“Why didn’t you take this to the sheriff?”

His expression answered before he did. “The sheriff was one of the men your father was investigating.”

“Why come now?”

“I saw the diner video.” He paused. “Then I saw your name attached to it. Lieutenant Colonel Nicole Turner.” He looked directly at me. “I decided the time had finally arrived.”

I picked up the recorder. It weighed almost nothing, and yet six years of silence seemed to rest inside it. “He knew,” I whispered. It wasn’t really a question.

“He knew almost everything,” Harold replied. “I can’t prove his death was connected on this evidence alone. But I believe what he uncovered is the reason he never came home.”