Page 5 of Savage Ranger Daddy

Through the window I can see her standing by the fireplace, notebook in hand, already writing something down. Even from here I can tell her hands are still shaking. She's scared. She's trying not to show it. And she's working anyway, because that's who she is.

I've protected a lot of people in my career. Witnesses. Informants. People who made enemies they couldn't handle alone. I've kept them all alive and handed them off when the job was done. Clean. Professional. No attachments.

Something tells me this one's going to be different.

I open the door and step inside, locking it behind me, and get to work.

3

Hazel

I stand in the middle of Brock's outpost and stare at my open duffel like it personally offended me.

Clothes. Notebooks. Protein bars. Laptop charger. The emergency chocolate stash I never travel without. The thumb drive zipped into the inner pocket where I can feel its tiny outline against the canvas. Everything looks so normal dumped on the big bed that it almost makes the whole situation feel fake. Almost. Except outside somewhere a very large US Marshal is currently sweeping the perimeter for people who want me dead.

I force a breath out and start unpacking because doing something with my hands is better than standing here letting the panic crawl up my throat.

First the clothes. I fold them with way more care than they deserve and stack them on a wooden chair in the corner. My favorite hoodie. The jeans with the hole in the knee that I refuse to throw away. A couple of long-sleeve shirts. Socks. Underwear I hope he never sees because they're covered in tiny cartoon pineapples and that is not the vibe for a life-or-death mountainhideout. I shove those to the bottom of the stack and pretend they don't exist.

Every few seconds my eyes flick to the heavy door. He's still outside. Good. That means he can't see the way my hands keep shaking no matter how hard I try to steady them.

I can handle this. I've handled tough sources and late-night stakeouts and one very angry politician who tried to have me fired. This is just another story. A bigger one. A scarier one. But I can handle it.

Except I can't stop thinking about the names.

Three journalists in the last five years who got too close to similar operations. One "hiking accident." One "random carjacking." One who simply vanished after filing a tip about smuggling routes through the Rockies. I read those stories when I was researching my article. Filed them away as cautionary tales. Now I'm living one, and the realization sits heavy in my chest like a rock I can't swallow.

I catch my reflection in the bathroom mirror while setting out my toiletries and almost laugh. Pink cheeks. Wild hair. Eyes a little too wide. I look exactly like what I am: a woman who's one bad news alert away from losing it completely.

I make myself smile at my reflection. Bright. Breezy. Totally unbothered. It looks about as convincing as a Halloween mask.

Back in the main room, I start arranging my notebooks on the small table near the fireplace. My fingers brush the cover of the one that holds all my notes on the smuggling ring. Photos. Transcripts. Maps of the trails they use. The evidence that got me here. I trace the edge of the notebook and feel my stomachtwist. This was supposed to be the story that made my career. Instead it might end it.

That's when I notice the wall behind the table.

At first glance it just looks like a cluttered shelf. Topographic maps tacked to a corkboard. A couple of dog-eared field manuals. A battered logbook held shut with a rubber band. But my journalist brain snags on something pinned to the far edge of the board, half hidden behind a stack of topo maps. A photograph. Grainy and overexposed, like it was taken from a distance in bad light. It shows a clearing surrounded by dense pines with what looks like a cluster of old structures, maybe cabins or storage buildings, and a dirt track leading away into the trees. Written in pen along the bottom margin in blocky handwriting: Harker Creek. 6 mo. No movement since.

Harker Creek. I know that name. It was in Cal Hutchins' notes, the ones he passed me at our last meeting before he went silent. Cal said Harker Creek was a burned-out site the ring had used and abandoned, but he thought there were other sites just like it deeper in the range, still active. I never found them. I didn't have the access or the time before I had to publish.

I lean closer. Behind the photo there's a hand-drawn map on lined paper, detailed enough that it has to be Brock's own work. Trail names I recognize. Ridge lines. Two small x-marks in red ink near locations I can't quite place, and a question mark next to something labeled RC North. Whatever Brock's been doing up in these mountains, it isn't just routine patrol. He's been investigating the same thing I have. Maybe longer. Maybe deeper.

The thought makes my pulse quicken for reasons that have nothing to do with fear. If he has intel I don't have, and I havesources he doesn't, then together we might be able to piece together what neither of us could finish alone. The journalist in me is already itching to ask him about every mark on that map.

But not tonight. Tonight I need to play it careful and figure out how much he's willing to share before I start pushing.

I step back from the board and arrange my own notebooks on the table, positioning them so the smuggling-ring notebook sits face down. Not hiding it, exactly. Just not advertising it either.

The door opens and I jump so hard I nearly knock the whole stack off the table. Brock steps inside, snow dusting his dark hair and the shoulders of his jacket. He stamps his boots on the mat and locks the door behind him with a click that sounds final. His eyes find me immediately, sharp and assessing.

I flash him my brightest smile. "Welcome back, mountain man. Perimeter all clear of murderous smugglers and grumpy bears? Because I just finished claiming this corner of your fortress and I'd hate to have to repack."

Something softens at the edges of his expression for half a second. He shrugs out of his jacket and hangs it by the door. "All clear. Generator's good. No tracks that don't belong to me." He moves to the fireplace, crouches, and starts building a fire with efficient movements. Flames catch quickly, throwing light across the room. "You done unpacking?"

"Yep. Officially moved into the wilderness. Do I get a welcome basket or just the tour of where the emergency exits aren't?"

He stands and wipes his hands on his jeans. "No exits you need to worry about. You're safe here. Eat something. Then bed. It's late."

Safe. He keeps saying that word like it's a fact carved into the mountain itself. I want so badly to believe him. My mouth opens with another joke ready to go, something about how I usually need at least three dates before I let a man order me to bed, but the words stick.