He nodded slowly.
“All right.”
“Tomorrow morning, you're going to publicly announce that the investigation is being suspended.”
“What?”
“Tell everyone we've found no evidence.”
“That isn't true.”
“Exactly.”
Hayes understood.
“You want the person responsible to think we've stopped.”
“Yes.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Wait.”
The trap was set.
The next morning, Hayes made the announcement.
The investigation was slowing.
The missing soldiers were presumed to have left voluntarily.
The base was returning to normal.
People relaxed.
That was when the first mistake happened.
At 02:11 the next morning, a security camera recorded someone entering the communications building.
The figure wore a hood.
The face was hidden.
But the gait was familiar.
I watched the footage three times.
Then I paused it.
“Enhance.”
The image sharpened.
The person stopped outside a secure terminal.
They removed their hood.
My eyes narrowed.
Major Thomas Vance.
Except it wasn't Vance.
It was someone wearing a prosthetic mask.
A very good one.
But not perfect.
The ears were wrong.
The jawline was slightly too narrow.
I knew immediately what it meant.
The person wanted us to believe Vance was alive.
But why?
I sent a team.
The building was surrounded.
The suspect escaped through an underground maintenance tunnel.
We found only a laptop.
And inside the laptop was a single file.
A list.
Names of American soldiers.
Dozens of them.
Some were active.
Some retired.
Some were dead.
At the bottom was another list.
Payments.
Amounts.
Dates.
Bank accounts.
Foreign entities.
The truth hit me hard.
This wasn't one traitor.
It was a network.
And the three missing soldiers had discovered it.
That was why they had been taken.
Not because they were valuable.
Because they were dangerous.
They knew the truth.
And someone wanted them silent.
I assembled a small team.
Hayes.
Two intelligence officers.
A cybersecurity specialist.
And Miller.
Hayes looked surprised when I named him.
“You want Specialist Miller?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because he's good.”
“He's arrogant.”
“So are half the people in this building.”
Hayes smiled.
“And?”
“He has courage.”
“That's your evidence?”
“No.”
I looked at the surveillance footage.
“Yesterday, while everyone else was standing around waiting for orders, Miller volunteered to enter the tunnel.”
Hayes nodded.
“He did.”
“He didn't know what was down there.”
“No.”
“And he went anyway.”
Hayes sighed.
“You're giving him another chance.”
“I'm giving him a job.”
Miller entered the briefing room.
He looked uncomfortable.
He stood at attention.
“General.”
“At ease.”
He sat.
I placed a photograph on the table.
“You're going underground.”
His eyes widened.
“Yes, ma'am.”
“You'll follow orders exactly.”
“Yes, ma'am.”
“And you will not try to prove anything.”
He hesitated.
“No, ma'am.”
I looked at him.
“Specialist?”
“Yes?”
“Yesterday you thought I didn't belong here.”
His face tightened.
“I was wrong.”
“You were.”
He looked down.
“I apologize.”
I nodded.
“Good.”
Then I pushed the photograph toward him.
“Now let's find our missing soldiers.”
Three Men in the Dark
The tunnel system beneath the base was older than most of the buildings above it.
It had been constructed decades earlier and expanded over time.
Narrow.
Wet.
Unforgiving.
Miller moved first.
I followed.
Our team advanced silently.
Every few yards, we found signs that someone had passed recently.
Fresh boot prints.
Scratches on the walls.
A broken cable.
Then we found blood.
Miller stopped.
“General.”
“I see it.”
The trail led deeper.
We followed it until the tunnel opened into an underground chamber.
There they were.
Price.
Webb.
Reed.
Alive.
Bound to metal chairs.
Bruised.
Exhausted.
But alive.
Miller immediately moved toward them.
I stopped him.
“Wait.”
He froze.
I studied the room.
Too clean.
Too obvious.
There was a camera in the corner.
The kidnappers wanted us to find them.
“It's a trap,” I whispered.
Miller looked around.
“What do we do?”
I smiled.
“We spring it.”
I stepped into the room.
“I'm here.”
A speaker crackled.
A man's voice filled the chamber.
“You shouldn't have come, General.”
I recognized it.
Captain Lewis.
The officer who had supposedly given Bennett the maintenance order.
“You made a mistake,” I said.
“Did I?”
“You kidnapped American personnel.”
“You call them personnel. I call them liabilities.”
Miller's fists clenched.
“Who are you working for?”
The voice laughed.
“You still don't understand.”
A monitor switched on.
Images appeared.
Politicians.
Contractors.
Military officers.
Foreign intelligence agents.
A network.
The same network from the laptop.
“You think this is about money?” Lewis asked.
I stared at the screen.
“No.”
“Good.”
“It's about control.”
Silence.
Then Lewis said:
“You're smarter than the reports suggested.”
“I read reports about myself.”
“You've become a problem.”
“I've been a problem for a long time.”
A door behind us opened.
Miller spun around.
Two armed men entered.