stepped beside his sister.
“You never call us,” he said.
Garrett had no answer for that.
General Bradley touched my shoulder and pointed toward the SUV.
A live tactical map showed a blinking location near a private airfield in Montenegro.
A multinational arrest team was moving into position.
The general wrote another message.
KEEP HIM INSIDE.
I understood.
Garrett could not reach the aircraft.
“The response code is not something I can recite,” I told him.
“It has to be generated through the original Glasshouse console.”
“Where is the console?”
“With me.”
That was a lie, but he wanted it to be true.
“Then generate it.”
“I need your device signature first.
The system will reject an unknown terminal.”
He muttered a curse.
“Send the request,” I said.
“Unless you never had the buyer and this entire scheme was just another performance.”
His pride did the rest.
A connection request flashed across the general’s tablet.
It included Garrett’s device signature, location beacon, and the address of the receiving server.
The server belonged to a private broker wanted in four countries for trafficking military intelligence.
General Bradley gave the arrest team the command.
Through the phone, I heard a distant crash.
Garrett swore.
Footsteps thundered.
Someone shouted in a language I did not recognize.
“Alex, what did you do?”
For seven years, I had imagined what I might say if he ever returned.
I had imagined anger, accusation, even forgiveness.
In the end, the truth required only one sentence.
“I protected the life you abandoned.”
The line filled with shouting.
Then it disconnected.
General Bradley waited for confirmation.
Rain ran from the brim of his cap, but he did not move.
Thirty seconds later, his radio sounded.
“Primary target secured.
Data devices recovered.
No friendly casualties.”
The breath left my body slowly.
Around us, the funeral had ceased to be a funeral.
Military police separated Beatrice and Richard.
Federal agents entered through the cemetery gate carrying evidence bags and warrants.
Scarlett backed away from them.
“I didn’t know,” she said.
“Garrett told me the accounts were for our future.
He said his parents were transferring an inheritance.”
An agent asked for her phone.
She clutched it to her chest.
“Am I under arrest?”
“You are being detained for questioning.
Your cooperation will matter.”
Her eyes met mine.
There was no triumph in me.
She had helped destroy my marriage, but Garrett had lied to her too.
The difference was that she had believed his promises after seeing what he had done to his first family.
“He said you were cold,” she whispered.
“He said you cared more about your uniform than your children.”
Emma took my hand.
Scarlett looked down at our joined fingers and understood the lie without needing an answer.
Beatrice did not surrender quietly.
When an agent read the charges connected to obstruction, conspiracy, financial fraud, and mishandling classified material, she lifted her chin and demanded her attorney.
Then she pointed at me.
“She turned him against us.
She has always wanted to destroy this family.”
Richard stared at her.
“You told me the transfer was a tax shelter,” he said.
Beatrice’s confidence faltered.
“I was saving our son.”
“You used my foundation.”
“He said he was in danger.”
“And you believed that justified an empty funeral at
