Colt braced a hand against the dash, eyes fixed ahead, heart hammering harder with every mile. This was a trap. Every instinct screamed it. But they didn’t have the luxury of caution. Not with nine people at risk. Not with Beck, Gary, and Naomi on that list.
He didn’t know the other six. Family members of the original Timberline hostages. Probably good people caught in the crossfire of something none of them had started. But the other three? Beck was one of theirs. And Gary and Naomi…
Colt ground his teeth.
Was one of them a victim or playing the part? Had one of them staged their own kidnapping to throw suspicion? Or were they just more names Wallace had twisted into leverage?
Colt didn’t know. Not yet.
But he was damn sure about one thing.
He wasn’t letting anyone die today.
The SUV ate up the road, tires humming over blacktop. Harlan didn’t speak. None of them did. The air inside felt heavier than it should’ve, like it carried the weight of what waited ahead.
Colt turned in his seat and looked at Brenna.
She met his gaze, steady.
No fear. Not in her eyes. What he saw there was worse. The shadows of Timberline. The echo of the compound. She wasn’t frozen. She wasn’t breaking. She was remembering. Fighting her way through it in real time.
Colt’s throat tightened. He cursed under his breath and turned forward again.
He wished he could shield her from this. From all of it. But they were past the point of shielding anyone. This was their fight, same as it was back then. The enemy just had a new face.
He unlocked his phone and pulled up the photos. Every message the killer had sent them. Every taunt. Every clue.
Nine hostages. Some with their faces covered. Gagged. Some slumped, some upright. He zoomed in on the latest images where Gary, Naomi, and Beck were. The room was windowless. Concrete walls. Industrial lighting. He traced the shadows along the floor, the smear near the drain in the corner.
“Same game,” Brenna said. “Different board.”
Colt glanced at her again and realized she was also looking at the photos. Like him, she was trying to work out the best plan of action. No matter what they did, it’d be dangerous. No way around that, but the idea was to minimize the danger and get out the hostages.
The real hostages anyway.
Since it was possible one of them was the killer.
“I suggest we go in hard since the killer will be expecting us,” Colt said. “Harlan, you circle wide and scan the perimeter. Look for secondary access or trip lines. Brenna and I will take point inside. We clear the hostages, we clear the threat.”
Brenna gave a short nod. “Works for me.”
Harlan didn’t argue. “Copy that.”
Colt tapped the comm in his ear. “Noah, here’s our move. Harlan’s going to sweep the perimeter. Brenna and I go in through the front. We’ll clear the room, then eliminate whatever threat we find.”
“Understood,” Noah replied. “Garrett McCall and Cal Granger will be backup for you and Brenna when they arrive. Weston will cover the perimeter with Harlan. I’ll respond where I’m needed.”
Colt didn’t answer that last part. Noah didn’t need his permission. He didn’t take part in a lot of ops these days, but Colt hadn’t forgotten what he was capable of. None of them had.
“Drone’s up,” Noah added. “You’ll have eyes on Timberline in five.”
Not a lot of time since they were only nine minutes out from Timberline. Still, it would have to do.
Colt looked out the windshield as the first stretch of back road thinned into dirt and scrub. They were getting close.
Too close to back down now.
The SUV jostled over the ruts in the dirt road as they closed in on Timberline. Dust kicked up behind them, the ghost of every bad memory rising with it.
