Maizie looked at Kenna. “Should I interview people here?”
“You could, if you want to work on your skills. But I’d rather meet up with Ryson and see where he’s at with looking for Crystal and the kids, now that we’re here.”
She’d been reading over the file from that other case on the drive and running through what she might’ve missed since she’d heard the details of the investigation recounted on the podcast.
“I have a report typed up for us to pass on to the Montana State Police.”
Maizie said, “Send it to me, and I’ll forward it to them.”
“Thanks.”
Kenna didn’t like that she might’ve missed an accomplice, but justice would be found, regardless. It wasn’t like she had to bring the guy in herself. There were plenty of good cops in the world. The kind who showed up to help a pregnant woman and her husband on the side of the road in Colorado.
Zeyla asked, “What happened to the flash drive and the port?”
Kenna went to the picnic table and sat on the bench. “Maizie copied everything on it.”
“Already posted it to the internet.” The young woman hopped up on the table and sat with her legs swinging under her. “So now everyone knows what that software company was doing. Even if they were working forDominatus, we put a serious crimp in it by making it public knowledge.”
“I enjoy ruining the plans of people who prey on others.” Zeyla folded her arms, looking every bit like the warrior she was. But on occasion, she allowed them to see the softer edges of who she could be.
All of them—Zeyla, Maizie, and Kenna—had been through so much. They’d walked different paths but become people who had hard edges and soft, vulnerable places. Still, Zeyla was one of the most complicated women Kenna had ever met.
“Me, too.” Kenna nodded. “If there’s something going on with the Feathers family, we’re going to find out what it is. It might feel like a small case compared to a lot of what we’ve beendoing lately, but it’s important. Maybe even more important than fightingDominatuson a global scale.”
Which was, if she was honest, something she couldn’t—or shouldn’t—be doing right now. Kenna needed to feel like her life meant something. That motherhood didn’t mean giving up who she was. It had to be about expanding that person, not contracting her to where she couldn’t do what she felt she’d been called to do.
She and God were working out the details, but helping Ellayna meant something to her. Actually, it meant a whole lot right now.
“I need to call Ryson if he hasn’t called me back yet.”
Maizie looked at her phone. “He’s almost here. Unlike Ramon, who has dropped off the map and gone completely dark, Ryson let me add him to our tracking app, so we should all be able to see where he is.”
Zeyla shifted her weight from one foot to the other. “You just drop that in there like it’s no big deal? Ramon is off the map. We have no idea where he is or what he’s doing.”
“He knows how to take care of himself.” Kenna didn’t need to point that out, but sometimes, they all needed the reminder. “I’m praying he’s safe and successful. And that he reports in soon.” She looked at Maizie, who, surprisingly, hadn’t cowered under the intensity of Zeyla’s opinion.
Maybe Zeyla had softened a little, but Maizie had definitely grown stronger in the past year or so. She’d adopted some self-confidence and independence. The kind that gave her a backbone.
Kenna nudged her. “You said Ryson is almost here?”
Maizie showed her the screen. The dot that was her friend pulled off the freeway and turned into the lot where the entrance to the campsite was located. This place wasn’t big. She could walk a circuit of the campsite in fifteen minutes, and thatincluded going out the entrance and then coming back in, but the place had good showers and laundry facilities. It wasn’t the kind of place to have a baby, but that was what hospitals were for.
A silver Toyota slowed to a stop on the single lane at the end of where they stood between the RV and the car—which they’d parked in the space they rented beside it so they could have more room.
Kenna stood as Ryson climbed from the front seat of his car. As she approached, he shook his head. “Never thought I’d see this. But then, I thought that about you in a wedding dress.” His mouth stretched into a wide smile; he looked so pleased to see her.
She took in her friend, one of her closest ones for years. They’d met during a hostage situation at a bank back when she’d been an FBI agent and he a police officer. Since then, he’d been promoted and shifted positions. He’d had a family, and she was about to have her first child.
Life moved on, but they were kindred spirits, and what she felt for him never wavered.
“Javier.” She spread her arms, and they hugged.
“You’re about to have this baby any day, and you come here?”
She found a snooty expression. “There’s a hospital here, and it’s better than the Podunk medical center where our cabin is.” She thumbed over her shoulder at where Jax was but realized he was standing beside her now.
Her husband said, “And if we call the police because we’re being shot at, the response time is quicker here.”
