Chương 3
“Embarrassing?”
Mara watched Shaw’s jaw tighten.
Mercer lowered his voice, but she still heard him.
“You know exactly what I mean.”
“No,” Shaw said.
“I want you to tell me.”
Mercer looked past him at the crowd.
“Not here.”
That was the first moment Mara became certain the medal meant something to him too.
Shaw seemed to reach the same conclusion.
He stepped between Mercer and the stage exit.
“You recognized it.”
“I recognized an old design.”
“What design?”
Mercer said nothing.
Thomas closed his eyes.
Evelyn looked from one man to the other, and panic gave way to something colder.
“Thomas.”
Her husband opened his eyes.
“Please don’t.”
“Twenty-three years.”
“Evelyn.”
“Twenty-three years, and you’re standing here looking at a Marine general like you’re both waiting for the other one to lie first.”
Thomas flinched.
Mara wanted to go to her mother, but the corpsman was insisting she remain seated until transport arrived.
The dizziness had mostly passed.
In its place came a hard clarity that she distrusted because anger often felt like clarity at first.
She looked at Caleb.
“Who was behind me before I fell?”
“A lot of people.”
“Who got close enough to touch my uniform?”
His eyes moved over the hall.
“During the reception line?”
“After.”
“You shook hands with General Shaw, General Mercer, Colonel Pierce, Sergeant Major Hanley.”
“My parents.”
“Your mother hugged you.”
“My father didn’t.”
Caleb considered that.
“There were two staff people moving award cases.”
“Names?”
“I know one.”
“Find the other.”
“Ma’am, NCIS is going to tell us not to conduct our own investigation.”
“I’m not conducting anything.”
“You’re using the voice you use immediately before conducting something.”
Despite herself, Mara nearly smiled.
Then she noticed Mercer watching them.
Not casually.
Watching.
When their eyes met, he turned away.
Installation security arrived through the side doors.
The senior military police officer spoke briefly with Shaw and began separating the immediate witnesses from the rest of the audience.
Whatever remained of the ceremony was over.
Families gathered coats and purses while Marines whispered in tight groups.
A little boy in a miniature dress-blue jacket began crying because his father would not let him retrieve a dropped toy from beneath a chair.
Someone’s phone rang with a bright pop song and was silenced almost instantly.
Ordinary sounds persisted with insulting ease.
Mara watched her mother stand three feet from Thomas without touching him.
They had always touched.
A hand at the small of the back, fingers on a wrist, knees bumping beneath restaurant tables.
Even when they were angry, they occupied space like people accustomed to belonging together.
Now there was air between them.
Mara hated Thomas for putting it there before she knew what he had done.
That frightened her almost as much as the medal.
The corpsman checked her blood pressure again.
“Still elevated.”
“I’m at a family event.”
He glanced around the disrupted hall.
“Technically.”
Shaw approached Mara.
“Captain, you’re going to the clinic.”
“Yes, sir.”
“After that, you speak to NCIS.”
“Yes, sir.”
His eyes settled on Thomas.
“And until we know what happened, nobody leaves the installation.”
Mercer came up behind him.
“You don’t have authority to detain civilians indefinitely.”
“I said until we know what happened.”
“You should be careful how you phrase orders in a room full of phones.”
Shaw turned.
“Are you giving me legal advice now?”
“I’m giving you common sense.”
“No, Owen.”
Shaw’s voice dropped.
“You’re trying to slow this down.”
Mercer stared at him.
For the first time, the sternness left his face.
What replaced it was not guilt.
It looked closer to dread.
Thomas saw it too.
“Don’t,” he said.
Mercer’s gaze shifted to him.
“You should have stayed away.”
Evelyn inhaled sharply.
Mara rose before the corpsman could stop her.
“Stayed away from what?”
Neither man answered.
Mara crossed the space between them.
Her knees were weak, and the white belt around her waist suddenly felt too tight, but she kept moving until she stood directly in front of Thomas.
“Dad, look at me.”
He did.
“If somebody put that medal on me because of you, I need to know now.”
His eyes reddened.
“That’s exactly why you don’t.”
“That isn’t your decision.”
“It used to be.”
“When?”
Thomas glanced at Evelyn.
She shook her head once, slowly, as if warning him against whatever answer he was considering.
Mara caught the movement.
“What does Mom know?”
“Nothing,” Evelyn said.
Too quickly.
Mara turned toward her.
The betrayal was small compared with whatever larger thing stood in the room with them, but it landed more cleanly.
“Don’t do that.”
Evelyn pressed her lips together.
“Do what?”
“Answer before he does.”
“Mara—”
“Do you recognize the medal?”
“No.”
Thomas looked at her.
Evelyn saw him looking.
Her face changed.
“You told me it was destroyed.”
The sentence emptied the air around them.
Thomas whispered her name.
Mara heard Caleb swear under his breath.
Shaw went utterly still.
Mercer stepped backward.
It was the first major truth Mara had received all afternoon, and it answered almost nothing.
Her mother had seen the medal before.
Her father had told her it no longer existed.
Both had lied to Mara within the last minute.
The bag containing the decoration rested on a folding chair six feet away, guarded now by a military police sergeant who looked as though he wished somebody else had been assigned the task.
Mara stared at the folded paper taped to the medal’s back.
“Open it.”
The sergeant shook his head.
“Ma’am, we need investigators to process it.”
“It was attached to my uniform.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“It may tell us who put it there.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“So open it.”
“No, ma’am.”
Caleb leaned close.
“He’s right.”
“I know.”
That made her angrier.
Thomas moved toward her.
“Mara, listen to me.”
She stepped away.
His hand stopped in midair.
“You don’t get to ask me for trust right now.”
May you like
“I’m asking you to leave this alone.”
“You just made my point.”
