“Confirm last known.”
“Boutique. Front door. I had eyes on the street. I looked away for a few seconds.” The words tasted like acid. “They took her in that window.”
Gray didn’t waste time on blame. That’s the thing about him, the thing that makes him dangerous. He doesn’t lean into emotion until after the job is done.
“I’m pulling traffic cams,” he said. “Town feeds. Ranch feeds. Any business we can tap. Stay on position and keep your head.”
My head.
My head was the only reason I wasn’t tearing doors off hinges already.
But my body was shaking with restraint.
Because all I could think about was Sierra. Not the name on Gray’s screen. Not the asset tag. Sierra, in a stranger’s hands, realizing the man she trusted wasn’t where she could see him.
Realizing I failed her.
And I don’t fail.
I walked the perimeter of that block until my boots memorized the cracks in the sidewalk. I checked the alley. The dumpsters. The back door. I leaned into the loading bay and smelled nothing but sun-baked trash and dust.
Nothing.
I wanted blood anyway.
The call from Gray came in twenty minutes later, and it wasn’t good news.
“Got her on cam,” he said, voice quiet.
My whole body went still.
“What do you see?” I asked, forcing every word through my teeth.
“Back of the boutique,” Gray said. “She steps out and disappears left. Thirty seconds later, Michaelson appears in frame, pulls her into the alley. She resists for a second, then…” A pause. “Then she goes with him.”
I shut my eyes.
Because of course she did.
He was family.
And I was the stranger with scars and rules.
“She get into a vehicle?” I asked.
“Black SUV. No plates visible. Headed out of town.” Another beat. “I’ve got the route. Highway 95, then they cut off onto backroads.”
I stared at the open stretch of street like I could see the SUV’s tire tracks in the heat shimmer.
“Any idea where they went?” I asked.
Gray didn’t answer right away, which meant he was weighing how much he wanted to tell me.
He decided to tell me anyway.
“The drive had more than names,” he said. “It had locations. A couple coded references to safe sites. One of them is close to Valor Springs.”
A cold, heavy calm settled over me.
