Chapter 4 - The Mask Slipped
The front door creaked open,
and the sound of his footsteps echoed in the hallway.
“Kelsey?”
he called out,
his voice dripping with rehearsed concern.
“Honey,
are you here?”
I stood at the top of the stairs,
watching him.
He looked up,
his eyes widening for a fraction of a second,
before the mask of the loving husband returned.
“Oh,
thank God you’re home,”
he said,
starting to climb the stairs.
“The police,
it was all a misunderstanding,
your mother,
she just attacked me,
I didn't mean to hit her so hard,
I was just trying to protect myself.”
“Stop,”
I said,
my voice a low growl.
He paused on the middle step,
tilting his head.
“Kelsey,
you’re tired,
you’ve been at the base too long,
let me take care of you.”
“Who are you,
Ryan?”
I asked,
stepping down one stair.
The air between us grew heavy,
and the silence was deafening.
His expression didn't change,
but his eyes turned cold,
like a predator assessing its prey.
“What a strange question,”
he replied.
“I’m your husband.”
“The real Ryan Vance died in 1984,”
I said.
“He was six years old.”
The mask finally slipped.
The warmth left his face,
leaving behind a sharp,
angular coldness that I had never seen before.
He straightened his posture,
the "clumsy" husband suddenly moving with the grace of a trained soldier.
“I thought you were smarter than that,”
he whispered.
“I thought you would just play your part,
be the beautiful Colonel,
and let me handle the business.”
“The business of treason?”
I countered.
He laughed,
a dry,
hollow sound that chilled me to the bone.
“Treason is such a big word,
Kelsey.
I prefer the term ‘market redistribution.’
The military has so much,
and the world needs so much.”
“You hit my mother.”
“She was snooping,”
he said,
shrugging his shoulders as if it were a minor inconvenience.
“She found the ledger I kept in the garden shed.
I told her to stay out of it,
but she wouldn't listen.
She wanted to protect you.”
He took another step up.
“Now,
where is the drive,
Kelsey?”
“In a safe place,”
I lied.
“Where you will never find it.”
He reached into his waistband,
and for a moment,
I thought he was going for a gun.
Instead,
he pulled out a small remote.
“This house is equipped with a very sophisticated security system,”
he said.
“One that I installed myself.
If I press this button,
a silent alarm goes off,
and a group of very unpleasant men will arrive to clean up this mess.”
“You’re threatening a military officer?”
“I’m threatening a wife who is about to be implicated in a multimillion-dollar smuggling ring,”
he sneered.
“Look at the manifests,
May you like
Kelsey.
Your signature is everywhere.”
