Page 54 of Burning Justice

Maria frowned.

“He isn’t paying me.” Crispin lifted a hand, his expression soft, though the man could be tough—even scary—when he wanted to be. He had that edge to him that only disappeared when Jade was around. “And he didn’t ask. I volunteered.”

Fine. “Thanks.”

They headed across the runway to the mess hall, where the others were already gathered. Maria handed Dani her laptop and looked around. “Where’s Tristan?”

Dani shrugged. “Saw him talking to Raine between the hangar and this building. Neither of them looked happy.”

Jamie said, “She’s been asking questions about Tristan, like she’s digging for information and trying to be sly about it.”

“Information about what?”

“I have no idea, and I’m due back at the hospital soon. Logan has more tests this morning.” Jamie dragged over Maria’s laptop and started typing. “Did you find anything on her grandfather’s hard drive?”

Maria shook her head. “I couldn’t go through every document, but he seems clean. It was just a lot of invoices and shipping notices for barrels of gasoline. Though, I’m not sure why he’d need so much.”

“Supplying communities up here with gas for generators. Plus, some planes use regular gas.”

“Which fits with what we were thinking. That he’s either innocent or he’s removed enough he can deny all knowledge of their activities because we have nothing.”

Grizz lowered his coffee mug. “Doesn’t mean he’s innocent. But I guess that’s up to Rio to dig out. He’s the one who questioned the guy and released him.”

“But we don’t think he’s clean, right?” Dani glanced around. “I’ve been looking into Raine’s family”—she winced—“which sounds bad, but it wasn’t pointless, because I found out something interesting.”

“Is it going to help us find Elias Redding and that canister?” Maria sat on the table, her feet on the bench seat.

Dani scrunched up her nose. “Unfortunately, it might.” She paced a little, as if she needed to move to keep the tension in her from building too high. “Her father is Brian Howards.”

Crew made a noise low in his throat. “Say that again.”

Dani winced. “He was the leader of the militia group that you ran into first. The group that Crew infiltrated.” She glanced at Jamie, who looked a little shell-shocked. “But it doesn’t seem like they had much of a relationship. He wasn’t a good guy. In and out of jail for stretches. She lived with her mother and went to school in Anchorage.”

“He was still her dad.” Maria couldn’t imagine finding out someone you knew had gone up against your father and considered him the enemy. Raine would have considered herself stained by her dad’s actions, even if they weren’t close.

Guilty by association.

“That’s why she said she was hiding here.” Like making amends—for who her father was. Maria could certainly understand that.

“We killed him,” Jamie said quietly. “He came into the room that day when we were trying to escape. Logan, Tristan, and I were in the room. He was at the door.”

Crew said, “I wasn’t there.”

“Tristan shot him.”

Maria looked at the door. “Why did you say Raine wanted to talk to Tristan?”

Jamie stood abruptly, almost falling. “Maybe she knows he’s the one who killed her dad.”

Crew ran to the door and hauled it open right as a gunshot sounded from outside.

Kane spun around and started running, even with all the gear on—the flight suit and the helmet with the wire plate to keep his face from getting scratched up by trees. He tore the helmet off as he raced toward the sound of the gunshot.

People poured out of the mess hall.

Kane raised a hand. “Stay back!” He stopped at the corner of the hangar building and looked around.

Tristan had Raine pinned up against the outside wall of the hangar, a thunderous expression on his face. She stared up at him, boxed in, angry beyond all measure. But which one of them had tried to shoot the other?

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