach the lower room. Rook’s attention needs to move to the front.”
“You are not approaching alone.”
“I can approach visibly while a team shadows outside her sightline.”
“She has a gun and a trigger.”
“She also needs me alive long enough to authenticate.”
“Need changes quickly.”
“Yes.”
Priya grabbed Sarah’s arm. “This is not a decision you make because Mercer chose you seven years ago.”
Sarah looked at her hand.
Priya released it.
Sarah said, “I’m making it because Elena’s son is locked beneath a wired door, and Rook believes I am the only person who can complete the access.”
“That is why you are valuable to her. It is also why you are valuable here.”
“The team can continue without me. The boy cannot wait without us.”
The commander listened, rejected the first version, modified the second, and approved a controlled approach only after the divers confirmed position beneath the structure.
Sarah wore a concealed microphone and no weapon. A decoy credential wallet went in her breast pocket. The actual biometric system could not be accessed from the boathouse, but Rook might not know that until she attempted it.
Priya adjusted the microphone beneath Sarah’s collar.
“You have glass in your hair,” she said.
Sarah touched the back of her bun. A tiny fragment came loose and glittered in her palm.
“Thanksgiving keeps giving.”
Priya did not smile. “Do not improvise beyond the plan.”
“I rarely do.”
“That was almost insulting.”
“It was meant to reassure you.”
“It failed.”
Sarah walked alone along the service path.
The boathouse appeared beyond dead reeds, gray boards leaning toward dark water. Julia’s drawing had made it gentle. The real building smelled of mud, oil, and rotting wood.
Sarah stopped twenty feet from the front door.
“I’m here.”
The door opened.
Anna Rook wore the camel coat from the photograph. Up close, she looked older than Sarah expected, perhaps fifty, with pale hair cut to her jaw and a face that would have seemed pleasant in a grocery-store line. She held a pistol low against her thigh.
A small black device rested in her other hand.
Remote trigger.
“Turn around,” Rook said.
Sarah did.
“Lift your arms.”
She obeyed.
Rook searched her from behind with quick, practiced movements. She found the microphone immediately and tore it away.
“Your colleagues lack imagination.”
“They know I talk too much.”
Rook threw the microphone into the water.
Sarah heard Priya’s voice vanish from the tiny receiver hidden in her ear. Rook found that too and crushed it beneath her heel.
Now Sarah was alone.
The plan remained: keep Rook visible, delay, wait for the divers to signal through a disturbance beneath the east side. Without communications, Sarah would have to recognize the moment herself.
May you like
Rook removed the credential wallet from her pocket.
“This is not active.”
