Page 88 of Shared By the Mountain Men Triplets

I catch her wrist before she goes for more supplies. “Hey, I’m okay.”

“You were shot.”

“And I’m okay. We’re all okay.”

The terror she must have been holding back behind the safe-room door flashes in her eyes for a split second, then she swallows it down and tapes the gauze across my ribs with barely-shaking hands.

Cade comes back inside carrying something black in one gloved hand.

A radio.

He sets it on the table, and we all move in.

“One of them dropped it near the north drainage,” he says. “There was a blood trail there, too, but not enough to matter.”

“This isn’t cheap equipment,” Rhett says.

As he’s leaning in for a closer look, static crackles from the radio. A distorted voice breaks through. “—Sparrow hit. Pulling to two. Negative reengage.”

Another voice answers, half buried under encryption noise. “Federal eyes confirmed. East corridor staging compromised.”

Cade’s eyes narrow in on the device as he adjusts the dial with maddening precision.

There’s only static until, “Boss says load moves early. No delays. Start convoy prep tonight.”

The transmission dies, and none of us speaks for several seconds.

“The shipment,” Wren says.

Cade looks at Rhett. “The first week of July just moved up.”

Rhett already has his phone out.

CHAPTER 39

RHETT

“My advance team was spotted,” Novak says after I get him up to speed on the attack and the captured radio.

“You knew?”

“We suspected. Turner’s cartel contacts have been in emergency communication for the last twelve hours. We didn’t have confirmation.”

“Now you do. How long to move?”

“I need forty-eight hours to reposition the tactical team without making him scatter.”

“No.”

“Rhett—”

I’m standing in my kitchen with glass under my boots and bullet holes in my walls, and Wren is kneeling beside my brother with blood on her hands. “You have twenty-four.”

“That’s not how this works.”

“It is now.” I step away from the others, but there’s no privacy in this cabin. “Turner’s people just tried to kill us in our own home. This was not a probe. The next attempt will be heavier, or he’ll be gone before you’re ready.”

“We’ve got it covered.”