Castellane’s documentation needed to be complete.

The offshore trail needed to be pulled all the way to its end.

A soldier does not spring the ambush when he first sees the enemy; he springs it when the whole column is inside the kill zone and not one second before.

So I held my position at my mother’s breakfast table, under her poison and my brother’s smirk, with my wife’s hand slowly learning to hold mine beneath the wood, and I waited for Friday.

Chapter 12 — Guidance

Torsten leaned back, expansive now, mistaking my smile for surrender.