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He yanked his laptop from his bag. “Also, I know what Grace Iverson found. Specifically. So you know how Iverson’s donations are to cover up where the money is really coming from, the drugs and all that? Well, turns out that the real estate side of Iverson’s company is buying up property in a very specific pattern.”

He turned his computer to Nicco and Ash. On it was a map of the southwest, following a trail from Sonora, Mexico over the Arizona border all the way up to Montana. Along the line, every two hundred to three hundred miles it seemed, another house was strategically placed.

“It’s a drug trade route,” Nicco stated. “This operation is much bigger than we realized.”

“There’s a reason for that too,” Jinx replied. “Hanna’s theory about Ralston is right. He wants to create some kind of moral panic, but he’s not doing it to grow his church in a small town in Montana. I did a little digging into Ralston’s recent business activity….”

He tapped a key. “He’s doing it to run for Congress.”

Ash grimaced. “I can only guess at what his platform is going to be.”

“Family values.” Jinx sounded like he was reading from something. “A return to tradition, and practicing the preachings of the good Lord.”

“Family fucking values,” he muttered.

“Fuck,” Ash bit out. “And Hanna is going up to what is no doubt a heavily guarded compound right now with no back up.”

“She’s smart,” Nicco muttered, reaching for Ash’s hand because in that moment he couldn’t stop himself. “She’s going to be okay until we get there.”

He wasn’t entirely certain of that. Hanna was smart and clever and quick on her feet, but she was often driven by her passions, especially where Grace was involved. There was every possibility she wouldn’t be able to hold her tongue, but he also couldn’t think about something happening to her without feeling like his heart was going to beat out of his chest and burst on the floor, sliding blood and fluid through the wood slats.

“What’s the ETA on the rest of the crew?” This, this was why Ash would make the perfect leader. Nothing held him back from getting the job done. He was smart and focused, and he would make a hell of a captain.

All I have to do is convince him it’s the right move…and myself.

“Right now,” Xander mumbled, and they all turned to see a cloud of dust kicking up at the turn of the hill. The roar of a dozen motorcycle engines grew louder, cutting through the Montana mountain quiet, and Nicco actually felt a sense of calm begin to settle over him at the sight. For now, for the very moment, this was his club and nothing would stop them from seeing justice done.

And getting Hanna home safe.

The calvary had arrived.

Chapter Thirty-Three

Hanna pulled Tori’s SUV off to the side of the road. They’d used one of the ambulances to get her out of the hospital and back to the fire station, and while Hanna did feel a touch of guilt about leaving Xander and Gray, she was more certain of her decision than ever. She had dragged too many people into her mess, let personal vendettas and fear keep her from seeing what was right in front of her own eyes in her department and when it came to Ralston and Iverson, and she couldn’t let anyone else get hurt, not on her account.

I can’t let Ash and Nic get hurt.

Tori had called it love.

Maybe she was right. This wasn’t a classic self-sacrifice of a girl who had grown too accustomed to doing things on her own. No, this was driven by a different kind of fear, the one that had her wondering about what life would be like if Nicco or Ash were gone. She’d felt the same panic when the three of them had been dancing around Nicco’s darkness, like it was too terrifying to start pulling the curtains back for fear of what they would find, but all the while knowing. It was the kind of fear that clogged her throat and made her heart pound so loudly she would swear it was echoing through the valley.

No, she could do this without them. It would be easier and quieter anyway, just sneaking in, rescuing Grace, and sneaking out, no one the wiser. She might have lied to Tori about making this exclusively a recon mission, but Hanna knew Tori would never have given her the keys otherwise. She’d deal with the fall out of it all on her own, never dragging her guys into it.

Her guys.

Hanna shook her head and quietly climbed along the back line of the compound. There were a handful of homes, just as Jinx had said, and she glanced at the crude map she had drawn on the back of a sick bag in the ambulance. Three main choices.

Hanna popped her head over the ridgeline just in time to see a woman walking out of one of the potential houses. She wore a matching athletic set and ball cap, along with a water vest, and she had two rambunctious dogs on leashes. Quickly, she loaded the dogs into an adventure SUV, and set off down the hill.

Hanna drew an X through that house.

Two options left.

She ran along the edge of the ridge before coming to the build site of the first possible location.

It was a cement slab in the dirt. The skeletal structure of the frame was in place, but the house was currently in pieces, building materials carefully laid out along the edges, and a truck full of gear and supplies parked at the end of a dirt drive. The only way Grace could be in that house was if she had been somehow camouflaged with the forest beyond.

Which left only one option.