His throat went dry.
Beneath that was another line.
He found something, Garrett. Something people were willing to kill for.
Garrett slowly raised his eyes toward the stranger.
The man was backing toward the door.
Cole moved sideways, not blocking him but making it clear that every person in the room was watching.
Garrett read the final sentence.
If anything happens to me, trust what Daniel gave you years ago, even if you don't know you have it.
Garrett frowned.
What Daniel gave you?
The stranger suddenly ran.
He shoved a chair aside and sprinted toward the kitchen.
Several riders reacted instantly, but Garrett shouted, “Nobody touch him!”
Rosa was already calling 911.
The stranger crashed through the kitchen door, disappeared through the rear exit, and seconds later an engine roared behind the building.
Mason ran outside.
Garrett remained with Lily.
A minute later Mason returned.
“Gray sedan. No plates.”
“Did you follow him?”
“No. Like you said.”
“Good.”
Garrett wanted the police involved.
Whatever this was, two hundred bikers chasing an unidentified man through Arizona would turn a rescue into something very different.
Lily was still gripping his vest.
Garrett crouched beside her again.
“Where's your mom?”
Her eyes immediately filled with tears.
“I don't know.”
“When did you see her last?”
“This morning.”
“What happened?”
Lily struggled to answer, so Garrett waited.
Eventually the words came.
“We were at a motel.”
“Where?”
“Near the road with the big red mountain.”
Garrett looked toward Cole.
That description could mean twenty places.
Lily continued.
“Mommy woke me up before the sun. She said we had to leave because bad people found us again.”
“Again?”
Lily nodded.
“We keep moving.”
For how long?
Garrett did not ask yet.
She was six.
There was only so much fear a six-year-old could organize into words.
“She drove for a long time,” Lily continued. “Then we stopped at a gas station. Mommy went inside, and the man came.”
“The man who brought you here?”
“Yes.”
“What did he say?”
“He said Mommy got sick and asked him to take me to her.”
Garrett's jaw tightened.
“And you believed him?”
“At first.”
“What changed?”
Lily swallowed.
“He called me Lucy.”
Garrett looked at her.
“My name isn't Lucy.”
Such a simple mistake.
Such a small thing.
But it might have saved her life.
“Then he put my backpack in his car,” she said. “Mommy always says I have to keep it with me. I asked where she was, and he got mad.”
“So why did he stop here?”
Lily glanced toward the motorcycles.
“I told him I had to use the bathroom.”
Garrett almost smiled.
She had manipulated him.
This terrified six-year-old child had seen motorcycles outside the diner, remembered her mother's instructions, and created an excuse to stop.
“You're very brave.”
Lily shook her head.
“No.”
“You came across a room full of scary-looking bikers and asked for help.”
A tiny expression appeared through her tears.
“Mommy said bikers aren't scary if they're the right bikers.”
Cole cleared his throat.
“I've been saying that for years.”
For the first time, Lily almost smiled.
Then a cell phone began ringing.
Not Garrett's.
Not Cole's.
Lily froze.
She reached into her other pocket and removed a small prepaid phone.
Garrett looked at her.
“Your mom gave you that?”
“Yes.”
The screen showed UNKNOWN NUMBER.
Garrett answered.
“Hello?”
Silence.
Then a man's voice.
Not the stranger from the diner.
Older.
Calmer.
“Garrett Rourke.”
Garrett's face hardened.
“Who is this?”
“You have something that belongs to us.”
Garrett looked at Lily.
“She doesn't belong to anybody.”
A quiet laugh came through the phone.
“You always were dramatic.”
Garrett's blood went cold.
“You know me.”
“I know enough.”
“Where's Emily?”
A pause.
Then a woman's voice screamed somewhere in the background.
Lily recognized it immediately.
“Mommy!”
Garrett turned away so Lily could not see his expression.
The man returned to the phone.
“Now we understand each other.”
“What do you want?”
“Daniel Parker took something from people he should never have crossed. For three years, his wife has refused to tell us where it is.”
“What thing?”
“You already have it.”
Garrett remembered the note.
Trust what Daniel gave you years ago, even if you don't know you have it.
“I don't know what you're talking about.”
“You have one hour to figure it out.”
A location arrived by text.
An abandoned copper-processing facility outside Chloride, roughly thirty miles north.
Garrett knew the place.
Everyone in Kingman did.
“You bring the girl,” the voice said, “and whatever Daniel left with you.”
“And Emily walks away?”