It took effort not to smile.
More so not to think about when they were going to have a chance to do that again.
The one-hour flight was uneventful, allowing Reese to catch a few minutes of sleep when Brantley did. He figured Brantley’s reasons had more to do with his training than anything. He’d once mentioned, during his time with the Teams, they were forced to catch sleep when they could during missions. A skill that was obviously still ingrained in him.
When they touched down, they found Decker Bromwell waiting.
“This is the best I could do,” Deck informed them, gesturing toward a ten-year-old Ford Taurus, a seen-better-days Honda Odyssey, and what had probably once been a relatively nice BMW.
“If you were goin’ for inconspicuous, you did good,” Brantley told him.
“And if you were goin’ for reliable, you probably failed miserably,” Baz noted.
“They run,” Deck assured them. “Maybe not for long, but they’ll get the job done.”
Reese was betting they’d crap out sooner rather than later, but for now, they would do. No one expected them to be here long, so if they were lucky, it wouldn’t matter.
“Do we know where she was last seen?” Brantley asked, accepting a set of keys from Deck.
“We’ve got one sighting of her at the Starbucks, another nearby. Two different days.”
“So it’s safe to assume she’s stayin’ somewhere around there?”
“There’s not much ground to cover, to be honest. She could be stayin’ anywhere, including on South Padre for all we know.”
“We’re gonna assume she’s here,” Reese told him. “And we’re gonna do a grid search accordingly. There’s six of us. We go door to door, business to business. Someone’s seen her. It’s just a matter of gettin’ to her before she realizes we’re here.”
“Baz and Deck, y’all can start from the south, work your way north,” Brantley instructed. “Trey and Magnus, work west to east. We’ll take north to south, meet somewhere in the middle.”
Reese opened his go-bag, pulled out a sealed plastic bag, and passed it to Magnus. “We were able to get some of Juliet’s things. If you’re lucky, that’ll have her scent.”
“We’ll see what we can do,” Magnus said, taking the bag. “Adira’s my best, so if she can be tracked, she’ll find her.”
Reese hoped that was the case. He honestly wanted this to be over.
While they were standing in the parking lot at the private airstrip, another plane came in for a landing, this one smaller than the one they’d come in on.
“Just FYI, this isn’t a busy place,” Deck noted. “I’ve been here for two hours and there’ve been no other planes in or out.”
Now there were two in a short time.
“No sense in stickin’ around to see who it is,” Brantley said, glancing at Reese.
Reese agreed. If that happened to be someone sent by Max Adorite, it would be best for them to hit the ground running. Even a few minutes in front of them might help.
Still, he kept his eyes on the plane as they piled into the cars and drove away. No one exited and they didn’t pass any vehicles sent to pick up a passenger. Maybe he was overthinking this. It was possible the plane was coming to pick someone up, take them to their destination.
“Let’s focus on the task at hand,” Brantley said. “We can’t control what Max Adorite does.”
“You’re right.”
“Plus, we should have a couple of hours on him.”
Reese didn’t bother to mention Max wouldn’t be the one flying down here. They wouldn’t be waiting for someone coming from Dallas. Knowing Max, he would call in a favor from someone local. Perhaps someone in Mexico.
For all they knew, that person could already be there.
Brantley wasted no time heading for the most populated places. He figured if they did end up going house to house, that would be their last resort. For now he wanted to focus on the businesses, mainly restaurants and motels.
