Chương 7
"You don't know that."
"No."
He looked at me.
"But I know how this works."
I stared at him.
"You know how people disappear."
The words were sharper than I intended.
Daniel accepted them anyway.
"Yes."
That honesty made the anger harder.
He reached for his cane.
"I am coming with you."
"No."
"Claire."
"You have a bad leg."
"I have had a bad leg for years."
"You move slower."
"I think slower than I did too."
Despite everything, I almost smiled.
Almost.
Daniel noticed.
"Good."
"What?"
"You still do that."
"Do what?"
"Try not to laugh when you are angry."
I looked away.
"I am not angry."
"You're terrible at lying."
That was something I would have argued with five years ago.
Now I was too tired.
We left my apartment together.
The drive to Thomas's last known location took twenty minutes.
Neither of us spoke much.
That was another thing I remembered about Daniel.
He never filled silence just because he was uncomfortable.
He let people sit with their own thoughts.
I watched the city pass outside the window.
People carried groceries.
A teenager rode a bicycle along the sidewalk.
A woman stood outside a coffee shop looking at her phone.
Everyone looked like they belonged somewhere.
I wondered when I stopped feeling like I did.
Thomas's car was parked behind an old office building on the edge of town.
The building used to belong to a private medical contractor.
Now most of the windows were covered.
The parking lot was almost empty.
Daniel turned off the engine.
"How did he know this place?"
I looked at the building.
"I don't know."
Daniel glanced at me.
"You are doing it too."
"What?"
"Saying you don't know."
I looked at him.
For a second, neither of us said anything.
Then I opened the door.
The front entrance was locked.
Daniel walked around the side.
I followed.
"You should not be doing this."
He glanced back.
"You say that a lot."
"Because you keep doing things you should not."
"Sounds familiar."
I almost responded.
Then I stopped.
Because he was right.
The side door had been forced open.
Not recently enough to be obvious.
Not carefully enough to be professional.
Someone wanted access quickly.
Inside, the building smelled like dust and old paper.
The lights did not work.
Daniel used his phone flashlight.
"This is where Thomas worked?"
"Sometimes."
"Sometimes?"
"He did contract investigations."
"For who?"
Daniel looked ahead.
"Anyone who paid him."
That answer bothered me.
"You trusted him?"
"No."
"Then why are we here?"
"Because sometimes you do not need to trust someone to know they are looking in the right direction."
The hallway stretched ahead.
Old offices lined both sides.
Most doors were open.
Some desks remained.
A calendar from three years ago hung on one wall.
A coffee cup sat beside a dead computer.
Someone had left this place suddenly.
I walked past a conference room.
Stopped.
There was a photo taped to the glass.
A group of people standing outside a military hospital.
I stepped closer.
Daniel stopped beside me.
"Who are they?"
He did not answer.
I looked at his face.
"Daniel."
He looked at the photograph.
"Some of the people connected to the operation."
"Connected how?"
He swallowed.
"Some were there the night of the explosion."
I studied the faces.
Then I saw one I recognized.
Not because I remembered the person.
Because I remembered the uniform.
My finger touched the glass.
"That one."
Daniel looked.
"Who?"
"The man in the back."
His expression changed.
"You know him?"
"No."
I stared harder.
"But I saw him."
"Where?"
The memory came slowly.
Not like a movie.
Like broken glass.
A voice.
A flashlight.
Someone standing outside the medical tent after the explosion.
Watching.
Not helping.
Watching.
"I don't know."
Daniel stepped closer.
"What do you remember?"
I closed my eyes.
Smoke.
Heat.
Someone shouting.
Then a face.
"I remember thinking he shouldn't have been there."
Daniel went quiet.
"Why?"
"Because he was not medical staff."
"Are you sure?"
I opened my eyes.
"Yes."
The certainty surprised me.
The memories were damaged.
But that one was clear.
Daniel took a picture of the photograph with his phone.
"We need to find out who he is."
Before I could answer, something fell upstairs.
Both of us froze.
A normal person might have assumed it was an old building.
Neither of us did.
Daniel lowered his phone.
"You stay behind me."
"No."
"Claire."
"No."
He looked at me.
"You used to listen better."
"I was younger."
A small smile crossed his face.
"That is not what I expected you to say."
We moved upstairs.
The sound had stopped.
The hallway above was darker.
At the end was a single office with the door slightly open.
Daniel pushed it carefully.
Inside, papers covered the floor.
A chair was overturned.
The room looked searched.
Not abandoned.
Searched.
I noticed the desk first.
A small object sat near the edge.
A military identification tag.
My breathing stopped.
I walked toward it.
Daniel noticed.
"Claire?"
I picked it up.
The metal was scratched.
Old.
Familiar.
My fingers closed around it.
"This was mine."
Daniel looked shocked.
"That is impossible."
"I know."
The words came out quietly.
Because they were the same words I had said too many times already.
I turned the tag over.
There was something carved into the back.
Not a name.
A date.
And beneath it, three letters.
MRC.
Daniel stared.
"Mercy."
I looked at him.
"No."
He frowned.
"Claire."
I shook my head.
"That was my call sign."
"Yes."
"Someone else wrote it."
The room became silent.
Because that was the part neither of us wanted to say.
Someone had my identification.
Someone had access to my records.
Someone had been carrying pieces of my old life while I was trying to forget it.
My phone buzzed.
I looked down.
Unknown number.
May you like
This time, the message stayed.
Come alone if you want the rest of your story.
