Chapter 6 - The Last Name on the List
I did not go to Pier 17 alone.
I also did not bring Harrison.
The people behind Nightglass expected emotion to override training.
That was their first mistake.
Their second was assuming I had survived years of classified operations by following instructions written by kidnappers.
The photograph of Daniel was real.
The claim that they had captured him was not.
Security cameras showed him entering an underground parking garage.
Then disappearing from view for forty-seven seconds.
After that, he entered a federal transport vehicle.
Safe.
The kidnappers had photographed him during the gap and gambled that I wouldn't verify.
We let them believe the gamble worked.
Harrison volunteered to participate.
I refused initially.
“This isn't redemption,” he said. “I know.”
“Then why?”
“Because Rebecca risked her life exposing what happened inside my company.”
“And?”
He looked toward Patricia.
“Because I've spent too long protecting the wrong things.”
For once, Patricia didn't rescue him from the consequences.
Neither did Grant.
Harrison wore a tracking device and concealed microphone.
At Pier 17, he carried an empty evidence case.
I watched from a covert command vehicle three blocks away.
Naomi sat beside me.
Reyes, officially detained, was nowhere near the operation.
That mattered.
We needed the enemy to believe our command structure was broken.
Harrison entered the warehouse.
Rebecca sat exactly where the photograph had shown her.
Bound.
Alive.
A masked man stood behind her.
“Case.”
Harrison raised it.
“Let her go first.”
The man laughed.
“You're negotiating?”
“Apparently.”
“Put it down.”
Harrison obeyed.
The masked man approached.
Then Rebecca moved.
Fast.
Much faster than a helpless hostage should.
She slipped one hand free, drove her shoulder into the man's chest and rolled away.
Federal tactical teams breached from three sides.
The masked man reached for a weapon.
Harrison kicked the evidence case into his legs.
He fell.
Agents overwhelmed him.
Rebecca was safe.
The masked man turned out to be a Mercer engineer named Stephen Kline.
One of the two engineers from Vale's list.
Kline talked within an hour.
Not because he was brave.
Because he discovered the people controlling Nightglass had already emptied his escape account.
The twenty-five million had passed through six shell entities before arriving at a domestic defense consulting firm.
The firm's owner shocked everyone.
Patricia Mercer.
Except Patricia had never created it.
Her identity had been used.
The account signatures were forged.
Who had access to her documents?
Harrison.
Grant.
Daniel.
Rebecca.
And Patricia's longtime financial manager.
A man named Charles Voss.
Harrison stared at the name.
“I've known Charlie for twenty-seven years.”
Naomi asked, “Does he work with Mercer Strategic?”
“He manages family trusts.”
“Security clearance?”
“Former military.”
“What branch?”
“Navy.”
My pulse changed.
“What did he do?”
Harrison thought.
“Procurement.”
There it was.
Charles Voss had retired twelve years earlier.
His service record looked ordinary.
Too ordinary.
Further investigation showed portions had been altered.
His actual position had given him access to the early research that eventually became Nightglass.
Voss had spent years building relationships with contractors.
Harrison included.
And he'd been at Thanksgiving dinner many times.
Just not this year.
“Where is he?” I asked.
Patricia called his office.
No answer.
Home.
No answer.
His private aircraft had departed Virginia ninety minutes earlier.
Destination Canada.
We alerted authorities.
The plane never reached Canadian airspace.
It disappeared from civilian tracking over Pennsylvania.
A search began.
Then Daniel found something.
We were back at the Mercer house by evening.
Twenty-four hours had passed since Grant shoved the coffee cup into my chest.
It felt like another lifetime.
Daniel stood in Harrison's office holding an old family photograph.
“Look.”
Voss stood beside Harrison at a company event twelve years earlier.
Behind them was Admiral Reyes.
Younger.
I stared.
Reyes had claimed he didn't know Voss personally.
That was now demonstrably false.
I called Naomi.
Reyes was brought back for questioning.
He looked at the photograph for several seconds.
“I wondered when you'd find that.”
Anger rose.
“You lied.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Voss wasn't working alone.”
“Who?”
Reyes looked tired.
“Me.”
Silence.
He explained.
Twelve years earlier, Reyes and Voss had worked on a legitimate classified communications initiative.
Voss became obsessed with creating persistent access capabilities.
Backdoors.
Reyes opposed him.
The project was terminated.
Voss disappeared into private consulting.
Years later, parts of his old architecture resurfaced inside Nightglass.
Reyes recognized them.
“You knew from the beginning.”
“I suspected.”
“And you used me to prove it.”
“Yes.”
I stood.
“You should have told me.”
“If I'd told you, your behavior around the Mercers might have changed.”
My anger sharpened.
“You used my marriage.”
“I protected your investigation.”
“You used my husband.”
Reyes didn't defend himself.
That was almost worse.
“You're relieved of operational involvement,” I said.
He stared at me.
“You don't have authority to—”
I placed the Secretary's directive on the table.
His expression changed.
“Yes,” I said. “I do.”
For the first time in my career, Admiral Thomas Reyes saluted me without speaking.
The investigation continued.
Voss's plane was found abandoned.
No body.
His financial trail ended.
Then Martin Vale emerged from hiding.
He arrived under federal protection carrying the final page of his list.
The page everyone had been willing to kill for.
Naomi placed it in front of me.
One name.
CHARLES VOSS.
Underneath:
PRIMARY ARCHITECT.
We had him.
Almost.
Vale explained that Voss's goal wasn't simply money.
Nightglass gave him leverage.
Information.
He intended to sell access to multiple foreign buyers, then blackmail the same buyers with records of their involvement.
Everyone became disposable.
Including the Mercer family.
Including me.
“Where would he go?” I asked.
Vale shook his head.
“Anywhere.”
Harrison spoke from across the room.
“No.”
We looked at him.
“I know where.”
Voss had once told Harrison that if the world ever collapsed, there was only one place he trusted.
An abandoned Mercer manufacturing facility near Norfolk.
Closed seven years earlier.
We moved immediately.
The facility looked empty.
Thermal imaging showed one person inside.
Tactical teams surrounded it.
I entered behind them.
We found Voss in the old executive office.
He was sitting calmly behind a dusty desk.
No weapon.
No resistance.
He looked at me.
“Commander.”
“Charles Voss.”
“I wondered how long it would take you.”
“You're under arrest.”
He smiled.
“For what?”
Naomi began listing charges.
Voss barely listened.
Instead he watched me.
“You still don't understand.”
I stopped.
“What?”
“Nightglass wasn't the objective.”
“Then what was?”
“You.”
My hand tightened.
He smiled.
“Your appointment to the task force wasn't Reyes's idea.”
I said nothing.
“I arranged it.”
“Why?”
“Because I needed someone incorruptible.”
That made no sense.
Voss leaned back.
“Corrupt people are predictable. Honest people are much more useful.”
Naomi ordered him restrained.
As agents pulled him up, Voss whispered something.
“What?”
He leaned toward me.
“Ask Daniel why he married you.”
I stared at him.
Then Voss smiled.
“Ask him who introduced you.”
My blood went cold.
May you like
Because I remembered exactly who had introduced Daniel and me four years earlier.
Charles Voss.
