Twilight Tactics (Soldiers in Shadows Book #1)

Chapter 1

November

Sunday afternoon

FBI Special Agent Collin Sullivan—aka Sully—gripped the SUV’s wheel and glanced in the rearview mirror once more. The silver sedan was still there, following at a discreet distance, but it was enough to set his teeth on edge.

His partner Piper Whitaker sat in the passenger seat, her jaw tight, brow furrowed. She shot him a quick glance. “You see it too?”

“Yeah.”

“See what?” Ollie Callahan, their fourteen-year-old murder witness, had hearing like a bat. Sully thought she was asleep. “The car behind us?”

No sense in lying. “Yes. You recognize it?”

“I can’t really see it very well. It’s too far back.” She gazed out the rear window.

“Turn around,” Sully said. “Don’t let him know you’ve seen him.”

“Oh. Sorry.” She faced front again and lowered her gaze to her hands, but not before he caught the sheen of tears in her eyes.

Remorse kicked him. “It’s okay. I should have prefaced my question with ‘Don’t turn around.

’” The teen was a good kid as far as he could tell.

She’d just been in the wrong place at the wrong time and had witnessed an organized crime hit.

As a result, Luca Bellini had sent his goons after her.

And it was his and Piper’s responsibility to make sure nothing happened to her.

Like death.

A bullet pinged off the back bumper. Ollie screamed and flattened herself against the seat, her seat belt still around her.

Piper pulled her weapon and rolled her window down while Sully pressed the gas, the speedometer inching up past sixty, then seventy.

Tennessee’s bitter wind whooshed through the window.

The poor heater had been fighting a losing battle almost since he’d cranked the vehicle at six o’clock this morning.

“There are two of them now,” Piper said. “Black SUV coming up on my side. Silver sedan hanging back on the left. Passenger of the SUV is the one who shot.”

“Hold on.”

Sully pressed the accelerator, and the engine roared as they wound through the rolling farmland dotted with patches of dense woods. The Smoky Mountains loomed in the distance. He glanced back at Ollie. She lay still on the seat, quiet as a statue.

The road narrowed. Weathered fence posts whipped past. Fields of dried cornstalks offered no cover or escape. His hands tightened on the wheel while his brain searched for options.

Broken Chains Ranch was less than ten miles ahead, but they’d never make it before their pursuers caught them. And besides, he didn’t want to take the bad guys right to his cousin’s doorstep.

Another shot took out the passenger side mirror.

Ollie screamed.

Piper climbed into the back seat, lowered the window. “I got this,” she said to Sully. “Let them pull up a little.”

Sully did as instructed and used the rearview mirror to keep track of the SUV and the sedan.

“Use the curve, Sully.”

“Got it.” It was a good plan. He turned into the curve and the sedan fell back, but the SUV gained. Piper fired.

Shattered a side window. They never slowed down.

“Ugh,” she said. “Let’s try that again.”

Sully winced. She was a good shot, but trying to hit a target in this situation was difficult if not downright impossible.

Ollie whimpered, and his heart clenched for the child. No kid should witness what she had unintentionally found herself in the middle of. “Ollie, hang in there, hon.”

“I’m hanging, Sully.” Her voice shook. She was terrified, of course, but she was also one of the bravest people he’d ever met. He needed to tell her that as soon as they got out of this mess.

The black SUV surged forward, right on their tail, then pulled up beside them. Piper gasped. “Is he positioning for a PIT maneuver?”

Sure looked like it to him.

With impact imminent, Sully accelerated and steered slightly toward the shoulder of the road.

When the hit on their rear quarter panel came, his SUV spun, but because of his countermeasures, he was able to gain control after a 360 that left him slightly dizzy. Somehow, he was still on the road and heading in the direction of the ranch with the black SUV falling behind them.

“Ollie, you okay?” Piper asked.

“Still in one piece.” Her small but sure voice came from the back seat.

The wind from the open window whipped around them, and Sully mentally flipped through plans. They couldn’t outrun them much longer. Whoever they were, they had fast cars. And knew how to execute PIT maneuvers.

That worried him. He glanced in the rearview mirror once more. “We passed an old barn a while back. With an overgrown access road.”

“Yeah,” Piper said, “I saw it.”

“I’m going to go for that. I have an idea.”

“What?”

“Hang on.” He slowed and made a quick U-turn. The sedan shot past with a squeal of brakes. Sully glanced in the rearview mirror to see the car barely avoid the SUV doing its own U-turn.

“I don’t know about this, Sully,” Piper said. “They could split up and cut us off.”

“Maybe. Or they’ll just follow us.”

“What are you thinking?”

“Flash-bangs are in the back, right?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“Then I’ve got a plan.”

“All right then. Let me know my part when it’s time.”

Ollie sat up and her slender fingers pressed into his shoulder. “Sully—”

“Not now, kiddo. Get back down and stay there, okay?”

She did as he said. “I’m scared.”

“I am too, but we’re going to fight our way out of this and be just fine. Got it?”

“Sure.” Her dubious tone conveyed what she really thought.

But she didn’t know everything that was going through Sully’s head right now, and that was the mantra that he could not fail. Would not fail.

Not this time.

Please, God, let this work.

“Sully’s really good at this,” Piper said. “He won’t let anything happen to us. My daughter, Hannah, thinks he’s a superhero in disguise.”

“How old is Hannah again?” Ollie asked.

“Sixteen.”

The teen huffed a short laugh. “A little old for that kind of belief, isn’t she?”

Piper’s chuckle was forced, but she’d managed to distract Ollie, and that was what mattered.

The black SUV edged closer once more, but Sully was ready. He had one chance to get this right. Movement caught his attention—the silver sedan was dropping back.

He glanced at Piper. “As soon as I stop, I’ll pop the back. You grab the bag and hightail it back.”

“Got it.” She rolled the window up.

Sully sucked in a breath, said a quick prayer, and cranked the wheel hard left.

Gravel sprayed as he whipped the SUV onto the overgrown access road. Tree branches slapped against the hood, leaves and twigs snapped and sprayed across the windshield.

Nothing like leaving a trail a blind man could follow.

The abandoned barn loomed ahead, the weathered boards having seen better days. But it would do for what he needed.

Piper looked back. “Splitting up like I thought they would.”

“It’s okay.” He pressed the accelerator and aimed for the barn’s gaping doors. He slammed on the brakes and spun the wheel hard once more. The SUV slid sideways into the barn in a shower of dirt and rotted wood.

Piper was already out of the vehicle, and he popped the hatch.

Less than five seconds later, she was back in her seat. She shoved the go bag on the floor and snagged a flash-bang. “Ready.”

“Here he comes,” Sully said.

“And the sedan?”

“Don’t know.” He frowned. “Hands over your ears and close your eyes, Ollie. Got it?”

“Yes!”

He nodded to Piper, who waited. Seconds ticked past, and the black SUV roared into sight. It slammed to a stop, and Piper tossed the weapon under the vehicle. She yanked her door shut, ducked her head, and clamped her arms over her ears.

Sully did the same.

The bang and flash came, expected but jarring all the same.

He threw the vehicle into reverse, spinning the wheel again, and shot through the back wall of the barn.

“The sedan!”

Piper’s cry alerted him to the vehicle he was almost on top of. The driver overcorrected, seeking to avoid hitting Sully, and slammed into an old, rusted tractor.

“Go!” Piper’s urgency fueled his own, and he accelerated toward the road, taking the path he’d created on his mad dash to the barn.

“Ollie! Still okay?”

“I’m okay,” she said, sounding breathless.

Sully allowed a moment of relief to sweep over him. And gratitude. They were safe. For now.

He swept his gaze between the mirrors looking for movement, any sign that their pursuers were still on their tail somewhere.

Piper turned to keep an eye on their rear.

She was a good partner, and he was glad she had his back.

“We bought some time,” he said, “but they’re not done.

They’ll regroup, replan, and come back.”

Piper shot him a strained smile. “Let’s hope Maya’s security is as good as she says it is.”

“It is. David and I helped her come up with it.” David Broussard, Maya’s head of security at the ranch, was also one of Sully’s former colleagues.

The man had been looking for something different and approached Sully about any job recommendations.

He’d sent the guy to Maya, and she’d hired him a few months ago.

“David and Maya discussed us using the ranch as a safe house,” he said.

“And they agreed Ollie would be safe there. She’s got top-notch tech. ”

“Well then, that makes me feel so much better. Security by David and Sully. What could go wrong?”

A soft chuckle came from the back seat, and he found a smile curving his own lips. He enjoyed sparring with Piper, and apparently Ollie liked it too. She sat up and met his gaze in the rearview mirror. “Will they find us at the ranch?”

“I can’t promise they won’t, but I can promise that the ranch is a special place with special people and you’ll be as safe as possible there.”

She nodded, and he glanced toward heaven. Please, God, let us be safe there.

The roar of the engine coming up the dirt driveway caught Elena Thompson’s attention.

She was outside the barn with four of the ranch’s occupants, teaching them how to make a solar water distiller.

A simple enough process with only a few materials needed, but it was something none of them had ever seen before, so she had a captive audience.