When had they gotten out? It couldn’t have been long ago, because there wasn’t anyone around. No cops, no sheriff, no feds, no one. But her heart pounded; she couldn’t stay here for long.
There was blood—good, they were hurt. Maybe dying. She walked along the unpaved road a few feet, looked toward her house, which she couldn’t quite see.
Could they have...?
She pulled up her phone and looked at the cameras at the farmhouse.
They were down, too.
She growled. These people were justimpossible. They couldn’t just play by the rules! She hit the archive and watched in high speed for a few minutes.
Damn, damn,damn!
She would just have to take care of all of them.
Audrey started toward her van when she heard somethingin the distance. She stopped, turned toward the house, hand up to shield her eyes from the late afternoon sun.
She saw a flash of something, then heard a distant crash, as if boulders rolled down a cliff like an avalanche.
Then... nothing... but she knew what was going to come.
One.
Two.
Three.
Boom!
An explosion shook the ground beneath her. A fireball exploded where the house had been.
She sneered. Served them right thinking they couldcheatthe game.No one cheated her. She won.
I won, I won, I won!
Clara Audrey Amber HopeReidalways won.
She laughed and climbed back into her van.
Then she stopped laughing. There was a chance—a small chance—that the FBI agents had reached out to someone. A small chance that she might be exposed... She couldn’t go back for Garrett. Not yet.
Soon. Maybe.
Instead of heading south toward Jacksonville, she headed north, then east, toward her family’s vacation house.
She called Garrett. He answered on the first ring.
“Babe?”
“Boom.”
“You’re sure?”
“I saw.”
“Okay. Franklin screwed us. We need to use the escape plan.”
“I am.”
