She looked back toward the tree line, though she couldn’t see Micah from here.
Be careful,she thought.
Then she lifted the latch and pulled the door open.
Micah watched Naomi disappear into the trees then made himself stop watching.
Please let this work.
He stayed low and kept to the perimeter, closing the distance in a wide arc that kept him out of the guard’s sightline until the last possible moment.
The man was still looking at his phone.
Micah came up fast and quiet from behind. He had Knox’s weapon, but using it meant noise, and noise meant losing the element of surprise on whoever was inside.
He didn’t use it.
Instead, he closed the last few feet at a run. His arm came up and around the man’s throat before he could react. He used a controlled hold that cut off sound and air in the same motion.
The man’s phone dropped into the dirt.
The man grabbed Micah’s arm and tried to find purchase. But the angle was wrong.
The leverage was gone. Within seconds, his knees buckled.
Micah lowered him to the ground and checked his pulse. It was steady, but he’d be out long enough.
He grabbed the man’s weapon, slipped it into his waistband, and moved to the corner of the building.
He pressed his back against the wall and counted each second.
From somewhere behind the building, Good Boy erupted into barking.
Not the intermittent barking from before. This was different—frantic, joyful, the full-throated noise of a dog that had found someone he loved and lost his mind about it.
Micah heard him crashing through whatever space he’d been in, still barking, the sound moving and alive.
Good girl,he thought.Now get back to those woods.
Footsteps sounded inside. Then he heard a sharp, irritated voice mutter, “What is that ruckus? Go check.”
The front door swung open.
Micah didn’t move.
The second man came around the corner fast, weapon up, scanning toward the outbuilding.
He never looked left.
Micah stepped out and drove the butt of his weapon hard into the side of the man’s head. He went down without a sound.
Two down.
Good Boy’s barking had shifted and moved away from the building now, back toward the tree line. Following Naomi. Right where they’d planned.
Micah exhaled.
The sound of Grace crying made any relief he’d felt disappear.
One man and one woman were still inside with Grace. He didn’t necessarily count the woman from the road as a fighter—she’d played a role before falling back. But he couldn’t assume.
He checked his watch.
Based on his last update, he had just over three minutes until backup arrived.
He looked at the door.
Grace had been in there with those people long enough.
He moved toward the entrance, ready to end this.
