Darkness had become Rick's enemy and ally all at once. In the pitch-black room, every sound was magnified—the creak of floorboards, the whisper of fabric, the barely audible click of a gun being cocked.
"You're wondering who I really am," Catherine's voice drifted through the darkness, no longer the breathless reporter or vengeful Burton daughter, but something else entirely. Something colder. "The truth is, Agent Forsyth, I'm the person who's been watching your career with great interest."
Rick pressed his back against the overturned table, his father's revolver steady in his hands despite the chaos in his mind. Years of training had taught him to compartmentalize, to function even when his world was crumbling.
"Scott," he called out, "you still alive over there?"
A groan from behind the bar confirmed his partner—former partner—was wounded but breathing. "Rick... don't trust her. She's not... she's not who any of us thought."
"Oh, Scott," Catherine's laugh was like silk over steel. "Still trying to be the protective mentor, even now? How touching."
The emergency lighting flickered on, casting long shadows across the room. Rick could see Catherine now, standing calmly near the window, her gun trained not on him but on the wounded Scott behind the bar. There was something different about her posture, her bearing—this was a woman accustomed to command.
"Let me properly introduce myself," she said, her accent now distinctly refined, East Coast elite. "Catherine Blackwood, Treasury Department. I've been embedded in this operation for two years."
Rick felt another piece of his reality shift. "Treasury? What does Treasury want with a bootlegging case?"
"Because it was never just about bootlegging, darling." Catherine's smile was predatory. "Operation Thunderbird was about following the money from the beginning. Illegal alcohol, yes, but also gunrunning, political corruption, and a network that reaches into the highest levels of government. Your father stumbled onto something much bigger than prohibition enforcement."
From behind the bar, Scott let out a bitter laugh. "She's lying, Rick. She has to be."
"Am I?" Catherine moved closer to the bar, her gun still trained on Scott. "Tell him about the Chicago connection, Agent Morrison. Tell him about the weapons that ended up in the hands of labor organizers. Tell him about the three federal agents who died when one of our 'controlled' shipments went astray."
Rick's blood ran cold. Labor organizers. Political corruption. This wasn't just about illegal alcohol—it was about weapons trafficking to radical groups during one of America's most volatile periods.
"That's impossible," Rick said, but even as he spoke, his photographic memory was pulling up fragments—cases involving union strikes that had been closed abruptly, evidence that had disappeared, witnesses who had suddenly become uncooperative.
"Your father was a good man," Catherine continued, her voice softening slightly. "Too good. He couldn't understand that sometimes terrible things must be done to prevent worse things from happening."
"So you had him killed."
"I didn't have him killed," Catherine said sharply. "That decision was made by people far above my pay grade. I was brought in afterward to... manage the situation."
"Manage?" Rick's voice was deadly quiet.
"To watch you. To make sure you never got close enough to the truth to become a threat. Just like Scott, in his own way, I've been protecting you."
Rick felt sick. "By lying to me? By letting me destroy myself with alcohol and guilt?"
"By keeping you alive," Catherine replied, echoing Scott's earlier words. "Do you think it was coincidence that every case you worked stayed safely away from Operation Thunderbird? Do you think it was luck that kept you from digging too deep?"
The pieces were falling into place now, creating a picture so vast and terrifying that Rick could barely comprehend it. "How many people are involved in this?"
"Hundreds. Maybe thousands. Treasury agents, Justice Department officials, local police, and those are just the official agencies." Catherine's expression grew grim. "The real players don't wear badges at all."
Rick remembered Scott's words: They don't wear badges. They don't follow orders. They write them.
"Who are they?"
"Bootleggers who've been in business since before Prohibition. Industrial tycoons who profit from labor unrest. Politicians who understand that chaos is easier to control than order." Catherine's gun never wavered. "Your father threatened to expose a network that's been operating since the war ended."
"And tonight?"
"Tonight, the network gets a clean slate. The Federal Building bombing will destroy all evidence of Operation Thunderbird. Everyone who knew the truth will be dead. The official story will be that the Burton brothers were international terrorists, case closed."
Rick's mind was racing. "But you're telling me the truth. Why?"
Catherine's smile returned, but it was sad now. "Because I'm tired, Agent Forsyth. Tired of the lies, tired of the deaths, tired of watching good people destroy themselves for a cause they don't even understand."
From behind the bar, Scott's voice was weak but urgent. "Rick... don't listen to her. She's... she's trying to turn you."
"Turn me into what?"
"A killer," Scott gasped. "Like me. Like her. Like all of us."
Catherine's expression hardened. "No, Scott. I'm trying to give him a choice. Something we never had."
"What choice?"
"Walk away," Catherine said simply. "Leave Washington tonight. Change your name, disappear. I can arrange it. You can live."
"And let you blow up the Federal Building?"
"The Federal Building is going to explode whether you're here or not. The only question is whether you'll be inside when it happens."
Rick felt the weight of the decision pressing down on him. Everything he had believed about justice, about duty, about right and wrong, had been revealed as illusion. But there was one thing that remained clear in his mind.
"My father wouldn't have run."
"Your father is dead."
"Because he chose to fight."
"And look where it got him."
Rick stood up slowly, his father's gun steady in his hands. "You're right. He's dead. But he died trying to do the right thing. That's more than I can say for the rest of us."
Catherine's smile faded. "You're making a mistake, Rick."
"Maybe. But it's my mistake to make."
The tension in the room was palpable. Rick could feel the weight of the moment—this was the choice that would define who he really was. Run and live as a coward, or stay and probably die as his father had.
"There's something else you should know," Catherine said quietly. "About the bomb."
"What?"
"It's not set for midnight."
Rick's blood turned to ice. "When?"
Catherine glanced at her watch. "Eleven-thirty. In twelve minutes."
"You lied about the time?"
"I lied about everything, darling. That's what I do." Her professional mask slipped for just a moment, revealing something almost human underneath. "But I wasn't lying about the choice. You can still get out of here."
"What about you?"
"I have my orders."
"And Scott?"
Catherine's gun shifted slightly toward the bar. "Scott knows too much. He always has."
"No." Rick's voice was firm. "He may be a killer, but he's not dying today. Not like this."
"You're willing to die for the man who murdered your father?"
Rick thought about it for a long moment. "I'm willing to die for the idea that people can be better than the worst thing they've ever done."
Catherine studied his face, and for the first time since he'd met her, she looked genuinely surprised. "You really are your father's son."
"I hope so."
The building shook slightly—not from an explosion, but from something heavy moving in the floors below. Rick's trained ear caught the sound of multiple footsteps, moving with military precision.
"They're here," Catherine said quietly. "The cleanup crew."
"How many?"
"Enough."
Rick moved toward the bar where Scott lay wounded. "Can you walk?"
"I can try," Scott replied weakly.
"Then we're leaving. All of us."
Catherine shook her head. "You don't understand. There's nowhere to run. This entire block is surrounded."
"Then we go up."
"Up?"
"To the roof. It's the only way out." Rick looked at both of them—the woman who had lied to him from the moment they met, and the man who had killed his father. "Unless you have a better idea."
The footsteps were getting closer now, echoing up the stairwell. Military boots on marble floors. Professional killers coming to tie up loose ends.
"Ten minutes," Catherine said, glancing at her watch again. "Even if we make it to the roof, we'll never get far enough away in time."
"One problem at a time," Rick said, helping Scott to his feet. "First we survive the next ten minutes. Then we worry about the bomb."
As they moved toward the door, Rick couldn't help but think about the irony. He had started this day hunting his father's killer, and now he was trying to save him. Maybe that was what justice really meant—not revenge, but the chance for redemption.
The footsteps were at the door now.
Time was running out.