“Oh?” William said, surprised. “Who is it so I...”
“William, you know better than to ask,” David reminded him, glancing at his wristwatch again. “Now I have to go. Stay safe.”
“You too,” William told him.
David stood and disappeared through the woods, his footsteps quiet on the carpet of pine needles and fallen leaves.
His truck was parked a quarter mile away, hidden off a service road where no casual observer would spot it.
As he walked, his mind churned.
The villain was at the Inn. His man was in position. The trap was set. After twenty-eight years, this nightmare might finally be over.
He should be focused. Single-minded. This was the moment everything had been building toward.
But instead, his thoughts kept drifting to a woman with intelligent eyes and a smile that made him feel something he hadn’t felt in twenty-eight years.
A woman who had ties to William, which made her dangerous to know.
A woman who was staying at the one place that could become a hot bed of violence and chaos when everything went down.
David reached his truck, climbed in, started the engine, and pulled back onto the service road.
Fate was twisted.
Twenty-eight years of sacrifice, of staying focused, of keeping his eye on one single goal.
And now, at the worst possible moment, when he needed to be most careful, most alert, most mission-oriented, his concentration was broken by someone he’d literally bumped into on a street corner.
He shook his head as he merged onto the main road.
Focus. The mission. That’s all that mattered.
Everything else was just noise.
But even as he thought it, he knew it wasn’t entirely true anymore.
And that scared him more than any hitman ever could.
13
DAVID
The phone rang twice before the line clicked open.
“Yeah,” came the voice on the other end, low and cautious.
David stood in his workshop, surrounded by half-finished projects and tools he’d been using to stay busy while waiting for this exact call. “Do you have the potential target in sight?”
“Yes,” his contact confirmed. “But I think they have company. Someone else that is also staying at the Inn. I’ve seen them together a few times now.”
David’s jaw tightened. More complications. “Can you identify the second person?”
“I know who they are checked in as,” his contact told them. “I’m waiting for a verification check to come in.”
“Good. I need you to do something else for me.” David scratched Chaos’s head idly.
A pause. “Sure, what is it?”
