A heavy engine rumbled in the distance.

The engine died, and a woman with four stars on her collar came around the hood of the black truck at a walk that ate up the gravel.

I had seen her face once before, in a briefing packet at the MP station.

Dewitt’s hand came off my sleeve.

Salas stepped back two paces and pressed his arms flat against his sides, and then he put one hand up over his mouth.

“Sergeant Conroy,” General Vance said.