Chương 2
“Real problem?” Hargrove asked.
“Possible credential duplication.”
“Yours?”
“Yes.”
His expression did not change, but he drew one quiet breath through his nose.
“Anything you need?”
“Keep the room steady.”
“That I can do.”
He turned toward the guests.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” he said, with the faint irritation of a host whose dinner had been delayed by bad manners, “please sit. The quartet will begin again when they locate the measure Mrs. Whitmore frightened out of them.”
A few nervous laughs broke through the room. The admiral’s dry tone gave everyone permission to move. Chairs scraped again. People sat, whispering. One of the musicians adjusted his music stand and murmured something to the trombonist, who shook his head with a smile he could not quite control.
Hargrove leaned closer to Evelyn.
“If there’s a breach, we move the principals first.”
“I know.”
“You were looking at your mother-in-law before the system alarm.”
“I know that too.”
His eyes rested on her for a moment.
“Handle the room. Don’t handle the family.”
Before she could answer, Nolan returned.
“Service corridor team has one individual detained near the loading access,” he said. “Male, civilian clothes, event credential displaying your name.”
Frank, seated twenty feet away, turned his head sharply.
Helen did not.
Evelyn saw that.
“Does he have a weapon?” she asked.
“Initial check is negative.”
“Device?”
“Camera, phone, small document pouch.”
“Who authorized his entry?”
“Unknown.”
“Take him to the service office. Two officers. Preserve everything. No questioning beyond identity and immediate safety.”
“Yes, Captain.”
As Nolan moved away, Evelyn looked toward Helen again.
Her mother-in-law had lowered her gaze to the diamonds around her wrist. She rotated the bracelet once, then stopped.
Frank followed Evelyn’s line of sight.
His mouth opened.
Nothing came out.
The quartet started again, softly and without confidence.
Evelyn had spent twenty-two years learning the difference between panic and information. Panic demanded motion. Information demanded order. She checked the ballroom entrances, the location of the security teams, the honor table, the civilian staff gathered near the kitchen doors, and the faces of people who were trying not to look frightened.
Only then did she look at her husband.
“What did you give her?”
Frank’s lips parted.
“Evelyn—”
“What did you give your mother?”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
It was a bad lie, made worse by the fact that he looked toward Helen while saying it.
Evelyn felt something inside her become very still.
“Stay at the table,” she said.
“Please.”
She walked away before he could touch her.
The detained man’s name was Daniel Mercer.
He sat in the service office between two military police officers, hands visible on the table, coat folded over the back of a chair. He was in his fifties, lean, with thinning blond hair and the tired watchfulness of someone who had made a career out of noticing doors other people forgot to lock.
On the table lay a professional camera, a phone sealed temporarily in a clear evidence pouch, a leather document case, and a laminated event credential bearing Evelyn’s photograph and rank.
The credential was good enough to pass a hurried visual inspection.
It was not good enough to survive the electronic system.
Evelyn stood inside the doorway and examined it without touching anything.
Mercer looked at her white uniform, then at her face.
“I assume,” he said, “you’re the real Captain Whitmore.”
One of the officers told him not to speak.
Evelyn entered and closed the door.
“Has he been advised not to make statements?”
“Yes, Captain.”
“Good.”
Mercer gave a weary laugh.
“That answer your question?”
“I haven’t asked you one.”
“You’re going to.”
“Not tonight.”
His gaze moved to the card on the table.
“I wasn’t there to hurt anybody.”
Evelyn said nothing.
“Your mother-in-law hired me.”
The room seemed to narrow by half an inch.
The officer beside Mercer glanced at Evelyn, then away.
Mercer continued because silence made certain people confess faster than interrogation.
“She wanted proof you weren’t who you claimed to be.”
Evelyn looked at the document pouch.
“Do not open that until the appropriate investigator is present,” she told the officers.
Mercer leaned back.
“You should know she didn’t ask me to come into the event.”
“That sounds like an attempt to minimize your choices.”
“I’m telling you she hired me for background work. The access pass came from documents I received from her office.”
Evelyn’s pulse remained steady. She could feel it in her throat anyway.
“Captain,” one of the officers said, “we should notify the investigative duty officer.”
“Do it.”
Mercer studied her.
“You don’t seem surprised.”
Evelyn met his eyes for the first time.
“I am surprised by people every day.”
She returned to the ballroom.
Dinner service had resumed, although nobody appeared interested in eating. Silver lids were lifted from plates of sea bass and winter vegetables. Servers moved carefully between tables, avoiding eye contact with the guests who had already begun reconstructing the accusation in whispers.
Helen sat upright, one hand resting beside an untouched glass of wine.
Frank was gone.
Evelyn found him in a narrow hallway outside the ballroom, standing beneath a framed photograph of a destroyer at sea. His bow tie was crooked now. He had removed his glasses and was wiping them with a folded napkin, though the lenses were not dirty.
She stopped six feet away.
“Did you leave the room after I told you not to?”
He put the glasses back on.
“I needed air.”
“You needed to avoid me.”
“Probably that too.”
A pair of banquet employees pushed a cart through the far end of the hall. One wheel squeaked at each rotation. Frank waited until they passed.
“Is someone actually inside with your credential?” he asked.
“Yes.”
His shoulders sank.
“I didn’t know.”
“That is not the same as being uninvolved.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
He looked toward the ballroom doors.
“My mother hired somebody.”
“I know.”
His eyes closed briefly.
May you like
“Then he told you.”
“He made an unsolicited statement. The formal process will determine the rest.”
