Chương 3
For a few seconds, I did not know where I was.
Then the memory returned.
The parking lot.
The blood.
The men.
Jonathan Cole.
I grabbed the nearest sweatshirt and walked toward the door.
When I looked through the peephole, I saw Marines standing outside.
Not one.
Not two.
Eight.
My first thought was that something had happened to him.
My second thought was that somehow, despite everything, I was in trouble.
I opened the door carefully.
The man in front stepped forward.
He was older, maybe in his forties, with a face that looked like it had spent years refusing to show exhaustion.
“Lieutenant Emily Carter?”
“Yes.”
“Gunnery Sergeant Daniel Hayes.”
He showed his identification.
“Colonel Cole’s command.”
My stomach tightened.
“Is he alive?”
For the first time, his expression softened.
“He made it through surgery.”
The relief hit harder than I expected.
My hand gripped the edge of the door.
“Okay.”
I realized I had said it out loud.
Just one word.
A very small word for the amount of fear that had disappeared.
Hayes looked behind me into my apartment.
Not in a suspicious way.
More like he was trying to understand the person standing in front of him.
“You helped him last night.”
It was not a question.
“I was there.”
“That is not what I said.”
I looked at him.
He glanced at the other Marines.
None of them spoke.
That bothered me.
A group of people who had spent their lives around danger usually did not stand silently unless they were waiting for something.
“Why are you here?”
Hayes took a breath.
“Because Colonel Cole woke up forty-three minutes ago.”
“And?”
“And the first thing he asked was whether you were alive.”
I did not know what to say to that.
So I said the first thing that came to mind.
“That seems dramatic.”
One of the younger Marines almost smiled.
Hayes did not.
“He does not usually ask about people.”
“That sounds like a personal issue.”
“It is.”
The answer surprised me.
It was not defensive.
It was almost tired.
Before I could respond, the sound of tires approaching made everyone turn.
A black SUV stopped near the curb.
Two people stepped out.
The first was a woman wearing a dark suit, carrying herself with the kind of confidence that came from being used to rooms changing when she entered them.
The second was a Marine officer with a folder under his arm.
The Marines outside my apartment immediately became more formal.
I looked at Hayes.
“Who are they?”
He lowered his voice.
“People who normally do not show up at someone’s house before sunrise.”
“That is not an answer.”
“No.”
His eyes stayed on the approaching officers.
“It is not.”
The woman stopped a few feet away.
“Lieutenant Carter?”
“Yes.”
“I’m Deputy Director Sarah Whitmore.”
I waited.
She seemed to expect that name to mean something.
It did not.
“That is nice.”
The younger Marine looked down quickly, hiding a reaction.
Whitmore studied me.
“You are not what I expected.”
“That makes two of us.”
A silence followed.
Not an uncomfortable one.
A careful one.
The kind where everyone was measuring what they could say.
Whitmore looked at the apartment behind me.
Then back at me.
“Colonel Cole told us you saved his life.”
I shook my head.
“I kept pressure on a wound until professionals arrived.”
“That is a modest description.”
“It is an accurate one.”
Her expression changed slightly.
Not approval.
Something closer to recognition.
“Colonel Cole also told us you refused to leave even after he warned you.”
“He was injured.”
“That was not his concern.”
“Then his priorities were strange.”
For the first time, Hayes looked amused.
Barely.
But enough that I noticed.
Whitmore opened the folder.
“I need to ask you about something that happened before the attack.”
I looked at the folder.
“What happened?”
“We are not sure yet.”
“That is not comforting.”
“It is not meant to be.”
The honesty caught me off guard.
Most officials I had met knew how to make uncertainty sound professional.
Whitmore did not bother.
She pulled out a photograph.
She did not hand it to me immediately.
She watched my reaction first.
That bothered me.
“What is it?”
“A vehicle.”
“Why are you showing me a vehicle?”
“Because you were the last civilian to see Colonel Cole before he disappeared from his security detail.”
The word stopped me.
“Disappeared?”
Whitmore nodded once.
“He was missing for eighteen hours before you found him.”
I looked past her toward the street.
The morning suddenly felt colder.
“You said he was injured.”
“He was.”
“You said he was attacked.”
“He was.”
“Then why does it sound like you are investigating him?”
Nobody answered.
That was the answer.
I looked back at the photograph.
A dark sedan.
Nothing special.
Nothing memorable.
Except I had seen it before.
Not last night.
Earlier.
The day before.
Parked outside my base.
I felt my expression change before I could stop it.
Whitmore noticed.
“Lieutenant?”
I swallowed.
“That car.”
Her voice became quieter.
“What about it?”
“I have seen it before.”
The Marines around me became still.
“Where?”
I looked at the photograph again.
Then at the people standing outside my home.
And for the first time since the parking lot, I understood something that made my stomach drop.
Jonathan Cole had not simply crossed my path by accident.
Someone had already been watching mine.
Whitmore noticed the hesitation before I spoke.
That was something I had always disliked about experienced investigators.
They rarely needed to interrupt.
They just waited until silence did the work for them.
I looked down at the photograph again.
The sedan was ordinary.
That was probably the point.
A black vehicle with tinted windows did not attract attention near a military installation.
There were hundreds of vehicles that looked almost identical.
May you like
But I remembered this one because of the small damage on the rear bumper.
A thin white scrape that looked like someone had tried to hide it with a cheap repair.
