Their eyes met.
Cole looked at Marcus.
Then at the cabinet.
Then he walked away.
Marcus followed.
“Cole!”
Cole stopped.
“You want to explain something?”
Cole turned slowly.
“I told you what happened.”
“No. You told me what you wanted in the report.”
Cole's jaw tightened.
“Be careful, Marcus.”
“Why?”
Cole stepped closer.
“Because you're asking questions about things you don't understand.”
Marcus stared at him.
“What is HS-17?”
For one second, Cole looked terrified.
Then the expression vanished.
“I don't know.”
He walked away.
Marcus watched him go.
Now he knew two things.
Cole was lying.
And Ranger had been injured for a reason.
Marcus spent the next two days building a private timeline.
He wrote everything down.
Harbor Street seizure.
Twelve containers on the original manifest.
Eleven physically logged.
Ranger alerting at HS-17.
Narcotics discovered in another container.
HS-17 disappearing from the records.
Security footage erased.
Ranger injured in the training warehouse.
An anonymous photograph.
The pieces didn't fit.
That bothered Marcus more than anything.
He had learned long ago that lies were rarely complicated.
They were usually simple.
One missing record.
One altered timestamp.
One person remembering something differently.
The complexity came when someone tried to hide the first lie with another.
On Thursday afternoon, Marcus returned to the warehouse.
His access badge had been suspended.
But he still knew a side entrance that maintenance workers used.
Inside, the building smelled of wet concrete and machine oil.
The fallen container had been removed.
Marcus examined the floor.
A faint scrape mark remained.
He followed it toward the loading bay.
There were tiny fragments of glass near the wall.
He crouched.
Then he noticed something underneath a pallet.
A training notebook.
Marcus pulled it free.
The cover was stained with grease.
He opened it.
Most pages contained ordinary notes.
Search patterns.
Canine responses.
Training temperatures.
Then he found a page dated three days before the Harbor Street seizure.
A handwritten note caught his attention.
Ranger repeatedly alerts to hollow metal surfaces even when no target odor is present. Investigate possible concealed compartments.
Marcus froze.
The note was signed by another handler.
Daniel Reese.
Daniel had retired six months earlier.
Marcus remembered the man.
Quiet.
Precise.
The kind of handler who noticed everything.
Why hadn't Marcus seen this note before?
He turned the page.
There was another entry.
Ranger reacts strongest near HS-17. Recommend physical inspection before disposal.
Marcus photographed the page.
Then footsteps echoed outside.
He closed the notebook.
Cole Mercer appeared through the loading door.
“You shouldn't be here.”
Marcus stood.
“Neither should you.”
Cole looked at the notebook.
“Give me that.”
“No.”
“Marcus.”
“What happened to HS-17?”
Cole's expression hardened.
“I told you I don't know.”
“You knew the number before I said it.”
Silence.
Marcus stepped closer.
“Why?”
Cole looked toward the empty loading bay.
“I can't talk here.”
“Then talk somewhere else.”
Cole shook his head.
“You don't understand what you're involved in.”
“Then explain it.”
Cole's voice dropped.
“The Harbor Street operation wasn't supposed to happen.”
Marcus stared at him.
“What does that mean?”
“It means the seizure was arranged around something else.”
“What something?”