And now she was being brought down by a part-time car salesman and his mother.
I laughed again. The same hollow sound from the morning Ryan left me.
Because if this was their best shot—if this was the weapon they chose to deploy—then they had made the fatal mistake of assuming I would fight fair.
They wanted to destroy my reputation?
I would expose theirs.
The drive to Fort Meade took forty-five minutes. Every mile felt like a countdown.
My phone buzzed constantly. Marcus Webb had sent six messages, the last one reading: “Ma’am, I don’t know what’s in the news, but I have your back. Always.”
I typed back a quick response. “Thank you, Sergeant. Stand by.”
Then I silenced my phone and focused on the road.
The Pentagon was a massive gray labyrinth, cold and impersonal. But I had walked these corridors for twenty-two years. I knew every shortcut, every security checkpoint, every face that mattered.
Colonel Massey’s office was on the third floor. When I arrived, his administrative assistant looked up with wide eyes.
