“This is going to take a moment,” he said, his fingers flying across the keyboard. “The encryption is standard military-grade, but I have the active key from the office.”

“Why did my father have these files, Aaron?” I asked, looking out the side window into the dark woods.

“He didn’t want them,” Aaron said. “He was forced to keep them as insurance.”

The laptop screen cast a cold blue glow over his face, deep shadows lining his eyes.

“Insurance against whom?” I asked.

“The board of Vanguard Tactical,” he said. “The people who funded his last campaign.”

A progress bar appeared on the screen, moving slowly from left to right.

Ten percent.

Fifteen percent.

“What is the project name?” I asked.

“It’s listed under the active procurement files,” Aaron said, squinting at the lines of code scrolling down the side of the screen.

The rain outside seemed to slacken slightly, the heavy downpour turning into a steady, gray drizzle.

In the distance, down the gravel road we had just traveled, I saw the sweep of a flashlight beam through the trees.