Page 69 of The Deadly Shallows

“She makes a solid point,” Emmy said, her nose scrunched in thought. “Why would they pass by her but murder the three men in the room right next to her?” Em exhaled. “I guess we never know how close to death we really are. God knows, but we don’t.”

Everyone turned toward Logan, as this was the part where he typically made a snide comment or huffed at the concept of a loving God in control when atrocities happened. But nothing. Logan just sat there with his notes, surprising them all.

Brooke leaned forward, studying the case board with a frown. “Wait a minute—did you say Lieutenant Talbot?”

Rissi rechecked her notes. “Yep.”

“Ken Talbot?” Brooke asked.

Rissi returned to her notes. “Yes, and his wife’s name is—”

“Mari,” Brooke said. “Well, her given name is Marigold, but everyone called her Mari during the investigation.”

Noah frowned. “Investigation?”

“Yeah . . .” She looked around the room. “None of you are familiar with the case?”

Everyone shook their head or answered in the negative.

“I suppose it was before you all were stationed here,” she said.

“Can you tell us about it?” Noah asked. It probably had nothing to do with their case, but she had him intrigued.

“Sure,” she said, smoothing the thighs of her flannel jammies. “It was around eight years ago, not long after I started medic school,” she said, standing and moving to inspect the photograph closer. “Yes,” she said, pointing at each body in turn. “Ken Talbot, Alex . . . Ford, I think.”

“That’s right,” Rissi said, skimming her notes.

“And Rich Sydell,” Brooke said, pointing at the final instructor in the grouping.

“You knew them all,” Noah said rather than asked.

“Yeah. They left quite an impression. They were the three IT instructors Scott Mirch implicated in his trial for the theft of cryptocurrency from the military.”

“Someone stole cryptocurrency from the military?” Logan asked. “Which branch?”

She paused a moment. “Air Force.”

“Can we back up for those of us with only a vague idea of cryptocurrency, and no idea of who Scott Mirch is?” Caleb asked.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to interrupt your flow of conversation. What happened with Scott was long ago. I’m sure it has no bearing on any of this.” She shifted her stance. “Though it is odd. . . . Nope. Sorry.” She looked to Rissi. “Go ahead, continue on. I’ll head back to my seat.”

“No,” the entire group said in unison.

“We need to hear what you started,” Rissi said. “You never know when something that might seem unrelated is actually very related.”

“Okay.” Brooke shrugged.

“Here.” Rissi rolled the empty stool over and raised it for Brooke to sit by the whiteboard. “Take a seat and catch us up to speed on Scott Mirch.”

“I met Scott soon after I arrived for Flight Medic A-School. He was here for IT C-School. He was a computer genius.”

“And a hacker,” Logan said, looking at his laptop. “It’s all here online. I can’t believe I haven’t heard of this before.”

THIRTY-SIX

“Initially, it was all hush-hush,” Brooke explained, “but whispers started circulating that someone had hacked into the Air Force’s cryptocurrency . . . I don’t know . . . account, I guess is the right term. They stole . . . a lot, though I’m not sure of the exact amount.”

Logan tapped on his laptop, then looked up. “Close to five million dollars,” he said.