My Estranged Cousin Tried to Evict Me From the Normandy Base Wash Station—Until I Pinned Him to the Concrete Floor
Darkness had fallen, a thick, damp blanket over the base. Rain lashed against the canvas of my quartering tent, each drop a cold, monotonous drumbeat. I was polishing a wrench by the flickering lantern light, my arthritis making the grip stiff.
A quiet cough startled me. I looked up to see a shadow in the tent flap.
“Nora Croft?” a soft voice asked.
Master Sergeant Silas Finch stepped inside, a tall, slender man in his fifties. He was the base supply clerk, usually buried under stacks of requisition forms and logbooks. His face was etched with fatigue, but his eyes held a steely resolve.
“Silas,” I said, surprised. “What are you doing out in this weather?”
He held up a thick envelope, sealed with red wax. “I need to give you something. Officially, I never saw you.”
“A sealed envelope?” I eyed it cautiously. “What is it?”
“It’s a copy of a field hospital medical record,” he explained, his voice low. “For Corporal Douglas Bradley.”
My brows furrowed. “Douglas? What about his shoulder?” Garrick had spread a story that my crane operator had swung a boom too close to him, causing an injury.
Silas stepped closer, glancing nervously towards the tent flap. “Captain Garrick filed a report. Said it was an accident. But the real story… it’s in here.”
He pressed the envelope into my hand. His fingers trembled slightly. “I knew your brother, back in Ohio. Thomas. We went to school together. He was a good man. I can’t stand by and watch this happen to you.”
“Silas, you could be court-martialed for this,” I whispered, the weight of his risk settling on me.
He nodded, a grim line to his mouth. “I know. But some things are more important than keeping quiet. The truth has a way of coming out, Nora.”
He turned and slipped back into the rainy night as silently as he’d appeared.
My fingers fumbled with the wax seal, tearing it open. Inside, tucked between official military stamps, was a detailed report. Douglas Bradley, crushed shoulder, severe contusions.
But the cause listed wasn’t “crane accident.” It explicitly stated: “Blunt force trauma. Patient states he was struck repeatedly by Captain R. Garrick during a dispute over a clandestine transfer of military supplies.”
My breath hitched. Douglas hadn’t been injured by accident. Garrick had beaten him. And Douglas had been covering it up, just like he was covering up the black-market operation. He wasn’t just my antagonist; he was Garrick’s victim. The full scope of their deceit, and Douglas’s fear, crashed down on me.
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