I turned my head.
“What was it?”
Marcus Vance looked out through the panoramic windows toward the Rocky Mountains rising sharp and purple against the western sky:
“Apex Health Logistics isn’t a pharmaceutical client, Sebastian.”
“Apex is the primary covert medical extraction and sovereign asset recovery wing of the **Department of Defense’s Special Operations Logistics Command**.”
“Eleanor was the founder.”
“And that pitch deck you spent all night polishing… was your technical entrance examination.”
Marcus tapped the titanium key on the table:
“She has an operational briefing for you at two o’clock.”
“And she told me to tell you…”
A heavy, five-second silence hung in the air:
“…that Carter Holbrook wasn’t working alone.”
***
CHAPTER 9: PROLOGUE TO PART 3: THE CIPHER IN THE VAULT
The private elevator at the end of the executive executive suite did not chime.
It gave a low, seismic, subterranean shudder that rattled the brass drafting compass resting on my desk:
