Chapter 5 - BishopI did not confront Cole immediately.
Nobody believed him.
At first.
Then detectives questioned him for ninety minutes.
His story never changed.
He said someone had paid him five thousand dollars to make Cole Mercer’s stay “difficult.”
Not kill him.
Not injure him.
Just provoke him.
Record him behaving violently.
Create documentation suggesting instability.
Why?
Derek said he didn’t know.
He had received instructions through encrypted messages.
The first arrived three weeks earlier.
Three weeks.
The same week I started at Harbor Point.
That bothered me more than anything else.
Derek had been specifically instructed to target “the new nurse” whenever Cole arrived.
Which meant someone had known Cole would eventually reach Harbor Point.
Someone had also known I would be here.
That wasn’t coincidence.
It was staging.
By midnight, federal agents had arrived.
Not ordinary FBI agents.
These men wore government credentials but moved like people accustomed to other kinds of work.
One introduced himself as Special Agent Thomas Briggs.
He had a square face, gray hair, and the careful eyes of someone who never accepted the first explanation.
He interviewed Cole privately.
Then me.
We sat in an empty conference room.
Briggs placed a recorder on the table.
“Name?”
“Maya Catherine Reed.”
“Occupation?”
“Registered nurse.”
“Previous occupation?”
“Emergency medical specialist.”
“Where?”
“Military contracting.”
“Which contractor?”
“Several.”
He leaned back.
“That’s vague.”
“It’s accurate.”
“Maya, I’m not here to prosecute you.”
“That sentence usually precedes something unpleasant.”
He smiled slightly.
“I’ve read your sealed file.”
My heart rate changed.
I kept my face still.
“What sealed file?”
“That answer tells me enough.”
He opened a folder.
Inside was my photograph.
Not a hospital ID.
A photograph taken eight years earlier.
Short hair.
Dust-covered face.
Tactical armor.
A rifle against my chest.
“Sparrow,” Briggs said.
I stared at him.
“I haven’t heard that name in years.”
“Apparently someone else has.”
He showed me Derek’s message.
MOVE BISHOP BEFORE SPARROW REMEMBERS.
“What am I supposed to remember?”
“That’s what I hoped you could tell me.”
“I can’t.”
“Night Cell.”
My hands went cold.
Briggs watched me closely.
“You were the team medic.”
“One of them.”
“You were also trained in tactical communications, extraction, field intelligence, and counter-surveillance.”
“I treated people.”
“That isn’t what your file says.”
“My file says whatever someone decided it should say.”
Briggs paused.
Fair answer.
He pulled out another photograph.
Dr. Martin Keller.
The hospital’s medical director.
“You recognize him.”
“He recruited me.”
“Did you know him before Harbor Point?”
“No.”
“You sure?”
“Yes.”
Briggs turned the photo around.
On the back was another image.
Keller twenty years younger.
Military uniform.
Different haircut.
Different glasses.
But unmistakably him.
Underneath, typed in black letters:
CAPTAIN MARTIN KELLER — DEFENSE MEDICAL INTELLIGENCE PROGRAM
My stomach tightened.
“He was military?”
“More than military.”
“What program?”
Briggs closed the folder.
“Classified.”
I laughed once.
“You show me a classified photograph and then tell me the program is classified?”
“I need to know whether you recognize him.”
“I don’t.”
He studied me.
Then nodded.
“Okay.”
“Where is Keller?”
“Missing.”
“What?”
“He left the hospital approximately four minutes before the lockdown.”
“Cameras?”
“Show him exiting through the parking garage.”
“Car?”
“Still there.”
“Then someone picked him up.”
“Probably.”
I leaned forward.
“Agent Briggs, Cole says someone is stealing veterans’ biometric information.”
Briggs didn’t react.
“Is that why you’re here?”
“No.”
“Why are you here?”
He hesitated.
Then slid another photograph across the table.
Nathan Vale.
The man from the hallway.
The missing contractor.
Except this photograph was dated nine years earlier.
Vale stood beside several soldiers.
Among them was Ethan Cross.
My old commander.
I stopped breathing.
“Where did you get this?”
“Archive material.”
“What were they doing?”
“Night Cell.”
I stared at Vale.
He looked younger.
Healthier.
But it was him.
“That means Vale was part of the team.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t I know?”
“You weren’t supposed to.”
“Cole didn’t know either?”
“We’re not sure.”
I looked toward the conference-room window.
My reflection looked normal.
That almost offended me.
How could I look normal when a life I buried was crawling out of the ground?
“What happened to Night Cell?” I asked.
Briggs was silent.
“You know.”
“Parts.”
“Tell me.”
“I can’t.”
I stood.
“Then this conversation is over.”
“Maya.”
I reached the door.
“Ethan Cross may be alive.”
I stopped.
Everything in me went still.
Briggs continued.
“We received an encrypted transmission six months ago using one of Cross’s old authentication sequences.”
I turned slowly.
“From where?”
“Unknown relay.”
“What did it say?”
Briggs looked at me.
“Find Sparrow before Keller does.”
The room seemed suddenly too small.
“Keller hired me.”
“Yes.”
“So either Cross was too late—”
“Or Keller wanted you where Cross could find you.”
I sat back down.
“Why?”
“That’s the question.”
A knock interrupted us.
An agent entered.
“Sir.”
He whispered something.
Briggs’s expression changed.
“What?”
The agent looked at me.
“Dr. Keller just called the hospital.”
Briggs stood.
“Trace?”
“Already trying.”
“What did he want?”
“He asked to speak to Maya Reed.”
I felt a chill.
Briggs glanced at me.
“Want to answer?”
“No.”
“You should.”
“Why?”
“Because right now, he thinks you don’t know anything.”
I considered that.
Then nodded.
They routed the call through a secure phone.
I picked it up.
“Hello?”
Keller sounded breathless.
“Maya?”
“Dr. Keller?”
“Thank God.”
“Where are you?”
“I can’t tell you.”
Briggs signaled for me to keep him talking.
“What’s happening?”
“You need to leave the hospital.”
“Why?”
“There are people looking for you.”
“Who?”
Silence.
“Keller?”
“I made a mistake bringing you here.”
My grip tightened.
“Why did you bring me here?”
“I thought I could protect you.”
“From what?”
“From Cross.”
My heart slammed once.
“Ethan Cross?”
Briggs leaned closer.
Keller continued.
“You believe he saved you years ago.”
“He did.”
“No.”
Keller’s voice dropped.
“He used you.”
“Explain.”
“I can’t on the phone.”
“Then meet me.”
“No.”
“You called me.”
“Because the operation is active again.”
“What operation?”
A pause.
Then Keller whispered one word.
“Janus.”
Briggs wrote it down.
I had never heard it before.
“What is Janus?”
Keller’s breathing changed.
“Maya, listen carefully. Cole Mercer cannot be trusted.”
I looked through the glass toward Cole’s room.
He was standing at the window watching me.
“Keller—”
“Bishop was never investigating the leak.”
“What?”
“He is the leak.”
The phone crackled.
Then I heard a distant sound.
A door.
Keller gasped.
“Maya—”
A gunshot exploded through the line.
The call went dead.
I stared at the phone.
Briggs immediately ordered agents to trace the signal.
I barely heard him.
My eyes stayed on Cole.
Across the emergency department, Cole stared back.
He couldn’t hear anything.
He couldn’t know what Keller had told me.
Yet as our eyes met, he slowly lifted one hand.
One question in ASL.
What happened?
May you like
I didn’t answer.
For the first time, I wondered whether the wounded man I had protected was the person I should have feared all along.
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