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When we're done, I pull a crumpled twenty from my pocket. "Wait here. I'm going to pay the girl at the register, then we're going to find a convenience store for that burner."

She nods, taking a sip of her water. I slide out of the booth and walk up to the front counter. The waitress is ringing up a trucker in front of me, chatting casually about the storm damage down the road. I wait patiently, tapping the twenty against the counter.

Suddenly, a hand grips my forearm.

I tense, my instincts flaring, my right hand dropping toward the grip of the gun tucked into the small of my back before I realize it's Oksana. She's standing right beside me, her face completely drained of color, her blue eyes wide and terrified.

"Cormac," she whispers, her voice urgent. "We have to go. Right now."

I don't ask questions. I drop the twenty-dollar bill onto the counter, grab her hand, and push open the diner door, the little bell chiming overhead as we step out into the cold mist.

I pull her quickly around the side of the building, into the blind spot between the diner and a rusted metal dumpster where we're hidden from the road. I push her gently against the cinderblock wall, my body shielding hers, scanning the treeline and the parking lot. "What happened?" I demand, keeping my voice dangerously quiet. "Did you see someone?"

Her hands are shaking so badly she can barely coordinate her fingers. She reaches into the pocket of her sweater and pulls out a small, tightly folded square of white paper.

"This was in my pocket," she gasps, her chest heaving as she thrusts it into my hand. "I didn't put it there, Cormac. I swear to God I didn't put it there. When I stood up to walk over to you, a guy in a gray jacket brushed past me near the restrooms. I felt something drop into my pocket, and when I reached in, this was there."

I take the paper from her fingers. The note is scrawled in black ink, the handwriting hurried. Back door. 2 minutes. We know he has you. Don't let him take you anywhere else.

An electric charge of adrenaline surges through my veins. I look down at Oksana. She's staring at the paper like it's a venomous snake, tears pooling in her eyes again, but this time they're tears of frantic terror. "I didn't ask for this," she whispers fiercely, grabbing the lapel of my jacket with both hands, pleading with everything she has. "I'm showing it to you because I want you to know the truth. I don't want them here. I don't want their help. I'm not playing you, Cormac. Please believe me."

I stare at the note, then down into her wide, panicked eyes. She could have kept it. She could have slipped out the back door while I was paying the bill. She could have walked straight into the arms of the federal agents waiting for her behind this diner and ended her nightmare right here.

Instead, she brought it straight to me. She's telling the truth.

She’s completely done with them. But it doesn't change the fact that they're here. They tracked us through the storm; they know we're on foot, and they're closing the net.

We're not outrunning this much longer. Not on foot, and not with a pregnant woman and an injured shoulder.

"Come on," I growl, grabbing her by the waist and pulling her with me toward the back edge of the diner lot, staying low behind a row of overgrown hedges that line the property.

"Where are we going?" she pants, struggling to keep up as we move through the wet brush.

"There's a gas station two hundred yards down on the other side of the road," I tell her. "We need that phone. Now."

—

As luck would have it, there's also a motel. I get us a room first, leaving Oksana while I go and get a cheap prepaid flip phone, slapping cash down on the counter and walking out before the teenage clerk can even process what he's looking at.

I make it back to the room in record time and dial Declan's number.

"Hello?" He answers a moment later, and my heart thuds in my chest.

"It's me," I say.

There's a brief pause. "Cormac. Where the fuck are you? Rian's been tearing the city apart trying to find an angle on your location."

"Somewhere in rural Indiana," I answer, keeping my voice low and level. "We went off the road in a storm last night. Safe house is completely blown."

"I know," Declan says, his tone hardening. "The feds raided three of our locations early this morning. They didn't find anything, obviously. But they're pushing hard, and I don't know why."

I close my eyes for a fraction of a second, the guilt hitting me like a physical blow. Then I open my eyes and look at Oksana. She's watching me with her hand pressed over her mouth, her eyes wide as she listens to my side of the conversation.

"The feds had leverage on Maksim's family," I say finally. "Katya went to them weeks ago. Agent Reyes used the threats against the Svenkovs to coerce Oksana into pulling files off my laptop when you sent them to me in Greece. She didn't get them to the feds; I found out in time. But she's been trying to drip-feed them what little she can since almost the start."

A deadly silence fills the line. For several agonizing seconds, Declan doesn't say a word. I can practically hear the gears turning in his head.

"Is she with you?" Declan asks, his voice chillingly calm.