Chương 7
Diane stepped inside.
Nobody had invited her.
An MP appeared behind her looking deeply unhappy.
“Ma’am, I asked you to remain—”
“I heard you.”
Diane closed the door in his face.
She was still wearing the pale gray dress she had chosen for her husband’s retirement.
One pearl earring was missing.
I had never seen Diane Wade without both earrings when she left the house.
She looked at Mercer.
“Where is my daughter?”
“Being interviewed.”
“About what?”
“We’re still establishing that.”
“That phrase has been used on me six times in twenty minutes.”
Her voice remained quiet.
“It has not improved with repetition.”
Mercer pulled out a chair.
“Mrs. Wade, please sit.”
“No.”
She looked at me.
“Emma, what did Lauren do?”
“I don’t know yet.”
“You know something.”
“Yes.”
Diane pressed her lips together.
“Tell me what you can.”
Mercer began to object.
I lifted a hand.
“Lauren was communicating with a man connected to the person who accessed protected information about me.”
Diane stared.
“On purpose?”
“We don’t know.”
“She wouldn’t.”
I said nothing.
Diane caught the silence.
“She can be spoiled.”
Her voice tightened.
“She can be mean.”
Mercer glanced away.
Diane ignored him.
“She can be vain and careless and she has spent half her life trying to impress her father, but she is not—”
Her voice broke before she finished.
I moved toward her.
She held up one hand.
“Don’t comfort me yet.”
I stopped.
That was fair.
Diane took a breath.
“What did Harold do?”
Mercer answered.
“He gave Voss identifying information about Emma.”
“For what?”
“He says he wanted to verify her background.”
Diane laughed once.
A dry, exhausted sound.
“No.”
Mercer watched her.
“No?”
“He wanted dirt.”
The directness surprised all of us.
Diane finally sat.
“He has hated being unable to explain Emma.”
She looked at me.
“You bothered him because you never tried to impress him.”
“I did try.”
“Not in the way he understands.”
That was probably true.
Diane folded her hands in her lap.
“He believes people tell you what they are by what they want from you.”
She looked toward the closed door.
“You never wanted anything.”
“I wanted him to stop treating me like a contaminant.”
“You didn’t ask him for it.”
“No.”
“Exactly.”
Her eyes filled but did not spill.
“So he decided your indifference was arrogance.”
Mercer leaned against the table.
“When did he begin asking questions?”
Diane’s expression changed.
“A few months ago.”
“How many?”
“Constantly.”
“Why then?”
She looked at me.
“Because Lauren told him she had met someone who said Emma wasn’t who she claimed.”
I felt a pressure behind my ribs.
“What exactly did Lauren say?”
“That a recruiter she’d met through work knew people in Washington.”
Diane rubbed one palm with the opposite thumb.
“She said he joked that Michael had married a ghost.”
Mercer and Shaw exchanged a look.
“When?” I asked.
“March.”
Four months.
Plenty of time to turn curiosity into certainty.
“What else?”
Diane hesitated.
“Harold became obsessed after that.”
“With what?”
“Your travel.”
I sat slowly.
Diane continued.
“He wrote down dates you missed family events.”
I looked at Mercer.
He had gone completely still.
“What dates?”
“I don’t know.”
“Think.”
“Emma.”
“Diane, please.”
She closed her eyes.
“Thanksgiving three years ago.”
That trip had been domestic and harmless.
“A weekend in May.”
Which May.
I waited.
“Two years ago.”
My breathing changed.
Mercer heard it.
“So did Kessler.”
I ignored him.
“What else?”
“Michael’s birthday.”
The date hit harder than the others.
I had been in Cyprus under a name that no longer existed.
The operation had been one of Raven Nine’s last surviving fragments.
Only eleven people had known I was there.
“Did Harold give those dates to Voss?”
“I don’t know.”
Shaw was already typing.
“His messages show attachments we haven’t decrypted yet.”
I stood.
“Get the dates.”
“We are.”
“Now.”
“Emma.”
Mercer stepped into my path.
I stopped inches from him.
“If those dates were transmitted, Kessler doesn’t just have my current identity.”
“I know.”
“He can cross-reference old operational windows.”
“I know.”
“He can identify other people.”
Mercer’s face hardened.
“I know.”
That finally silenced me.
The danger had spread beyond Michael.
Beyond the Wades.
Beyond my house in Alexandria.
People I had not spoken to in years could become visible because a retired general disliked his daughter-in-law.
A knock came at the door.
Shaw opened it.
The investigator outside whispered to her.
She turned toward us.
“Lauren admits sending the marriage license.”
Diane closed her eyes.
“What else?”
Shaw’s gaze found mine.
“She also sent Kessler photographs from your wedding.”
I frowned.
“Our wedding?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“She says he told her he was researching military families for an executive recruitment profile.”
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“No.”
Shaw paused.
“There is one photograph he asked for specifically.”
My pulse slowed.
“Which one?”
“The group picture outside the courthouse.”
I could see it immediately.
Michael beside me.
Two friends from his unit.
Diane, who had flown out despite Harold’s refusal.
And behind us, slightly out of focus, a man wearing sunglasses and an ill-fitting gray suit.
Collins.
He had attended for twelve minutes because I had made him promise not to miss it.
Mercer saw my face.
“Who was in the picture?”
I looked at him.
“Someone Kessler believed was dead.”
Mercer closed his eyes for half a second.
“Collins?”
“Yes.”
Shaw looked between us.
“Who is Collins?”
“Someone who should not be connected to Emma by any public record,” Mercer said.
Diane stared at me.
“Was he at your wedding?”
“For twelve minutes.”
“Why twelve?”
“Because he hated weddings.”
That slipped out before I could stop it.
Michael would have smiled at that once.
The thought made my chest tighten.
Shaw turned back to the investigator at the door.
“Get the photograph.”
He disappeared.
Mercer looked at me.
“When did Collins relocate?”
“Five years ago.”
“Still Virginia?”
“No.”
I shook my head.
“Not anymore.”
May you like
“Where?”
“I don’t know his current residence.”
