Chapter 3 - The File That Should Not Exist
Emergency lights flickered on.
Marco tried the door.
Locked.
Claire looked at Adrian.
“Tell me that's normal.”
“It isn't.”
Adrian examined the room.
“No windows. One entrance.”
Marco pulled out his phone.
“No signal.”
Claire returned to the computer.
The message disappeared.
A countdown replaced it.
04:59.
04:58.
04:57.
“What happens at zero?” she asked.
“I don't intend to find out.”
Marco attacked the electronic lock.
Adrian scanned the shelves.
“Fire suppression.”
Claire looked upward.
Small nozzles dotted the ceiling.
Adrian's expression changed.
“Marco. Faster.”
Claire understood.
Medical archives could use chemical fire suppression systems capable of displacing oxygen.
The countdown reached four minutes.
Marco ripped open the access panel.
Claire searched drawers for tools.
Adrian wheeled himself toward the wall.
His chair struck a cabinet.
A folder fell.
Claire picked it up.
The label read DONOVAN, DANIEL.
She froze.
“Adrian.”
He saw the name.
“Take it.”
The countdown reached three minutes.
Marco finally bypassed the lock.
The door opened.
They escaped.
Seconds later, the archive sealed itself again.
Claire held her father's folder against her chest.
Adrian stared at it.
“Don't open that here.”
“Why?”
“Because whoever wanted us in that room may be watching.”
They returned upstairs.
Marco swept Adrian's suite.
Nothing.
Claire locked the door.
Then she opened Daniel's file.
The first pages contained military medical records.
The next contained photographs.
Claire recognized her father instantly.
Young.
Smiling.
Alive.
Then she found another photograph.
Daniel stood beside Adrian.
Both wore civilian clothes.
Behind them was a building Claire did not recognize.
On the back, someone had written:
VIRGINIA, 2010.
Claire stared.
“My father died in 2009.”
Adrian took the photograph.
His face went pale.
“That isn't possible.”
“You're standing beside him.”
“I wasn't.”
She looked at him.
“What?”
“I never saw Daniel after the mission.”
Claire examined the image.
It looked authentic.
Adrian pointed to his own wrist.
“No scar.”
“What?”
“I got this scar in 2006.”
The man in the photograph did not have it.
Claire understood.
“It's fake.”
“Maybe.”
The next document was stranger.
A death certificate.
Daniel Donovan.
Date of death: October 14, 2009.
Then another death certificate.
Same name.
Same birth date.
Different death date.
January 8, 2011.
Claire's hands shook.
“There are two.”
Adrian turned pages.
At the back was a handwritten note.
If Ghost survives, Donovan becomes leverage.
Adrian stared at the sentence.
Claire whispered, “What does that mean?”
“I don't know.”
But he did know one thing.
Daniel's death had been connected to him.
A knock came.
Marco checked the camera.
Dr. Mercer.
Adrian let him enter.
Mercer looked irritated.
“Mr. Vale, your rehabilitation team has been waiting.”
Claire held up the scan.
“What was removed from his spine?”
Mercer stopped.
Adrian noticed.
“You know.”
Mercer looked at Claire.
“That information is restricted.”
“By whom?” Adrian asked.
Mercer swallowed.
“The federal government.”
Adrian laughed coldly.
“I stopped taking federal orders years ago.”
Mercer sat.
Seven months earlier, Adrian had arrived unconscious after his supposed car crash.
During surgery, doctors discovered a tiny tracking device embedded near the damaged vertebra.
“Tracking?” Claire said.
Mercer nodded.
“Military-grade.”
“Why wasn't I told?” Adrian asked.
“We were ordered not to tell you.”
“Who gave the order?”
Mercer hesitated.
Adrian leaned forward.
“Name.”
“Rear Admiral Thomas Keene.”
Adrian went motionless.
Claire noticed immediately.
“You know him.”
Adrian's voice was almost inaudible.
“He commanded my unit.”
“Is he alive?”
“No.”
Mercer shook his head.
“Yes.”
Adrian stared at him.
“No. Keene died twelve years ago.”
Mercer opened his phone.
A recent photograph appeared.
An older man leaving a government building.
Thomas Keene.
Alive.
May you like
Adrian's past had just returned from the dead.
And Claire realized the man in the photograph was wearing her father's watch.
