We head down to the kitchen and Tom sits at the island with a pot of coffee already made.
“Figured you’d want some before heading out.”Tom rubs the back of his neck.
Wyatt makes a noncommittal noise and gets two cups down.He fills one and passes it to me before filling his own.
“Any words of wisdom?”I lean against the counter and take a sip, watching Tom over the rim of my cup.
Wyatt chuckles.“From him?Nah.”
“Fuck off, Wyatt.”But Tom smiles.
And I see Sara in his smile.As someone who did everything wrong and got a second chance at happiness, I hope Tom finds his way back to his family, because that’s what these guys and Sara are.His family.
And they’re my family too now.
“If they need more, here.”Tom holds out a flash drive.“It’s not much, but with everything else we gave them, it might help.”
I take it from him.“As one of the guys nailing your sister?—”
“Fuck.”Tom runs his hand through his hair and his green eyes give me anare you fucking kidding melook.
I smirk.“I’m pretty sure she’ll forgive you eventually.Sara’s got too much love in her heart to carry a grudge.Thanks for the coffee.”
Tom shakes his head.“Yeah, you can fuck off too.”
I grin, because he does it begrudgingly.“Nice.”
Wyatt gestures to the door.“Come on.We’ve got a drive and a day of downloading crap from the internet to get to.”
“Be careful.”Tom rises and his eyes meet Wyatt’s.“We may not be right yet, but you’re still my best friend.Come back unharmed.”
Wyatt chuckles under his breath.“You better hope I come back in one piece.Sara will beat you up if I don’t.”
Tom gives Wyatt a wry grin.We head out to the garage and get in the car.
“I think he likes me,” I say as Wyatt backs the car out.
“Don’t let it go to your head.”
* * *
We make it to a town a couple hours away and check into a hotel.Same room.Two beds.Then we find a little café to set up in.I’m on download duty while Wyatt goes outside to make the call on one of the burner phones (as Sara called them) that we bought.That one will be left here in town, maybe given to that guy asking for money on the corner.
We’re in the middle of fucking nowhere, and it’s going to take the Feds time to drive to our location.I sip my latte while downloading movies to entertain Sara.Even if the Feds tell us what we want to hear, it might be a few days before we can reemerge safely.
I’m also checking my emails and downloading the guys’.Now that’s fucking trust.They gave me their passwords.
We’re doing it all on the new laptop that Wyatt and I picked up at a Best Buy on the way here.Paid cash because that fucker is brilliant.Wyatt and his gang used to hang out at the house when they wanted to escape everything.
That meant not leaving a paper trail.So they stashed cash at their hideout whenever they could.We also went to a used car dealership and offered the guy there a few thousand to use a car overnight.There’s an abandoned farm where we left the car we’ll take back to the house after we return this one.
Finn gave us all the cloak-and-dagger moves last night before he went to get Sara.
Wyatt comes in and sits across from me with the new tablet he bought.“They can be here in a few hours.”
I look out the window.It’s early.If they’re here in the next few hours… “We could head back today.”
“No.We don’t want to risk someone following us.We need to make sure the Feds aregonegone before we leave.”Wyatt sets his tablet down and picks up his iced coffee.
