Chapter 3 - The Traitor Inside Atlas
The insignia was small enough that anyone else might have missed it.
Nathan didn't.
A silver compass pierced by a black line.
Atlas.
The man in the doorway raised both hands.
"Don't shoot."
Mercer kept his pistol trained on him.
Nathan stared.
"Elias Grant."
Grant had once been Atlas Five.
Signals.
Surveillance.
The youngest member of the team.
Now he was fifty-two, heavier, with gray at his temples and the exhaustion of a man who had spent too many years looking over his shoulder.
Nathan said, "You have five seconds."
"Rachel sent me."
"Prove it."
Grant recited, "Sarajevo. Blue staircase. You told me never to trust a locked room with fresh paint."
Nathan remembered.
No report had ever contained that detail.
Mercer lowered his weapon slightly.
Grant stepped inside and shut the door.
"What happened to the power?" Nathan asked.
"I did it."
Ortiz emerged from the alcove.
"Wonderful. Another criminal."
Grant looked at Mercer.
"Who's the cop?"
"Detective Ortiz."
"Can we trust her?"
Ortiz answered for herself.
"No."
Nathan almost smiled.
Almost.
Grant pulled out a tablet.
"The federal team that took the three suspects wasn't federal."
"We know."
"They used authentic credentials."
"Stolen?"
"No. Issued."
Nathan's expression tightened.
"By whom?"
"Office of Special Protective Operations."
Ortiz frowned.
"I've never heard of it."
Grant replied, "That's the idea."
Nathan said, "Who controls it?"
Grant looked at him.
"Senator Reeves chairs the classified appropriations subcommittee that funds it."
The pieces began moving.
Emily's audit.
Raven Vault.
The senator.
The wealthy families.
Nathan asked, "Where are the boys?"
"Moving west."
"Destination?"
"Unknown."
"Find them."
Grant shook his head.
"They're bait."
"For me?"
"For all of us."
Nathan looked toward Emily.
"And she is?"
"The reason."
Nathan's voice became dangerous.
"Explain."
Grant placed the tablet on a side table.
A web of names appeared.
Whitmore.
Caldwell.
Vale.
Reeves.
Financial accounts.
Foundations.
Defense contractors.
Private intelligence firms.
At the center was a symbol Nathan recognized from the cuff link.
R.V.C.
"Raven Vault Consortium," Grant said. "Twenty-six years old. Possibly older."
Ortiz moved closer.
"This looks like organized crime."
"It's more organized than crime."
Nathan studied the network.
"What does Emily have?"
"We think she copied their ledger."
"Think?"
"Her firm's audit software flagged several nonprofit transfers. She downloaded records before somebody remotely wiped the server."
"Where's the copy?"
Grant looked at Emily.
"She never uploaded it."
Nathan understood.
"She hid it."
"Exactly."
Emily stirred.
Nathan sat beside her.
"Em."
Her eyes opened.
"Did you copy financial records from Whitmore Foundation?"
Fear flashed in her eyes.
Nathan squeezed her hand.
"You're safe."
She gave him a look that said they both knew that wasn't true.
"Where did you put them?"
Emily stared toward the bedside table.
Nathan followed her gaze.
Nothing.
Then she pointed weakly toward herself.
"The necklace?" he asked.
She nodded.
The necklace was missing.
Mercer swore quietly.
Grant said, "Then that's why they attacked her."
Nathan shook his head.
"No. If they wanted the necklace, why leave her alive?"
Ortiz answered.
"Maybe they didn't know what they were looking for."
Emily began writing again.
HE TOOK IT.
"Who?" Nathan asked.
RYAN.
Nathan looked at Grant.
"Find him."
Grant was already typing.
Emily wrote another line.
BUT IT WAS EMPTY.
Everyone froze.
Nathan leaned closer.
"Empty?"
She nodded.
"Then where's the data?"
Emily wrote slowly.
DAD'S GIFT.
Nathan stared.
Years earlier, he had given her a small silver pendant for law-school graduation.
Inside was a tiny removable metal plate engraved with coordinates to the lake cabin where they had spent summers.
He suddenly understood.
The plate wasn't decorative.
Emily had modified it.
"Where is the pendant now?"
She wrote:
NOT THE ONE THEY TOOK.
Nathan looked confused.
Emily pointed toward his wrist.
He glanced down.
His watch.
A simple military-style watch she had given him for his sixtieth birthday.
"You put it in my watch?"
She nodded.
Nathan removed it.
Grant took the watch carefully.
Within minutes he found the hidden micro-storage chip beneath the backplate.
Mercer whispered, "Smart kid."
Emily gave him the faintest smile.
Grant connected the chip to an isolated reader.
Files appeared.
Thousands.
Bank transfers.
Shell corporations.
Names.
Dates.
Then a folder.
ATLAS.
Nathan felt every muscle in his body tighten.
"Open it."
Grant hesitated.
"Commander—"
"Open it."
The first document was a classified operations summary.
Twenty-one years old.
Atlas mission schedules.
Team assignments.
Safe houses.
Internal medical records.
Ortiz stared.
"This is military."
Nathan said nothing.
The next file contained photographs.
Mercer in Belgrade.
Rachel in Ankara.
Marcus outside Damascus.
Grant aboard a transport.
Nathan with Samantha.
Then a memo appeared.
PROJECT CONTAINMENT.
Seven Atlas names were listed.
Six team members.
And Samantha Sterling.
Beside each was a status.
Nathan Sterling: RETIRED / OBSERVE.
Marcus Kane: RELEASED / OBSERVE.
Rachel Cole: RELEASED / OBSERVE.
Elias Grant: RELEASED / OBSERVE.
David Mercer: TERMINATED / CONVERTED.
Samantha Sterling: TERMINATED.
Nathan stared at the word beside his sister's name.
"Who wrote this?"
Grant scrolled.
Author field.
M.R.
Nathan knew.
"Malcolm Reeves."
Mercer turned away.
Nathan grabbed his shoulder.
"You knew."
Mercer didn't deny it.
"You knew Reeves ordered Samantha's death."
"I knew someone in his office approved it."
"And you said nothing for nineteen years?"
"I thought you already knew enough."
"Enough?"
Nathan's voice rose for the first time.
"My sister died because of him!"
Emily flinched.
Nathan immediately lowered his voice.
Mercer looked ashamed.
"She didn't die."
Nathan froze.
"What?"
Mercer stared at the floor.
"Samantha survived Prague."
Nathan heard nothing else in the room.
"Say that again."
"She survived."
"Then where has she been for twenty-two years?"
"Hiding."
"From Reeves?"
"From Raven Vault."
Nathan took a step back.
"You let me bury an empty coffin."
"It wasn't empty."
Nathan stared.
"Whose body?"
"A woman Raven Vault wanted identified as Samantha."
Ortiz whispered, "Jesus."
Nathan looked at Mercer.
"Why?"
"Because Samantha found the ledger."
"The same ledger Emily found?"
"An earlier version."
"And she disappeared?"
"She tried to expose it."
"Then why not come to me?"
Mercer's eyes were full of regret.
"Because she believed Atlas had a traitor."
Nathan looked around the room.
Mercer.
Grant.
Marcus on the line.
Rachel.
His old team.
"Who?"
Mercer said, "She never told me."
Nathan turned to Grant.
"Can the files identify them?"
Grant searched.
"No direct name."
"Look harder."
"I'm trying."
A notification appeared.
REMOTE CONNECTION ATTEMPT.
Grant swore.
"Someone knows we're reading the drive."
"Can they access it?"
"No."
"Can you trace them?"
"Maybe."
The attempt came again.
Grant allowed a partial handshake.
Code streamed.
Then a location appeared.
"Got them."
"Where?"
Grant frowned.
"That's impossible."
Nathan stepped closer.
The coordinates pointed to a building less than one mile away.
The headquarters of Sterling Strategic Holdings.
Nathan's own company.
For nineteen years, Nathan had run a legitimate security consulting business.
Two hundred employees.
Government contracts.
Corporate risk assessments.
His quiet second life.
Someone inside his company was trying to access Emily's files.
Nathan asked, "Which terminal?"
Grant worked.
Then stopped.
"What?"
"It's your executive floor."
"Whose office?"
Grant looked at Nathan.
"Yours."
Nathan's phone rang.
His assistant, Caroline Brooks.
He answered.
"Caroline."
Her breathing was fast.
"Mr. Sterling, someone is in your office."
Nathan looked at Mercer.
"Who?"
"I don't know. Building security won't answer."
"Leave."
"I tried."
Nathan heard a door close on her end.
Then silence.
"Caroline?"
A man's voice replaced hers.
"Commander."
Nathan's face hardened.
"Where is she?"
"Alive."
"For now?"
"That depends."
"On what?"
"The ledger."
Nathan glanced at Emily.
"No."
"We know your daughter kept a copy."
Nathan said nothing.
"We also know Atlas is gathering."
Still nothing.
The caller laughed.
"You always did mistake silence for power."
Nathan recognized the voice.
Not the identity.
The rhythm.
Military.
Someone he had commanded.
Someone who knew him.
The caller continued.
"You want your assistant alive? Come to your office."
"Alone?"
"Bring whoever you like."
That surprised Nathan.
The man wanted Atlas together.
A trap.
Nathan said, "Why?"
"Because nineteen years is long enough."
The line disconnected.
Mercer asked, "You recognized him."
Nathan slowly nodded.
"But I can't place it."
Grant began packing equipment.
Ortiz said, "Nobody is going anywhere until I call this in."
Nathan looked at her.
"Call who?"
She stopped.
Her own department had already been penetrated.
Nathan said, "You can stay with Emily."
Ortiz shook her head.
"I'm not a babysitter."
"Tonight, keeping her alive may be the most important job in Chicago."
Ortiz looked at Emily.
Then at Nathan.
"Go."
Nathan turned toward Mercer and Grant.
"Atlas protocols."
Both men straightened instinctively.
For one strange second, nineteen years disappeared.
Grant asked, "Command structure?"
Nathan looked at them.
"Mine."
Mercer nodded.
"Good."
They left through a secured service elevator.
Halfway down, Marcus called again.
"I'm ten minutes out."
"Rachel?"
"With me."
"Meet at Sterling Strategic."
"Commander."
Nathan heard concern.
"What?"
"I found something else."
"Say it."
"A dormant Atlas emergency account activated forty minutes ago."
"Who has access?"
"Only team members."
"Which one used it?"
Marcus went silent.
"Marcus."
"The credentials belong to Atlas One."
Nathan stopped.
Atlas One had been Nathan.
But another officer had held that designation before him.
A man who disappeared after the unit's first classified operation.
Colonel Adrian Cross.
Nathan's mentor.
The man who recruited him.
The man officially killed in Afghanistan twenty-five years earlier.
The elevator doors opened.
Marcus whispered through the phone.
"Commander, Adrian Cross is alive."
Nathan looked across the dark lobby.
A figure stood on the other side of the glass doors.
May you like
Waiting.
Then the man stepped into the light.
