Page 139 of The Deadly Shallows

“He was in IT C-School while I was in Flight Medic A-School, and our mess hall slots hit at the same time.”

“Would you say you knew him well?” Jack asked.

“I think as well as anyone could know Scott,” she said.

“So you did know him well.” Jack exhaled. “His was the hardest defense I ever had to pull together.”

“Because he kept things close to the vest?” Brooke said.

“Exactly.” He reached for the pile of files to his left and fingered through them. “Ah. Here we go. I pulled this when you called. I’m not sure how much use it’ll be. You won’t find much in there on Scott. Only what he was willing to say.”

“What do you mean?” Noah asked.

“When building a defense, it’s important to have as many character witnesses as you can get. I tried to talk Scott into letting me call his brother, John, to speak on his behalf, but Scott refused to talk about his family or anyone else who might have spoken for him.”

Brooke smiled. So John was his brother. Knowing that should make their conversation in Florida go easier.

“Scott acted as if John didn’t exist, though the background check I did proved otherwise. Try as I might to convince him, Scott refused to let John testify.”

“Did he say why?” Noah asked.

“No. Just denied his existence.”

“And his parents?” Brooke asked, trying to remember if Scott had ever mentioned parents or even where he was from.

“Again, only from the background check, but his mom—Margie, I believe—is deceased. She died when Scott was seventeen. John, I think, is close to a decade older than Scott.”

“And their dad?”

“In the wind since he left the service.”

“Their dad was military too?” Noah looked at Brooke. They were both thinking it. The older man with the Marine Raiders hat in the photograph.

“Yes. He was in the Marines, but that’s as far as I got. His records were sealed. Labeled classified. I went a little higher up the chain, and suddenly Frank Mirch’s records vanished.”

SIXTY-FIVE

The announcement to prepare for their final descent into Pensacola came over the plane speakers. Noah and Brooke spent the entire flight combing through Scott Mirch’s file. It was clear that Jack Weaver believed the three men Scott implicated as guilty were just that. And based on the evidence Jack collected—as circumstantial and theoretical as it was—there seemed a strong and intriguing possibility that a silent fifth man existed.

The biggest takeaway, though, was learning the father’s name, along with confirmation that Frank was a former Marine Raider with his service disappearing.

Noah looked out the window as the plane touched down, bouncing along the runway until it screeched to a stop.

“It’s sunny,” Brooke said, looking past him.

“And warm.” He showed her his phone with the local weather page. “Sixty-five degrees. Not too shabby.”

“Is John expecting us?” she asked as they made their way up the ramp to the airport.

“Yep. I gave him a call while you grabbed some snacks in the sundry shop. He seemed intrigued about our visit but didn’t seem surprised when I mentioned it was about his brother, saying he figured someone would visit again.”

Brooke dipped her chin. “Again?”

“Apparently, we aren’t the first authorities who’ve visited John Mirch.”

Having no checked luggage, they breezed through the airport, picked up their car, and were on the freeway in no time.

“You know, I keep thinking . . .” Brooke said.