Chapter 3 - A Message in the Barracks

The base bomb squad cleared the barracks while soldiers filed into the windy yard. An explosive specialist placed Voss's abandoned radio in a shielded container. A strip of tape wrapped around its battery compartment carried four handwritten words: SHE SHOULD HAVE STAYED DEAD.

“That's for me,” Olivia said.

Hale barred her path. “You're not going anywhere near it.”

“Then look at the handwriting.”

The specialist showed her a photograph of the message. Olivia recognized the steep hook on the letter S. She'd seen it in a field notebook nine years ago.

“Voss wrote it?” Hale asked.

“No. He delivers messages. He never writes them.”

“Who does?”

Olivia looked toward the empty barracks. “A man we called the Surveyor.”

Hale knew the nickname. Nightglass had begun as a classified mission to find stolen military communications equipment along a border corridor. Five soldiers disappeared after reporting a network of officers who sold access codes to private brokers. An investigation ended before it started. Too many records had been stamped destroyed.

“I asked Washington to reopen it,” Hale said. “Three times.”

“And three times somebody buried it.”

Briggs approached with a military police escort. Without his swagger, he looked twenty-seven instead of invincible. “I need to tell you something,” he said. “Major Voss told me to pull her shirt.”

Hale stared at him. “He ordered an assault?”

“He said she'd been pretending to be something she wasn't. He promised me a recommendation if I exposed her tattoo in front of witnesses.”

Olivia's voice sharpened. “When did he tell you?”

“Yesterday. After he checked the new roster.” Briggs swallowed. “He showed me her personnel photo.”

“So he knew I was here before I arrived.”

A bomb technician ran toward them. “Colonel, there's a transmitter built into that radio. It sent a signal when the collar was pulled.”

“A camera trigger?” Hale asked.

“Not a camera. A location beacon.”

At that instant, a low engine roared beyond the perimeter fence. The sentry shouted into his handset that an unmarked black truck had stopped on the access road.

Through the truck's tinted window, Olivia saw a familiar pale hand press against the glass.

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The hand had only two fingers.

THE MARK THEY TRIED TO ERASE •