Chapter 26
The minute the words were out of his mouth, Gabe wished he could pull them back. The question hung between them in the truck's darkness, heavy with implications he wasn't ready to deal with now. Or maybe ever.
The dim glow from the dash highlighted the conflict playing across her features. Fear warred with calculation. She was weighing how much truth she could afford to give him.
"I had a life before Haven Cove," she answered finally, her voice steady even though her hands trembled against her thighs. "A dangerous one. That's all you need to know right now."
She'd picked a lock in under thirty seconds, scaled an eight-foot fence like it was a bump in the road, and moved through that warehouse with the kind of skill that came from real experience, not amateur luck.
Those skills required years of training. Law enforcement, military, intelligence work, or something else he couldn't quite categorize yet, something less-than-legit, probably.
But the way she'd reacted when cornered, the bone-deep fear in her eyes when he'd pressed for answers, told him something crucial: whatever she was running from was dangerous enough that exposure could get her killed.
His counter-intelligence background had taught him when to push an asset and when to give them space. When immediate answers mattered less than maintaining operational effectiveness.
Right now, finding David mattered more than solving the mystery of Cara Sweet. "I'm not blind. Those aren't skills you picked up from YouTube tutorials. But I also know you risked everything tonight to help me find my brother. That counts for something."
She turned to look at him, surprise flickering across her face.
"We'll table this conversation for later," Gabe continued. "Dissecting this phone is our top priority."
Relief and confusion fought across her expression. "You're not going to investigate me?"
"My brother's in trouble and I have about a day and a half before my career implodes," he said bluntly.
"I don't have time to run background checks when you're the best asset I have for finding David alive.
" He met her eyes. "Besides, whatever you're running from, it's not connected to my case.
Those men at the warehouse were hunting for David's evidence, not for you. "
She studied him for a long moment, like she was trying to figure out if this was some kind of interrogation tactic.
"Okay," she said finally, and some of the tension drained from her shoulders.
He slowed for a sweeping curve. Everything else was secondary until his brother was safe.
They parked behind the bakery and climbed the exterior stairs to Cara's apartment. Light glowed warm in the windows above, cutting through the fog-laced dark.
Tom opened the door before they could knock, his expression tight with concern that relaxed when he saw them. "No blood. That's always a good sign."
"We're fine," Gabe said, stepping inside. "Close call, but we made it out clean."
Piper looked up from her position on the couch, her teenage face pale with worry that she was trying to hide behind her phone. "So did Wade and Reagan."
The apartment felt crowded with four of them in the small kitchen. Tom's laptop sat open on the table, displaying multiple windows of police scanner feeds and what looked like traffic camera access that definitely shouldn't be available to a civilian.
"What did you find at the warehouse?" Tom asked.
Gabe pulled out the burner phone and David's handwritten notes, spreading them across the table. "David was using the warehouse as a base of operations. He left this phone behind, probably when he had to run three weeks ago."
Tom picked up the phone with careful precision, handling it like the evidence it was. "Battery's almost dead again."
"There's a draft message," Cara said. "Unsent. Dated the night David disappeared."
Tom navigated to the messages while Piper abandoned her phone to lean over his shoulder and read. Her eyes widened as she processed the truncated text.
"He was meeting someone at two in the morning," Piper said. "Someone saved as just 'M'."
"Marco Ruiz," Gabe said. "The private detective David hired. We already know that from the files on the flash drive. But the message got interrupted before David could explain what he wanted to tell me."
Tom attached his keyboard. "Let me see what else is on this phone. Even if the message is incomplete, there might be other data. Photos, GPS history, deleted files that didn't fully purge."
"How long will that take?" Cara asked.
"Couple hours, maybe less." Tom was already absorbed in the technical work, connecting the phone to his laptop through multiple adapters. "Phone's old and the battery keeps dying, but that actually works in our favor. There's way less sophisticated encryption on these older models."
Footsteps sounded on the exterior stairs, heavy and deliberate.
Gabe's hand moved toward his weapon before Wade's distinctive three-knock pattern identified them as friendly.
Reagan pushed through the door first, her face flushed from exertion and cold air. Wade followed close behind, moving with the controlled calm of someone still in operational mode.
"Everyone intact?" Wade asked, his eyes doing a quick threat assessment of the room before settling on Cara.
"We're good," Gabe confirmed. "How'd it go on your end?"
"Led them on a very scenic tour of the county.
" Reagan pulled off Cara's green coat and draped it over a chair with obvious relief.
"Ruiz's motel first, just like we planned.
We stayed there about forty minutes doing the whole investigation routine.
Had the recording playing the entire time.
They watched from the parking lot without ever getting close enough to realize it wasn't actually you two. "
Wade picked up the narrative with typical economy. "Then we drove to three different locations from David's files. Made it look like we were following up on leads from the flash drive. They maintained surveillance the whole time."
Gabe absorbed that information and added it to his growing picture of the opposition. Organized crime with serious resources.
The kind of operation worth killing to protect.
"Wade shook them off about twenty minutes ago when we doubled back through the industrial park," Reagan continued. "By the time they realized we'd slipped their surveillance, we were already on our way back here."
Piper's grin was pure teenage satisfaction at successful deception. "So the fake fight recording actually worked?"
"Perfectly," Reagan said. "They bought the whole performance. Never questioned that it was really Gabe and Cara in the car having a breakdown about the investigation."
Tom returned his attention to the phone recovery process while the others settled into Cara's small living room.
Reagan made coffee. Wade positioned himself where he could monitor the door and windows simultaneously.
Piper returned to her phone but kept glancing at her dad's laptop like she was resisting the urge to ask questions.
Cara moved to stand beside Gabe near the kitchen counter, close enough that he could feel her warmth despite the careful distance she maintained.
"Thank you," she said, meant only for him. "For earlier. For not pushing."
"We'll talk about it eventually," he said, keeping his voice equally low. "But not tonight."
She nodded, something like relief crossing her features before she moved away to help Reagan with the coffee.
Gabe positioned himself where he could see Tom's screen, watching the technical work proceed. But he kept circling back to the same dark question he'd been avoiding for three weeks.
What if David was already dead?
What if all this effort, all this searching, was just chasing the ghost of his brother instead of finding him alive? Three weeks was a long time to stay hidden. A long time to survive if someone dangerous wanted you dead.
The burner phone sat on the table beside Tom's laptop. That unsent message David had tried to send before running. If something happens to me, tell Gabe that Dad was right.
Gabe's chest tightened with familiar fear he couldn't afford to acknowledge. He'd already lost his father to this investigation twenty years ago. Lost those years of grief and anger and questions that would never be answered.
He couldn't lose his brother too.
Please, Lord. Please let him still be alive. Let me be searching for my brother, not just his body.
"Stop." Wade's gruff voice cut through the spiral. He'd moved to stand beside Gabe without making a sound. "Trail's hot. That's what matters."
Gabe looked at him, pulled out of the dark thoughts by the blunt assessment.
Wade met his eyes with the flat certainty of someone who'd operated in worse situations. "Focus on the mission."
Exactly what Gabe needed to hear from another operator who understood how fear could compromise clear thinking.
He nodded. Wade clapped him on the shoulder and lumbered off.
The coffee Reagan handed him was strong and hot and more than necessary about now. He positioned himself where he could see Tom's screen, watching the technical work proceed with methodical precision.
An hour passed. Then another. Tom worked in silence, occasionally muttering technical terms under his breath. The others talked quietly, processing the night's events and the danger they'd all stepped into while Piper dove into the online world on her phone.
Gabe studied the group with new appreciation.
Tom with his unexplained technical expertise and security knowledge that went far beyond handyman work.
Wade with the combat readiness he was no longer bothered to hide.
Reagan with her months of systematic intelligence gathering.
Even Piper with her sharp observation skills and creativity.
They were all hiding something.
But they'd shown up when it mattered, risking themselves to help find a man most of them had never met.