Page 97 of Honor ’N’ Duty

“No!” Laia spun and tucked Rosa to her chest, as if that could actually protect her from a bullet.

“Idiot,” Colon shouted. “Take them outside. I don’t want any blood in the cabin.”

“No, please,” she cried over her shoulder.

“Mommy, I want to go home.” Tears began streaming from Rosa’s eyes.

It can’t end this way. Not for her baby.

“Let Rosa go,” she pleaded. “She’s just a child. She doesn’t understand any of this. She can’t tell anyone anything. If you drop her off at a rest stop somewhere on the highway, I promise she won’t say anything. She wouldn’t even know what to say. Just let her go. Please.”

A quick glance over her shoulder, and she thought she might have gotten through to Colon. His face had softened. Some, anyway.

“I’m truly sorry, Mrs. Sampson. Children should never be separated from their parents. Sometimes, it’s unavoidable. She is a precocious little girl. Too precocious.” Colon’s face returned to what she now understood was his typical look. Mean. Unfeeling. Homicidal. “I can’t take the chance. I’m sorry.”

When he turned to leave, any remaining hope died that at least Rosa would survive this.

She’d tried, really tried. And failed. At least they would die together.

Laia squeezed her eyes shut and began doing something she hadn’t done in years.

She prayed to God.

Please, God. Don’t let my daughter suffer. Let her feel no pain. Let her—

A radio crackled. “There’s a fed here. He wants to see you.”

“What?” Colon barked, echoing Laia’s thoughts.

It can’t be.

Still holding Rosa away from the goon with the gun, she glanced over her shoulder to see Colon grab the other man’s radio.

“What fed?” Colon shouted into the radio.

“Kade Sampson,” came the response. “Homeland Security.”

Happiness and hope burst inside Laia’s chest.

Kade is here. Actually here. He’d come for her.

Colon’s eyes narrowed, on her this time. “You were told not to call the police or the FBI. Did you tell your brother-in-law where you were going?”

“I didn’t. I swear it. I did exactly as you told me to.” Well, aside from the tiny little thing about creating a phony ledger. “I came here alone and didn’t tell anyone where I was going.”

“Then how did he find this cabin?” Colon said through his clenched jaw.

“I don’t know.” Was it possible Kade had managed to track her phone from the brief moments she’d had it on earlier?

“Did you check her for devices?” he asked the goon, who nodded. “What about her car?”

“Si.” The goon nodded vigorously. “No tracking devices.”

These idiots had missed her phone. Or they hadn’t searched well enough and didn’t want to admit their mistake. But she’d only just turned it back on, so that couldn’t have been how Kade had found her so quickly.

Colon clicked a button on the side of the radio. “Is he alone?”

“Si.”