Lincoln crossed to the command center, Morgan following. Another message had come in from the Treasury Department, from a contact he’d worked with for years.
Another someone who’d trusted him the way Callum trusted him.
He opened it.
Bollinger—We know you have resources we don’t. Morgan Reece remains a priority. Your continued lack of results is being noted. We expect a substantive update within 48 hours.
Being noted.
Lincoln stared at the words. Professional language wrapped around a threat. They were building a file on him now—documenting his lack of cooperation, preparing to revoke the access he’d spent a decade earning. Forty-eighthours, and he’d have to produce something useful or become a liability instead of an asset.
“What does it say?” Morgan had moved to stand beside him.
He tilted the screen toward her. Watched her read it, watched the color drain from her face.
“They’re giving you an ultimatum. They’re suspicious of you.”
“Statistically likely.” He closed the message. Opened the next one from this morning that he’d been avoiding—FBI, similar tone. Then Homeland. Then his NSA back channel, the most pointed of all.Your expertise has always been reliable. We’d hate to question that reliability now.
The walls weren’t just closing in. They were crushing him.
Morgan’s hand found his arm. “This is bad.”
He pulled up his monitoring dashboard. Callum’s visit, logged and analyzed. The federal messages, multiplying like a virus. And somewhere out there was a facial recognition search, still running, still hunting for the match that would end everything.
Once Randall knew who Lincoln was, this place wouldn’t be safe for them. Nowhere in Oak Creek would. It was only a matter of time.
It was time to discuss the contingency plan.
It had been running in his head for days, but he’d never said it out loud. Voicing it meant accepting that everything he’d built might not be enough.
“I have money,” he said. “Millions, accumulated over years. Enough to disappear. Enough for both of us.” The words came out steady, though something was cracking open in his chest. “There are countries without extradition. I know which ones are viable. I know how to get there clean—no trail, no records, identities solid enough to last decades.”
Morgan’s face had gone still. Frozen. “Lincoln?—”
“If we can’t crack this. If we can’t decode what’s in your head, can’t find Randall, can’t clear your name before everything closes in—” He held her gaze, letting her see what this cost him to say. “Then I take you somewhere they’ll never find you. We go together.”
“But your life is here. Your family. This house.” Her voice came out barely above a whisper. “You’d have to walk away from everything.”
“I know.”
“You’d have to become someone else. Give up thirty years of being Lincoln Bollinger.”
“I know.” He reached for her hand, and she let him take it—her fingers ice-cold, trembling.
“Then how can you even consider it?”
“Because I’ve also calculated what it would cost to lose you.” He lifted her hand, pressed it flat against his chest where his heart was beating too fast, too hard. “And the math is simple, Morgan. You’re worth more.”
She stared at him. Her mouth opened, closed. Opened again.
“I’ve never been worth more.” The words came out barely audible. “To anyone. I’ve always been the one people transferred out, or tolerated, or eventually got tired of. I’ve never been the one someone chose.”
“You are now.”
Morgan went still. He watched her process it—the words moving through her the way data moved through his systems, finding no existing framework to attach to. Her eyes searched his face like she was looking for the catch, the exception, the fine print that would make this make sense.
“Why?” The question cracked in the middle. “Lincoln,why would you give up everything for someone you’ve known in person for two weeks?”
