CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Kari stood in the parking lot of the Flagstaff FBI field office three days after Michael Torres had been airlifted from the Superstition Wilderness, and tried to convince her exhausted body that it could make it through one more briefing.
Torres was alive—still in the hospital but stable, his kidneys recovering from acute failure, his body slowly repairing the damage from eight hours of being chased through brutal desert heat.
Thomas Brightwater was in custody, undergoing psychiatric evaluation while prosecutors determined whether his brain damage made him legally incompetent to stand trial.
The ultra-marathon case was essentially closed. Four murders solved, a fifth victim saved, a killer stopped. It should have felt like a victory.
But Kari couldn't stop thinking about what Paul had said in his text: This is big. Really big.
She'd visited Ben first, stopping by his house on the reservation to check on his recovery.
The rope burns on his wrists had healed, the bruises had faded, but something in his eyes remained haunted—the knowledge that powerful people had been willing to kill him to protect their secret, and that those people were still out there.
"Be careful," Ben had told her as she left. "Whatever Paul and your father found, it's dangerous enough that Devco kidnapped and interrogated me. They won't hesitate to do worse if they think their plans are being exposed."
Now Kari climbed the stairs to the field office, where Paul had said he'd arranged a secure conference room for their briefing.
Her father was waiting in the lobby, and seeing him there—gray-haired and weathered but standing straight with that old FBI bearing—brought a complicated mix of emotions Kari wasn't ready to process.
"Kari," James said, his voice careful. "Thank you for coming. I know you're exhausted."
"Let's just get this over with," Kari replied, not unkindly but without warmth either. They had a professional relationship now, built on mutual respect for each other's investigative skills. Colleagues first, family second.
Paul emerged from an inner office, gesturing them toward a conference room. Inside, boxes of documents were stacked against one wall, and a laptop sat open on the table, the screen displaying a geological survey.
"Before we start," Paul said, closing the door, "you need to understand that what we're about to show you is dangerous. People have been killed to keep this information hidden. Your mother was killed for discovering it."
Kari's throat tightened. She nodded, not trusting herself to speak.
James pulled out a thick folder, opening it to reveal a timeline covered in Anna's handwriting.
"Anna documented seventeen suspicious deaths over the past twenty years.
All of them people who got close to discovering what's beneath the land Devco Holdings has been acquiring. The pattern is unmistakable."
They walked Kari through everything they'd found.
The coded notes Anna had disguised as paranoid rambling.
The decoded information revealing a massive lithium deposit worth potentially twenty billion dollars.
The systematic land acquisition is designed to surround and control access to the deposit.
The shell companies and corporate structures hiding the real investors.
The timeline of deaths—including Anna's—that had protected the conspiracy.
Kari listened, her exhaustion forgotten as the scope of what her mother had discovered became clear.
This wasn't just about a few land sales or isolated murders.
This was decades of systematic conspiracy, corporate corruption reaching into federal law enforcement, a mineral deposit so valuable that the people who controlled it were willing to kill anyone who threatened to expose it.
"The richest part of the deposit sits on tribal land," Paul explained, pointing to maps showing the reservation boundary.
"Land the Navajo Nation has refused to sell, possibly because they don't know what's under it or possibly because they do know and won't be pressured into giving it up.
Either way, Devco can't access the most valuable section without tribal cooperation. "
"So they've been waiting," Kari said. "Buying up everything around the deposit, eliminating threats, biding their time until they can figure out a way to get that tribal land."
"And killing anyone who might expose what they're doing before they can cash in," James added. His voice was heavy with pain.
"Ben saw the mining equipment," Kari said, making the final connection. "They've moved from exploration to preparation. They're getting ready to start extraction, which means they're more dangerous now than ever."
"Exactly," Paul said. "Which brings us to the question of what we do with this information.
We have evidence—solid evidence of conspiracy and murder.
But we also know the conspiracy has protection within federal law enforcement.
Going to the wrong person could get us killed, not to mention it would ensure that this evidence disappears forever. "
"So what do you think we should do?" Kari asked, glancing between the two of them. "Clearly you've put some thought into this. You must have some ideas."
"We need to be strategic," Paul said slowly. "Document everything, make multiple copies, distribute them where Devco can't reach them. Then we coordinate public exposure—media, congressional oversight, tribal authorities all at once. Make it too big to bury."
"How long will that take?"
"A week. Maybe less if we move fast."
Kari thought about the exhaustion pulling at her, about how she'd been running on adrenaline and coffee for days. A week felt like an eternity. But it was also sensible—taking time to do this right, to ensure Anna's evidence couldn't be destroyed or dismissed.
"I need to sleep on this," she said. "Process everything, figure out my role in whatever we do next. Can we reconvene in the morning?"
They agreed, and Kari left with copies of the key documents secured in her vehicle. The drive back to the reservation passed in a blur, her mind churning through implications.
Her mother had been right. All those years of investigation, all the suspicions people had dismissed as paranoia—Anna had been right about everything. And she'd died for it.
By the time Kari reached her house, it was after midnight. She pulled into her driveway, grabbed the document case, and started toward her front door.
Then stopped.
Her porch light was off. She distinctly remembered leaving it on this morning before heading to Flagstaff.
Her hand moved toward her sidearm as she processed the implications. Someone had been here. Might still be here.
She was still reaching for her weapon when gunfire erupted from inside her house.