Chapter 7 - The Recruit Who Lied
Briggs wasn't asking forgiveness. He was asking for a way out.
“Her name's Paige,” he said. “She's sixteen. Our mom works nights.”
Maya took the phone, copied the message, and arranged for local law enforcement to find Paige and keep her safe without broadcasting the operation. Hale approved it. Olivia watched Briggs fight tears he would never have allowed his recruits to see.
“You hurt me for a promotion,” she said. “Don't turn that into heroism.”
“I know.”
“You're going to tell investigators every word Voss said, even if it ends your career.”
“I will.”
“And until Paige is safe, you're staying here.”
Briggs nodded. Olivia walked away before either of them could pretend this made them friends.
The culvert lay in a wooded gully beyond the old fuel station. Ben drove a battered utility truck along a service track while Maya checked landmarks on a paper map. Hale remained at the base, coordinating an independent federal investigator with authority outside training command.
At the stream, Olivia crouched by three faded blue stones. She reached beneath the largest and felt only mud.
“It's gone,” she said.
Ben knelt beside her. “Check the other side.”
A small waterproof case was wedged inside a drainage seam. Her fingers closed around it, and for one impossible second she could hear Mara laughing again.
Maya scanned the treeline. “We have company.”
An SUV appeared on the dirt road, blocking their truck. Two men climbed out wearing civilian jackets over body armor. Neither displayed identification.
“Federal recovery,” one called. “Put down the case.”
Maya answered, “Show credentials.”
The man raised a badge too quickly to read. His partner moved toward the passenger door, one hand hidden.
Olivia whispered, “That's Voss's driver.”
Ben backed toward the stream. “We need another exit.”
The man at the SUV lifted a portable loudspeaker. “Olivia, we have your mother on the phone. She wants you to do the right thing.”
A frail voice came through the static. “Liv? Please.”
Olivia took one step forward.
Then the woman on the speaker used the childhood nickname only Mara had known.
“Little Sparrow,” the voice said.
Olivia stopped. Her mother had called her Livvy, never Little Sparrow. That name belonged to Mara, whispered during the long night under the wreckage. Someone had mixed stolen recordings together.
“That's not my mother,” Olivia told Maya.
The fake federal agent reached under his jacket. Maya shouted, “Hands where I can see them!”
He brought up a weapon. Maya fired at the dirt beside his feet and pulled Olivia behind a concrete drainage wall. Ben slid the waterproof case into his coat. The man dropped behind the SUV as his partner reversed it across the narrow road.
“No clean shot,” Maya said. “We move.”
They splashed through knee-deep water and scrambled up the opposite bank. Olivia knew the gully from nine years ago, knew where the stream split under an old footbridge and where fallen timber hid an animal trail.
A shot struck a branch above them. Splinters scattered. Ben stumbled, catching himself with his injured hand.
“Keep going,” he gasped.
They reached a farm track and found a county maintenance truck idling beside the fence. A middle-aged worker stood behind it with his hands raised.
“Who sent you?” Maya demanded.
“Woman named Collins,” the worker said. “Said you'd need a ride.”
Maya stared. “I'm Collins.”
The worker handed her a note. It was written in Hale's unmistakable block letters: TRUST THE WOMAN WHO DOESN'T ASK FOR YOUR NAMES.
“Colonel's got friends?” Ben said.
“Or somebody's copied his handwriting,” Olivia replied.
They drove with the windows low and the radio off. Ten miles later, the case clicked open under Ben's knife. Inside lay Mara's cracked medical tag, a memory device wrapped in gauze, and a photograph of five soldiers grinning in front of a helicopter.
On the back, Mara had written: IF WE VANISH, START WITH THE LAST VOICE ON THE RADIO.
Maya plugged the device into an isolated field computer. The first audio file played a panicked soldier begging for evacuation. Then Hale's voice ordered the aircraft to stand down.
A second voice came onto the channel seconds later, speaking a single sentence.
It was Olivia's voice.
May you like
“Do not send the rescue,” the recording said. “They're all dead.”
THE MARK THEY TRIED TO ERASE •
