The evidence survived twenty-six years. It may not survive Friday.
Navy lieutenant Eli Mercer needs a hidden Pacific Northwest archive to clear his father’s name. But a backdated destruction order gives him only days to find it.
Forensic financial investigator Rosalie Tanaka can trace money through any shell company, but she refuses to call a theory proof. Together, they follow vanished settlement funds from a Bremerton records annex across Puget Sound to the Iron Vault.
Someone is already erasing the trail. Legal obstruction becomes sabotage. Fire and flood turn evidence recovery into a fight for survival.
If Eli and Rosalie cannot authenticate and release the archive before Friday, the final proof behind Blackwater will disappear—and twenty-six years of lies will become permanent.
The Iron Vault is a clean action-adventure thriller with procedural suspense and a slow-burn romantic undercurrent. It is Book 3 of The Mercer Files but can be read as a standalone.
Preorder The Iron Vault before the record closes for good. Available October 20, 2026.