Page 8 of Travis
“Stay behind me,” I said. “Stay close. Don’t run.”
They followed me out of the room, past the two unconscious men on the floor, through the north window, and into the dark. They didn’t ask questions. They didn’t cry. They moved in a tight knot of silence, bare feet on pine needles, and I hated every single thing about the world that had made them this good at following a stranger’s orders.
The drive to the fire station took twenty-two minutes. I put the kids in the back seat and turned the heat up as high as it would go. Nobody spoke. In the rearview mirror, the boy sat in the middle with a girl pressed against each side of him, and his arms were around both of them.
The fire station was a small volunteer house off the county road, staffed overnight by two guys who probably spent most of their shift sleeping. The lights were on inside. Trucks visible through the bay windows. Public. Visible. Safe.
I parked two hundred yards out in the lot of a closed feed store and walked the kids to the fire station’s front entrance. I set them on the bench outside the door under the overhead light where they’d be seen immediately.
“Someone will be coming in just a second,” I told them. “Stay right here.”
The boy looked at me. Didn’t nod. Didn’t speak. Just looked, with an expression that I would carry home with me and add to all the others.
I walked back to my vehicle and pulled the burner phone from the glovebox. Dialed 911.
“There are three children outside the Flathead County Fire Station on Route 35. Approximately eight to ten years old. They need medical evaluation and child protective services.”
I hung up before the dispatcher could respond. Sat in the dark with the engine off and watched the front of the fire station until, less than four minutes later, the door opened and the light inside spilled out across the bench where three kids sat pressed together, waiting for whatever came next.
Someone crouched down in front of them. I couldn’t see the details, but the body language was right—low, gentle, non-threatening. A hand extended. One of the girls took it.
I crushed the phone’s SIM card between the pliers I kept in the center console. Snapped the phone in half. Put the pieces in different pockets to dispose of separately.
Then I left and drove south, and the world started to go quiet.
The adrenaline drained out of me over the first thirty miles. It didn’t leave gracefully. It left the way a tide goes out—pulling everything with it, exposing what was underneath.
And underneath was the damage.
My ribs had settled into a deep, structural pain that shifted with every bump in the road. My jaw throbbed where the second man’s fist had connected, and when I probed it with my tongue, I found a ragged edge inside my cheek where my teeth had cut through.
The hives were finally receding, deflating back into my skin with that particular itch that meant they’d be gone in an hour,but my arms would feel raw and oversensitive for the rest of the night.
My hands trembled on the wheel. Not the fine-motor tremor from before. This was the full-body aftermath, the shaking that started in my core and worked outward, muscles releasing tension they’d been holding so long they’d forgotten how to let go. I gripped the wheel tighter and the shaking moved into my forearms, my shoulders, the hinges of my jaw.
Ninety miles. I just had to hold it together for ninety miles.
“Maude.”
“Welcome back to comms range. Mission status?”
“Complete. Three recovered. Two incapacitated at the target location.”
“Shall I route an anonymous tip to local law enforcement regarding the incapacitated individuals?”
“Do it. Same protocol as last time.”
“Routing now.”
A pause. “Your biometrics suggest you’re injured. Again.”
I rolled my eyes. It was the only thing that didn’t hurt. “I’m driving.”
“I can tell. Your speed is fluctuating between fifty-two and sixty-eight miles per hour, which either means you’re injured, falling asleep, or have developed a sudden interest in fuel-efficient driving. I’m ruling out the third option.”
I pressed my hand against my left side. Not the kind of damage that required a hospital, which was good, because a hospital wasn’t happening. I just needed to get home.
The compound lights appeared on the ridge at mile eighty-six. The gate opened on approach, keyed to my vehicle’s transponder, and I pulled into the garage and sat in the dark for a full minute with the engine off and my hands still on the wheel.
