Chapter 24
TWENTY-FOUR
Shane came through it like a hurricane, his gaze scanning the room until he found her. Behind him came the rest of Mountain Division—Gabe straight from the rec center, Elias and Waylon still in their EMT uniforms, Ben, and even Bear down off his mountain.
Shane crossed the distance to her. "Are you okay? Did he touch you?"
April shook her head. She still couldn't seem to make her voice work properly.
Shane cupped her face in his hands, tilting it up so she had to look at him. "April. Talk to me. What happened?"
"He—" She had to stop, swallow, try again. "He wants custody. He's going to sue for full custody."
"The hell he is."
"He said he has rights. That a judge will—"
"No." Shane's voice was flat and absolute. "He's not getting near Kevin. I promise you that."
"What if he knows where we live? It’s easy enough to look up all that now that he’s found me. He… He knew about you—" April's voice cracked. "He knows everything, Shane."
Shane pulled her into his arms, and she went willingly, pressing her face against his chest. His heart was pounding as hard as hers.
Over her head, She felt Shane looked at Sonny. "Where is he?"
"Left right before you got here. Silver rental car, headed east. I got the plate number."
"I'm texting Kyle,” Gabe said. “We'll pull traffic cameras."
"What do we do?" April pulled back to look at Shane. "He said he's going to court. He said—"
"We get you a lawyer. We document everything. We fight this." Shane's jaw was set in that way that meant someone was about to have a very bad day. "But first, we need to get Kevin."
April's heart skipped. "Kevin. Oh God, What if he knows where Kevin goes to camp? Kevin—"
"He's safe. The camp is the other direction." Shane's hands were steady on her shoulders. "But we need to pick him up. Now."
She nodded, trying to pull herself together. "Okay. Okay, we go get Kevin."
"Waylon, Elias—you're with us." Shane looked at the rest of his brothers. "Gabe, Bear, Ben—find that rental car. I want to know where he's staying, who he's been talking to, everything."
"On it," Gabe said.
Shane looked back at April. "Ready?"
No. She wasn't ready. She would never be ready to tell her son that the man who'd wanted him dead before he was born was now demanding visitation rights.
But she nodded anyway. "Let's go get our son."
They took Shane's Watchdog SUV. Waylon and Elias followed in Waylon's truck, still in their EMT uniforms. April sat in the passenger seat, her hands twisted together in her lap.
"We should shield him from this," April said. "He doesn't need to know yet. We could just—"
"April." Shane's voice was gentle but firm. "We talked about this. Remember? We decided we weren't going to lie to Kevin. Not about the important stuff."
"I know. But—"
"It won't work anyway. Kid's too smart. He'll know something's wrong the second he sees you."
April looked at him. "Is that why you brought backup? So he'd know something was wrong?"
"I brought backup because if Vince knows where Kevin is, I'm not taking any chances." Shane's hands tightened on the steering wheel. "But yeah. Kevin's going to know. And we need to tell him the truth."
"What if he wants to meet him?" The words came out small and scared. "What if he thinks—"
"He won't."
"You don't know that."
Shane reached over and took her hand. "I know Kevin. And I know he loves you more than anything in the world. He's not going to choose some stranger over his mom."
"But Vince is his biological father—"
"And I'm his dad." Shane said it simply, like it was fact. "Kevin told me so himself. Biology doesn't change that."
April squeezed his hand, unable to speak past the lump in her throat. That was almost exactly what her dad had told her.
They were both right.
They pulled up to the camp in time for their lunch break. Kevin was near the front, talking to one of his friends. April watched him look up when Shane's SUV pulled in, watched his face light up the way it always did when he saw them.
Then he saw Waylon and Elias getting out of the other vehicle, still in uniform, and his smile faltered.
April and Shane got out of the truck. Kevin ran over.
"What's wrong?" he asked immediately. "Is someone hurt? Is Grandpapa okay?"
"Everyone's fine," April said, crouching down to his level. "But we need to go. There's something we need to talk to you about."
Kevin's eyes went wide. "Am I in trouble?"
"No, baby. Not at all." April pulled him into a hug. "Come on. Let's get in the SUV."
They drove in silence. Kevin sat in the back, Pete out of his crate and curled beside him, and April could feel the weight of his worry pressing against her from behind.
Finally, Kevin asked the question April had been dreading.
"Does this have to do with my bio-dad?"
April turned in her seat to look at him. "How did you—"
"I figured it out, Mom." Kevin's voice was quiet. Small. "And…I may have eavesdropped on you guys again.”
“Oh, Kevin.” Though she had herself to blame, too. She thought back through the evenings when they thought Kevin was asleep and they discussed the ongoing surveillance, how Vince seemed to be less of a threat every day. Of course Kevin would try and listen in. She should have known better.
“But now you both look scared,” Kevin went on. “And Uncle Waylon and Uncle Elias are following us." He swallowed hard. "Is he here? Did he come? Is he…a bad guy?"
Shane pulled over into a parking lot. Turned off the engine. He twisted around to face Kevin.
"Yeah, bud. He's here. In Lyons."
Kevin nodded slowly. "Does he want to see me?"
April's heart cracked clean in half. "Kevin—"
"It's okay, Mom." But Kevin's eyes were bright with unshed tears. "You told me he wasn't ready to be a dad when I was born. Maybe he's ready now?"
"Kevin." Shane's voice was steady and sure. "I need you to listen to me. Can you do that?"
Kevin nodded.
"Your biological father—Vince—he showed up at Riversong today.
He told your mom he wants to meet you. But here's the thing, bud.
He doesn't get to just walk into your life and demand things.
He gave up that right before you were even born.
I'm not saying you can't meet him if that's what you want.
But right now, we need to keep you safe while we figure out what he really wants. Okay?"
Kevin looked between them. "Do you think he wants to hurt Mom?"
"I don't know," Shane said honestly.
“So he is a bad guy.”
"We’re still trying to figure that out. But if he is, I’m not going to let him near you or your mom. Neither are your uncles. You're safe. Your mom's safe. That's what matters."
Kevin was quiet for a long moment. Then he said, in a voice so small it barely qualified as a whisper, "I don't want to meet him. I don't need him. I have you."
Shane looked like he'd been punched in the chest. "Kev—"
"You're my dad. Not him, not even if he’s a good guy. You." Kevin's tears spilled over. "Is that okay?"
Shane unbuckled and climbed into the back seat, pulling Kevin into his arms. "Yeah, buddy. That's more than okay."
April climbed back too, wrapping both of them in her arms while Pete whined softly and licked Kevin's hand.
They sat there in Shane's truck in a random parking lot, holding each other while the world tried its best to break them apart.
Shane didn't take chances.
Within two hours of Vince's appearance at Riversong, April and Kevin were in one of the Watchdog safehouses—the former Sanders property on Watchdog's sprawling foothill compound east of Lyons.
Walter Sanders had been Arden's neighbor, Ellie's uncle, who'd passed away after a long battle with dementia.
Bear had fixed up the house beautifully—new security system, reinforced doors and windows, but keeping the warm touches that made it a home rather than a bunker.
April hated it anyway.
Not the house itself—it was lovely, actually. Comfortable furniture, a well-stocked kitchen, windows that looked out over acres of protected land. Kevin could run around outside, play with Benny who they'd brought to the safehouse to keep his spirits up.
But it still felt like prison. Like hiding. Like Vince was winning just by making them afraid.
"It's temporary," Shane kept saying. "Just until we find him."
But they couldn't find him.
Vince Romano had vanished like smoke. No credit card transactions. No hotel bookings. The silver rental car turned up abandoned in a grocery store parking lot in Longmont—wiped clean, no prints, no evidence. Traffic cameras showed him ditching it and walking away, but after that? Nothing.
Watchdog dug into his life with the kind of thoroughness that would have been illegal if they were law enforcement. Flint worked his contacts at every federal agency that owed him favors, calling in markers he'd been saving for years.
The results were beyond frustrating.
"I don't understand it," Flint admitted three days in. Sitting in the safehouse living room, he looked exhausted, bags under his eyes, his usual confidence replaced by something that looked almost like shame. "No paper trail. No digital footprint. It's like he knows exactly how to stay invisible."
"He's had help," Shane said. "Professional help."
"Has to be. The restaurant in Vegas is clean—just a normal kitchen job.
No big deposits in his account. We still can't find him on any commercial flights, and now with the rental car abandoned.
.." Flint rubbed his face. "I'm sorry, Shane.
I should have caught this earlier. Should have seen he was here. "
"You were monitoring him and he’d kept to his routine. He checked in with his PO that morning."
"Which we now know was bullshit. PO's claiming Vince was there, but I'd bet my pension he was already in Colorado by then. Someone got to that PO. Money or threats, doesn't matter—he lied."
"Keep looking."
"I am. We all are. But Shane..." Flint's voice dropped. "Whoever's backing Vince, they're good. Really good. And they've got resources we can't track."
April listened to all of this from the couch, Kevin visible through the window playing fetch with Benny and Pete in the yard. She felt like she was disappearing—erased from her own life. April didn't go to Riversong at all; Hannah and Sonny covered her shifts. The world kept turning without her.
Kevin was handling it better than she'd expected.
Having Benny there helped—the dog slept in Kevin's room at night, and during the day Kevin could work with him, practice commands, run around the property. Arden gave them an open invitation to visit the ranch up the road to see the horses and alpacas. Charlie took Kevin on hikes through the woods within Watchdog’s massive property.
Their family and friends visited, bringing dinner and staying to eat and talk and just spend time with them.
April was deeply grateful for everyone trying to bring her and Kevin a slice of normalcy.
But when Kevin was still, when he wasn't distracted, April could see the weight of it pressing down on him. The knowledge that somewhere out there, his biological father was planning something. Waiting. It brought her down, too.
Kevin asked twice when Vince was going to leave, when they could go home.
April didn't have an answer for that.
On the fifth day, Sonny showed up at her door in the middle of the day.
“Papa? What are you doing here, what’s wrong?”
Sonny came in, his face grim. “A courier came in, said he tried your house first but you weren’t there. I had to accept this. I’m so sorry.”
He held out an envelope, return address—Family Court, Boulder County.
“It’s okay, Papa. We can’t stay here forever, waiting. I’m actually a little relieved the hammer finally fell.”
Still, April's hands shook as she opened it.
Vince Romano v. April Taylor. Petition for Emergency Custody Hearing.
The words swam in front of her eyes. Vince had filed for an emergency hearing. He wanted a DNA test to establish paternity. He wanted joint custody. The right to walk into her house to see Kevin.
The hearing was scheduled for ten days from now.
"April?" Sonny's voice seemed to come from very far away.
She looked up at him, and her voice when she spoke was hollow. "He's actually doing it. He's suing for custody."
Sonny's face went hard. "We'll fight him. We'll get you the best lawyer in the state."
April looked down at the summons again. At Vince's name printed in cold, official letters.
"I'm not losing my son," she said quietly. The fear was still there, sharp and cutting, but underneath it was something harder. Something fierce.
"Damn right."
April grabbed her phone off the table. "I'm calling Arden. She told me she knows the best family lawyers in Boulder if it comes to that."
“Right. Her patients.” Arden ran an animal therapy program for kids with autism, PTSD, and physical disabilities.
Arden picked up. “April, hey. What do you need?”
“He did it. He filed for an emergency custody hearing and got it.”
“Oh, shit. I’m so sorry. Let me text you a phone number. One of the parents just went through a custody hearing and she loved her lawyer.”
“I’m worried I have to appear in person. I wonder if I can do a video from the safehouse?" April asked, though she already knew the answer.
"Probably not for emergency custody hearings,” Arden sighed. “It depends on the judge. Some require physical presence. There, I just texted the contact info. Good luck. We all love you and Kevin. I can come down after my next appointment if you need company."
April teared up. Sonny put his arm around her and pulled her close. “We love you, too. Don’t worry, my dad’s here right now.” She smiled up at him. “We’ll see you later.”
Shane's hands curled into fists. "It's the one time you have to be exposed."
April stared at the summons lying on the table. She’d shown it to Shane the minute he came home from work. “Maybe we can do a video conference?”
“We’ll see.”
Over my dead body is he taking Kevin from me.
From us.
But to fight for Kevin, she'd have to leave the safehouse. She'd have to walk into that courthouse—the one place Shane couldn't carry a weapon, the one place she'd be vulnerable.
And somehow, she knew Vince was counting on exactly that.