He stopped only two feet away, rainwater streaming off the brim of his cap. My triplets instinctively pressed against my legs as he surveyed each of them with a stern, unreadable expression before locking eyes with me.
Then, to the complete shock of everyone present, he raised his hand in a slow, precise salute. “Major Katherine Hunt,” he announced in a voice that cut through the rain.
I returned the salute automatically, my military training overriding the utter confusion crashing through my brain. Every instinct I possessed screamed that something had gone terribly wrong in the world of high-level intelligence.
General Kingston lowered his hand but did not offer me the folded flag. Instead, he gripped it tightly under his arm and turned slightly so his voice carried across the entire assembly.
“I am not here to present a hero’s flag to a grieving widow,” he declared, his voice hard as iron. “I am here to deliver a classified briefing on why this man has been stripped of his honors.”
The cemetery fell so silent you could hear the rain hitting the marble headstones. Monica’s face drained of color, her performance of grief replaced by an immediate, visceral terror.
General Kingston’s eyes stayed fixed on mine, ignoring the reporters who were now sprinting toward us. “We recovered encrypted files from Caleb O’Connor’s final operation,” he continued. “He did not die protecting American soldiers.”
My muscles tightened until I felt like I might snap.
“He died during an illicit intelligence exchange inside a hostile compound after attempting to sell critical satellite coordinates to enemy combatants,” the General stated clearly. “He was trying to sell the real-time movement data of your own unit, Major Hunt.”
The world tilted on its axis, and for a moment, I felt like I couldn’t breathe. Caleb had not just abandoned us; he had actively tried to facilitate the slaughter of my entire tactical team.
My children would have been left without a mother because their father wanted a payday badly enough to commit high treason.
Behind the General, Diane started screaming that it was a fabrication and that her son was a patriot, but Frank looked as if he might collapse right there in the mud. The reporters turned their cameras toward the O’Connor family, capturing every second of their public disintegration.
