Chapter Twenty
Callum double-checked the GPS and turned onto a nondescript driveway curving off the side of a mountain.
The term driveway was a bit of a stretch.
This was more like tire tracks, partially marked with crushed rocks.
Tall grass and brush reached the truck’s side mirrors.
Weeds ran down the center. They had been cut back, but not within a week or two.
Grace twisted her bracelet around two fingers. “You know that Dominic’s people were able to get to a guy in witness protection.”
She hadn’t said much since their bare-all discussion. In the last few hours, their conversation revolved around whether the air conditioning was too cool or if she needed a pit stop. “I agree, though Viv said the feds don’t.”
“Right, as if people hiding in witness protection randomly decide to recant their testimony.”
“I didn’t say you’re wrong. Though I wonder if Marino had that kind of reach, why didn’t he use it during the trial?”
“I don’t know.”
“Maybe that’s what the DOJ wants to talk to you about.”
“I didn’t even know he was out of prison. How would I know if he scared people into changing their testimony?” She focused on the grass slapping the sides of his truck. “Have you been here before?”
“Nope.” A doe hopped across the driveway.
He eased off the gas. When there was one, there were probably more.
He scanned the grass and saw another lurking in the brush, waiting to bound across the driveway.
“But like I said, it has everything we need. Space. A stocked pantry.” A security system that could probably track the difference between a deer and a sniper crossing through the woods they were about to enter.
They rumbled up the driveway. Tall grass and brush gave way to trees with a thick green canopy that blocked the sun. “It’s safe. That’s all that matters.”
“No more Molotov cocktails or FedEx deliveries.”
“None.” The truck threaded up a hill on the side of a wooded mountain. Bits of sunshine blinked through the shadows. The terrain became rougher. That was by design, he was sure. Everything about this location would have been expertly calculated.
The house came into view at the end of a horseshoe driveway.
“It looks like a regular house,” she said.
“Exactly the point.” It blended in. Not fancy nor dripping in visible security. Titan had probably purchased this house and retrofitted it surreptitiously. He parked and leaned forward to get a good look out the windshield. “It’s our new digs. At least temporarily.”
Grace popped out. Callum studied her for a second too long before he joined her. He wasn’t sure how long ago he’d actually fallen in love with her, but now that he saw it, he couldn’t unsee the blaring obviousness.
He unloaded their bags. Pitiful, actually. They both had duffels, and she had her backpack. They both lived on so little. Clothes and necessities. What did her rental cabin have? She had continually moved. It was the first time he really thought about how few possessions she must keep.
Loneliness struck him in the chest. Her loneliness.
He could relate to a minimalist life. His time in the Army hadn’t been conducive to settling down.
He didn’t collect things. He hadn’t set up deep roots.
That was apparent even in his current bare-bones, drab, undecorated apartment, but at least he always had a home base. Grace didn’t.
Callum unlocked the front door.
Her gaze swept through the open layout of the living room, dining room, and small kitchen. Deer mounts lined the wall above the couches. A trophy fish hung over a soot-stained fireplace. Well-read fishing and hunting magazines were piled haphazardly on the scuffed coffee table.
“It looks like we walked into someone’s home,” she whispered. “It’s like someone lives here.”
“That’s the idea.” He meandered down the short hallway lined with faded pictures from hunting and fishing expeditions.
Most were action shots with faces artfully obscured.
A man’s back faced the camera as he reeled in a monster with the fishing rod bent under the weight of the catch.
Another focused on a net with large trout, leaving the person behind it unfocused and unrecognizable.
Still another showed the back of a man in blaze orange, rifle slung over his shoulder, walking into the sunset.
The floorboards creaked underfoot. The air conditioning hummed. He noted the sounds, eyeballed what he thought were the well-hidden cameras that fed into a state-of-the-art security system, and searched for covert weapons caches.
The hallway off the living room-kitchen area was short with four doors.
One bathroom, two bedrooms, and a linen closet.
He opened the closet and mentally cataloged the boxes of ammo placed above towels and washcloths.
The bottom shelf was dedicated to first aid supplies.
Useful and expected, given the established hunting motif of the house.
He closed the linen closet and opened the bathroom door. Nothing special unless the 1980s were having a moment again.
Callum moved on to the two bedrooms. One was larger than the other, but both had large closets and dresser drawers filled with generic clothes in several sizes, along with more weapons.
This place really looked like they’d stepped into a hunter-and-fisherman’s home, and strategically, the layout was a winner. He could see their surroundings from almost every angle.
Grace waltzed into the bedroom and pulled the drapes open. “That’s a huge backyard.” The windows had a fantastic view of the back and side of the house. A two-person swing faced the tree line. Chairs surrounded a well-used fire pit. “Very pretty, and very quiet.”
He nodded. “No neighbors are the best neighbors.”
“Will we have to keep all the drapes and blinds closed?”
Callum lifted a shoulder. “No. We’re not going to make ourselves into sitting ducks, but we’re not going to hide in the dark. Safe house, remember?”
Her lips were pinched together as she nodded. Her gaze locked on the trees as if she were expecting an offensive line to infiltrate the backyard.
“Hey, you okay?”
She didn’t look away from the window. “Sure.”
Callum squeezed her shoulder and found knots of tension under his hand. He flexed his fingers into the muscle and wished his will alone could relax her. “You’re safe here. Whether or not we have the drapes open. No one knows where we are.”
“The people you work with do.”
“Well, yeah. But they’re not your problem.”
“This is the first time I’m staying somewhere I didn’t choose.”
“So?”
“Anyone can be bought. Dominic has a way of flipping people to join his team. Threats and money do wonders.”
Grace didn’t trust a soul on earth, and that had included him until recently. If he or Hayden had fixed her problems years ago, she wouldn’t see every new place as a threat. “Not everyone,” he reminded her. “Not me.”
He would keep reminding her until it stuck.
She released an exhausted sigh and turned from staring at the backyard. “I trust you.”
Good. “Are you okay with this room?” It was bigger. The bed had decorative pillows, albeit with stitched scenes of ducks and bears. He dropped their bags on the bed, ensuring she was okay with sharing a room.
“Sure.”
That didn’t sound like the same woman who had admitted wanting him her entire life. “Are you hungry?”
She rested her hand over her stomach as if just remembering she should eat. “I’m starved.”
Nothing good came from a worried woman with a calorie deficit or low blood sugar. “Let’s raid the kitchen. These places come stocked with an all-you-can-eat shelf-stable buffet.”
“Oh, yum.”
“Give me a chance. I’ll surprise you.”
They checked the kitchen cabinets and found more food than they could need.
A deep freezer in the attached garage and shelves lined with provisions confirmed they wouldn’t have to leave to eat well.
He grabbed a frozen pie crust from the deep freeze and collected cans from the garage, pantry, and kitchen.
She eyed everything on the counter and picked up the pie crust box. “What are you making?”
“Chicken pot pie. It’s not really a summer food, but it is a comfort food, and that seems like a hell of a good idea.
” This was step one in reaffirming her trust in the world.
Creamy, savory carbohydrates. He opened drawers until he found a can opener among the various self-defense options.
A taser. Pepper spray. More knives than would ever be in a typical kitchen. “Can you preheat the oven?”
She checked inside the oven door before turning it on. Maybe she’d noticed the various weapons stashes throughout the house. “What temperature?”
He was winging it and didn’t know. The pie crust box offered recipes for cherry and pumpkin pies. Meat and veggies were the same-ish, he guessed. He washed his hands and dried them on a hand towel with screen-printed fish. “Three-fifty.”
“You know your way around a kitchen.”
“I thought I showed that this morning making bacon.”
“Oh my God, that was this morning. I’m so tired that it feels like decades ago.”
“Go sit down.”
“No, I want to help.”
He assessed whether it was an empty offer, then handed her a colander and opened two cans of vegetables: one of corn and the other of mixed peas and carrots. “Drain these.”
She stared as if he’d sprouted a third eye but did as requested.
Callum set a pot of water on the stove and cranked the dial to high, filled a bowl with ice cubes and water, and set it next to the sink. “We’ll flash-boil them for a minute, drain ’em, throw them into an ice bath, drain ’em again, and voila, the canned taste disappears.”
“Really?”
He raised his shoulders. “I mean, I haven’t run a taste test or anything, but yeah. It’s what Hayden and I do, and we lived on canned crap like kings.”
A curious smile curved on her lips. “Alicia would be impressed.”
Alicia wasn’t the woman he wanted to impress.