They were still close.
Which meant he was not too late.
Jack rose, every sense narrowing, every scattered instinct hardening into focus. The dynamic had shifted. He was nolonger evading pursuit. He was tracking it. The fear that had driven them through fire and stone transformed into something colder and far more dangerous.
They had taken the woman he loved.
And he was coming for her.
Chapter 10
Annie pressed her back into the rough bark of a massive pine, forcing her breathing to slow even as her heart pounded hard enough to rattle her ribs. The tree towered above her like a sentry, its branches swallowing moonlight and casting the forest floor in shifting patterns of shadow. Resin and damp earth filled her lungs, grounding her as she peered through the narrow break in the trees toward the logging station below.
The rockslide distraction had worked. She could see the two guards moving away from the vehicles, flashlights sweeping uphill as they investigated the noise she’d created by dislodging stones along the slope. Their attention was exactly where it needed to be.
Now all she had to do was wait for Jack’s signal.
She tightened her fingers around the strap of the canvas bag and glanced down at her watch, counting the seconds as they slipped past. They had done this sort of thing a hundred times in investigations—setups, diversions, controlled movements meant to shift the advantage just long enough to gather evidence or make an arrest. Only this time there were no uniforms coming. No perimeter. No backup on the way.
Only Jack. And her.
Thirty more seconds, she told herself. Just thirty.
She lifted her gaze again—and froze.
A sound had risen behind her that didn’t belong to the forest. Not the rustle of a deer or the careless crack of a branch under wandering boots, but something measured. Deliberate. Controlled.
Footsteps.
Annie’s pulse thundered in her ears as she slowly shifted her weight, careful not to disturb the pine needles beneath her shoes. She turned her head by degrees, scanning the darkness between the trees. At first, she saw nothing but shadow and layered trunks. Then one shadow moved.
A figure detached from the darkness and advanced directly toward her, not searching, not sweeping the area, but moving with quiet certainty straight for her position, and the realization sent a chill through her—this wasn’t a random approach. This wasn’t chance. Whoever it was knew exactly where she stood.
She had chosen her route carefully. She had avoided snapping branches, doubled back, stepped where rock met soil. Jack had taught her how to move through terrain without leaving an obvious trail. Yet the figure continued forward with quiet confidence, closing the distance as if following a clear line only she could see.
A memory surfaced with sickening clarity—the small drilled hole in the bathroom wall at her shop, Sarah Mitchell asking touse the restroom, the faint brush of unease she had dismissed as imagination—and the truth slammed into her all at once. They hadn’t just found her. They’d been tracking her. Her breath caught as the truth settled into place. They hadn’t needed to search. They’d never lost her. Every place she had gone, every step she had taken since the shop—they had known.
The figure moved into a wash of moonlight. Sarah Mitchell.
She was taller than Annie had remembered, her posture athletic, her stride unhurried. A pistol hung at her side, not raised yet, but present. Ready. Her face held no panic, no desperation. Only focus.
This was not a grieving descendant guarding an old family shame.
This was an operative.
Annie’s mind raced, forcing itself to stay sharp. Running blindly would only delay the inevitable. Hiding was pointless if Sarah could track her position. Fighting hand-to-hand against an armed woman trained to hunt was not courage—it was surrender.
Her hands flew to her jacket, her pockets, the strap of the canvas bag. She fought the urge to panic as she searched, fingers sweeping fabric, seams, folds. For one terrifying second she felt nothing.
Her fingertips brushed a rigid edge beneath the lining near her collarbone, and she peeled it free, revealing a thin disk that lay cold and deceptively simple in her palm. It looked like nothing more than a coin, smooth and ordinary—but coins didn’t guide killers through the wilderness. Sarah was less than twenty yards away now. Annie could see the faint glint of her weapon. The concentration in her eyes.
There was no more time to consider.
Annie drew her arm back and hurled the tracker downslope toward the logging station with everything she had, praying thesudden shift in location data would send anyone monitoring it in the wrong direction.
Then she turned and ran.
The forest exploded into motion behind her. Branches cracked. Leaves tore. Footsteps surged.
