So he knew my name.
That answered one question.
I stood up slow. “Funny. I was about to say the same thing to you.”
His gaze flicked to the blood on Nora’s jacket, then to the packet in my hand. No surprise. Just calculation.
“She’s unstable,” he said. “She stole sensitive material and fled medical supervision.”
Nora spat blood onto the pavement. “Tell him what you put in the IV.”
The man ignored her. “She’s frightened and unwell. Hand over the documents, and we can settle this quietly.”
Quietly.
That word did more damage than a threat.
That was how they always framed erasure. Quiet. Necessary. Clean.
Cole appeared at the far angle between pallets, visible enough to make them count him, hidden enough to force caution. Reyes stayed invisible. That was his favorite place to be.
I said, “If this is official, call the base commander.”
The man smiled again. “You know better than that.”
Yeah. I did.
There it was, out in the open. No authority he could name. No record he could risk creating. Which meant Nora had guessed right. They hadn’t come to arrest her. They’d come to fold her back into a hole and close the lid.
I took one step to the side so he could see the blood on her hand more clearly.
“If she dies here,” I said, “five witnesses walk straight into daylight with that packet.”
His expression changed a little then. Not fear. Annoyance.
He looked at me the way people look at a door that was supposed to be unlocked.
Behind him, a second man shifted his weight near the truck bumper. Former military by the posture. Another stood farther back with an earbud wire tucked under his collar. They weren’t local muscle. They were organized. Briefed. Probably told this was simple.
They had expected Nora alone.
They had not expected us to remember.
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