Now Daniel Cross was telling her the aircraft listed in the casualty report had never crashed.
“There was no accident?” Aria asked.
“No.”
“Then why did they say there was?”
“Because Sentinel Group disappeared.”
“All of them?”
“Seven members were presumed dead within eleven months.”
“What about the others?”
“One retired.”
“One transferred.”
“And Commander Hale?”
Cross met her eyes.
“Commander Hale survived.”
Aria stared through the observation window toward the training field.
Soldiers were dismantling equipment.
From this distance they looked small.
Ordinary.
“You think Jackson killed them?”
Harper immediately replied, “No one said that.”
“But you're investigating him.”
“We're investigating inconsistencies.”
Aria turned.
“He recognized something my father taught me.”
“Yes.”
“He deliberately attacked me to see whether I'd use it.”
“Yes.”
“And you're all treating that like evidence?”
Cross shook his head.
“Not evidence against you.”
“Against who?”
“That,” he said, “is the problem.”
That evening, Jackson requested to speak with Aria.
Cross refused.
Aria insisted.
General Harper reluctantly approved the meeting under supervision.
They sat across from each other in a conference room shortly before sunset.
No uniforms now.
Jackson wore a dark training shirt.
Aria had changed into clean fatigues.
His cheek carried a thin scrape from the fall.
Her face was still faintly red where he had struck her.
For several seconds, neither spoke.
Finally Jackson said, “You did that better than he did.”
Aria's stomach twisted.
“My father?”
Jackson nodded.
“You knew him.”
“Yes.”
“How well?”
Jackson looked toward the observation window.
Cross and Harper stood behind it.
“I trusted him with my life.”
“That isn't an answer.”
“It's the only one I know how to give.”
Aria leaned forward.
“Did you know the crash story was false?”
“Yes.”
The word hit harder than the strike.
“You knew for twenty-three years?”
“Yes.”
“My mother raised me believing he died in an aircraft accident.”
“I know.”
“You attended his memorial?”
“Yes.”
“You looked at an eight-year-old girl and lied to her?”
Jackson's face tightened.
“Yes.”
Aria stood.
Jackson didn't.
“Why?”
“Because your father asked me to.”
Her anger faltered.
“What?”
“Sit down.”
“No.”
“Then stand. But listen.”
Jackson folded his hands.
“Sentinel wasn't what Cross thinks it was.”
“Then what was it?”
“At the beginning? Exactly what the files say. Experimental cross-branch training. Adaptability. Intelligence. Survival. Teaching operators to work when plans collapsed.”
“And later?”
“Someone realized the unit was useful for missions nobody wanted connected to normal chains of command.”
“Who?”
“We didn't know.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“I expect you to believe that young men with security clearances often confuse access with knowledge.”
Aria said nothing.
Jackson continued.
“Your father figured it out first.”
“What?”
“That mission reports were being altered.”
“Altered how?”
“Locations. Objectives. Names.”
“Why?”
“Because someone was using Sentinel to erase operations.”
Aria lowered herself back into the chair.
Jackson's voice became quieter.
“Thomas started copying records.”
“My father stole classified documents?”
“He preserved evidence.”
“Of what?”
Jackson looked toward the mirrored glass.
“Ask Cross why his agency spent seven months looking for records that officially don't exist.”
Aria turned toward the window.
Cross was unreadable.
“Keep talking,” she said.
Jackson did.
“Your father came to me three days before he disappeared. He said the unit had been compromised. He told me not to trust anyone who claimed to be investigating.”
“And you trusted him?”
“I laughed at him.”
The pain in Jackson's expression seemed genuine.
“I was twenty-five. I thought he was becoming paranoid.”
“What happened?”
“We deployed.”
“Where?”
“I still can't tell you.”
“My father disappeared there?”
“No.”
Jackson looked directly at her.
“He came back.”
Aria forgot how to breathe.
“You're lying.”
“I saw him six weeks after his supposed death.”
She stood again.
This time the chair toppled.
Behind the glass, Harper moved toward the door.
Aria raised her voice.
“You watched my family bury an empty coffin while knowing he was alive?”
Jackson stood too.
“I saw him once.”
“Where?”
“Virginia.”
“When?”
“1999.”
“What did he say?”