“They’re all still inside the house, Colonel,” he said, falling into step beside me. “And you need to know they’ve already posted part of the video online.”

I didn’t break stride. I walked to the SUV with the flat calm of a man who has just realized the war followed him home.

The drive from the base to our neighborhood usually took forty-five minutes. It took nineteen, because two state police cruisers were clearing every intersection ahead of us.

I sat in the back and watched the clips Jackson had pulled from Samantha’s public accounts before she locked her profile. I said nothing through the first one.

I didn’t blink through the second.

By the third, Valerie had leaned into the lens with wide, bright eyes.