We swing into the drive like a freight train that never learned to slow down.Benji’s barking orders half to himself, half to the world, and Micah is hunched over his laptop like it’s a lifeline.
The ranch blurs past—fence posts, the feed shed, Angie’s Mazda where it belongs—and for a second, I let myself breathe because they’re all standing, whole, waiting on the porch.
Angie’s face when she sees me is a punch straight to the gut and the kind that steadies me.
She’s wrapped in a blanket, bruise already fading to angry purple, and she opens her arms like a harbor.
I step into them for one second, long enough to know I’m human and not a machine, then we’re moving again.
We already dropped the rig in the yard and locked it.Next, we check the doors, the cameras, the alarms—everything is accounted for.
I run to the gun cabinet, and I get everything—and I mean everything.
Guns, ammo, and hunting knives—the kind I used on special military ops.
I don’t slow because I can’t slow.
Not yet.
Not until she’s back where she belongs.
“Go bring her back,” Angie says.
“I will,” I say, then I nod, glancing at Diego and telling him without words I will avenge the hurt they delivered to his wife, too.
“I’m coming too.You might need help,” Alex says, and I don’t say no, because he’s right.
Micah slides into the passenger seat, laptop blinking.
“I’ve got feeds on three intersections between here and Route 80,” he says, voice tight.
He’s been scraping everything—traffic cams, highway cams, private feeds—anything that will show us a tail or a stop.
He’s good.
He’s been good since day one.
Benji’s quiet beside me, hands locked around a coffee cup he hasn’t touched.
He looks like a man waiting for the order to move, coiled and ready.“Where we headed?”he asks like it’s a test.
“Straight West on 80, then keep eyes on every rest stop and back road,” I say, eyes on the road.
My voice is steady but whatever’s under it is hot and sharp.
“Micah, drone up.Give me eyes over tree line.”
Micah smirks, thumbs dancing.“Already airborne.Thermal’s warm.Running path prediction on their last known vector.”
He taps.
The screen blooms.
A thousand dots of heat, a lacework of routes.
His grin drops off when the software starts to snap things into place.
A couple of hours later, he sits up.
