"You don't want to find out that you've been punishing yourself for something that happened differently than you remember."
Thomas said nothing.
Rachel stood.
"You taught me something once."
"When?"
"I was sixteen. I backed Mom's car into the mailbox."
Thomas almost smiled.
"I remember."
"You told me fear gets bigger in rooms you refuse to enter."
Thomas frowned.
"I said that?"
"You used to be smarter."
That finally made him laugh.
Quietly.
Rachel smiled.
Then she said, "Go see him."
Thomas called Nathan that night.
The meeting was set for three days later.
Thomas expected an isolated warehouse.
Maybe a military facility.
Instead, Nathan gave him an address twenty minutes outside Olympia.
It was a small boat repair shop beside a marina.
Thomas parked across the road.
For five minutes, he stayed in the truck.
Then he went inside.
An old bell rang above the door.
The shop smelled of gasoline, sawdust, and lake water.
A radio played quietly near the back.
A man was bent over an outboard motor.
Gray hair.
Thin frame.
One leg braced slightly differently than the other.
Thomas stopped breathing.
The man turned.
Twenty-seven years collapsed.
Calvin Ross smiled.
"Still late."
Thomas couldn't speak.
Calvin wiped his hands on a rag.
"You always were."
Thomas took one step.
Calvin looked older than he should have.
Scars ran up the right side of his neck.
Two fingers on his left hand were missing.
Thomas stared at them.
Calvin noticed.
"Lost those later."
Thomas finally spoke.
"You were alive."
Calvin's smile faded.
"Yeah."
"You were alive."
"I know."
Thomas crossed the room.
Calvin didn't move.
Thomas hit him.
One punch.
Across the jaw.
Calvin stumbled against the workbench.
Nathan Briggs, standing in an office doorway, took one step forward.
Calvin raised a hand.
"Don't."
Thomas stared at him.
"You let me think you were dead."
Blood touched Calvin's lip.
"I didn't get a vote for a while."
"Twenty-seven years."
"Tom."
"Twenty-seven years."
Calvin looked at him.
"I know."
Thomas shoved him.
"Do you?"
Calvin let it happen.
"You know what I told your mother?"
"Tom."
"I stood in her living room."
Calvin looked down.
"I told her I left you."
"I know."
"She died thinking you died alone."
Calvin's face broke.
Just slightly.
Thomas saw it.
And hated that he saw it.
Calvin sat on a stool.
"I was captured."
Thomas stopped.
The words were simple.
Their meaning wasn't.
Calvin continued.
"Building came down after you left. I woke up somewhere else."
"Who?"
Calvin looked toward Nathan.
Nathan closed the office door.
Calvin said, "People connected to the group we were sent after."
Thomas stood completely still.