ACCESS DENIED.
She looked at me. “What else?”
I thought of Grace. Of the woman at the motel. Of Burton’s voice.
“Try the name on the photo,” I said. “My Jess. My reason.”
Jessica typed:
MY REASON.
The laptop clicked.
Files bloomed across the screen.
Maps. Payment records. Route changes. Photographs. Names.
Then one video file appeared at the bottom.
Its timestamp was impossible.
June 15, 2026.
Today.
Jessica went still.
“That can’t be right,” Henderson said.
She opened it.
The screen filled with darkness. Then a face leaned into view.
Older. Scarred. Beard streaked gray. One eye clouded, the other unmistakably Jessica’s.
Daniel Burton looked into the camera.
“Jack,” he said, voice rough but alive, “if you are seeing this, then my daughter has come into the light.”
Jessica made a sound I will hear until I die.
Burton looked over his shoulder as if someone had moved behind him.
“You have less time than you think. Voss is only the hand. The man beside you is the door.”
Henderson stepped closer to the screen. “Daniel?”
Burton’s face tightened.
“Do not trust General Henderson,” he said. “The man wearing his name is not the man I pulled from the fire.”
Behind us, a floorboard creaked.
We turned.
General Henderson stood in the cabin doorway, pistol in hand, his face unreadable in the lantern light.
“Jack,” he said softly, “step away from my daughter.”
THE END OF PART 2