Think.
Autumn comes early if you know where to look.
My father used to photograph the first red maple every year.
He kept the photos in albums.
Each labeled by date.
Naomi had those albums.
I called Sloan.
“Get my sister on secure video.”
Ten minutes later, Naomi appeared on a tablet from a protected location.
Her hair was tied back.
She looked furious and terrified.
“Derek, someone finally tell me what’s happening.”
“Do you have Dad’s old photo albums?”
“At Mom’s house.”
“Can agents get them?”
“They already moved Mom.”
“Ask her where they are.”
Twenty minutes later, a protective agent displayed the albums on camera.
I directed him to September photographs.
Every year, the same thing.
A red maple tree beside a stone wall.
Then I noticed something.
The location changed after 1998.
Not dramatically.
Same tree.
Same wall.
But a small brass plate appeared behind us in the photograph.
I zoomed.
Couldn’t read it.
Naomi said, “I know where that is.”
“Where?”
“Arlington.”
I stared at her.
“What?”
“Not the cemetery. The old military records annex Dad used to take us near. Remember? There was a little memorial garden.”
I remembered.
A government logistics complex where my father worked before retirement.
Closed now.
Sold to private developers.
The memorial garden had a maple tree.
“Autumn comes early,” I whispered.
Evan leaned forward.
“What?”
I looked at the photograph.
Beneath the maple tree was a plaque honoring Army logistics personnel lost overseas.
My father had made us stand beside it every year.
Not because of the tree.
Because of the plaque.
I enlarged the image.
One line of names.
One name circled lightly in pen.
Arthur Caldwell.
My heart stopped.
President Arthur Caldwell?
Impossible.
The President had never served in military logistics.
Then I saw the middle initial.
Arthur J. Caldwell.
The President was Arthur James Caldwell.
Same name.
Could be coincidence.
But below it was a date.
October 19, 1983.
A soldier with the President’s exact name had supposedly died during an overseas logistics accident.
I looked at Evan.
He looked at me.
Neither of us said anything.
Then Sloan’s voice came through the phone.
“Derek.”
“What?”
“I ran the name.”
“And?”
Her tone had changed completely.
“Arthur J. Caldwell existed.”
I waited.
“He was an Army intelligence specialist attached to a logistics unit.”
“What happened to him?”
“Officially? Died in Beirut in 1983.”
“And unofficially?”
Long silence.
“We need to get you out of that building.”
“Rebecca.”
“Now.”
“Why?”
“Because the President’s original birth records were sealed under executive authority thirty-one years ago.”
The room went cold.
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying someone just accessed our search.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“From where?”
She whispered the answer.
“The White House.”
The line went dead.
Every light inside the ranger station went out.
Outside, gunfire erupted.
Chapter 5
The first bullet came through the window where my head had been less than a second earlier.
Evan tackled me.
Glass exploded across the floor.
We crawled behind a heavy desk.
Outside, federal agents returned fire.
“Back exit!” I shouted.
Evan shook his head.
“Covered.”
“How do you know?”
“Because that’s what I would do.”
I grabbed the unloaded pistol from the floor.
“Magazine?”
He slid one from his pocket.
I loaded it.
Another burst shattered the front wall.
These weren’t local deputies.
Too disciplined.
Three-round bursts.
Controlled fire.
Sloan’s team outside began moving.
Someone shouted “Federal agents!”
The attackers kept shooting.
That told me everything.
They had not mistaken their target.
They knew exactly who surrounded the building.
Evan pointed toward a trapdoor beneath a rug.
“Old fire lookout tunnel.”
Of course there was a tunnel.
“Where does it go?”
“Drainage ditch. Eighty yards.”
We dropped through.
The tunnel smelled of mud and mold.
We crawled.
Halfway through, my phone regained signal.
One message appeared from Sloan.
Do not trust arriving federal units. Authentication compromised.
I stopped.
Evan looked back.
“What?”
I showed him.
He closed his eyes.
“That’s Frost.”
“Or someone above him.”
“Who’s above an FBI counterintelligence supervisor?”
I didn’t answer.
Because we both knew.
Plenty of people.
At the drainage exit, we heard engines.
Then a voice.
“Derek Hayes!”
I froze.
The voice was familiar.
Deputy Special Agent in Charge Thomas Vale.
My boss.
“Derek, it’s Vale. Identify yourself.”
Evan whispered, “Do you trust him?”
I wanted to say yes.
Vale had promoted me.
Recommended me for Presidential Protective Division.
Attended my father’s memorial service.
Wait.
My father’s memorial service.
I suddenly remembered Vale standing beside my mother.
He had known my father.
Not casually.
He had embraced him once at my academy graduation.
I had forgotten.
Or never questioned it.
“Vale!” I shouted from cover. “Authentication phrase!”
Silence.
Then: “Bluebird Seven.”
Wrong.
Today’s emergency phrase was Copper Lantern.
Only operational command knew.
I looked at Evan.
He already understood.
We moved deeper into the drainage ditch.
Behind us, Vale called again.
“Derek, don’t do something stupid.”
My chest tightened.
A man I had trusted for ten years was standing fifty yards away using the wrong authentication phrase.
Then he said something worse.
“Your father made the same mistake.”
I stopped.
Evan grabbed my sleeve.
“Keep moving.”
I wanted to turn around.
I wanted answers.
But my father had died because he stayed too long.
So we ran.
Sloan found us forty minutes later near an abandoned service road.
She was bleeding from a cut above her eye.
“What happened?” I asked.
“Two agents wounded. Attackers withdrew.”
“Vale?”
“Gone.”
“He was there.”
“I know.”