Page 31 of Over the Top

“Keep her quiet,” Gunner muttered as he closed the door. Chas stuffed a pacifier in her mouth as he let down the door handle slowly enough to make minimal noise. Then, with a sprint around to the driver’s side and a repeat of closing the door silently, he threw the car into Neutral and released the parking brake.

He’d chosen this parking spot for its proximity to the exit and its slight downhill slope. Slowly, the car rolled forward. He turned the wheel and let it roll for perhaps thirty more seconds. It had nearly reached the end of the building before it started to lose momentum. At that point he started the engine and pulled away from the building.

He accelerated away into the night, praying that the hostiles did not pursue them in their faster, more powerful SUV. To that end, he didn’t take the same road they’d come into town on and changed directions to head south and then back to the east. Most civilians fled in a single direction, straight away from pursuit, and he hoped the circuitous route would throw off the bad guys for a while at least. Long enough to figure out how in the hell they’d found him, Chas, and Poppy.

“Chas, did you use a credit card in the past day without me seeing you do it?”

“No.”

“Make any phone calls?”

“None. Why are you asking?”

“They’ve got to be tracking us somehow. There’s no way they randomly showed up in a dinky town, hours away from Misty Falls, and went directly to our hotel. They even knew the floor we were on.”

Chas’s eyes went wide. “How could they do that?”

“Poppy,” he answered grimly. “They’ve got some sort of tracker on her. Or in her.”

“Inher?”

“Sure. I’ve got one implanted under my shoulder blade. If I ever go missing, Uncle Sam can find me anywhere on earth.”

“Are you kidding me?” Chas blurted.

“Nope. Hurt like a bitch when they put it in too.”

Chas frowned. “I don’t remember seeing any scars on Poppy when I gave her a bath.”

“Tracker’s probably in her clothes. Do we still have the shirt and pants she was wearing the night you found her?”

“Yes.”

“Check them over. It’ll be a small metallic device about the size and shape of a grain of rice. It may be glued to the fabric, or it may be tucked inside a seam.”

Before he checked the clothes, Chas turned around in the front seat, got on his knees, and carefully lifted Poppy into her car seat. “I’m worried about her. She’s gone silent again.”

“She definitely picks up on fear in the adults around her,” Gunner agreed. “It’s come in handy a couple of times now.”

“But it can’t be good for her emotional health,” Chas commented. “Here, sweetie. Suck on your pacifier while I make you a bottle.”

Gunner snorted. Just like his mother, Chas was. When in doubt, feed people’s hurts and pains away.

Once Poppy was sucking sleepily on a bottle, Chas dug in the baby bag and came up with a plastic grocery sack. He flopped back down in the front seat.

“I wrapped her clothes up in case they were needed for evidence or something. I never dreamed they’d be used to follow us.” He paused, then added apologetically, “I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”

“You’re a civilian. It’s not your job to live in my world. I’m the one who should’ve thought to check for a tracking burr earlier.” Damn, he’d been off his game ever since he woke up in that hospital room.

Chas opened the bag and began checking over the baby’s clothes. He found the burr in the hem of Poppy’s pants. “Oh my God. There it is. Should I throw it out the window?”

“No!” Gunner exclaimed. He headed for the nearest highway, which took about a half hour to reach, and then he headed north until he found a truck stop at an exit. Chas started to pump gas for the car while Gunner jogged to the diesel fuel pumps where a few trucks were filling up. He found one with Canadian plates and surreptitiously opened the passenger door of the cab, dropped the burr on the front seat, and backed out of the truck.

He checked on Poppy, who was fast asleep in her car seat, carefully locked the car doors, and headed inside quickly to find Chas.

“Looking for the pretty blond guy?” the clerk asked.

“Yeah.”

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