8
SHELBY
Inever make it to Denver.
I'm forty miles south of Grizzly Ridge with Logan Creed in the passenger seat of my rental SUV when Rhea's name lights up my phone on the dash mount. Logan answers it on speaker before the second ring.
"Talk to me," he says, and the shift from the quiet, gentle man who spent the last thirty minutes telling me about his daughter Lucy's dinosaur obsession to the Navy SEAL running operational comms is so immediate it makes my fingers tighten on the wheel.
"Garrett Hollis returned the rental car in Denver this morning." Rhea's voice is crisp and fast. "He didn't get on a plane. He rented a different vehicle from a second agency two hours later. A white Ford pickup. Colorado plates. Cal's cyber team pulled highway camera footage from I-70 westbound. He turned off at the exit for Highway 9 heading north toward Breckenridge at oh nine thirty."
Highway 9 north. That's the corridor that leads to Mountain Ready.
"He's not heading for Denver," Logan says. "He's heading for the mountain."
"Confirmed. Cal plotted the trajectory. If he stays on 9 and picks up the county roads, he's three to four hours from Grizzly Ridge. Two and a half from Mountain Ready's access road."
My hands are shaking on the steering wheel. I grip harder.
"Turn the car around, Shelby." Logan's voice is calm and absolute. Not a suggestion.
I'm already looking for the next turnaround. A gravel pulloff appears and I take it, swinging the SUV in a tight arc, and then we're heading north, back the way we came, the morning sun now behind us instead of ahead.
Logan is on the phone with Cory before I've finished the turn. "Matthews, we have a situation. Hollis is mobile, northbound on Highway 9. Three to four hours from your position. Shelby and I are returning to Grizzly Ridge now."
I can hear Cory's voice through the speaker, sharp and controlled. "Get her to Sawyer's. I'm coming down."
"Negative. Stay at Mountain Ready. If he's heading for the school, that's where we want you. On your ground, on your terms. I'll have Shelby at Logan's cabin with Erica within ninety minutes. Sawyer's already been notified."
A beat of silence. Then Cory's voice, lower. Rougher. "Put her on."
Logan holds the phone toward me.
"I'm here," I say.
"Are you okay?"
"I'm okay. I'm turning around."
"Shelby." Just my name. Loaded with everything he can't say on a speaker phone in an operational context. "Come back to me."
"I'm coming."
Logan takes the phone back and the call shifts to logistics, coordinates and timelines and contingencies, but I'm not listening anymore. I'm driving. Fast and focused, eating the miles between me and the only place in the world I want to be right now, which is anywhere in the radius of Cory Matthews.
I used to run from things. Now I'm running toward something. The irony would make me laugh if my heart wasn't hammering so hard I can feel it in my teeth.
We reach Grizzly Ridge in just over an hour. Logan directs me straight to his cabin. Erica is waiting on the porch with Lucy on her hip and an expression that tells me she's already in lawyer mode, cataloging facts, assessing options, preparing for whatever comes.
"Inside," she says. No pleasantries. "Coffee's on. Sawyer's on his way."
The cabin becomes a command post within thirty minutes. Sawyer arrives with a deputy. Dan Whitmore calls in from his lodge, already positioned on the county road that serves as the main northern approach to Grizzly Ridge. Miguel McNab checks in via the Channel 16 thread from his position east of town.
And Cory. Cory is at Mountain Ready, on his ground, in his territory, doing what he was trained to do. Waiting.
The hours crawl. I sit at Logan's kitchen table with my laptop and try to work on the article draft, because that's what I told Cory I'd do and because stopping now would mean Garrett has already won. The words come slowly, each sentence a small act of defiance against the fear that wants to swallow me whole.
Erica sits across from me. She doesn't hover. She doesn't offer false reassurance. She works on her own laptop, doing whatever former lawyers turned nonprofit directors do, and her calm presence is more grounding than any words could be.
