Chapter Ten

As promised, just before they reached the Little Rock city limits, Pete pulled into a roadside rest stop and gently shook Shannon awake.

Follow the signs to head toward Nashville, and wake me when we get there, all right? he wrote and showed her.

She nodded and smiled, then exited the truck to make use of the rest stop’s facilities before trading seats with him.

Leah yawned and stretched from the back seat.

“Bathroom break, yay,” she said blearily, and Pete chuckled as she followed Shannon to the ladies’ room.

His burner phone buzzed, indicating an incoming text from Larry.

Pete glanced at the message and was dumbfounded.

Duffy? Seriously? Are you sure about that? he typed back.

Positive. He was mentioned by name, Pete. How far out are you?

About halfway.

Get a move on. Need to form battle plan as soon as you get here.

Roger that.

“Holy crap,” Pete murmured, just as Shannon and Leah returned to the truck.

“What?” Leah asked him.

“Duffy. He’s in Creach & Langford’s pocket.”

Leah stared in amazement as Shannon pleaded, “Will one of you please tell me why Pete looks majorly stressed out right now?”

Leah grabbed the notebook from the front seat console.

Duffy’s in with the bad guys, she wrote.

“Great. That’s just great,” Shannon remarked. “Now what do we do? Does he know where we were going?”

Pete shook his head no.

“Oh, thank God,” Shannon said. “Let’s keep moving, then. I’ll drive.”

And she waved her hands to get them into gear.

Leah resumed her spot in the back seat, and Pete climbed in on the front passenger side.

“You still need to sleep, you know,” Shannon told him as she clicked her seat belt into place.

He nodded, his mind racing.

Not sure how successful I will be at that, but she’s right. I need to at least try.

“So, you two switch places. Leah up front, you stretch out in the back,” she commanded, and raised an eyebrow when he opened his mouth to start to protest.

“Now.”

Pete started to argue, then thought better of it.

“Here,” he said, handing Leah the burner phone as they traded places. “Fill Larry in. I’m going to try to sleep.”

Shannon pulled out of the rest stop and quickly gained speed as she got back out on the road toward their destination. Leah, nicely settled into the front seat, opted to entertain herself by texting an update to Larry.

In the meantime, Pete stretched out as much as he comfortably could, given his height, and began to scheme as they continued to tick off the miles. Before twenty minutes had passed, he was sound asleep.

***

“Where are they now?” Charlie demanded.

“Just a second…and… yeah, heading east out of Little Rock,” Duffy confirmed.

“Let’s roll,” Charlie urged.

“Why? I say we wait for them to stop moving,” Duffy suggested. “Once they do, we’ll know precisely where to hone in. There’s no point in us moving around until they stop. They could change direction at any time.”

Charlie reined in his temper enough to consider that the kid had a valid point.

“All right,” he muttered. “But the moment that dot stays in the same place for longer than forty-five minutes, we’re moving. Got it?”

***

Shannon delivered them to Nashville without incident, and Pete resumed the driving duties. He glanced at his watch as the three changed up seating positions in the vehicle.

“Four more hours, and we’re there,” Pete announced.

Another round of bathroom breaks and a gas stop, and then Pete’s truck rejoined the flow of traffic heading north on I-65.

From her position in the backseat, Leah relayed the latest update from Larry.

“He says he just heard Duffy is nowhere to be found,” she read aloud, and Pete’s grip tightened on the wheel.

“If he’s in the wind, then chances are he’s trailing us.”

“How could he be trailing us?” Leah asked, as the scowl on Shannon’s face revealed she wasn’t happy with being left out of the conversation.

Leah scribbled it all down and showed her.

Suddenly Leah had a flash of inspiration.

“Wait! Pete, Duffy went outside for a little while, remember?”

“Yeah, I remember.”

“And you said he was probably radioing in. What if he put a thingy on your truck?”

“A thingy?” Pete smiled despite his best attempts not to.

“You know, a thingy, like you see in spy movies. A… what are they called?”

“You mean a tracker?”

The smile left Pete’s face.

“Yeah. A tracker.”

Pete took the next exit, pulling into the first parking lot he came to. He slammed the transmission into park, got out, and immediately moved to the back of his vehicle.

Reaching his hand down under the back bumper, he frowned, moving from side to side.

“I don’t feel anything,” he murmured.

“Here, let me,” Leah offered, and before he could stop her, she was on the ground, peering up underneath the chassis.

She whistled, took her phone from her pocket, and snapped a picture.

“What is that?” she asked, as she showed Pete and Shannon the photo.

Pete’s jaw set like granite.

“That is definitely a tracker on my truck,” he growled.

Shannon snapped her fingers then flung her arms out in a what’s going on gesture.

Pete grabbed the notebook and wrote, Duffy put a tracker on my truck.

Shannon’s eyes darkened as she finally completely lost her temper.

“I’m done with this,” she exclaimed, hands on hips. “I’m done running, and I refuse to be afraid anymore. This is bullshit, and it stops now. So, here’s what we’re gonna do. We are gonna leave that tracker right where it is, so they can follow the signal. We are gonna go wherever it is you and Larry agreed on, and we’re gonna set a trap for however many jackasses decide to show up.”

I think I just fell in love with this woman, was Pete’s immediate and heartfelt realization.

“You two with me?” Shannon challenged.

A thumbs-up was the reply she got from each of them.

“Good.”

They climbed back into the truck with Pete behind the wheel. As he navigated back to the interstate, Leah typed furiously to pass the new battle plan on to Larry.

***

By five p.m. Pete was turning onto the county road that would lead them most of the way to the farm. Four miles down, he took a sharp left onto the narrow strip of gravel that wound its way two miles further back before ending in front of a small cabin.

Larry stood grinning at them from the front porch as he watched them park and climb out of the truck.

“So, the little creep tagged your truck, huh?” Larry quipped as he stepped forward to help grab their bags.

“Yeah,” Pete said. “I definitely owe him one.”

Shannon stood for a moment, taking in the landscape.

“This will be perfect,” she observed. “One way in and out. We can pin them down, make sure they can’t leave.”

And she walked away toward the cabin.

Larry’s eyebrows raised.

“O…kay… I am loving her attitude. Where did it come from?”

“She’s pissed,” Leah volunteered, a huge grin on her face. “Those guys won’t know what hit ‘em. They messed with the wrong woman.”

“I thought you were the feisty one,” Larry teased.

“Oh, no, we both are,” Leah corrected him. “I just let mine out to play more often than she does. And it takes a lot to set her off. That’s how I know these guys chasing us are in serious trouble. In fact, I almost feel sorry for them. Almost.”

“Well, we most likely have an hour or two, at least, to get organized before our uninvited guests show up,” Pete said.

“What makes you say that? How do you know that?” Leah asked.

“If I were the one tracking, I wouldn’t bother chasing until the beacon stopped moving for a while,” Pete told her, with Larry nodding in agreement. “Let’s get inside, make some food, and line it all out.”

“Way ahead of you, man,” Larry answered. “The grill is nice and hot. The only thing I need to know is how everyone likes their steaks.”

***

Within a half-hour they were gathered around the table with their plates.

“Here’s what I had in mind. Tell me what you think,” Shannon said, and all three paused to watch and listen to her.

“I vote we go up into the tree line on either side of this place in pairs. Me and Pete on one side, you two on the other. Leave the vehicles right where they are, in plain view. Leave a couple lights on, maybe the TV, too. Watch and wait and let them come on in. They’ll think we’re in the cabin and try to ambush us, but the joke’s gonna be on them.”

“I like the way she thinks,” Larry told Pete, then asked Leah, “You sure she’s never done this before?”

Shannon guessed the question by the stunned look on Larry’s face.

“You’re wondering how I came up with all that,” she stated, and Larry and Pete both nodded.

“There’s a bunch of cops and soldiers in my family,” she said simply. “I’ve been shown and told a thing or two over the years. Speaking of which, I hope you two have extra guns with you, because I was also taught how to shoot, and I fully intend to play offense, not defense, when these guys get here.”

Leah laughed out loud at the way both men’s jaws dropped open at the same time. Shannon noticed it too and grinned mischievously.

“So, did either of you bring any long-range stuff, or are we just doing this with handguns?”

In response, Pete stood and motioned for her to join him. They walked over to his ready bag, and he brought forth his Remington rifle and his extra 9mm semi-automatic pistol for her inspection.

“Nice!” Shannon said, nodding in approval as she expertly checked to make sure each was unloaded, then tested the sights.

“Those will do nicely. I don’t suppose you brought night vision gear, did you?”

Yep, I love her, I’m sure of it, Pete’s brain shouted triumphantly as he grinned down at her. And as soon as this is over, I’m gonna kiss her, and I don’t care who sees.

“Larry,” he called over his shoulder. “You still have the ATV’s around here?”

“Of course, I do. They’re in the shed out back.”

“When is sunset tonight? We’re going to want to be in place in the trees before dark, right?” Leah asked.

“That’s right. We have about forty minutes of daylight left, so we’d better get moving,” Larry announced. “There are two deer blinds already set up on either side of us in the tree line. I think they’ll do nicely for this. Should be able to drive the ATV’s right up to them but still have plenty of cover. And you can’t see them at all from the driveway.”

Leah wrote down what Larry said and showed it to Shannon.

“Cool,” was Shannon’s response. “Let’s finish our food and go get in place.”