Chapter 13 - THE INTERROGATION IN THE KITCHEN: WHY VICTOR STERLING JUST WOKE A SLEEPING WAR CRIME INVESTIGATOR
Ten minutes later, the tactical intruder—whose name was operative Miller, though no relation to Agent Miller from JSOC—was sitting uncomfortably at our kitchen island, his right arm bound tightly behind his back with heavy-duty zip-ties, his suppressed carbine dismantled into three useless pieces resting on the marble countertop.
I stood across from him, sipping a cup of black coffee while Lily remained soundly asleep in her bedroom, oblivious to the high-stakes intelligence debriefing happening five yards away.
“Let’s get one thing straight, operative,” I said calmly, setting my coffee cup down on the counter. “Breaking into a decorated Special Operations Major’s domicile in the middle of the night is a fantastic way to commit involuntary suicide. Now, why would Victor Sterling send a professional wet-work specialist to a quiet suburb in Virginia?”
Miller winced, favoring his broken elbow as he glared up at me with a mixture of fear and reluctant professional respect.
“Sterling didn't send me to kill you, Major,” Miller muttered, spitting a drop of blood onto the kitchen tile. “He sent me to deliver a message.”
“A message,” I repeated skeptically. “Usually messages are sent via secure encrypted email or diplomatic pouch. Tactical home invasions are typically reserved for terminations.”
“Sterling didn't know you were here,” Miller confessed quickly, his eyes darting toward the front door as if expecting backup that was never coming. “He thought Warren Caldwell’s former sister-in-law was just some clueless civilian records clerk. He hired me to break into your house, crack your computer hard drive, and steal whatever financial files Warren might have stashed away regarding their joint accounts before the federal grand jury subpoenas dropped next week.”
I stared at him, my mind racing through the tactical implications at lightning speed.
If Sterling thought I was just a civilian clerk, he didn't know my true military identity.
Which meant his operational reach into the Department of Defense database was still compromised by a high-level mole inside the Pentagon’s civilian personnel branch.
“Who’s your handler inside the Pentagon, Miller?” I asked quietly, leaning forward across the marble island.
Miller swallowed hard, his throat dry as bone. “I... I don't know his name. We only communicate through dead drops and encrypted satellite relay. He goes by the alias Archon.”
Archon.
The legendary, untouchable intelligence leak who had been selling black-ops personnel rosters to foreign cartels and criminal syndicates for over a decade.
My blood ran cold.
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This wasn't just a local suburban dispute anymore.
Warren Caldwell’s arrest had accidentally kicked open a hornet’s nest that went straight to the highest levels of national security corruption.
