Devin slid back down to the threadbare carpet as the beers floated through the air. Marnie snatched them both out of the air, her hands at least two feet apart when she grabbed them. She handed one off to Devin faster than a blackjack dealer spitting out cards.

“Nice trick,” said Rich.

“Hand-eye coordination,” said Marnie. “It’s a helicopter pilot quirk.”

Devin popped his can, followed by Marnie. “So . . . we actually have a next move?”

Rich scooted into the room with a Coke and sat on the bed in front of them, a cryptic smile on his face.

“Karl’s been busy. He spent part of yesterday and all of today researching a lead that sounds promising. Something that could crack the wider sleeper list open. There’s that and the big news that came later this afternoon while examining the gun-camera footage. Nice shooting to both of you, by the way. Saw some likely hits when we were slugging it out at the cabins. Impossible to say one hundred percent at night with those cameras, but I’d score them as confirmed.”

“This is bizarre,” said Marnie, taking a long sip of her beer.

“Yeah. There’s absolutely nothing normal about this,” said Devin. “Anyway. What’s the big news?”

“Scott’s team took out the sentries from the boat dock, on their way east to link up with Graves and Gupta. The two never knew what hit them, and the team certainly didn’t know who they hit—until we reviewed Emily’s gun-camera footage. She put a light on them while they were down, to give us a better shot at identifying them,” said Rich. “Berg recognized one of them immediately. Senator Robert Filmore’s wife, Emma. The other KIA was their son, Thomas.”

“This is going to be front-page news,” said Marnie.

“It’s definitely going to test the sleeper network’s spin doctors.”

“How the hell did my mother miss them?” asked Devin.

“I thought the same thing, but Gupta and Graves did some digging, and neither of their family backgrounds would have raised alarms. It has to be some kind of digital historical-archive manipulation. I’m thinking they only do this for high-profile sleepers.”

“This kind of calls into question everything,” said Marnie. “If we can’t identify them even when we’re looking right at them. And if we can’t trust Helen’s vetting process, how can we trust anyone that fits the age profile?”

“We can’t,” said Rich. “Right now, we have to assume the worst. Our circle of trust just shrank considerably.”

“The Russians will have to assume that we discovered their identities,” said Devin. “What if they go to work digitally altering all of the family histories? Make it impossible to root out the rest.”