“Victor Shaw?”
The name barely came out of my mouth.
General Cole looked at the silver ring on my finger as if it had suddenly become dangerous.
“That doesn’t make sense,” Elizabeth said. “Thomas wore that ring for decades.”
“I know,” Cole replied.
“Then how could it belong to Victor?”
Cole looked toward the smoke pouring from my apartment window.
“Because I was there the night Victor gave it to him.”
I stared at him.
“You told me the rings belonged to the unit.”
“They did.”
“So which is it?”
“Both.”
Sirens screamed somewhere in the distance.
Cole grabbed my arm.
“We need to move.”
“No.”
“This building may be burning.”
“And every time we’re in danger, somebody tells me there isn’t time for the truth.”
I pulled my arm free.
“Make time.”
Cole stared at me.
Then nodded.
“The rings were commissioned after our first successful operation. Seven identical rings. One for each original member.”
“Seven.”
“Yes.”
“But the photograph showed six.”
“Because Victor took the photograph.”
That explained it.
Cole continued.
“During the operation that went wrong, Victor disappeared. When Thomas finally ordered us to withdraw, he found Victor’s pack near the extraction point.”
“And the ring?”
“Inside.”
My eyes dropped to my hand.
“Thomas believed Victor was dead?”
“Yes.”
“So he kept it?”
“No.”
Cole shook his head.
“He intended to return it to Victor’s family.”
“Then why didn’t he?”
“Because Victor came back.”
I frowned.
“You said Grandpa didn’t learn Victor survived until eleven years ago.”
“I said Thomas claimed that.”
My stomach tightened.
“You don’t believe him?”
Cole’s eyes filled with something I hadn’t seen before.
Regret.
“I don’t know what I believe anymore.”
A fire engine turned into the parking lot.
Cole pointed toward the street.
“We continue this somewhere safe.”
We moved quickly.
Firefighters rushed toward my building while police officers began securing the area.
I kept looking for Dad.
Nothing.
No body.
No movement.
No sign of him.
I grabbed the nearest officer.
“My father was in that hallway.”
“Name?”
“Michael Hail.”
The officer spoke into his radio.
A minute later, another officer came downstairs.
“No one is in the second-floor hallway.”
“What?”
“We checked.”
“He was there.”
“Maybe he exited before we arrived.”
“There were gunshots.”
The officer’s expression sharpened.
“How many?”
“Two.”
“Did you see the shooter?”
“No.”
“Your father?”
“No.”
He started asking more questions, but General Cole stepped in and explained enough to get us moved away from the building.
Twenty minutes later, I was sitting in the back of an emergency vehicle with a blanket around my shoulders.
I wasn’t cold.
I was furious.
Dad had vanished.
Someone had threatened me.
My apartment had been set on fire.
And the one object Grandpa had left me apparently belonged to a man accused of betraying his unit.
My phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
I opened it immediately.
NO POLICE.
I showed Cole.
Another message arrived.
YOU WANT MICHAEL ALIVE?
Elizabeth gasped.
“They have him.”
I started typing.
Cole stopped me.
“Don’t.”
“That’s my father.”
“They want you emotional.”
“I am emotional.”
“And that’s exactly why you don’t answer yet.”
A third message arrived.
SUNRISE.
BRING THE DRIVE AND THE RING.
COME ALONE.
Then an address appeared.
Elizabeth looked at Cole.
“Where is that?”
Cole entered it into his phone.
His expression changed.
“What?”
He turned the screen toward us.
The address was an abandoned industrial property nearly sixty miles away.
But the name attached to the old property made my stomach twist.
MERCER TOOL & STEEL.
Mercer.
Grandpa’s original surname.
“That can’t be coincidence,” I said.
“It isn’t,” Cole replied.
“Who owned it?”
Cole searched.
The property had changed hands repeatedly.
Then he found the oldest available record.
His face tightened.
“Victor Shaw.”
Elizabeth whispered, “Why would Victor own property under the Mercer name?”
“He didn’t.”
Cole enlarged the record.
“The company existed before Victor bought it.”
“Who founded it?”
Cole scrolled.
Then stopped.
“Thomas Mercer.”
I stared at him.
“My grandfather?”
“Possibly.”
Nothing fit anymore.
The millionaire who lived like he had nothing.
The Marine who saved eleven men.
The father who let another man raise his daughter.
The quiet old man who apparently owned businesses nobody in his family knew existed.
I looked at the time.
2:48 a.m.
Sunrise wasn’t far away.
“We need Father Daniel.”
Cole nodded.
“The key.”
Elizabeth searched online.
“There are four priests named Daniel within fifty miles.”
I remembered Grandpa’s funeral program.
The church name was printed on it.
“St. Matthew’s.”
Elizabeth found it.
“Father Daniel Brennan.”
Cole made a call.
No answer.
Again.
Nothing.
I called.
Voicemail.
“We go there,” I said.
Cole didn’t argue.
St. Matthew’s was twenty-seven minutes away.
The church stood beside a cemetery at the edge of town.
The parking lot was empty when we arrived.
But a light was on inside the rectory.
I knocked.
Nothing.
Again.
Finally, locks moved.
An elderly priest opened the door.
The moment he saw me, his tired expression disappeared.
“You.”
“You remember me?”
“Thomas’s funeral.”
I nodded.
His gaze dropped to the ring.
Then he opened the door.
“Come inside.”
Father Daniel didn’t ask why a Marine, a general, and a frightened woman had arrived before four in the morning.
He simply walked into his study.
“Thomas told me someone might come.”
“When?”
“Seven months ago.”
My heart jumped.
“What did he give you?”
Father Daniel opened a drawer.
“A key.”
General Cole and I exchanged a look.
The priest removed a small sealed envelope.
My name was written on it.
“He told me I was only to give this to you personally.”
I took it.
Inside was a brass key attached to a numbered tag.
B-117.
There was also a note.
The bank where I kept my promises knows what this opens.
Nothing else.
“What bank?”
Father Daniel smiled sadly.
“He expected you to ask.”
He reached into the drawer again.
This time he removed a business card.
HARRISON COUNTY COMMUNITY BANK.
I recognized the name.
Grandpa had used that bank for years.
Elizabeth checked the time.
“It won’t open for hours.”
“Maybe not,” Cole said.
He turned the card over.
A handwritten phone number was on the back.
PRIVATE ACCESS — ESTATE SERVICES.
Cole called.
After several transfers and an explanation involving military authorities and an active police investigation, someone agreed to meet us.
Forty minutes later, a nervous bank manager unlocked a side entrance.
He led us downstairs.
B-117 was not a normal safe-deposit box.
It was larger.
Almost the size of a filing cabinet.
I inserted the key.
The manager entered a second code.
The drawer opened.
Inside were files.
Hundreds of pages.
And three sealed packages.
One was marked:
VETERANS FUND — ORIGINAL LEDGERS.
Another:
MICHAEL AND CAROLINE HAIL.
My parents.
The third:
VICTOR SHAW — IF HE RETURNS.
I reached for Victor’s package.
Cole stopped me.
“Maybe start with your parents.”
“No.”
I looked at him.
“Victor is the reason someone wants this ring.”
I opened the package.
Inside was a letter and a small cassette recorder.
The letter began:
Sweetheart,
If Victor Shaw is alive when you read this, do not assume he is the man hunting you.
I froze.
Elizabeth read over my shoulder.
“What?”
I continued.
Victor betrayed us once.
That is true.
But men can spend the rest of their lives trying to repair the worst thing they’ve ever done.
I looked at Cole.
“Grandpa forgave him?”
Cole looked stunned.
The letter continued.
When Victor came to my house eleven years ago, he didn’t come to threaten me.
He came to warn me.
My pulse accelerated.
Warn him about whom?
I read faster.
Victor discovered that someone had been using his identity to move money for years.
Someone wanted me to believe Victor was still stealing.
He wasn’t.
General Cole whispered, “Then who was?”
The next sentence answered him.
Michael found the records before I did.
My stomach dropped.
But Michael wasn’t the person controlling the third account.
Your mother wasn’t either.
I stopped.
“But the video said Mom controlled it.”
Elizabeth shook her head.
“No. Thomas said she knew where the money went and helped Michael hide later thefts. He never said she controlled the original account.”
She was right.
I’d connected two pieces that didn’t belong together.
I continued reading.
The third account belonged to someone inside our own circle.
Someone who had access to operational identities, casualty reports, banking records, and every member of our unit.
General Cole suddenly became very still.
I noticed.
“So who had that access?”
He didn’t answer.
“General?”
“Command.”
“Who specifically?”
Cole’s face hardened.
“Our commanding officer.”
“Name.”
He looked at me.
“Colonel James Rourke.”
I searched Grandpa’s letter.
The next line made my blood run cold.
James Rourke was declared dead twenty-nine years ago.
Elizabeth whispered, “Declared?”
I continued.
I never saw his body.
Neither did Victor.
Neither did Raymond.
General Cole took the letter from me.
“No.”
He read the line himself.
“Rourke died in a plane crash.”
“Was the body identified?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
Cole stopped.
I waited.
“Dental records.”
“Who confirmed them?”
“I don’t remember.”
The bank manager stood awkwardly near the door.
Then my phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
A photograph appeared.
Dad was sitting in a chair.
His hands were tied.
Blood ran from his forehead.
But he was alive.
Underneath:
ONE HOUR.
Cole whispered, “We can’t let you go alone.”
“I’m not leaving Dad there.”
“That’s exactly what they expect.”
I looked inside the safe-deposit drawer again.
“Then we give them what they expect.”
I removed the flash drive from my pocket.
“What are you doing?”
“They want this.”
“Yes.”
“So we’ll give them a drive.”
Cole understood.
“A copy.”
“A controlled one.”
The bank manager said quietly, “We have computers upstairs.”
Twenty minutes later, Cole had duplicated only the files we wanted the kidnappers to see.
The original stayed with Elizabeth.
I placed the copy into my pocket.
Then I looked at Grandpa’s ring.
“There’s still one problem.”
Cole nodded.
“They want the ring too.”
I removed it.
Father Daniel’s words came back to me.
Thomas told me someone might come.
Grandpa had planned for nearly everything.
Maybe the ring contained more than the archive number.
I examined it under the bank’s desk lamp.
Cole joined me.
We found the tiny mechanism again.
The inner band shifted.
Numbers appeared.
But beneath them was another marking.
So small we’d missed it.
Three letters.
V.S.R.
Cole stared.
“Victor Samuel Shaw.”
“Then it really was his.”
“Yes.”
I twisted the ring farther.
Something clicked.
A tiny piece of metal dropped onto the desk.
Not metal.
A microfilm capsule.
Elizabeth gasped.
“Thomas hid something inside it.”
The bank manager found a magnifier.
Under it, the film contained several tiny photographed pages.
Cole examined the first.
Then the second.
His breathing changed.
“What is it?”
“Transfer records.”
“From the stolen fund?”
“Yes.”
“Whose name?”
“No name.”
He pointed.
“Only an authorization code.”
I looked.
RC-01.
Cole went completely silent.
“RC,” I whispered.
Elizabeth looked from the code to him.
“Raymond Cole.”
He stepped backward.
“No.”
“Is that your authorization code?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Absolutely.”
Then he stopped.
His expression changed.
“What?”
Cole stared at the code.
“Before I became an officer, there was another Raymond Cole in the unit’s administrative command.”
My stomach tightened.
“Related to you?”
His voice became barely audible.
“My father.”
Nobody spoke.
General Cole stared at the microfilm as if the room had vanished around him.
“My father handled operational finances.”
Elizabeth whispered, “Could he have been the third person?”
Cole shook his head.
“He died when I was twenty-eight.”
“Are you certain?”
Cole looked at her sharply.
“Yes.”
Then my phone rang.
Unknown number.
This time I answered.
“Where is my father?”
A man’s voice replied.
“Bring what Thomas stole.”
“You have the drive and ring when I see Michael alive.”
The man laughed.
Then he said something that made General Cole grab the edge of the desk.
“You’re standing beside Raymond, aren’t you?”
I didn’t answer.
“Tell the general his father sends his regards.”
Cole’s face went white.
“Who are you?” I demanded.
The man ignored me.
“Sunrise. Mercer Tool & Steel.”
Then he added:
“And bring Raymond.”
The call ended.
Cole stared at my phone.
“My father is dead.”
I looked at the microfilm.
RC-01.
“Maybe.”
“No. I buried him.”
“Did you see his body?”
Cole opened his mouth.
Then stopped.
I already knew the answer.
“No.”
His phone suddenly buzzed.
A text.
Not mine.
His.
Cole looked down.
One photograph had arrived.
It showed an elderly man sitting beside my bound father.
His face was partially shadowed.
But General Cole recognized him instantly.
His knees nearly buckled.
“General?”
He enlarged the photograph.
“My God.”
“Who is it?”
Cole looked at me with tears in his eyes.
“My father.”
Then another message appeared beneath the photograph.
BRING THOMAS HAIL’S DAUGHTER.
WE HAVE BEEN WAITING THIRTY-FOUR YEARS TO FINISH WHAT HE STARTED……..
