Sarah slumped against a metal cabinet. She was soaked, covered in salt, bleeding from a dozen small cuts. Griff looked worse—his shoulder still seeping blood, his face gray with exhaustion and blood loss. His shoulder must be on fire. She couldn’t imagine how badly salt would sting.
"First aid kit under the left bench," Doc instructed. "The red one. Blue is for chemical weapons, green is for biological."
"How many first aid kits do you have?" Sarah asked, pulling out the red case.
"Seven. One can never be too prepared." Doc took another turn, smooth and controlled now. "We'll be at my McLean farm in twenty minutes. It's secure—properly secure."
Sarah pressed gauze to Griff's shoulder while he tried to wave her off. "Let me help," she insisted quietly.
Their eyes met, and something passed between them—acknowledgment of what they'd survived. Again. Her hands were steady as she worked, but inside she was trembling. They'd almost died. Multiple times in the last hour.
"You did good back there," Griff said, his voice low enough that Doc couldn't hear over the engine. "The salt hopper. Keeping your head when they were closing in."
"I was terrified," Sarah admitted, securing the gauze with medical tape.
"But you didn't freeze. That's what counts."
Sarah's fingers found the cross at her throat, closing around it briefly. She closed her eyes, lips moving in silent prayer—Thank You for getting us through. Please keep protecting us. Guide us to safety.
When she opened her eyes, Griff was watching her withan expression she couldn't quite read. Not judgment. Something softer. Almost... longing?
"My mom used to do that," he said quietly. "Pray when things got bad. Said God was always listening, even in the darkest moments."
"Do you believe that?"
He was quiet for so long she thought he wouldn't answer. "I want to," he finally said. "Some days I want to more than others."
Sarah's hand found his—the one not pressed against his wounded shoulder. "Today’s a good day to want to."
A ghost of a smile crossed his face. "Copy that."
He closed his eyes, the tension draining out of him. Sarah sat quietly, careful not to disturb him until the vehicle slowed.
Doc wound down a series of sweeping residential streets, each block bringing larger, more palatial spreads. Urban ranches with lots of zeros on their price tags. Finally, she turned down a long drive outlined by picturesque white fences. She stopped the truck in front of a sprawling ranch home that would have been better served with an expensive imported SUV, but Sarah well knew that nothing about Doc was normal.
"Your farm is secure?" Griff asked, professional assessment in his voice.
She aimed the truck at a freshly painted barn and grabbed a remote. The entire front wall tilted up, leaving plenty of room to roll the big truck inside. "My dear boy, this cul-de-sac is safer than the White House."
Doc parked, immediately lowering the door behind them and turned to grin at Sarah. "If anyone tries anything here, they'll have to explain it to some very connected, very paranoid former intelligence officers."
"Thank you," Sarah said quietly. "I didn't know who else to call."
"Nonsense. You did exactly right." Lips pursed, Doc studied the two of them. "Now, let's get that shoulder properly treated and you can tell me everything. I have fresh coffee and homemade scones. One can't strategize on an empty stomach."
Despite everything—the terror, the pain, the insanity of being rescued by her economics professor in an armored food truck—Sarah almost laughed.
They'd survived. Somehow, against all odds, they'd survived.
And now they had an ally who might be even more dangerous than their enemies.
19
Sandwiched between Doc and Griff,Sarah tried not to limp as they exited the barn and crossed the gravel drive to the front door.
Doc's farmhouse sprawled across the Virginia countryside like something from Architectural Digest—stone and timber facade, wraparound porch, dormers that caught the first hints of dawn. Not a bunker. Not a compound, an absurdly elegant country estate with what Sarah could only assume was a breach-proof underground bunker beneath it.
"Welcome to my humble home," Doc said, leading them through the front door like she hadn't just extracted them from a firefight in an armored food truck.
