CHAPTER 6 — Emily's Last Call
CHAPTER 6 — Emily's Last Call
Smoke drifted through the hallway as flames climbed the front porch.
The attackers had already set the entrance on fire.
Daniel carried Noah.
Lily held Rex's collar as they descended into the narrow underground tunnel.
The passage smelled of damp earth and old wood.
It stretched beneath the property toward an abandoned storm shelter nearly a hundred yards away.
Halfway through, Noah whispered,
"Dad..."
"Is Mom hiding here?"
Daniel swallowed hard.
"I don't know."
He prayed the answer wasn't no.
They emerged behind a collapsed barn.
From the hill above, Daniel watched his own home burn.
Orange flames consumed the porch.
Windows exploded one by one.
Firefighters hadn't even arrived.
The attackers had vanished.
Only smoke remained.
Lily broke down.
"Our house..."
Daniel wrapped an arm around her.
"It's just a house."
"You are my home."
For the first time in months...
Lily cried like a ten-year-old instead of the exhausted adult she'd been forced to become.
Daniel borrowed a phone from a nearby gas station.
He dialed Sarah Whitmore's number.
Voicemail.
Again.
Nothing.
Then his phone vibrated.
Unknown caller.
He answered cautiously.
A weak female voice whispered,
"Daniel..."
His knees nearly gave out.
"Emily?"
Static filled the line.
"I'm sorry..."
"I couldn't let them use the children."
"Where are you?"
"I don't have much time."
Daniel could hear traffic.
Sirens.
A train horn somewhere nearby.
"They know I called."
"Listen carefully."
"Victor Hale..."
"isn't Victor Hale."
Daniel frowned.
"What do you mean?"
"That's not his real name."
"Everything is fake."
"The company."
"The documents."
"Even the identity."
Daniel's heart pounded.
"Who is he?"
Emily answered with four words.
"Your commanding officer..."
The line suddenly erupted into shouting.
Emily screamed.
Then—
Gunshots.
The call disconnected.
Daniel stared at the silent phone.
His commanding officer?
Colonel Richard Mercer.
The man who had personally approved Daniel's overseas deployment.
The same deployment that kept him away while everything fell apart.
The same man who always insisted Daniel extend his missions.
It couldn't be...
Could it?
That evening Daniel contacted an old friend from the Army.
Former Military Intelligence Sergeant Marcus Reed.
Marcus listened without interrupting.
Finally he said,
"I ran a facial recognition search."
"And?"
"The man calling himself Victor Hale..."
Marcus slid a file across the table.
Inside was a military photograph.
Fifteen years old.
Daniel felt the room spin.
The face was unmistakable.
Only younger.
Without the expensive suit.
Without gray hair.
Without the fake name.
Marcus spoke quietly.
"His real name is..."
Colonel Richard Mercer.
"He disappeared from military records twelve years ago."
Daniel looked up in disbelief.
"That's impossible."
Marcus shook his head.
"It gets worse."
He opened another classified file.
Across the top, stamped in red, were the words:
OPERATION HOMECOMING
Daniel read the first paragraph.
Then the second.
By the third...
His hands began shaking.
Every soldier listed in the file...
had been deployed shortly before losing everything back home.
Homes.
Savings.
Businesses.
Families.
It wasn't random.
It was a system.
And Daniel had become the newest target.
Marcus looked him straight in the eye.
"Daniel..."
May you like
"They're not just after your house anymore."
"They're after everyone who knows the truth."
