Elise hesitated.
“Mrs. Mercer.”
Judith's expression tightened. “He called me Mom.”
“He did when he was talking about you to us.”
A small, involuntary sound escaped Judith. It was almost a laugh, but grief caught it before it could become one.
“To you?”
Elise nodded.
“He talked about home. He talked about you and Mark. He complained that you sent too much food in care packages.”
“He loved those packages.”
“He knew.”
Judith looked at the identification plate again.
“What else did he say?”
Elise's voice remained gentle.
“That you worried when he didn't call. That you kept every letter. That you wanted him to take leave and come home for the holidays.”
Judith's eyes dropped.
“He promised he would.”
“I know.”
“How?”
“Because he told me.”
For the first time that evening, Judith seemed unable to find an accusation.
Mark stepped closer to Elise.
“Why did you never tell me any of this?”
Elise turned toward him.
“Because the first time you told me about Andrew, you were trying to survive the conversation. You weren't asking for a report from someone who had been there. You were telling me about your brother.”
Mark's face changed.
“And I didn't want to take that away from you.”
“You didn't take anything away.”
“I know that now.”
He looked at the plate.
“Did you keep something from me because of the Navy?”
“Yes.”
“Or because you thought I couldn't handle it?”
“Both, at different times.”
Mark nodded slowly. He did not look angry. That almost made it worse.
“I wish you had trusted me.”
“I should have trusted you with the parts I could share.”
Judith drew her hand away from the table.
“Then why did you let me believe you were just an analyst?”
Elise looked at her.
“I never said I was just an analyst.”
“You never corrected me.”
“I tried to explain that my work involved intelligence operations. You told me that wasn't the same as serving.”
“Because I thought you sat behind a computer.”
“I did sit behind a computer. Sometimes. I also stood watch, led personnel, coordinated intelligence, and worked alongside people whose names I still cannot discuss.”
Judith's eyes narrowed.
“So you expect me to believe all of this because an admiral says so?”
“No,” Elise answered. “You don't have to believe anything tonight.”
She adjusted the cover beneath her arm.
“But you do have to stop touching my uniform.”
Judith looked at the white cover.
The humiliation of the moment returned to her. She remembered pulling it from Elise's head. She remembered the way it had rolled under the table. She remembered the guests watching.
Her eyes moved across the ballroom.
“I didn't know,” she said.
Elise's expression did not change.
“You didn't ask.”
“I did ask.”
“You asked for details I couldn't give you. You asked me to name people, ships, assignments, and operations. When I explained that I couldn't, you decided I was hiding something shameful.”
“I thought you were exaggerating.”
“I know.”
Judith's chin lifted.
“You could have told me about Andrew.”
“I couldn't tell you what happened to him in the way you wanted. I could tell you that I knew him. I could tell you that he was respected. I could tell you that he was not alone in the final hours of the ship.”
Judith's breath stopped.
“Was he alone?”
“No.”
The answer came immediately.
Judith looked at her.
“No?”
“No.”
“Who was with him?”
Elise swallowed.
“I can't give you every name or every detail. But he had people with him. He had people who trusted him. He had people who followed his instructions because they knew he was trying to get them out.”
Judith lowered her head.
For eight years, she had imagined her son in the final moments of his life. Sometimes she imagined him standing alone in a corridor. Sometimes she pictured him at a communications station, refusing to leave while everyone else escaped. Sometimes she imagined the ship shaking around him and wondered whether he had known what was coming.
The Navy's official letter had been precise and respectful. It had not been comforting.
It had described Andrew's actions as courageous and consistent with the highest traditions of naval service.
Judith had read that sentence hundreds of times.
She had never been able to picture the people who had stood beside him.
Now one of them was standing in front of her.
And she had torn the cover from her head.
“I owe you an apology,” Judith said.
Elise looked at her.
“You owe me more than one.”
Judith flinched.
Mark did not intervene.
Elise continued, still calm.
“You owe me an apology for what you said about my service. For questioning my integrity in front of these people. For grabbing my cover and reaching for my insignia. And for treating every boundary I set as evidence that I was lying.”
Judith's eyes filled again.
“I was grieving.”
“I know.”
“You don't know what it is to lose a child.”
“No,” Elise said. “I don't.”
The honesty in the answer seemed to unsettle Judith more than any argument could have.
Elise continued.
“But I know what it is to lose people. I know what it is to hear a voice over a communications channel and realize you may never hear it again. I know what it is to return from a deployment and have to explain to a family why someone they love isn't coming home.”
She paused.
“And I know what it is to be asked to keep living with things you cannot explain.”
The ballroom remained silent.
Brennan closed the presentation box.
“Commander Navarro,” he said, “I believe the foundation was preparing to make its announcement.”
Elise looked toward the stage.
“I don't think tonight is the right time, sir.”
“It may be the right time precisely because people have seen what they should not have seen.”
Judith looked between them.
“What announcement?”
Brennan glanced at Mark, then at Elise.