Chương 5
“Sir, I’m her senior enlisted advisor.”
“And a witness.”
Caleb looked at Mara.
She gave him a small nod.
He stepped away from the vehicle.
“Don’t let them annoy you into doing anything stupid, ma’am.”
“Excellent advice from a man who once tried to fix a generator with a multitool.”
“It worked.”
“It caught fire.”
“Briefly.”
The door shut before she could answer.
At the clinic, a physician named Lieutenant Commander Park examined the reddened patch beneath Mara’s collarbone while a nurse sealed her uniform blouse in a collection bag.
Mara sat in a paper gown, furious at the vulnerability of bare knees and fluorescent lighting.
Park asked about nausea, blurred vision, numbness, breathing difficulty, medications, allergies, and what she had eaten.
“Coffee,” Mara said.
The nurse looked up.
“And half a banana.”
“Progress,” Park said.
Blood was drawn.
Her hands were washed and swabbed.
A second sample was taken from the skin where the medal had rested.
Park would not speculate about the residue.
“Could it make someone faint?”
“Many substances could.”
“Could this one?”
“I don’t know what this one is.”
“Everyone keeps saying that.”
“That’s because guessing in a medical setting is generally frowned upon.”
He peeled off his gloves.
“Your ECG looks normal.”
“So I can leave.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because you lost consciousness after a possible chemical exposure.”
“I did not lose consciousness.”
“You collapsed.”
“I remained aware.”
“Congratulations.”
Mara stared at him.
Park pulled a rolling stool toward the computer.
“You can dislike me after toxicology clears you.”
“I don’t dislike you.”
“You’re making the face.”
“I have one face.”
“That must save time.”
He turned to the screen.
Mara almost laughed, which irritated her further.
The nurse returned with hospital scrub pants and a sweatshirt because investigators had requested the rest of Mara’s uniform remain untouched until they could document it.
The sweatshirt was navy blue and two sizes too large.
Across the front, faded yellow letters advertised a base fun run from six years earlier.
Mara looked down at herself.
“I was decorated forty minutes ago.”
The nurse smiled.
“Now you’re dressed for Costco.”
There was no dignity available, so Mara put on the sweatshirt.
An NCIS special agent arrived twelve minutes later.
Special Agent Naomi Keene was perhaps forty, with short dark hair, a plain gray suit, and the expression of someone accustomed to being lied to before lunch.
She introduced herself, placed her credentials on the counter long enough for Mara to inspect them, and asked permission to record their conversation.
Mara agreed.
Keene began with the ceremony.
Not Daniel.
Not Thomas.
The ceremony.
“What time did you arrive?”
“Thirteen twenty.”
“Who saw you dress?”
“No one.”
“Where was your uniform before that?”
“In a garment bag in my office.”
“Locked?”
“The office, yes.”
“Who has access?”
“My deputy, administrative chief, facilities personnel with master access, probably more people than I’d like if you keep asking.”
Keene made a note.
“Did you leave the garment bag unattended after dressing?”
Mara reconstructed the afternoon.
The restroom.
The reception room.
A conversation with Shaw’s aide.
Her mother fixing a loose strand of Mara’s hair despite Mara asking her not to.
Caleb handing her a bottle of water.
A lieutenant dropping a stack of programs.
Mercer shaking her hand and saying, “Your father must be proud.”
At the time, Mara had assumed he meant Thomas because Thomas was standing nearby.
Now the sentence felt different.
“General Mercer spoke to me.”
Keene’s pen stopped.
“What did he say?”
Mara told her.
“Had you met him previously?”
“No.”
“Are you certain?”
“Yes.”
Keene studied her for a moment.
“Captain, I need to ask something that may sound accusatory.”
“Most useful questions do.”
“Could you have attached the medal yourself and forgotten?”
“No.”
“Could someone have attached it as a joke?”
“Not anyone who wants to remain employed.”
“Could your father?”
Mara paused.
Keene noticed.
“You’re considering it.”
“I’m considering whether he had physical access.”
“Did he?”
“At the reception, yes.”
“Did he touch your uniform?”
“I don’t remember.”
Keene wrote that down too.
Mara disliked seeing uncertainty converted into ink.
“Now tell me about Daniel Velez.”
“I can tell you exactly what I learned twenty minutes ago.”
She did.
Keene asked no dramatic questions afterward.
She simply wrote.
That restraint made Mara trust her more than reassurance would have.
“General Mercer said Jordan,” Keene said.
“Yes.”
“Your father said overseas.”
“Yes.”
“Your mother indicated the medal had supposedly been destroyed.”
“Yes.”
“And General Shaw recognized the design.”
“He reacted to it.”
“That isn’t quite the same thing.”
Mara looked at her.
Keene lifted one shoulder.
“Words matter when six people remember six different versions tomorrow.”
A knock interrupted them.
Another agent entered and handed Keene a clear evidence sleeve containing a printed photograph.
Keene read the note attached to it.
Her expression remained neutral, but she read it twice.
“What?”
Keene placed the photograph facedown.
“I need to verify something.”
“You brought it into an interview with me.”
“My colleague brought it into an interview.”
“Congratulations on the distinction.”
Keene almost smiled.
Then she turned the photograph over.
It showed four men standing in front of a beige concrete wall.
The image had the washed colors of late-nineties film.
Three wore civilian clothes.
One wore desert camouflage.
Mara recognized Thomas immediately.
He was thinner, clean-shaven, and wearing sunglasses, but it was him.
Beside him stood a younger man with the same narrow nose and heavy eyebrows.
Daniel.
Mara did not need anyone to identify him.
Family resemblance had done the work before reason could interfere.
The third man was Owen Mercer.
His hair was dark, his face leaner, but there was no mistaking him.
Mara leaned closer.
“Who’s the fourth?”
Keene looked at the attached note.
“Lieutenant Franklin Shaw.”
Mara stared at the photograph.
Shaw was smiling.
Mercer was not.
Daniel had one arm around Thomas’s shoulders.
Thomas looked annoyed by it.
They looked ordinary.
May you like
That was somehow unbearable.
On Daniel’s shirt, partly obscured by a fold of fabric, was the eagle-and-blade emblem from the medal.
