Chapter 5 - The Christmas Lie That Started Fifteen Years Ago
“Colonel Hayes.”
Rebecca recognized the voice.
Charles Voss.
Natalie's team moved toward the staircase.
“Don't,” Voss called.
Rebecca held up a hand.
“Why?”
“Because I'm unarmed.”
Natalie answered, “Then come down with your hands visible.”
A long pause.
Then Charles Voss appeared.
Seventy-two.
Tall.
Silver hair.
Dark winter coat.
Hands raised.
He descended slowly.
William stared at him.
“Charles.”
“Will.”
“You took my wife.”
“No.”
“You met her.”
“Yes.”
“For fifteen years?”
Voss looked tired.
“Yes.”
William's face hardened.
Rebecca stepped forward.
“What do you want?”
“To stop a lie.”
“Which lie?”
“The one your grandfather died protecting.”
Rebecca studied him.
“The photo says the third man sold them out.”
Voss smiled without humor.
“I know.”
“Was it you?”
“No.”
“Daniel Mercer?”
Voss looked at her.
“That's what Samuel believed.”
Rebecca felt her pulse change.
General Thomas Mercer's father.
Voss sat when Natalie allowed it.
He reached slowly into his coat.
Natalie raised her weapon.
“Stop.”
“Notebook.”
She removed it herself.
Inside were handwritten dates.
Names.
Bank records.
“Operation Lantern,” Voss said, “wasn't a slush fund.”
“What was it?”
“A counterintelligence trap.”
Rebecca remembered Samuel's letter.
The fund was bait.
Voss nodded.
“In 1989, intelligence knew someone senior was selling operational information. Forty million dollars was placed in accounts that only three officers could access on paper.”
“Samuel, Daniel Mercer, and you.”
“Yes.”
“Money moved?”
“On paper.”
“Not real money?”
“Some was real. Most was traceable.”
Rebecca understood.
“Whoever tried to steal it exposed themselves.”
“That was the idea.”
“Who did?”
Voss looked at William.
“Daniel Mercer.”
William shook his head.
“My father trusted Daniel.”
“Until he didn't.”
Rebecca asked, “Where's proof?”
“In the ledger.”
“The one everyone wants.”
“Yes.”
“Where is it?”
Voss looked at her.
“You have it.”
Rebecca frowned.
“No.”
“The coins.”
Her grandfather's Christmas gifts.
“The dates create a cipher,” Voss said. “Samuel refused to keep the ledger in one place. He encoded it across objects nobody would think mattered.”
Rebecca felt anger rise.
“Then why contact my mother instead of me?”
“Because Samuel made me promise never to involve you.”
“Yet someone is actively trying to destroy my career.”
“That wasn't me.”
“Cole?”
Voss sighed.
“Cole is working for someone else.”
“Who?”
“I don't know.”
Rebecca stared.
“You expect me to believe that?”
“No. I expect you to investigate it.”
William stepped closer.
“What did Margaret have to do with this?”
Voss lowered his eyes.
“Fifteen years ago, Samuel believed someone was searching his house.”
Rebecca remembered the estate sale.
“He asked Mom to remove the case.”
“Yes.”
William looked stunned.
“She didn't sell it accidentally.”
“No.”
“She lied to me.”
“To protect you.”
William laughed bitterly.
“You don't get to tell me that.”
Voss nodded.
“Fair.”
Rebecca looked toward the window.
“Mom knew the brown case mattered.”
“Yes.”
“She knew about Lantern?”
“Partly.”
“And tonight?”
“She contacted me when Michael told her about Cole.”
Rebecca closed her eyes.
“So Mom knew Michael was communicating with a journalist and went to you instead of telling me.”
“She was afraid.”
“Of what?”
“That you would lose your career.”
“She helped make that more likely.”
“She knows that now.”
Rebecca turned away.
Fifteen years of family tension had hidden another life beneath it.
Her mother hadn't merely resented her career.
She had been keeping secrets tied to it.
“Why leave the house tonight?”
“To bring me here.”
“Why?”
“Because I knew where Samuel hid the letter for you.”
Rebecca looked at him.
“You were upstairs.”
“Yes.”
“Why not come down?”
“Because I didn't know whether Natalie's team was compromised.”
Natalie stiffened.
“Careful.”
Voss looked at her.
“Someone inside Defense fabricated records with access to sealed Kandahar material.”
Nobody argued with that.
Rebecca sat opposite him.
“What happened in Kandahar is known by perhaps twelve people.”
“Then start with twelve.”
“One is General Mercer.”
Voss met her eyes.
“Yes.”
The possibility made Rebecca uncomfortable.
Thomas Mercer had sponsored her promotion.
He trusted her.
Or appeared to.
His father was one of the men implicated in Lantern.
“Are you saying Mercer is behind this?”
“No.”
“Then say what you're saying.”
“His father betrayed Samuel.”
“That doesn't mean Thomas did.”
“No.”
“But?”
Voss looked at the photograph.
“Children spend their lives cleaning up what their parents leave behind.”
Rebecca glanced toward William.
Too close to tonight.
“Do you have proof Daniel Mercer betrayed Granddad?”
Voss opened the notebook.
“There was a fourth man.”
Rebecca frowned.
“You said three.”
“Three had official access. A fourth designed the financial architecture.”
“Name?”
“Arthur Cole.”
Rebecca stared.
“Cole.”
Voss nodded.
“Evan Cole's father.”
Everything shifted.
The journalist wasn't random.
His family was tied to Lantern.
“What happened to Arthur?”
“Died in 2001.”
“What was his role?”
“CIA financial operations.”
“And you believe his son is trying to expose what happened?”
“Or bury it.”
Rebecca stood.
“We need the coins.”
William nodded.
“They're at your apartment?”
“Yes.”
Voss shook his head.
“No.”
Rebecca looked at him.
“What?”
“Not anymore.”
She froze.
“How would you know?”
“Because Margaret told me Michael borrowed your storage key three weeks ago.”
Rebecca's jaw tightened.
“My brother had access to my apartment?”
“Apparently.”
She called the team at her parents' house.
“Put Michael on.”
Seconds later, his voice came through.
“What?”
“Where are Granddad's coins?”
Silence.
“Michael.”
“I borrowed them.”
“Why?”
“Cole wanted photographs.”
Rebecca closed her eyes.
“Where are they?”
“I gave them to him.”
The room went still.
“When?”
“Two days ago.”
“You gave a journalist objects from my private collection?”
“They were coins, Rebecca!”
Her restraint broke.
“NOT TO HIM.”
Everyone stared.
Rebecca rarely shouted.
Michael went silent.
She lowered her voice.
“Where did you meet?”
“A coffee shop in Arlington.”
“Did he keep all of them?”
“Yes.”
“How many?”
“I don't know. Twenty?”
“Twenty-three.”
“What?”
“There were twenty-three.”
Another silence.
Rebecca's memory flashed.
Twenty-three civilians in Kandahar.
No.
That couldn't be coincidence.
“Did Cole ask about Kandahar?”
Michael breathed.
“Yes.”
Rebecca's blood chilled.
“You told me he didn't.”
“I forgot.”
“What did he ask?”
“Whether you ever talked about twenty-three people.”
Rebecca sat slowly.
Voss watched her.
“Rebecca?”
She ignored him.
“What did you say?”
“That you woke up screaming once when you stayed here.”
William looked at her.
Rebecca felt exposed.
Michael continued.
“And you said twenty-three.”
Her voice became almost inaudible.
“You told him that?”
“I didn't know it mattered.”
Everything Michael didn't know mattered.
Rebecca ended the call.
Natalie swore quietly.
“We need Cole.”
Voss shook his head.
“You won't find him.”
“Why?”
“He's probably found what he needs.”
Rebecca looked at the letter again.
Dates.
Countries.
Operations.
Twenty-three coins.
She could remember each one.
Granddad gave her the first when she was six.
A 1944 Philippine coin.
Then Germany.
Korea.
Vietnam.
Panama.
Bosnia.
Places that corresponded to military history.
She grabbed paper.
“What year did Lantern begin?”
“1989,” Voss said.
Rebecca wrote the coins she remembered.
The dates weren't chronological.
Maybe denominations.
Countries.
Initials.
She worked for twenty minutes.
William watched.
Then he pointed.
“Those aren't countries.”
“What?”
“The mint marks.”
Rebecca looked closer in memory.
Her grandfather had taught her mint marks when she was a child.
D.
S.
P.
Letters.
Twenty-three coins created twenty-three characters.
She wrote what she could recall.
Not enough.
“We need photographs.”
Natalie contacted cyber analysts.
Michael had photographed some before giving them away.
They recovered cloud backups.
One by one, images arrived.
Rebecca wrote the mint marks.
D S P...
Numbers.
Voss leaned over.
“Coordinates?”
“No.”
William studied them.
“Book cipher.”
Rebecca looked at Samuel's letter.
Christmas remembers what soldiers forget.
Christmas.
Songs?
Bible verses?
Then Margaret called.
Rebecca answered.
“Mom.”
Her mother was crying.
“I am sorry.”
“We'll deal with that later.”
“I should've told you.”
“Yes.”
“I thought I could protect you.”
“Mom, I need you focused.”
Margaret steadied.
“Okay.”
“Granddad's Christmas coins. Did he ever say anything when he gave them to me?”
Her mother paused.
“Yes.”
“What?”
“Every year?”
“Yes.”
Rebecca waited.
“He always said the same thing.”
“What?”
“Remember where home is.”
Rebecca stared at William.
Home.
Not geography.
Address.
Her grandfather's old address.
The Hayes property?
“No,” William whispered.
Rebecca looked at him.
“My childhood home.”
Samuel had lived in Arlington for thirty years.
Rebecca knew the address.
She applied the numbers.
The cipher resolved.
Not coordinates.
A bank safe-deposit box.
Number.
Branch code.
Natalie immediately sent the information.
Five minutes later, she received a response.
The box existed.
It had been opened that afternoon.
Authorized visitor: Rebecca Hayes.
Rebecca stared.
“I wasn't there.”
Natalie nodded grimly.
“Someone used your identification.”
“Camera?”
“Being retrieved.”
Another message arrived.
Natalie opened the still image.
A woman stood at the bank counter wearing a dark coat and sunglasses.
Rebecca didn't recognize her.
Voss did.
His face changed completely.
“What?”
He pointed.
“That woman.”
“Who is she?”
Voss stood.
“She worked for Daniel Mercer.”
“When?”
“Thirty years ago.”
Rebecca stared at the photo.
“That woman looks forty.”
“She should be seventy.”
Natalie zoomed in.
Voss shook his head.
“No. Not her.”
“Then who?”
“Her daughter.”
Rebecca's secure phone rang.
General Thomas Mercer.
She answered slowly.
“Sir.”
“Rebecca, do not go to Fort Belvoir tomorrow.”
Her eyes narrowed.
“You ordered me there.”
“The order has changed.”
“Why?”
A pause.
Then Mercer said something that made every person in the cabin look at her.
“My daughter took the ledger.”
Rebecca said nothing.
May you like
Mercer continued.
“And if she realizes what Samuel Hayes recorded about our family, she will kill to keep it buried.”
