Chapter 5 - Black Cedar
The bullet struck glass, not me.
I dropped below the dashboard and reversed into the ditch.
The SUV behind me accelerated away.
Interesting.
Whoever had followed me apparently did not want to remain after the shooting.
Police arrived seven minutes later.
The porch was empty.
No Voss.
No shooter.
Inside, nothing obvious had been stolen.
But my bedroom had been searched.
One floorboard was lifted.
The compartment beneath it was empty.
Agent Mara Keene arrived before midnight.
Forty-two.
Dark suit.
No patience for introductions.
“What was inside?”
“Nothing.”
She stared at me.
“Try again.”
“I don’t know you.”
“I’ve spent eleven months preventing someone from putting a bullet through your farmhouse.”
“You’re doing fantastic.”
She almost smiled.
Almost.
Then she placed a photograph on my table.
Elias Voss.
Taken six months earlier in Prague.
“Alive?”
“We don’t know.”
“That’s him.”
“Facial recognition says ninety-four percent.”
“Then it’s him.”
“Unless someone wants you believing that.”
I sat down.
Black Cedar had been a recovery operation in a country I was legally forbidden to name.
We were sent to retrieve stolen targeting technology.
The mission collapsed.
Three men died.
Voss disappeared inside a burning warehouse.
I dragged two others out.
The official investigation blamed faulty intelligence.
Then I left the Navy.
Keene placed another file down.
“The technology was never recovered.”
“I know.”
“No.”
She leaned closer.
“The government told your team it wasn’t recovered.”
My jaw tightened.
“What are you saying?”
“Someone sold portions of it afterward.”
“Who?”
“We believed Voss.”
“Believed?”
“Until six months ago.”
She showed me bank records.
Payments had been routed through agricultural equipment companies.
I laughed.
“You think I’m involved?”
“No.”
“Then why agriculture?”
“We think someone chose that sector because of you.”
My life.
My farm.
My poverty.
Perhaps none of it had been as invisible as I thought.
Then Keene asked:
“What did Voss give you before the warehouse exploded?”
“Nothing.”
“Clayton.”
“Nothing.”
She watched my face.
And I remembered.
Not a device.
Not documents.
A phrase.
Voss had grabbed my vest before sending me outside.
If things go wrong, remember where farmers bury steel.
I had assumed delirium.
Nine years later, I suddenly understood.
My farm had belonged to someone before me.
I pulled the property deed from a drawer.
Previous owner:
Elias Vincent.
Elias V.
Keene went pale.
“Clayton…”
I looked toward the barn.
The combine.
The dead alternator.
The machine I had bought with the farm.
The machine whose serial number had always looked strangely scratched.
I stood.
“Call your people.”
May you like
“Why?”
“Because I think my dead commander sold me this farm.”
