Chapter 6 - The Deployment Orders
The official notification from my base command sat on the dashboard of my car, glowing softly in the dim light of the dashboard instruments. Effective in thirty days. An overseas deployment to a naval logistics support hub in the Western Pacific.
Under normal circumstances, orders like these were routine—a standard rotation for a petty officer with my technical rating. But right now, sitting curbside outside my parents' suburban house with the motor running, the timing felt less like a coincidence and more like an eviction notice from my own life. The military didn't care about family fraud investigations or domestic financial ruins, but an active federal inquiry into identity theft involving a service member's credentials required command notification, legal counsel, and hours of administrative paperwork that could easily stall a transfer or drag me through a military magistrate's court.
I picked up my phone and dialed the number for base legal assistance.
"Lieutenant Commander Hayes's office," a crisp voice answered.
"Ma'am, this is Petty Officer Second Class Maren Sinclair. I need to request an urgent consultation regarding an identity theft and corporate fraud matter affecting my security clearance and current active-duty status."
There was a brief pause on the other end, the rustle of papers, and then a more focused tone. "Can you make it to the base legal office by 0800 tomorrow, Petty Officer? If your credentials have been tied to an unauthorized corporate entity without your written Department of Defense disclosure, we need to file an expedited buffer notice with NCIS before your deployment window locks."
"I'll be there," I said.
I ended the call and looked back at the house. The lights in the front window were still on, casting a pale, weak glow against the drawn curtains. My father had forty-eight hours to call Detective Miller and turn over the complete financial records of Barrett Enterprises. If he didn't, I would hand the file to the federal prosecutor myself. But sitting here in the quiet car, listening to the hum of the engine, I realized something else: waiting for my father to do the right thing was just another way of letting him control the timeline.
He wouldn't call the detective. Men like Barrett Sinclair—men who had spent their entire lives curating an immaculate facade of success while quietly bleeding everyone around them dry—didn't surrender voluntarily. They stalled, they deflected, and they waited for someone else to rescue them from the consequences of their own vanity.
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I put the car in reverse, backed out of the driveway, and drove away. I wasn't going to wait forty-eight hours for a confession that would never come. If my name was on those corporate filings, I was going down to the state corporation commission myself first thing in the morning to strip it off legally, no matter what signatures my father had forged.
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