“So do I and that’s why I can’t let Wade run around free. The longer we go without catching him, the more confident he’s going to get. I don’t think that’s a good thing.”

  “It might be,” Jared argued. “It might make him sloppy. He’ll make a mistake and we’ll get him.”

  “He hasn’t made any mistakes so far and I’m growing old waiting for it. He’s come after the marshals. It’s only a matter of time before he comes after one of you or maybe my family. He wants to get to me, hurt me before he kills me, and the more he tortures me the better. May I remind you that he was going to slice me up and watch me bleed to death slowly?”

  Logan remembered that fucking day as if it were yesterday. Bright, Technicolor memories that would be with him for the rest of his life. Not so much from the danger – Logan hadn’t ever really felt that he was going to die – but the horrifying realization that Wade was the vigilante killer. That had been the awful part.

  “We remember,” Jason said grimly. “We know what he’s capable of. I’m just not sure that going after him is the right move. He’s trying to lure you out into the open.”

  “He’s doing a good job of it.”

  Jared tapped the table to emphasize his point. “Our job is to keep you and your family under wraps and safe.”

  Logan shrugged. “Plans change. They need to be fluid. I’m not asking permission here, if that’s what you’re thinking. If I think that the best thing to do is go after Wade, then that’s what I’m going to do.”

  He didn’t mention his conversation with Ava and how she’d wanted his friends’ buy-in to the whole scheme.

  “You’re a grown man and you don’t need our permission, but you might need our help,” Jason pointed out. “I’m not letting you go after Wade Bryson all alone. I’ll shoot you myself before I let you do that.”

  Logan didn’t doubt Jason’s vow and for a moment an image of himself limping around camp because Jason shot him in the leg came to mind.

  “I’d still go after Wade.” Logan’s gaze veered over to the man sitting on the couch, his feet propped up on the old coffee table. Reed hadn’t said a damn word since they’d come in to talk about this. “What about you, Mitchell? What do you think?”

  Taking a drink of his coffee, Reed seemed to consider his words before answering. “I think that Logan is right.”

  Stunned silence. Logan was surprised at the vote of confidence and Jared and Jason looked shocked as well.

  “Of course, I’m right,” Logan finally replied. “We can’t sit around and wait for Wade to move. We need to do something.”

  Reed smiled and raised his hand in a stop motion. “Whoa. I said that I agreed. Up to a point. We do need to do something. Clearly, this isn’t working and you know what they say about the definition of insanity. I don’t want to keep making the same mistake and expecting a different outcome. We need to make a change, but I think we need to think about what that change actually is very fucking carefully.”

  It was the closest thing to an endorsement that Logan was going to get. He’d take it.

  “So we need a new plan.”

  “Yes,” Reed agreed. “And the first thing we need to do is get the women and children out of the way. With them here, we’re constantly worrying about them. Get Evan on the phone and let’s put them on a plane south as soon as possible.”

  Logan couldn’t agree more. “That’s what I wanted to do originally but Ava wasn’t going for it. And honestly, I wanted to keep them close.”

  “That’s normal,” Jason said. “After all, no one can keep them as safe as their husband and father can, but right now you’re the lightning rod in all of this. They’re better off away from you. But will Ava agree to it?”

  “If you all agree, she said she’d go.” Logan turned to Reed. “What about Kaylee? She’ll want to stay with you.”

  Logan didn’t know what was going on with his friend’s marriage, but something was definitely wrong. The tension had lessened in the last few days, however, and it might be a task to get Kaylee to leave Reed just when things were getting better.

  “She’ll go,” Reed said, his expression determined. “If I have to put her on that plane myself, she’ll go.”

  “So we all agree?” Logan looked around at his friends. “A new plan? A new start?”

  The three other men nodded, although they didn’t look all that happy. Too bad.

  Already Logan felt like a new person. He hated sitting around waiting for Wade.

  “We need to get Bryson reacting to us instead of the other way around. He’s not so smart when he doesn’t have time to think things through. We need him making split-second decisions. That’s when he’s going to do something stupid and then we’ll get him.”

  Because failure wasn’t an option.

  * * * *

  Reed placed Kaylee’s suitcase in the back of their vehicle. “Don’t worry. It’s not a long drive to the new safe house Evan found for us.”

  The new house was closer to Denver where Ava, Kaylee, and the twins were going to board a plane tomorrow for Florida. They’d discussed having them fly out of Bozeman but they’d all felt that it would be the first place Wade would look for them. But of course, Kaylee didn’t know about any of this.

  Reed and his friends had spent the better part of the afternoon strategizing, discarding one plan after another until they had something they could live with. Not be happy about necessarily. But live with. Because they all wanted to stay alive.

  “I’m not worried about that,” Kaylee replied. “I’m worried about you. You look worried so now I worry.”

  Shit, do I really?

  Trying to set his wife’s mind at ease, he mustered a teasing smile. “Maybe I’m worried about interest rates or the price of gas.”

  “You never worry about those things.” Kaylee stepped closer and placed her hand on his arm. She kept her voice low so he could barely hear. “Spill it. Something is going on.”

  Something was going on. Had Logan told Ava yet? There was no indication but a hell of a lot of decisions had been made in the last several hours and as usual the women were going to be the last to know.

  They were all leaving under the cover of darkness and Ava and Kaylee – bless them – had barely even asked a question. They’d simply nodded and went to pack up the cabin. Reed could only hope that they’d made the right call to wait until after sundown to get on the road. It could be the correct decision or so very, very wrong.

  That’s why Reed looked so damn worried.

  “I was going to tell you while we were on the road.”

  “Why don’t you tell me now. Is it that bad? Has Wade done something else?”

  “No, it’s not that. We…”

  “We?” she prompted. “Just spit it out or let me guess. We’re going to Florida, right?”

  She was partially correct.

  “You’re going to Florida. I’m staying here. In the morning. Evan is getting a private plane. He has a rich as shit friend, I guess.”

  To his relief, she didn’t look surprised in the least. He had a feeling that she and Ava had been talking about this very thing while the men were making new plans.

  “Okay, I can’t say that I’m shocked. Is Wade closing in?”

  “Well…yes and no. He’s out there and he knows our location, but he doesn’t seem to be coming after us. He’s playing his game. But eventually…”

  He didn’t put words to the actual fears in his heart that she, Ava, or the twins might be hurt or killed because of Wade Bryson and Reed’s involvement.

  “How long can this go on?” she asked. “You all have jobs. I don’t mean you, of course. You have more vacation saved up than any human being on the planet, but the others might actually lose their jobs.”

  Since meeting and marrying Kaylee, Reed had been making an effort to use up all of his saved vacation and sick days but when a person hoards them as badly as he had for years it wasn’t easy. He still had two months in the bank.

  He’d been hoping to use it when they had a baby. Now they’d need to find another reason. Maybe when this was all over, he could sweep her off her feet and take her on a long second honeymoon. They’d been talking about traveling someday. That day might be soon.

  “If they get fired Jason, Jared, and Logan will simply hire them for the consulting firm. They’re busier than hell apparently and they want to start a new division that would specialize in bigger, more complex cases.”

  “You’d be good at that.”

  Reed hadn’t considered himself for the team. He had a town to run and people that depended on him.

  “All the guys would. So are you ready to get on the road?”

  “Let’s do this.”

  He could only hope and pray that she had no idea just how dangerous what they were about to do truly was. This wasn’t going to be a fun little road trip. Wade Bryson and his henchmen might be out there waiting for them.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Reed’s fingers gripped the steering wheel, his knuckles white and his palms sweaty. Outwardly he hoped he conveyed a sense of ease and calm, but inside his guts were churning and he could taste the acid in the back of his throat. There was a real fear that Bryson was watching and might ambush them just as he had done with the marshals.

  To protect the women and children, he and his friends had put them in the middle of their small convoy. He’d persuaded Kaylee to ride with Logan, Ava, and the twins and they were currently in the minivan right in front of him. Griffin sat in Reed’s passenger seat while Jason and Jared led the group in their vehicle with Amy and Mike right behind.

  Tanner and Seth were planning to meet them at the new safe house. With any luck, they’d all arrive safe and alive.

  Funny how the drive to the cabin in the daytime hadn’t been this nerve-wracking, but then Bryson’s body count had been lower. The psychopath was determined to fuck with Logan before killing him in some strange “clean up the Bryson family name” vendetta. Logan didn’t even use the Bryson name and he was a damn fine upstanding citizen. As far as Reed was concerned, that looney tune was using it all as an excuse to kill. Because he fucking enjoyed it, the bastard. Wade Bryson got his jollies killing people. End of story. He also knew he was never going to be as good as Logan, so he’d decided to wipe him off the face of the earth.

  Reed and his friends weren’t about to let that happen.

  That meant they had to make this drive without anyone getting killed or injured. There weren’t any streetlights out this far and it was as dark as the devil’s asshole out here. They’d made the decision to keep their headlights off, so that meant that they had to keep their speed down since no one could see a goddamn thing. They were literally traveling by the light of the moon and their satellite navigation systems. Thank heaven it was a clear night.

  The only good news was that if they couldn’t see anything, then neither could Bryson and whomever was helping him.

  They only had to do this for a little while longer and then they’d be out in the open on a major highway. They’d gone back and forth for awhile about whether they should stick to the side roads but had finally decided that Bryson wouldn’t want to be anywhere around large numbers of people. That was another reason they’d chosen the Denver area.

  Griffin shifted in his seat, craning his neck to see in the darkness. “Jesus, I never realized just how dark it gets away from the city lights. It’s like driving through black ink.”

  Sweat trickling down Reed’s back, he could only nod in agreement. The heater blasted hot air into the vehicle and he would have reached over to turn it down, but he didn’t want to take his eyes from the road for a second. He couldn’t see the damn knob anyway, so he’d just have to sweat. Assuming it was the temperature making him sweat and not the stress.

  While Reed drove, Griffin was supposed to keep his eyes peeled for anything out of the ordinary and that meant anything literally. Animals, cars, unexplained lights. Whatever might be a threat to their safety. The silence stretched on as the minutes ticked slowly by, each one taking them closer to civilization. Reed wasn’t sure whether he would be relieved or even more wary. Complacency was the enemy.

  “Jason said that you were the one that swayed the vote on going after Bryson.”

  The road was becoming less twisty and Reed’s tension had lowered a notch or two. His fingers loosened on the steering wheel and he brought his right hand down to dry the damp palm on his jeans.

  “I guess,” Reed finally replied. “As I said it’s crazy to keep doing the same thing and just hoping shit gets better. It’s not getting better, it’s only getting worse.”

  “He’s taking this too personally. He’s too emotional and he’s going to get someone killed.”

  Him being Logan.

  “Maybe,” Reed conceded. “I have to say though I’ve seen Logan go cold as ice in certain situations. He’s not a hothead. But yeah, this situation is a cluster of mammoth proportions and he’s at the center of it all. And that’s personal. I don’t see how it can’t be personal. This is about Bryson and Logan. And in the end, it’s going to be between the two of them. When the time comes, let him take the shot. Fuck, he’s earned it.”

  “Has it already been decided? Bryson’s not going back to prison?”

  There was no censure in Griffin’s tone. None at all.

  “No, but you know how accurate Logan’s gut is?” Griffin nodded in the darkness. “Well, his gut is telling him that Bryson isn’t going back to prison. It’s going to be dead or alive and only one of them walks away. Or maybe he’s watched too many Charles Bronson movies. Either way, I don’t think this guy is going to just throw up his hands and surrender. He doesn’t want to go back and be a guest of the state and he has to know that this time he’ll go to Florence. I’m guessing he’d rather go to hell than a Supermax.”

  “And Bryson will take out anyone in his way.”

  Was that what this was about?

  “He will. Are you worried? You don’t have to do this, you know. We can get you on the plane and you can watch over the women and kids. No one would question you.”

  “That’s not it. I just can’t help but wonder…” Griffin paused as if gathering his thoughts. “What makes a person go so far to the other side? What sent this guy on a one-way trip to suicide by cop?”

  “He did see his father murder his mother,” Reed reminded his friend. “And God knows what else. I don’t know enough about sociopaths to know whether they’re born or made. Maybe a little of both. Logan says that Bryson wants to go out in a blaze of glory. He wants news coverage, headlines, and books written about him.”

  “That’s sick as shit.”

  “Damn right. I’m making it my personal mission to make sure that he doesn’t become famous. The day after we capture him I want him to be completely forgotten by the public. No books. No movies. No groupies. Lock him up and throw away the key. He can never be rehabilitated.”

  “This has to be driving Logan out of his mind. The rising body count has to be making him crazy.”

  “It is,” Reed confirmed. “Frankly, I’m surprised we were able to keep him in check this long. He won’t be happy until he’s put an end to Bryson’s reign of terror.”

  The crackling of the radio captured their attention as Jared announced that they were taking the next exit to the main highway. They would begin seeing other vehicles in a few minutes.

  Stay alert and vigilant.

  * * * *

  Kaylee was beginning to lose count as to how many times she’d packed and re-packed her suitcase. They were in another house, this time in an affluent suburb outside of Boulder. They’d arrived in the middle of the night like thieves, sneaking out of their camp and into this home.

  She’d barely noticed it last night, intent on getting the twins settled into bed and making sandwiches for the hungry men, but it was quite lovely. High ceilings, oak floors, and large airy rooms. The home was surrounded by tall trees which would block anyone’s view into the windows, which she assumed was by design. Did these innocent suburbanites realize that the United States government owned this home and kept key witnesses under cover here? Probably not.

  After getting a bite to eat, she’d eventually fallen into a deep sleep despite all the caffeine she’d ingested that evening, but it hadn’t been restorative in the least. She was just as tired as when she went to bed. This situation was starting to wear on her and she could only imagine how Ava and Logan felt. She’d crawled out of bed this morning and taken a shower but now standing in front of the bathroom mirror wrapped in a towel she barely had the energy to put on a coat of mascara.

  I’m only going on an airplane. Does anyone really care how I look?

  “Hey, babe.”

  Reed stuck his head around the doorway, his face covered in stubble and his hair askew from running his fingers through it. If he’d come to bed at any time last night, she hadn’t stirred. More likely, he and the others had stayed up talking about plans and strategy. His eyes were slightly red-rimmed and he looked…exhausted. He needed about a week of sleep. They all did really, but that wasn’t in the cards.

  “Hey. I don’t suppose you got any sleep last night?”

  Shaking his head, he stepped into the steamy bathroom. “I’ll try and catch a nap after we take you to the airport. Josie and Evan are meeting us there which is outstanding news. You’ll be even more protected on the flight down.”

  Evan, of course, was a former US Marshal and Josie was no slouch either. When she’d met Evan, she’d been on the run for a crime she didn’t commit. Smart and resourceful, she had successfully dodged the bad guys after her all on her own until Evan had stepped in to help.

  “That’s really nice of them. I thought we’d just meet them in Florida.” She scraped her wet hair away from her face. “I was just trying to figure out if I needed to put any makeup on.”

  “You don’t need it.”