Page 34 of Cornered

Cole went straight to the masked man, cuffed him, and ripped the mask off.

Steph gaped. “Gage Bolin!”

He glared at her while Tate checked on the unconscious homeowner. “Pulse is strong,” Tate said. “But he’s going to have a nasty headache when he wakes up.”

“At least he’ll wake up,” Steph said, still gazing at her attacker while her pulse thrummed in her ears and her throat ached. “It was you all along?”

“I want a lawyer.”

Paramedics hurried through the door while Cole grabbed Bolin’s arm and passed him off to a uniformed officer. “Make sure he gets his lawyer.” He looked at the man. “And go round up his kids. Maybe they’ll talk if he won’t.”

The flash of fear in Bolin’s eyes made Steph believe Cole might be onto something. She cleared her sore throat and walked over to Gage. “I saw the vehicle in the warehouse,” she said. “That wasn’t you who ran Brenda off the road, because Cherry said she didn’t call you until the day before yesterday. So who was it? Benji? Or...” She hesitated. “Cherry?”

His shoulders twitched.

Cherry.

Her heart plummeted. “No.”

“It was an accident,” Bolin muttered, his voice low.

“Sure it was,” Cole said.

“Cherry killed her? She wouldn’t. No.” Her sore throat tightened even more and tears gathered. “I don’t believe you. You’re a liar!” She backed away.

“Steph...” Tate held out a hand, but she ignored it and shoved out of the room. She needed space, room to breathe, to process that one of her friends had killed another. She made it outside to the front yard and bent double, hands on her knees.No, God ... not Cherry.

A gentle hand on her shoulder pulled her up and around. She looked up through her tears to see Tate’s compassionate gaze, and she leaned her forehead on his shoulder while silent tears dripped down her cheeks. “I want to hear her side of this.”

“Of course.”

“I don’t believe him.”

“I know you don’t.”

She wanted to punch him for sounding so pacifying, but deep down she realized he was just trying to offer some comfort. And while she appreciated it, she pulled back and swipedher palms across her cheeks. Paramedics loaded the homeowner into the ambulance.

Steph stopped the nearest one. “How is he?”

“He’ll be all right as far as I can tell, but a CT scan is probably a good idea.”

“Any idea who he is?”

“His ID was in his wallet. One of the officers called his wife. She’s meeting us at the hospital.”

“Oh good.” When the ambulance pulled away, she turned to Tate. “Okay, now what?”

“Now we—as in Cole and I—go find the other three Bolins and figure the rest of this thing out.”

TATE COULDN’T LEAVESteph without a way home. At least that’s what he told himself when he led her to his unmarked vehicle. She climbed into the back seat, buckled up, and rested her head against the headrest. He still wasn’t sure she shouldn’t go to the hospital, but she refused and he wanted to keep an eye on her. The fact that Cole didn’t argue said he felt the same.

While she rested, he and Cole mapped out a plan, alerted SWAT and other backup, then made their way across the mountain to Bolin’s Nature Nurture Expeditions.

Cole parked just outside the entrance. “All right, Steph. You stay put, and I mean that.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” she muttered. “I’m done playing investigator.”

“Good.” Cole popped the trunk and went to don his SWAT gear.

---