Chapter 2 - THE SON WHO DIED TWELVE YEARS AGO
The shooting range disappeared around General Harlan.
The voices.
The gunfire.
The smell of powder.
All of it became distant noise.
Daniel Harlan.
His only son.
Dead for twelve years.
Harlan grabbed the edge of the shooting bench.
Marcus stepped closer.
“General, you okay?”
Harlan ignored him.
He stared at Eli.
“Say that name again.”
“Daniel Harlan.”
“No.”
Eli frowned.
“You asked.”
“My son Daniel died in Afghanistan.”
Eli’s expression hardened.
“No, sir.”
Harlan looked as though Eli had slapped him.
“I buried him.”
“Then you buried an empty coffin.”
The words were quiet.
They hit harder because of it.
Harlan’s breathing became shallow.
Daniel had been thirty-two when his reconnaissance unit disappeared during a classified operation near the Afghan-Pakistan border.
An explosion destroyed their vehicle.
Bodies were recovered.
Not all of them could be identified.
Daniel’s death had been confirmed through military channels.
Thomas Harlan had personally received the folded flag.
He still kept it in a glass case.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Harlan whispered.
Eli reached under his hoodie and removed the pendant.
He placed it on the bench.
Harlan picked it up.
The silver hawk had a tiny crack along the left wing.
Thomas knew that crack.
He had caused it himself in 1987 when the pendant slipped from his hand onto a concrete barracks floor.
Later, he gave it to Daniel on the day his son graduated from Ranger School.
There was only one pendant like it.
Harlan looked up slowly.
“Where is he?”
Eli looked around the range.
“I was told not to answer that until we were alone.”
Marcus smiled thinly.
“What is this, some kind of movie?”
Harlan turned.
“Marcus, shut down this firing lane.”
“General, with respect—”
“That wasn’t a request.”
The old command in Harlan’s voice changed the atmosphere instantly.
Marcus’s smile disappeared.
Eli picked up his bucket.
“Can we go somewhere private?”
Harlan nodded.
They walked toward the clubhouse.
Marcus watched them leave.
Something in his expression made Eli glance back.
Inside Harlan’s private office, the general shut the door.
“Talk.”
Eli remained standing.
“My dad lived under another name.”
“What name?”
“David Carter.”
Harlan’s knees nearly gave out.
Eli continued.
“He married my mom sixteen years ago. She never knew who he really was at first.”
“Your mother?”
“Sarah Carter.”
Harlan swallowed.
“Where is she?”
Eli looked down.
“She died eight months ago.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Car accident.”
Something about the way Eli said it made Harlan look up.
“You don’t think it was an accident.”
“No.”
Harlan stepped closer.
“Where is Daniel now?”
“I don’t know.”
“What do you mean you don’t know?”
“He disappeared six months after Mom died.”
Harlan stared at him.
“Then how did he tell you to come here?”
Eli reached into his bucket.
Under the brass casings was an old prepaid phone.
“He called me three weeks ago.”
Harlan’s pulse jumped.
“What did he say?”
Eli handed him the phone.
“He said to come to Pine Ridge today at exactly two o’clock. He said you’d be here.”
“How could he know that?”
“He knew a lot of things.”
Harlan looked at the phone.
“Did he say anything else?”
Eli nodded.
“He told me if you recognized the pendant, I should give you a message.”
“What message?”
Eli took a breath.
“He said, ‘The man who killed my team is still standing beside you.’”
May you like
Harlan froze.
Outside the closed office door, a floorboard creaked.
