54. Evie
EVIE
Rain hammers against the windows of Langley like someone is trying to break in.
I know better.
Tonight, the danger is already inside.
It’s nearly midnight, and the underground corridor should be empty.
Most of the analysts left hours ago. The senior directors disappeared behind secure doors, and the night staff are buried inside windowless rooms, watching screens and pretending the world isn’t always one bad decision away from disaster.
I adjust the strap of my bag and continue toward the secure exit.
My heels make almost no sound against the polished floor.
That isn’t an accident.
I learned years ago how to move quietly through buildings where powerful men believed closed doors made them untouchable.
Listen carefully.
Remember everything.
Never let them know you were close enough to hear.
I pass one closed door.
Then another.
The corridor curves toward the private elevator reserved for executive-level personnel.
I should keep walking.
I almost do.
Then I hear a voice.
Low.
Sharp.
Familiar.
Walter Graves.
I stop.
My pulse doesn’t race. Not yet.
I’ve spent twelve years learning how to keep my expression calm while my instincts scream. I’ve watched men lie to senators, generals, diplomats, and grieving families without blinking.
But Deputy Intelligence Director Walter Graves doesn’t stand in an underground corridor after midnight unless something ugly is happening.
The door ahead is open less than an inch.
A blade of light cuts across the dark floor.
Every instinct tells me to leave.
Pretend I heard nothing.
Go home.
Forget I was ever here.
Then Graves says a name that stops me cold.
“Shadow Division is still alive.”
I move closer to the wall.
Inside the room, another man answers. “The Alaska operation was supposed to eliminate every surviving member.”
Director Alan Miller.
I recognize his voice from countless briefings. Calm, polished, reassuring—the voice of a man who can order something monstrous and make it sound patriotic.
“They failed,” Graves says. “Rook and his people are still moving. They have resources we underestimated. Contacts. Access to names that should have remained buried.”
A third man speaks.
Commander Jerry Rhodes.
“What about McDougal?”
My fingers tighten around my bag.
Caleb McDougal.
Sniper.
The quiet one.
His intelligence file contains fewer than twenty unredacted lines.
Former military sniper. Special operations. Multiple classified deployments. No confirmed location. No confirmed status.
Dangerous.
Graves gives a humorless laugh. “McDougal is not the problem.”
“No?” Rhodes asks.
“He’s a rifle. A weapon. He does what he’s told.”
My stomach twists.
I don’t know Caleb McDougal personally, but I’ve read enough buried reports to know Graves is wrong.
Weapons don’t question orders.
Caleb McDougal did.
That’s why six members of his team were murdered on a mountain—and why the survivors are still being hunted.
I slide one hand into my bag and press the record button on the secure device inside.
Miller lowers his voice. “The senator is becoming a problem.”
I lean closer to the narrow opening.
“Richard Vance has requested access to the old intelligence archives,” Miller continues. “He wants to know why certain operations were buried.”
“He won’t get access,” Graves says.
“What if he pushes?”
“Then he becomes part of the story.”
Silence fills the room.
Cold crawls over my skin.
Rhodes finally speaks. “You’re certain it will point back to Shadow Division?”
“We’ll make certain it does.”
My breath catches.
They’re going to kill a United States senator.
Then they’re going to frame Shadow Division for his assassination.
This isn’t about silencing Rook’s team anymore. Graves is building a case against them—creating evidence, manufacturing motives, and turning men who served their country into traitors.
Miller speaks again. “What about the agent?”
I freeze.
Graves answers, “We don’t know who overheard the earlier conversation.”
For the first time, I hear a fracture in his composure.
Not uncertainty.
Fear.
“The hallway cameras were disabled for scheduled maintenance,” Miller says. “No one should have been there.”
“Someone was there,” Graves replies. “I can feel it.”
I step away from the door.
Slowly.
Carefully.
One step.
Then another.
My heart begins pounding hard enough to hurt.
The recorder in my bag holds enough to prove Graves, Miller, and Rhodes are planning an assassination.
Enough to destroy them.
Enough to get me killed before I reach the parking garage.
A hinge whispers behind me.
The door is opening.
I don’t look back.
Running would confirm everything.
I force myself to walk at the same unhurried pace, even though every muscle in my body is braced for a bullet.
I reach the curve in the corridor.
“Agent Hart.”
I stop.
My blood turns to ice.
Walter Graves stands beside the open door. His silver hair is perfectly combed. His suit jacket is unbuttoned, and his expression is as calm as it is during congressional briefings.
Miller and Rhodes stand behind him.
So do two armed security officers.
Graves smiles. “Working late?”
I turn and force myself to return it.
“I could ask you the same thing.”
His gaze drops to my bag.
Then returns to my face.
“You should be careful,” he says quietly. “There are dangerous people in this building.”
He doesn’t know.
Not for certain.
But he suspects.
And if Walter Graves suspects, I have minutes.
Maybe less.
“I’ll remember that.”
I turn toward the elevator.
I can feel all five men watching me.
My shoulder blades itch as I wait for the doors to open. For one terrible second, I’m certain Graves will order the guards to stop me.
The doors slide apart.
I step inside and press the button for the main level.
Graves watches me until the doors close between us.
The moment they do, I pull out the recorder.
The elevator is part of Langley’s secured network. I can’t risk transmitting from here, so I remove the encrypted memory card and slip it beneath the lining of my coat.
Then I take a second card from my wallet, insert it into the recorder, and copy the file.
One truth.
Two chances for it to survive.
The elevator begins to rise.
My phone shows no signal, but I compose a message to the only secure contact I believe might still exist beyond Graves’s reach.
Shadow Division is being framed. Senator Vance is the target. I recorded Graves, Miller, and Rhodes. Graves knows someone heard them. Find Caleb McDougal.
The elevator reaches the main level.
The doors open.
Two security officers are waiting in the lobby.
Neither one looks at me.
That frightens me more than if they had.
I walk past them, scan my identification, and step through the final security checkpoint.
Rain pounds the pavement outside.
My phone finds a signal.
The message sends.
I make it halfway to the parking garage before the lights behind me go out.
Not all of them.
Only the ones covering my path.
I reach inside my coat and close my hand around my pistol.
Then I start running.
Behind me, somewhere inside the dark halls of Langley, Walter Graves picks up a phone.
I don’t hear his order.
I don’t need to.
I already know what it is.
Find Agent Hart.
And make certain she never leaves Washington alive.