Chapter 11 - The Woman in the Glass Room
Jack closed his fist around the ring.
A line of dried blood marked the inside band.
Not enough to prove injury.
Enough to make his breathing sharpen.
Emily moved toward the medical monitor.
A live pulse trace moved across the screen.
“Someone is connected nearby.”
“Where?”
“The signal is wired. It could be another room.”
Vale searched the walls.
Daniel tested the shutter behind them.
Locked.
The speaker clicked again.
“Duke remembers more than Jack does,” Elias said. “That was always the problem.”
Jack looked upward.
“Let Sarah go.”
“You still believe captivity is the worst thing that happened to her.”
“Show me she’s alive.”
A section of dark glass on the far wall brightened.
A room appeared behind it.
Sarah sat strapped to a metal chair.
Her hair, once dark, was threaded with gray. Her face was thinner. A bruise marked one cheek.
But she was alive.
Her eyes found Jack immediately.
The force of the moment hollowed him out.
He stepped toward the glass.
Sarah’s lips parted.
No sound passed through.
She shook her head.
Jack touched the barrier.
Nine years of grief collapsed into one impossible image.
Sarah leaned forward against the restraints.
Her mouth formed two words.
Not safe.
Jack looked around.
Vale aimed at the glass’s upper corner.
“Two-way viewing panel. Reinforced.”
Emily studied the pulse monitor.
“This isn’t Sarah’s heart rate.”
Jack turned.
“How do you know?”
“Her breathing doesn’t match the trace.”
A second patient.
Hidden nearby.
Elias spoke again.
“Very good, Nurse Harper.”
Emily stared toward the speaker.
“You knew my father.”
“I funded his genius.”
“You murdered him.”
“No. Rebecca did.”
Vale’s pistol lowered half an inch.
Jack looked at her.
“Is that true?”
Vale’s face hardened.
“Samuel was trying to transmit the Ledger through an unsecured military channel. I stopped him.”
“You killed him?”
“I fired the shot.”
Emily staggered back as though struck.
Vale continued.
“He had been compromised. Elias had his family under surveillance. Samuel believed sending the Ledger was the only way to protect you.”
“You expect me to believe you murdered my father to save me?”
“No,” Vale said. “I expect you to hate me accurately.”
The glass room lights flickered.
Sarah twisted her hands against the restraints.
She pointed repeatedly toward the floor.
Duke began sniffing beneath the medical bed.
Jack crouched.
A metal hatch lay under the frame.
He opened it.
A narrow passage descended beneath the room.
The live pulse signal strengthened.
Someone lay below them.
Jack looked through the glass at Sarah.
She shook her head harder.
Not that way.
A warning.
Elias’s voice softened.
“Choose carefully, Jack. Sarah is behind the glass. The man beneath your feet knows where the Ledger is. You have time to save only one.”
Daniel stared at the hatch.
“This is insane.”
“No,” Jack said.
“It’s a pattern.”
He remembered Red Valley.
A burning corridor.
Two extraction routes.
One voice telling him to save the intelligence officer.
Another telling him to rescue his trapped team.
Jack had chosen the route marked by command.
Three men had died behind the other door.
Elias was recreating the decision.
Duke moved away from the hatch.
He went to the left wall and sat.
Jack followed him.
No visible door.
No handle.
Only concrete.
Duke scratched once near the floor.
Jack pressed the wall.
Air moved through a hidden seam.
Sarah wasn’t beyond the glass.
The image was a live projection from another location.
The real room was behind the wall.
Jack drove the steel bar into the seam.
Daniel joined him.
The concrete panel shifted.
A hidden door opened.
Sarah stood on the other side.
May you like
Unrestrained.
Holding a pistol aimed directly at Jack.
