“I should be telling you that, dammit,” Dunne said through set teeth. “Fitz is going to kill me. Don’t do—”
He broke off as they all heard the sound of a fierce spate of bullets coming from the phone in Dunne’s hand. Kendra tensed as she heard it followed by a shrill scream of agony.
“No!” Dunne said hoarsely. “Dear God, no!” His expression twisted in pain as his hand closed into a fist. “Okay. Get the hell out of here. I’ll contact Fitz and try to get ahold of Bruce again.”
But that was the last thing that Kendra heard because Jessie had started the motorcycle and they were roaring through the forest toward the road.
Jessie didn’t pull over to the side of the road until they were at least a dozen miles from the encampment. Kendra’s phone rang once during that interval with a call from Dunne to make certain they were okay and tell them Fitz and his men were on the way to the camp—but not to return until they checked back in with him. She was glad he was still safe, but she wasn’t tempted to return yet. The past hour had been a shock and she just wanted to get away somewhere she felt moderately safe before making any plans about next steps. Evidently Jessie felt close to the same thing, because when she did pull over it wasn’t until after she’d found a nook deep on the other side of the forest. There she switched off the cycle and turned to face Kendra. “Not a great night. I guess we should probably talk about how to make it better?”
“Why do you say that?” Kendra asked. “Just because that poorKenneth Bruce has probably been murdered?” She shivered. “And I made a snap decision that might leave us just like Bruce?”
“We didn’t have time for anything but a snap decision,” Jessie said quietly. “And since we were the principal ones at risk, we had to make it. Your decision made sense to me. So stop having second thoughts and tell me what we’re going to do next.”
“So I still have the responsibility? I’m open to suggestions.”
“But you don’t always take them. This is your particular battle, as you’ve often told me. You give the orders. I’ll shoot you down if I think you’re full of crap.” Then she flinched. “Oops, that was particularly bad timing for a threat like that. Sorry.”
Kendra shook her head. “Yes, it was. But I’ll come up with something.” She was frowning. “I don’t know if Cambry is involved in this at all, but I’m not ready to trust him yet. I think we have to find a way to investigate Cambry and any possible association with Vlad Korkil.”
“Do we involve Justice?”
“Not right away. I think we have to finish searching this area first and then go after that man who lost his hand and see if it was Lynch who took it.”
“I like that plan.”
“I thought you would. But if we don’t find any trace of Lynch nearby, we’ll hunt down Palmer Nolan, who created the prosthetic, and give him the third degree. Agreed?”
“Agreed,” Jessie said gloomily. She started the motorcycle. “Let’s go before those commandos get here.”
Kendra and Jessie rode five miles to the south over the uneven terrain, then stashed the motorcycle in the brush so that theycould move more quietly. They spent hours looking for some sign of Lynch, and their calls to Fitz went unanswered. They were about to give up when they happened upon an abandoned gas station.
The small building they were approaching was almost invisible from the road. Tall weeds grew all around it, and the building itself was stained by mold and mildew.
“Definitely not worth our time,” Jessie said. “I wouldn’t have paid any attention to this place even out of the corner of my eye.”
Jessie took a few more steps forward to get a closer look. “Definitely a gas station,” she said. “Or at least it was a long time ago.” She pointed to a pair of concrete pads in front. “That’s where the pumps were.”
“Get down!” Kendra hissed as she fell to the ground.
Jessie dove next to her. “What?” she whispered as she crawled after Kendra behind a clump of weeds. “See somebody?”
“No. But someone’s been here. Recently. They may still be inside.”
“Squatters?”
“Could be. There are fresh footprints in the mud all around. Do you have your binoculars with you?”
Jessie reached into her knapsack and pulled out a small pair of military-grade binoculars. She handed them to Kendra.
Kendra scanned the area. “There were at least four people here recently. There could be more, but it’s hard to tell since they were all wearing the same type of boots. Field boots of some kind, the type that paramilitary guys like to wear. So I don’t think they were squatters.” She suddenly gasped. “I think Lynch was here.”
“Are you sure?”
“Pretty sure. One of the prints is that ridiculously expensive Zamberlan hiking shoe Lynch wears. I always tease him about his billionaire tastes.” She adjusted the binoculars to study the layout of prints. “But there’s only one set of those. There’s no sign of them on the path leading up to the entrance.”
“They just . . . appear there?” Jessie asked. “I don’t like the sound of that.”
“Do you think I do?” Kendra asked harshly. From the instant she’d seen those prints, she’d had only one thought and it was causing her to shake with fear. But she had to put it into words. “It looks like someone may have been . . . dragged.” She lowered the binoculars and handed them back to Jessie. “I think that could have been Lynch.”
