Page 8 of Her Last Vow

Diane leaned forward, and for the first time since they'd sat down, some of the grief in her face gave way to something closer to urgency. "There are people who've been tracking every reported Apogee death for the last two years. Somebody built a spreadsheet. I saw it myself. Every single case, the person died within days of their predicted peak. Not weeks before, not months after. Right around the date."

"That could be explained a number of ways," Rachel said gently. "If the algorithm is modeling someone's cardiovascular decline, it's not unreasonable that a person nearing serious health risk might also be nearing their statistical peak."

"That's what everyone says." Diane shook her head and there was a look in her eyes that reminded them that this woman had already had a lot of cops wave off her concerns. "But some of these people were young. Healthy. No history of anything,” she said. “There's a theory going around that the company sells the predictions, that somebody's paying to know exactly when a person will be vulnerable so they can time something. Poison, maybe. There's a whole thread about untraceable compounds that make it look natural."

Novak's expression didn't change, but Rachel saw him glance briefly at his phone screen, where the recording light blinked steadily.

“Are these actual studies or just things you found online?” Novak asked. It sounded like he was choosing his words quite carefully.

“Just online. And it’s not like it’s a ton of deaths out there, but it is quite a rabbit hole. There’s some very shady stuff centered around this app…this company. There’s another theory too," Diane went on, and now she was talking faster, the words tumbling over each other. "That the company's own founder is behind it. That he's sick himself and he's testing something on people without their knowledge, using the app to track who's the best candidate. I don't know which one is true. Maybe none of it is. But I know my husband is dead and that watch told him exactly when it would happen, and nobody wants to explain how that's possible if it's all just a coincidence."

The kitchen went quiet except for the tick of a clock somewhere in the next room. Rachel let the silence sit for a moment before she spoke again. She strongly felt Diane was falling prey to false hopes, seeking any possible answer for the sudden death of her husband.

"Mrs. Mott, I understand why you'd want an explanation,” she said. “Losing someone suddenly, with no warning, it's disorienting in a way that makes any answer feel better than none."

"Don't do that," Diane said quietly. "Don't tell me I'm imagining it just because it's easier for you."

"I'm not saying that." Rachel kept her voice even. "I'm saying grief can send people looking in a lot of directions at once, and not all of them lead somewhere real. But I also came here because I think there might be something to what you're describing, even if it's not exactly what the forums are saying. Something a little more grounded in logic. That's why we're asking questions instead of closing this out."

Diane studied her for a long moment, as if deciding whether to believe her. Eventually she nodded. Rachel could see some of the tension leaving her shoulders.

"There's more," Diane said. "If you want it."

"We do," Novak said.

"I learned that it’s a local company. I mean, they have little satellite offices all over, but the corporate headquarters isn’t too far away—in Reston, believe it or not. People post pictures of it, protest outside sometimes." Diane got up and crossed to a drawer near the refrigerator, pulling out a folded printout. "It's not far from here. Reston is just forty minutes, maybe less depending on traffic."

Rachel took the paper and unfolded it. It was a printed map with an office park circled in red pen, the kind of thing someone prints out at two in the morning when they can't stop thinking about something. She chose not to comment on how strange it seemed that she had gone to the lengths of printing it out.

"You've been there," Rachel said. It wasn't a question.

"I drove past it once." Diane sat back down, suddenly looking exhausted, as though the admission had cost her something. "I didn't go in. I just sat in the parking lot for a while. I just…like you said," she said with a shrug. “Just looking for answers.”

Rachel folded the map and slid it into her bag. "Thank you for this. And for talking to us."

"Just find out what happened to him," Diane said. "I don't need it to be some grand conspiracy. I just need it to be true."

Rachel nodded even though a small, nagging voice in the back of her head told her that with a big company like Apogee, a conspiracy might be exactly what they were stepping into.

CHAPTER SIX

The Apogee campus sat behind a wall of glass and landscaped lawn just off the toll road in Reston. The building looked like it had been airlifted in from somewhere far more expensive, or maybe even from the future. Rachel counted three separate fountains before they even reached the entrance, each one lit from below despite the bright, morning sunlight.

"I feel like I should take my shoes off," Novak said as they walked toward the doors. "This place is cleaner than my kitchen."

"Cleaner than your kitchen isn't a high bar," Rachel said.

“Touche.”

The lobby continued the theme that had started outside. White stone floors reflected the light pouring in from a two-story wall of windows, and a curved reception desk sat beneath a suspended sculpture of interlocking rings that Rachel assumed was meant to evoke a heartbeat or a pulse trace, though it could just as easily have been decorative. A young man behind the desk greeted them before they'd finished crossing the lobby, his headset already adjusting as he stood.

“Can I help you?”

"Agents Gift and Novak,” Rachel said. “We called ahead about fifteen minutes ago.”

“Yes! Nina's expecting you. I'll walk you up."

“And who, exactly, is Nina?” Novak asked.