Dad approached slowly and stopped several feet from the hood.
“Emily.”
I lowered the window only an inch.
“Where’s Mom?”
“With Ben.”
“Is she hurt?”
“No.”
“What exploded?”
“The SUV.”
I stared at him.
“The one you were photographed standing beside three nights ago?”
His expression changed.
Not guilt.
Recognition.
“You opened Mark’s drive.”
I felt something inside me harden.
“You knew about it.”
“I knew he was building a file.”
“On you?”
Dad looked toward the dark roadway behind him.
“Partly.”
My hand tightened around the steering wheel.
“Did you give people information about my husband?”
He did not answer quickly enough.
That silence hurt more than a confession.
“Dad.”
“Yes.”
The word seemed to empty the car of air.
My son shifted in the back seat but did not wake.
I stared at my father through the narrow opening in the window.
“What did you give them?”
“Nothing classified.”
“That is not what I asked.”
His jaw tightened.
“A former contact asked whether Mark was traveling more than usual.
Whether he was working nights.
Whether he seemed concerned.”
I could barely believe what I was hearing.
“You discussed my husband’s movements with someone?”
“I thought I was helping verify a security concern.”
“You thought?”
“I knew the man for decades.”
“And that made it safe?”
“No.”
Dad looked down.
For the first time in my life, Colonel Robert Hensley looked ashamed.
“At first it was ordinary conversation,” he said.
“Then they wanted dates.
Places.
Patterns.
I refused.
That’s when I realized the first questions had never been ordinary.”
I remembered the recording.
“You met them beside the SUV.”
“Yes.”
“To give them something?”
