“I didn't ask you to fight me.”
Dylan's expression tightened.
“You think you're better than me?”
“No.”
“Then why won't you fight?”
Walter turned.
“Because you're twenty-eight.”
Dylan blinked.
“So?”
“And I'm sixty-six.”
“You didn't look sixty-six.”
Walter's face softened.
“That is precisely the problem.”
Dylan didn't understand.
Walter continued:
“When people see strength, they want to test it.”
Dylan stepped closer.
“You're scared you'll lose.”
Walter looked directly into his eyes.
“No.”
The answer was so calm that Dylan hesitated.
Walter walked away.
Dylan grabbed his shoulder.
That was a mistake.
Walter turned immediately.
He didn't strike.
He didn't throw him.
He simply trapped Dylan's wrist against his own chest.
The movement was almost invisible.
Dylan's face changed.
Walter whispered:
“Don't touch me again.”
Then he released him.
Dylan stepped back.
His friends stared.
One of them whispered:
“What the hell?”
Walter picked up the ladder.
“Have a good day.”
Dylan watched him disappear.
His humiliation had become anger.
But beneath the anger was something else.
Fear.
For the first time, Dylan understood that Walter had not been lucky.
He had been holding back.
The Missing Years
Marcus confronted Walter after closing.
“You trained military units.”
Walter sat on a bench in the empty gym.
“You found something.”
“Yes.”
“You shouldn't have.”
Marcus sat beside him.
“I saw your photograph.”
Walter sighed.
“How much did you find?”
“Not much.”
“Good.”
Marcus waited.
Walter looked toward the empty basketball court.
“I was young.”
“How young?”
“Twenty-nine when I joined the program.”
“What program?”
Walter hesitated.
“A classified training unit.”
Marcus frowned.
“Special operations?”
“Not exactly.”
“Then what?”
“Personnel protection. Close-quarters defense. Recovery work.”
Marcus nodded slowly.
“You trained people who operated in dangerous places.”
“Yes.”
“What happened?”
Walter looked down.
“My team lost three people.”
Marcus said nothing.
“An extraction went wrong.”