Cade POV
We moved like we were under fire.
The second the Colter truck disappeared, Riley was in motion. "Grab your go-bag from your truck. Tessa, you have five minutes. Clothes, meds, nothing sentimental. We're ghosts."
Tessa didn't argue. The sight of the confrontation had left her pale but strangely calm, like the worst had already happened and now she was just surviving. She scurried to her room.
I got my duffel from the truck. Inside was my locked pistol case. I didn't open it. Not yet. I slung the bag over my shoulder and helped Riley. She was already packing her laptop and files into a nondescript black backpack.
"Where is this place?" I asked, scanning the tree line as I worked.
"Deep in the Daniel Boone National Forest. A hunting cabin my grandfather left me. No electricity, no water bill, no paper trail. Cell service is a maybe. It's safe."
"Safe is a relative term right now."
"It's safer than here," she said, zipping her pack shut. "They know this address. They will come back, and next time it won't be two brothers with a bad attitude. It'll be all of them, with a plan."
Tessa came out with a small suitcase. She looked at the living room, her eyes lingering on the half-finished nursery door. "What about… all her things?" she whispered, a hand on her belly.
"We'll come back for them," I promised, my voice rough. "When it's safe. I promise."
We loaded into Riley's black sedan. I made Tessa lie down across the backseat, covered with an old blanket. "Stay down. No matter what you hear."
I took the passenger seat, my bag at my feet. Riley started the engine, but didn't pull out. She looked at me. "They might have left a watcher. A car down the road. If we see one, we don't run. We drive normal to the gas station in town, then lose them. Understood?"
"Understood." It felt good to have a clear directive, a role. Soldier. Protector.
She pulled onto the main road, driving the speed limit. The sun was a red sliver on the horizon, throwing long, creepy shadows. My eyes scanned every driveway, every pull-off.
A quarter-mile from the farm, I saw it. A beat-up blue sedan parked under a cluster of trees, half-hidden. "Ten o'clock. Blue sedan."
"I see it," Riley murmured. She didn't slow down or speed up. As we passed, I saw the glow of a cigarette in the driver's seat. He was on his phone, talking urgently. He looked right at us, his eyes following our car.
"He made us," I said.
"Of course he did. He was waiting to see who left." Riley's hands were steady on the wheel. "We go to Plan B."
Plan B was the gas station at the one stoplight in town. Riley pulled in, stopping at a pump. "Go inside. Buy a pack of gum, a soda. Look normal. I'll fill the tank. We need him to think we're just running an errand, not fleeing."
I got out, feeling exposed under the bright station lights. I walked slowly into the small store. The clerk nodded. I grabbed a Coke and some beef jerky, taking my time at the counter, counting out change. Through the window, I saw the blue sedan cruise slowly past the station, then park across the street by the diner.
He was waiting.
I walked back to the car. Riley was finishing up. "He's across the street," I said softly, getting in.
"Good. Let's give him a little show." She started the car and, instead of heading back toward the farm or the highway, she turned deeper into town. She drove to the small grocery store, parked, and we both got out and went inside. We wandered the aisles for five minutes, buying bread and milk. The whole time, my skin prickled.
When we came out, the blue sedan was parked three spots down.
"They're not even trying to hide," Riley said, a hint of admiration in her voice. "They own the streets. They want us to know we're being watched. It's a power play."
"So how do we lose a tail in a town he knows and we don't?"
"We don't," she said, putting the groceries in the trunk. "We let him follow us to the wrong place."
She got back on the main road, but this time she headed east, away from the forest, toward the interstate. The blue sedan followed, a quarter-mile back.
"Where are we going?"
"Lexington," she said. "There's a big box store with a massive parking lot. We go in one entrance, weave through the lot, and go out another. In the dark, in the crowd of cars, we might slip him. If not, we lead him on a two-hour wild goose chase, then double back to the cabin. It'll burn time, but it might work."
It was a risk. Every minute on the road was a minute Tessa was exposed in the backseat. Every mile was a minute we weren't scouting the enemy.
We drove in silence for twenty minutes. The blue car was a constant ghost in the rearview. My mind raced. There had to be another way. A faster way. We were reacting. We needed to act.
Then, Riley's phone, connected to the car's speaker, buzzed with an incoming call from a number she didn't recognize. She frowned and hit accept. "Hello?"
A male voice, young and shaky, came through. "Is this the investigator? The one helping Tessa?"
Riley and I exchanged a sharp glance. "Who is this?" she asked, her voice carefully neutral.
"It's Ian. Tessa's husband." The voice was thick with what sounded like tears or panic. "Please. You have to listen. My dad… he's crazy. After what happened with Harlan, he's calling everyone. He's not waiting for the Fourth. He's coming tonight. He's gathering everyone at the compound right now. They're loading guns into trucks. You have to get Tessa out!"
I leaned toward the speaker. "Ian, it's Cade. Where are you?"
A choked sob. "I'm at the compound. I snuck out to the old toolshed to call. He's going to burn your house down, Cade. With Tessa in it if she's there. He said it sends a message. You have thirty minutes, maybe less. They're leaving soon. Please… just get her somewhere safe. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."
The call went dead.
The air in the car turned to ice. The blue sedan in the rearview mirror wasn't just a watcher. It was the tip of the spear. They weren't following us to see where we'd go. They were herding us, keeping us occupied while the main force mobilized.
Riley's knuckles were white on the steering wheel. The professional calm was gone, replaced by stark urgency. "The cabin is too far. We can't outrun them to the forest. They'll intercept us on the county road."
"Then we don't run," I said, the plan forming in my mind, cold and hard. "We turn the herd."
"What?"
"We have their watcher following us. We know their main force is gathering at the compound. Ian said thirty minutes. That's our window." I pointed to a side road up ahead a narrow, unmarked lane cutting back toward the hills. "Take that turn. Now."
Riley didn't hesitate. She slammed the brakes and spun the wheel, hitting the turnoff so fast the tires squealed. The sedan bounced violently onto the rutted dirt road. In the back, Tessa gasped.
The blue sedan shot past the turn, its brake lights flaring red. He'd been caught off guard. We had maybe ten seconds before he could turn around.
"Where does this go?" I barked, pulling my pistol case from the duffel at my feet.
"Nowhere! Dead-ends at an old quarry about two miles up! It's a trap!"
"Perfect," I said, unlocking the case and assembling my sidearm with quick, automatic movements. The solid weight of the gun in my hand was an anchor in the chaos. "We're not going to the quarry. We're going to lose him in the dark, then we're going to the one place they won't expect us to be while they're busy planning their raid."
Riley's eyes cut to me, the headlights carving tunnels through the thick woods on either side. "Where?"
I checked the magazine and chambered a round. The click-clack was loud in the quiet car.
"Their front door," I said. "We're going to the Colter compound. Right now. While they're all inside, loading up. We're going to listen. And then we're going to show them what happens when you threaten my family."
The car swerved as Riley processed it. The headlights of the blue sedan flickered behind us as he finally got turned around and gave chase, his high beams flooding our interior.
We were off the map. The plan was dead. The 72-hour clock had shattered.
The only thing left was the mission. And it started now, in the dark, on a dead-end road, with the enemy at our heels and a far greater enemy waiting ahead.
Riley hit the gas, the engine whining as we flew down the dark, forgotten lane. The real hunt had begun.