Chương 16
Bell looked at me as if asking whether this was normal.
“Extremely.”
My father muttered, “You have no idea.”
For the first time since dawn, Harper smiled.
It lasted less than a second.
It was enough.
Keene turned to me.
“You’re staying.”
“I figured.”
“You also need to make a decision.”
“What kind?”
“Command wants to place you on protective administrative status until we understand whether David’s contingency channel was exposed through your household.”
I stared at her.
“That sounds suspiciously like being grounded.”
“It is more paperwork than grounding.”
“That’s worse.”
A corner of her mouth moved.
Then she became serious again.
“You won’t deploy.”
I looked toward the kitchen window.
The vehicles outside reflected pale morning light.
Yesterday I had buried my husband.
This morning I had expected to return to duty because work was the one structure left that still made sense.
Now even that had been removed.
“When?”
“We’ll reassess after the initial review.”
“I hate that sentence.”
“I know.”
My father appeared beside us.
“She’s pregnant.”
I turned.
“Dad.”
He ignored me.
“Does that matter to any of you?”
Keene looked at him.
“Yes.”
“Good.”
I stared at him.
He folded his arms.
“What?”
“You spent breakfast trying to put me in a garage.”
His face fell.
“That sounded worse than it did in my head.”
“It was also worse in reality.”
He rubbed his forehead.
“I deserve that.”
“Yes.”
Keene looked away, perhaps generously.
Within twenty minutes, Bell left with Harper and my mother.
My father stayed because someone needed to be at the house and because, for once, he did not assume that someone was me.
The turkey continued cooking.
He checked it every nine minutes despite knowing nothing about turkey.
I sat at the kitchen table with David’s letter inside a clear evidence sleeve Bell had allowed me to keep after photographing it.
Outside, agents moved through the garage.
My father placed a plate in front of me.
Scrambled eggs.
I looked up.
He shrugged.
“Angry Claire eats.”
I laughed.
Then I ate.
By noon, the house smelled like Thanksgiving.
By one, nobody had touched the turkey.
By two, Bell called.
They had entered Julian’s downtown office under warrant.
The office belonged on paper to a consulting company registered in Delaware.
Inside were three workstations, two empty filing cabinets, several encrypted drives, and a shredder still holding strips of documents.
No Malik.
No other employee.
But there was enough financial material to tie Julian’s company to payments routed through the same subcontractor flagged in Black Ridge.
Not enough for conclusions.
Enough for questions.
Julian remained with counsel.
He had stopped answering them.
Harper came home at three with my mother.
She walked in without her purse.
Bell had retained it temporarily because the key card had become evidence.
Harper looked around the kitchen.
“Did you eat?”
“Eggs.”
Dad looked vindicated.
She rolled her eyes.
That ordinary expression felt precious.
My mother took the turkey out.
It was dry.
No one cared.
We ate at four-thirty because none of us knew what else to do.
There were five place settings.
Julian’s plate remained in the cabinet.
David’s chair remained empty.
My father started to sit there out of habit.
Then he stopped.
He moved to another chair without saying anything.
I noticed.
So did my mother.
No one commented.
Halfway through dinner, Harper put down her fork.
“I’m leaving him.”
My mother inhaled.
Dad stared at his potatoes.
I looked at Harper.
“You don’t have to decide tonight.”
“Yes, I do.”
“No.”
She frowned.
I continued.
“You have to decide what you do tonight.”
She stared at me.
“That sounds like something David would say.”
“It is.”
He used to irritate me with that line whenever I tried to solve six months of life before breakfast.
Harper looked at the empty chair.
“I wish I’d known him better.”
That sentence hurt in a different way.
“So do I.”
She looked at me.
“You knew him better than anyone.”
“I knew parts.”
The truth settled gently between us.
Later, after my parents went upstairs and Harper fell asleep on the couch, Keene returned.
She carried no case this time.
Just a folder.
I met her in the kitchen.
“Good news or bad?”
“Neither.”
“I hate those most.”
She sat across from me.
“The D-17 repository opened.”
I stopped breathing for a second.
“And?”
“There was material.”
“How much?”
“Enough.”
“From David?”
“Yes.”
I pressed my palms flat against the table.
Keene continued carefully.
“He documented discrepancies in mission reporting, access anomalies, and communications involving Malik.”
“Was Malik the leak?”
“We don’t know.”
“Julian?”
“We don’t know.”
I closed my eyes.
Keene waited.
“What do you know?”
“That David believed the mission package had been altered.”
My eyes opened.
“Altered how?”
“Route timing.”
The words struck hard.
“What happened on the mission?”
“I still can’t give you all of it.”
“Mara.”
“I know.”
Her voice softened.
“But I can tell you this.”
She leaned forward.
“David’s team reached a location earlier than the supporting intelligence indicated they would.”
My mouth went dry.
“They were expected.”
“We believe someone may have known the real timing.”
“Did David survive the initial contact?”
Keene hesitated.
That hesitation answered before she did.
“Yes.”
For seven months, I had pictured something fast because the official wording had allowed me to.
Killed during operations.
No details.
No body viewing.
Delayed funeral.
Classification.
All of it had left blank spaces I filled with mercy.
“How long?”
“Claire.”
“How long was he alive?”
“We don’t know precisely.”
“Hours?”
She looked at me.
“Yes.”
I stood so quickly the chair scraped backward.
I walked to the sink.
For a while, I could not feel my hands.
Keene did not follow.
Good.
If she had touched me, I might have broken something.
Finally I turned.
“Did he suffer?”
Her face changed.
“I don’t know.”
I hated her for not lying.
I loved her for not lying.
May you like
Both feelings existed at once.
“Did he send D-17 after the attack?”
