“I’ve gotten out of more situations being light on my feet.”
“Tell you what—we’ll take them.” He hooked the vests and the bandolier over his arm and grabbed the handle of the gun case. “You can decide to use them or not when we get to Bandera. Better to have too much ammunition or protection than not have it and wish you did.”
Keira wasn’t convinced. She’d always relied on stealth, speed and the use of quiet, but lethal weapons to accomplish her mission. Still, she hadn’t been trying to bring down a powerful organization with unlimited assets and assassins. “Let me carry something.”
He handed her the gun case. Together they stepped out of the storage unit and transferred the items into the back seat of the truck. After Rogue closed and locked the unit, he climbed into the truck and Keira onto her motorcycle.
The sun sank toward the horizon as they drove the backroads between Bruer and Bandera. As they entered the small town, they split up, taking side roads through neighborhoods to get through the town without parading down Main Street. When they emerged on the west side of town, Rogue took the lead. With the coordinates keyed into his map application, he’d pass the turnoff and keep going until he found a place to pull off the road and hide the truck. Then he’d hike in, set up his rifle within range of the barn and wait for Jade and Keira to show up.
Keira would find a place to pull off the road on the edge of town and wait until closer to the designated meeting time to drive the rest of the way on her motorcycle.
“I don’t like leaving you, even for a few minutes, much less an hour,” Rogue said into her radio headset as he kept going when she’d found a place to pull off the road.
“Go. I’ll be okay. Especially, knowing you have my six.” Her pulse beat faster. “I’ll see you in a few.”
“Keira, I wish you were wearing the body armor. It could get bad. Thing is...I care about you. Please, be safe,” he said.
“You, too.” Keira’s heart fluttered and warmed at the concern evident in his words and tone before they went radio silent. She was on her own for the next hour, waiting for that time when Rogue would relay he was in place, and she would move in to meet with Jade.
Time dragged, the minutes feeling like hours. She’d parked her motorcycle behind an abandoned fruit stand with a live oak tree shading the stand and her location from the heat of the Texas sun. Every time a vehicle passed on the road, Keira tensed. She sat on the motorcycle, ready to start the engine and tear out should someone slow to a stop and question her existence there.
No one did, and the time stretched interminably. Finally, her burner phone vibrated in her pocket. She read the text.
Unknown Caller: Eagle has eyes
Keira: Green?
Unknown Caller: Neg
Rogue was in place with a view of the barn, and Jade had yet to appear.
Keira glanced down at her watch and up at the colorful sky as the sun set fire to the horizon in the final throes of its descent. The time had come to meet with Jade.
As she started the engine, she sent a silent prayer to the heavens that Jade would be the only person there.
She drove out on the highway leading west of Bandera, following the GPS on her cell phone to the turnoff. She slowed but passed the entrance to the abandoned farm. Twenty yards further, she pulled off the road and laid her motorcycle down behind the brush.
“On foot, moving in,” she said into her radio earbuds.
“Still clear.” Rogue’s voice in her ear gave her more confidence. He was watching over her and Jade.
Moving through the trees and underbrush, she worked her way in, moving parallel with the old farm road until she came to a clearing where a big, weathered gray barn stood in the golden haze of sunset.
Keira paused in the shadows.
“No company detected,” Rogue whispered in her ear.
Her pulse pounding, Keira drew in a breath, stepped into the clearing and spoke softly, “I’m here.”
For a long moment, she stood with her empty hands held out.
Had they come to the wrong place? The wrong abandoned ranch and barn?
“Door’s opening,” Rogue said. “I have a bead on it.”
Keira tensed and prepared to throw herself to the ground if bullets started flying.
A pale face peered out, a dark cap of hair falling to just below her ears. Dark, rounded eyes searched for and found Keira. “You came,” she said softly.
