He wanted to argue, wanted to be the one at Tessa's side, but Bree was right. More eyes were better. And Tessa was safer surrounded by people than alone with him.
"Go," he said to Tessa. "I'll be right there."
She hesitated, then rose on her toes and pressed a quick kiss to his lips. "Be careful."
"Always."
The women moved off toward the blankets, and Brian turned back to Hank and Colby. The three of them stood in a loose triangle, scanning the crowd, watching the shadows, waiting.
"He's bold," Hank said quietly. "Showing up here, with all these people around. That's not the behavior of someone who's scared of getting caught."
"No," Brian agreed. "It's the behavior of someone who's escalating."
The word sat heavily between them. Escalating. Getting worse. Moving toward something.
Brian looked back at Tessa, surrounded by Bree and Sabrina, her face pale in the gathering dark. She met his eyes across the distance, and he saw the fear there, the same fear she'd carried from Chicago.
But beneath the fear, he saw something else. Trust. She trusted him. Trusted them. Trusted this town that had wrapped itself around her in protection.
He wasn't going to let that trust be misplaced.
Sergeant Diaz arrived within ten minutes, two patrol cars pulling up to the edge of the green with their lights off. She took statements from all of them, organized a search of the immediate area, and put out an alert to every officer on duty.
Marcus Webb had been seen. Marcus Webb was in Copper Moon. And Marcus Webb was not going to get away with this.
The concert ended early, the crowd dispersing with confused murmurs about the police presence. Brian packed up the blanket while Hank and Colby walked the perimeter one last time. Bree and Sabrina stayed glued to Tessa's side, making small talk about nothing important, filling the silence with normalcy.
On the drive home, Tessa was quiet, her hand gripping his on the center console.
"He wanted me to see him," she said finally. "That's why he came. Not to do anything. Just to remind me that he's watching. That he can get to me whenever he wants."
"He can't," Brian said. "Not with all of us watching back."
"But for how long? You can't watch forever. None of you can. And he knows that." Her voice cracked. "He's patient. He waited eight months before following me here. He can wait longer."
Brian pulled the truck over to the side of the road, killed the engine, and turned to face her.
"Listen to me," he said. "I don't care how patient he is. I don't care if this takes a week, a month, or a year. I'm not going anywhere. Hank's not going anywhere. Colby, Bree, Sabrina, the whole damn town. We're here, Tessa. We're not leaving you alone."
Tears spilled down her cheeks, catching the moonlight. "I don't deserve this. I don't deserve any of you."
"That's not how it works." He reached across and wiped the tears with his thumb. "You don't have to deserve it. You just have to accept it."
She let out a shaky breath. "I don't know how."
"Then let me teach you." He pulled her across the console and into his arms, holding her while she cried, while the fear and the exhaustion and the weight of it all came pouring out. "Let us teach you."
She clung to him, her tears soaking into his shirt, her body shaking with sobs she'd been holding back for too long. And Brian held on, steady and sure, letting her fall apart because he knew she needed to.
Tomorrow, they'd regroup. Tomorrow, they'd make a plan. Tomorrow, they'd figure out how to end this once and for all.
But tonight, he held her. And that was enough.
Chapter Thirteen
The days after the concert passed in a strange twilight state, suspended between fear and normalcy.
Tessa tried to maintain her routines. Morning tea on the deck. Reading in the afternoon. Meals with Brian at the small table by the window. But everything felt muted, as if she were experiencing her life through a layer of gauze. She found herself jumping at sounds, checking the locks multiple times a day, and scanning every crowd for a gray cap and sunglasses.
