Chapter Eleven
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“I’ll meet you there,” Jericho added to Kincade. His voice was sharp and steady as ever. “Already heading out.”
The line clicked off.
Kincade slipped the phone into his pocket and turned to Travis. “You stay put.”
Travis frowned. “I can help—”
“You’ve got your face on APBs across the state,” Kincade reminded him. “Every rookie with a badge is one bad judgment call away from trying to be a hero. If you’re with us and we get spotted, someone could end up dead. Maybe you. Maybe even us because we’d be with you.”
Cassidy’s nod was quick and firm. “You being out there makes it harder for all of us. Just for now, stay safe. Let us do this.”
Travis let out a breath, clearly not liking it. But he finally agreed. “Fine. But call me the second anything changes.”
“We will,” Kincade assured him.
They said their goodbyes—quick, quiet, no time for anything else—and stepped out into the late afternoon heat.
Kincade climbed into the driver’s seat of the SUV with Cassidy taking shotgun. He tapped the GPS screen, and the route Jericho had already programmed lit up. A direct path out of Blanco Pass and onto a narrow county road that twisted toward the outskirts of town.
Kincade’s jaw tightened as he scrolled through the satellite overlay. There it was. An old, weather-beaten trailer tucked back beneath a scrim of mesquite and cedar, barely visible from the main road.
Exactly the kind of place someone might stash a hostage.
If Marlene’s mother was there, they were going to get her out. And if someone else was waiting, they were going to deal with that, too.
As they pulled onto the main road, Kincade’s eyes scanned the rearview. No movement. No vehicles too close. Still, the weight pressing down on his shoulders didn’t ease.
“Keep an eye out,” he said. “Could be Moran or Becker has someone trailing us.”
Cassidy angled her side mirror and turned her head to check behind them. “Yes, that’s something they would do. They don’t trust us, and they don’t want us getting too close to the truth.”
Bingo. And that meant one of them might be willing to kill to stop them.
She glanced down at the GPS, then at the passing streets. “What about a tracker? What if they slipped one on the SUV?”
“They didn’t.” He spared her a quick glance. “This vehicle’s rigged to neutralize any unauthorized tracking signals. It’s one of Ruby’s upgrades. She doesn’t hand over keys without layering in half a dozen countermeasures.”
Cassidy nodded slowly, but her fingers drummed lightly on the armrest, her body still tense. Kincade couldn’t blame her about the tenseness. They were heading straight toward danger.
The SUV rolled out of Blanco Pass, the narrow road stretching ahead like a ribbon of sun-baked asphalt.
The clock on the dash read 5:53 p.m., but the sun still rode high, casting streaks of gold across the Texas Hill Country.
The scrub oaks lining the roadside were bone-dry, rustling in the wind like brittle paper.
The trailer was still a ways out, tucked beyond a cluster of ranch properties and forgotten dirt roads. They passed a faded windmill, a rusted-out tractor, and fields that hadn’t been worked in years. Isolation. That’s what someone wanted.
Kincade scanned the roadside as he drove, watching for glints of chrome in the brush, anything out of place. Nothing. He hoped it stayed that way.
“Depending on what we find when we get there,” he said, keeping his voice even, “we might have to wait for dark. Barging in without knowing what’s inside could get Ginny Lang killed.”
“Understood,” she murmured.
His eyes stayed locked on the road and continued with the impromptu briefing. Not because this info hadn’t already occurred to her. It had. But it soothed him to spell it all out, and by hearing the details, he might be able to identify any weaknesses that could turn this into a shitshow.
“If someone’s still watching Ginny,” he said, “if this whole thing’s still active… we need to be smart. Slow, if we have to. The sun won’t set for another two hours. That might be our window.”
Or their countdown.
“Understood,” she repeated. And she did. No doubts about that. As a cop, she knew the stakes as well as he did.
The trailer came into view just as the sun dipped lower, painting the horizon in dusty orange and gold. It sat on a patch of hard-packed dirt, surrounded by scraggly mesquite and brush. No other structures nearby, no sign of movement. But it didn’t feel empty.
Kincade slowed the SUV and pulled off the road onto a rutted trail, half overgrown but passable. He eased the vehicle behind a cluster of cedars, killing the engine and letting the silence settle.
He reached into the back seat and pulled out a compact black case. As he popped it open, Cassidy leaned closer.
“What is that?” she asked.
“Thermal scanner,” he said, flipping the switch. “Standard gear in Ruby’s vehicles now. Helps spot heat signatures through walls.”
She arched a brow. “What else does this SUV have?”
He smirked faintly, eyes on the scanner as it powered up. “Pretty much anything we’d need for a small war.”
Cassidy looked out at the trailer, and her voice lowered. “Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.”
“Same here,” Kincade said. “Shots fired this close? We don’t know where Marlene’s mother is inside. One stray round could end this before it even begins.”
The screen lit up with ghostly heat shapes, and Kincade adjusted the settings. Time to see who, or what, was inside, and he soon spotted the heat signatures glowing against the cool background of the trailer’s interior.
“Two people,” Kincade muttered, adjusting the contrast.
Cassidy leaned in, eyes narrowing. “Can you tell which one’s Ginny?”
He pointed to the smaller outline seated against the far wall. Her form was hunched, and it appeared her knees were drawn close together.
“Smaller one’s probably her,” he said. “She’s not moving much, and the way she’s positioned… looks like her hands might be tied behind her back.”
Cassidy’s jaw tensed. “She’s been here for days like that.”
Yeah. Days that likely would have felt like a lifetime or two.
Kincade shifted the view slightly, highlighting the larger figure.
“That one’s sitting, but see the way his arm’s angled?
He’s wearing a holster, but his gun’s not drawn.
He seems to be eating something. And that hot rectangular shape?
” He pointed to it. “That’s a TV. It’s been on for a while for it to show up as a heat source. ”
She kept her attention fixed on the screen as Kincade adjusted the scanner. “Only one guard?”
“Looks like it.” He scanned again, shifting the device toward the back window, then to each side. Slowly, methodically, he swept the surrounding area.
No other heat signatures. No one in the trees. No second vehicle nearby.
“I didn’t spot any others,” he let her know.
Kincade set the thermal scanner aside and tapped back to the satellite images Jericho had sent.
The aerial view of the trailer came into focus—grainy but detailed enough.
He studied the angles and the layout. One main door at the front, another narrower entry at the back.
That one led directly into the kitchen, if the blueprints Jericho pulled were still accurate.
“There,” Kincade said, pointing. “The back door. It’s tucked in under a sagging awning, mostly in shadow. No direct line of sight from the front. That’s our best point of entry.”
Cassidy leaned in, nodding slowly. “Less exposed. Cleaner approach.”
He turned to her. “I’m going to have to take the guard out which means we won’t be getting any answers from him.”
Her eyes met his, steady. “You’re sure?”
“No way around it.” He tapped the image of the trailer again, his voice low and hard. “We open that door, we become targets. And if the guy gets a shot off, he might not aim for us. He could shoot the hostage.”
Cassidy’s jaw tensed, but she gave a small nod.
Kincade looked away for a moment, gathering the edge that always came before a kill. He wasn’t one to take lives lightly, but he knew when it was necessary.
And this time? Hesitation could cost them everything.
His phone buzzed, and Kincade saw the message from Jericho pop up on the screen.
In position. Opposite side of the trailer. Parked out of sight. Moving in now. Will scan for explosives once I’m closer.
Cassidy leaned in to read it, then let out a low groan. “Explosives,” she grumbled.
“I was already thinking about it,” Kincade said, slipping the phone into his pocket. “If Ginny’s alive in there, she’s leverage. Someone’s going to protect that asset.”
Cassidy rubbed a hand over her face. “Or she’s a decoy. A trap.”
“Exactly,” Kincade said. “Either way, the people pulling the strings wouldn’t leave her unguarded, and they might have set a boobytrap.”
He glanced toward the trailer again, squinting through the rays of the sun. The trailer’s outline was still and silent, but he knew better than to trust the quiet.
Every step forward had to count.
Because the next few minutes might decide if Ginny Lang lived, or became collateral damage.
A few tense minutes passed, every second stretching longer than the last. Then his phone buzzed again with another message from Jericho.
No signs of wires, charges, or traps. Exterior’s clean. You’re good to breach. Code Black: clear to engage.
Kincade’s jaw flexed at the message. “Code Black,” he repeated. “That’s Jericho’s shorthand for clean access, high-risk potential.”
He showed the screen to Cassidy, who nodded without a word. Jericho wouldn’t interfere unless they needed him. That was their rhythm. Their trust.
Kincade reached behind the driver’s seat and pulled out two Kevlar vests, tossing one to her. “Suit up.”
They slid them on quickly, both already checking their weapons. He double-checked the suppressor on his pistol, then tucked a backup into his waistband. Cassidy chambered a round with practiced ease, eyes locked on the trailer.
“Ready?” he asked quietly.
She nodded once. “Let’s go get her.”
They stepped out of the SUV and into the brush, the crunch of dry grass muffled by the rustling wind. Kincade kept low, using the scraggly line of cedar trees as cover. Cassidy moved right behind him, silent, steady.
The trailer loomed ahead, faded and sagging but still intact. The sun had dropped lower now, shadows stretching longer across the dirt.
Adrenaline fired through him with each step.
They reached the trailer in less than a minute, crouched low beneath the line of rusted-out windows. Kincade glanced around the back corner but saw no sign of Jericho.
Good. He hadn’t expected to.
When Jericho wanted to disappear, he did. That was part of why Kincade trusted him to watch their six.
Kincade motioned to Cassidy with two fingers—watch the perimeter. She nodded and took position, her eyes sweeping the clearing like a hawk ready to strike.
He turned to the back door. It was cheap aluminum, dented, with a flimsy handle and a loose deadbolt. Kincade pulled his lockpick tool from his pocket, slid it in, and worked with quiet precision. The mechanism gave with a soft click.
Unlocked.
In one smooth move, Kincade threw the door open and surged inside, gun raised. A man sat at a small folding table just inside the kitchen. Greasy hair. Sleeveless shirt stained with sweat and food. In his hand was a paper plate, halfway to his mouth—until he saw Kincade.
The plate clattered to the linoleum as the man reached under the table. Kincade didn’t hesitate. One shot, clean through the chest. The guard collapsed backward with a grunt, knocking over the chair.
Kincade swept the room, cleared it with a glance, then turned his head toward the hallway.
“Clear,” he said low, loud enough for Cassidy to hear.
Cassidy rushed in behind him, veering straight toward the far corner of the trailer.
“I’ve got you, Ginny,” she breathed, dropping to her knees beside the woman tied to a battered wooden chair.
Ginny Lang looked smaller than Kincade remembered from her file. Early sixties, gray hair pulled back in a loose, frizzy knot. Her face was bruised, and her mouth was gagged with a filthy strip of cloth. There was a strip of duct tape over her eyes, acting as a blindfold.
Cassidy worked quickly, fingers trembling only slightly as she eased off the duct tape and tugged the gag loose. One of Ginny’s eyes was black and swollen shut. The woman had obviously been knocked around.
Kincade swept out of the kitchenette and toward the guard’s sprawled body. He kicked the pistol out of reach and crouched to check for a pulse. There wasn’t one. Dead. Just like he intended.
But there was no satisfaction in it.
Only urgency.
He checked the guard’s pants pockets for a wallet or phone. Not there. The items were probably somewhere in the trailer, but they’d have to wait. No time for a thorough search now.
Behind him, Ginny gasped in air, ragged and hoarse. She coughed, then broke into a sob that cracked through the tension like a gunshot.
“I’m Deputy Cassidy Prescott, and this is Kincade Maddox. He works for Maverick Ops. You’re okay,” she told Ginny. “You’re safe now.”
Ginny shook her head wildly. “No… you don’t understand.”
Cassidy froze, mid-reach to untie her wrists.
Ginny’s eyes locked on her, panic blazing through the pain. “Marlene—someone’s going after her. They’re on their way right now to kill her.”
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