Chapter 8: The Names in the Sealed Statement
Patricia's cooperation attorney called Marsh at 13:10.
I was in the kitchen when Marsh took the call at my table, and she did not ask me to leave the room.
"Mr.
Alcott," she said.
"Yes.
I've heard the recording." A pause.
"Your client's sealed statement is now a central element of an active federal investigation.
The terms of her cooperation agreement need to be renegotiated before 17:00 today or the tribunal referral proceeds without accommodation." Another pause, longer.
"I understand your client's concern.
Tell her that her concern is shared.
Tell her the people she's protecting herself from are already aware that she's in our building.
She has less time than she thinks."
Marsh ended the call.
"Patricia is frightened," I said.
"Patricia is calculating," Marsh said.
"She's frightened and calculating, which makes her dangerous and useful at the same time." She stood.
"Her attorney is going to call back within twenty minutes.
When he does, she's going to offer us the sealed statement in exchange for full immunity and relocation."
"Will you give it to her?"
Marsh looked at me with an expression that was not quite an answer.
"That depends on what's in the statement," she said.
"If the names she has are as significant as the recording suggests, the people above Harrison are not mid-level contractors.
They're institutional.
And institutional exposure at that level requires authorization above my office."
"How long does that take?"
"Longer than seventy-two hours," she said.
"Which is why I need you to do something for me."
She placed a document on the table.
"This is a formal request for you to provide technical testimony regarding the architecture of your network, the security protocols you built, and the specific firewall event that flagged the Gulf convoy routing in October 2021." She looked at me.
"Your testimony establishes that the network was used without your knowledge and that your own security system actively worked against the people who were misusing it.
It closes Patricia's false cooperation statement permanently and it puts the technical origin of the evidence beyond challenge."
I looked at the document.
"If I testify," I said, "I become a named witness in a federal tribunal.
Everything connected to my name, my work, my clearance history — it becomes part of the record."
"Yes," Marsh said.
"Harrison's attorneys will come after my credibility."
"They will try," she said.
"They won't find much.
We've reviewed your record thoroughly.
Claire — you built a security system that caught a conspiracy your own husband was running.
Your credibility is the strongest element of this entire case."
I picked up the pen.
Marsh's phone rang before I could sign.
She looked at the screen and her expression shifted — not alarm, something more controlled than alarm, but close to it.
"Excuse me," she said, and stepped into the hallway.
Reyes moved slightly closer to the kitchen doorway.
I could hear Marsh's voice but not her words.
The call lasted four minutes.
When she came back, she sat down and placed both hands flat on the table.
"Harrison contacted Patricia's attorney directly," she said.
"Forty minutes ago.
Before we knew he had turned back from the airfield." She paused.
"He told Alcott that if Patricia releases the sealed statement, he will provide documentation that implicates her in an additional set of transfers that predate the Solace Group by three years.
Transfers she did not disclose to us."
I set the pen down.
"He's threatening his own mother," I said.
"He's threatening her with evidence he's been holding against her," Marsh said.
"Which means the relationship between Harrison and Patricia is not what it appeared to be.
She wasn't protecting him.
He wasn't protecting her.
They were each holding material on the other as mutual insurance."
"And now the insurance has run out," I said.
"For both of them," Marsh said.
"Which means they are both now highly motivated to make a deal before the other one does." She looked at me.
"And the first one to give us the names above Harrison wins."
My laptop chimed.
A new email.
Same anonymous routing.
No subject line.
The body read: *He doesn't have what he told Alcott he has.
He's bluffing.
She knows it.
She's going to call you directly.*
I turned the laptop toward Marsh.
She read it.
"Sylvia Crane," she said quietly.
"She's still watching," I said.
Marsh's phone rang again.
She looked at the screen.
"Unknown number," she said.
"Encrypted routing."
She answered it on speaker.
"Director Marsh." A woman's voice.
Precise, composed, and underneath the composure, something that had been held tightly for a very long time.
May you like
"This is Patricia Vance.
I'd like to speak to my daughter-in-law."
