I turned to her.
“First, I’m going to get you out of this hospital.
Then I’m going to find out exactly what they built.”
She looked down at her bruised hands.
“I never wanted to be part of this.”
“This isn’t your fault, Abby.”
I sat beside her again.
“None of this is your fault.”
She didn’t answer.
Just let the silence hang.
—
Marcus called back forty minutes later.
“Colonel, we found the coat.
We recovered the USB drive from the lining.”
“And the recorder?”
There was a pause.
“I didn’t find a recorder.”
My chest tightened.
“Look under the loose floorboard in the guest house bathroom.”
Another pause.
“I just checked. That floorboard is intact.
There’s nothing under it.”
I felt the ground shift beneath me.
“Someone got to it first.”
Marcus’s voice went low.
“Colonel, there’s something else.”
“Tell me.”
“We found a hidden camera in the guest house.
It was installed inside the bathroom light fixture.
It’s been recording for weeks.”
My stomach turned to ice.
“If there’s a camera, they knew about the floorboard.”
I whispered.
“They knew about everything.”
I looked at Abigail.
Her face had gone pale.
“Mom, who else knows I was there?”
I didn’t answer.
I was already calculating.
—
I called Daniel immediately.
He answered on the first ring.
“Evelyn, what’s wrong?”
“They found the recorder before we did.
There’s a camera in the guest house.”
Daniel was silent for a second.
“That means they know she recorded them.
They know you’re close.”
“I know.”
“You need to move Abigail now.
Tonight.
To a military facility.”
“That’s what I’m doing.”
“I’ll meet you at Womack Army Medical Center.
I’ll have the paperwork ready.”
“Good.”
“Evelyn—”
His voice caught.
“Be careful.
Abigail isn’t the only target.”
That hung in the air.
I knew he was right.
—
I moved fast.
Within an hour, Abigail was transferred by ambulance to Womack Army Medical Center at Fort Liberty.
Military police escorted the entire route.
Daniel met us in the parking lot, paperwork in hand.
The staff took her in immediately.
A team of forensic nurses documented her injuries again.
A psychiatrist began a trauma assessment.
Security was placed on her room around the clock.
I stood in the hallway, watching the door close.
Daniel came up beside me.
“She’s safe now.”
“For now.”
He studied my face.
“What are you thinking?”
“Operation Glass House.”
“You know what that name means?”
“No. But I know who might.”
I pulled out my phone.
There was only one person I trusted to help me dig into classified files without leaving a trail.
A former intelligence officer who owed me a favor.
Her name was Captain Sarah Kim.
She’d left the service three years ago.
But she still had access to certain systems.
And she knew how to disappear.
—
Sarah answered on the third ring.
“Evelyn, it’s two in the morning.”
“I need you to run a name for me.”
“What name?”
“Operation Glass House.”
There was a long silence.
I heard her shift, the sound of a chair creaking.
“Where did you hear that?”
“It came up in an investigation involving my daughter.”
“Your daughter?”
“Sarah, do you know it?”
Another pause.
“Evelyn, that name isn’t something you run casually.
It’s a codeword I’ve seen once.
Twice at most.”
“And?”
“Both times it was buried in files so deep, they required multiple clearances.
And both times, the files were wiped within days.”
“What kind of files?”
