Page 112 of In The Trenches (Owens Protective Services)

“Yes, but how would they get into our account?”

“Eva, I could have any of my techs in your cloud account in minutes,” he said, swerving onto the road.

I heard the sound of a helicopter overhead and looked out through the windshield.

“Fuck!” Cash slammed his hand on the steering wheel. He grabbed his sat phone and quickly dialed, swerving as he tried to drive and dial at the same time. “Dash, it’s a fucking setup. Get me to Rafe right now! I need backup.”

I stared out through the passenger side window as the house slowly faded in the distance. If this was a setup, where was my aunt?

“Cash, we have to go back,” I said in a panic.

“We can’t. They were waiting for us.”

“That’s my aunt, the last of my family. I can’t leave her with them!”

I grabbed at his arm, trying to get him to turn around, but he fought me off.

“We’re not turning around!”

“I can’t leave her!”

I grabbed the handle on the door, yanking it open. Cash shouted at me, trying to hold onto me as I fought to get away. It wasn’t logical or rational in any way, but I had to get to her. If there was even a chance to save her, I had to try. I flung him off me as he hit the brakes, then threw the door open and jumped out of the truck that was still moving. I hit the ground hard, rolling and hurting my shoulder once again. But none of that mattered as I stood and took off running for the house.

I didn’t make it far, though. Cash tackled me to the ground, grabbing my hands as I struggled to get away from him.

“Stop, just fucking stop!” he shouted. “We can’t go back there. We don’t have the manpower or the weapons!”

“I can’t leave her,” I shouted, tears pouring down my cheeks. “I can’t lose her!”

“She’s not there,” he snapped. “They’ve most likely been there since a few weeks after you contacted her.”

I squeezed my eyes shut, not wanting to admit the truth. “Is she dead?” I asked.

“I don’t know, but we can’t stick around here.” His gaze jerked back to the road, at the end of the driveway where a truck was peeling out onto the road. He hauled me up quickly, pushing me to the truck. “Get inside now!”

I raced back to the truck, jumping inside just as someone started shooting at us again. I ducked down, covering my head as Cash threw the truck in drive and slammed his foot down on the gas. I screamed as more bullets slammed into the truck. This was all my fault. We would have been further away if it weren’t for me losing my shit and jumping out of the truck.

The sat phone rang and Cash handed it to me. “Put it on speakerphone,” he said quickly.

I answered, keeping my head down.

“Dash, where is he?”

“Gone Elvis,” he replied.

“What does that mean?” I screeched.

“Beth, that you?” he asked.

“Who else would it be?” I practically yelled at him.

Cash snatched the phone from me. “Tell me you have something for me!”

“I got you John Wayne.” I could hear the laughter in his voice, but had no idea why he thought this was funny.

“What the hell is John Wayne?”

“It’s a can opener,” Cash said as he took a hard right down a gravel road.

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