Chapter 9 - Six Weeks After Ben’s Funeral
I stared at the date until the numbers blurred.
Six weeks after Ben’s funeral.
Six weeks after I stood beneath the California sun while a chaplain spoke about sacrifice and Donovan placed the folded flag in my hands.
In the photograph, Ben looked thinner. His beard had grown unevenly, and one side of his face was bruised. But he was standing.
Alive.
Rex sat beside him wearing the same scarred tactical collar.
Behind them, a concrete wall carried a painted date and part of a circular symbol. The rest had been torn away with the missing half.
“Could the image be manipulated?” I asked.
Harper examined it under her phone’s offline camera tools. “Possibly, but the paper is chemically aged, and the tear exposed layered security fibers. It came from an intelligence printer.”
Doc checked my pulse. “Sit down.”
“I don’t need to sit.”
“You inhaled smoke.”
“My husband may be alive.”
The sentence silenced him.
The side door Donovan had used was locked again. A technician attempted the manual release, but the mechanism had been jammed from the other side.
No one knew whether Donovan had chased the intruder or left with them.
Rex paced behind the lowered kennel shield.
When the handler raised it, the dog immediately searched the hangar, nose low, then stopped at the side door.
“He can track them,” I said.
“Possibly.”
“Open the kennel.”
The handler hesitated. “Rex is retired, injured, and operating under commands I don’t fully understand.”
“He is also the only witness who knows what Ben built.”
“Dogs don’t understand evidence.”
“No. They understand who they trust.”
I looked at the empty doorway.
“So far, he’s been right.”
The handler opened the gate.
Rex stepped out slowly, favoring his scarred shoulder for two strides before settling into a disciplined pace. He approached me first and touched his muzzle to the tag in my hand.
Then he moved to the smoke canister.
He sniffed once.
His body stiffened.
He crossed to the place where Donovan had stood, then to the side door.
But instead of pawing at it, he turned and walked toward the transport aircraft.
The handler followed. “He’s not tracking the intruder.”
“What is he doing?”
“Following a transferred scent.”
Rex climbed the aircraft stairs.
We entered behind him.
The interior had been stripped for display, but several secured compartments remained along the walls. Rex moved past all of them and stopped beside a folded crew seat.
He pushed his nose beneath it.
The handler reached under the frame and removed a small cloth patch.
It bore no readable writing, only the same split-circle symbol.
The patch smelled faintly of antiseptic.
Doc took it with gloved fingers.
“This is hospital-grade sterilizing solution.”
“From the base clinic?” Harper asked.
“Not ours. Different formulation.”
Rex continued toward the cockpit.
Behind the pilot’s seat, he found a narrow access panel.
Inside was a smartphone wrapped in signal-blocking fabric.
The battery should have been dead.
The screen lit when I touched it.
A single video file appeared with no readable title.
Harper disconnected all nearby devices before opening it.
The video showed Ben seated in the same concrete room from the photograph.
His wrists were out of frame. A medical sensor was attached to his neck.
He looked directly into the camera.
“Emily, if you’re seeing this, Rex completed the first retrieval.”
My hand covered my mouth.
Ben glanced toward someone off-camera.
“Donovan isn’t the architect,” he continued. “But he may be carrying their trigger without knowing it.”
The image shook.
A second voice ordered him to stop.
Ben leaned closer.
“Aaron Vale is alive, and he—”
The video cut to static.
A live call immediately appeared on the phone.
The caller identification was blocked.
I answered.
For several seconds, I heard only breathing.
Then Donovan whispered, “Do not trust Carter.”
The line went dead.
I turned.
May you like
Doc was no longer standing behind me.
📖 Search for the missing physician after Donovan’s warning—and discover what Doc had taken from the case in CHAPTER 10. 👇
