Page 51 of Breached

Peter was our head of security for the south side of the property's perimeter.

“What’s up?” I asked him.

“Liza’s here.” He sounded baffled. “Seems like she had a flat tire and is stranded a few miles down the road.”

“What? Our road?” How—why in the world would she be here? “She was just running with the teacher.”

“No idea. We need to get changed, look the part.” He whistled, and Brandon, Liam, and Ethan dropped their kites and ran toward us. “Boys, come bring these boxes inside.”

“Yes, sir.” Brandon waved at the others to follow while we hurried inside to change into the military training uniforms we often wore when deep in the brush. We needed to stay with our cover and look the part that we trained on the property owned by Cuttingham’s green energy development site.

We drove five minutes down the road. Keith had a heavy foot, and I didn’t blame him. Something felt off, but we both hoped it was just a freak coincidence.

Turning off at a small, covered spot, where you’d have to know where to look to see it, we parked then slipped into the woods. We jogged down a small path that only we knew about, having spent years studying the property. Daniel had been adamant that we knew not only every inch of Shadows but the acres of land it sat on. We were dressed in black boots, camo pants, and black long-sleeved sport shirts.

“Hey,” I whispered and pointed through the trees toward the road, “she’s right there.” She had her hand covering her eyes, trying to see into the woods. I could see her holding up her phone as she walked slowly in a circle. We watched her.

“Come on!” she cried then jumped when something startled her from the other side of the road. “Of course, there’d be a bear—no cars for the last thirty minutes, no cell signal, but sure, bring on a big, scary bear.” She sounded nervous.

Keith chuckled, and I bumped his shoulder to warn him to be quiet, but our concern left us as we took in the stranded, wide-eyed woman.

We made our way silently back to the old blue Chevy pickup truck then drove to where she was. We slowed as we approached her hatchback and pulled up next to it. Keith rolled down his passenger side window. We both pretended to look surprised to see her.

“What in the world are you doing out here?” Keith asked as she came over.

“Keith?” Her chin pulled in with shock as he hopped out, then she reached over and hugged him. “Holy shit, I thought I was going to be bear food.”

I put the truck in park, inspected her tire, and saw it had run over an old spike, probably from a snowplow. The curse of mountain roads.

Her hands shook as she ran them through her hair and stepped back from Keith. “I’ve never come this way before. Jenny told me about this spot called,” she paused to think, then reached in her pocket and pulled out a piece of paper, “Whispering Pine Lookout.” We both nodded. We knew the spot well. It was a local thing.

“She said when the wind blows in the direction it is today, and you looked over the edge, the pines below create this movement almost like water for as far as the eye can see.”

“It is quite impressive,” Keith agreed.

“Yeah? Well, she said today was the day to go see it, something about how she and her father always come up here every year on their annual camping trip. I figured it was worth seeing.” She sighed and drew in breath, then her face dropped. “But I hit something, and now I’m stranded out here. Why are you guys here anyway?” she asked.

“It’s where we train,” I answered as Keith just stood there. “All this land belongs to Cuttingham.” I waved my arm in a circle, and she nodded.

“Well, you’re not going to be stranded.” Keith pulled out his phone. “Let me call you some help.” He sent off a quick text. “We have to get back to training. Someone will be along soon to fix your tire and get you on your way.”

“Oh, okay.” Liza sounded disappointed.

“In the meantime,” he looked around and held up a hand and one of our soldiers appeared from the woods, “Lance will stay with you. He patrols for Cuttingham.”

“All right, well, thanks.” Liza gave him a little wave. It was obvious she didn’t like it that Keith wasn’t sticking around, and to be honest, I knew no one could make me leave Nicole if she was in a situation like that. Something was wrong.

“Text me when you get home, okay?” Keith headed for the truck, and I followed him.

“Okay.” She hesitated. “I’m sure lucky you were passing by when you did,” she called to him. Suddenly, she hurried past me toward our truck as Keith opened his door. When he turned to look back, she leaned in for a quick hug. For a split second, I caught something on his face.

I smiled at Liza as I hurried to get behind the wheel and started the engine. “Everything⁠—”

“Head toward Redstone,” he whispered. I didn’t argue. Keith might be a man of few words, but he was never purposely ambiguous, which meant something was up. When we had gone a fair distance, he turned to me with a strange look on his face.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“I only told Jenny Baker about Whispering Pine Lookout at the beginning of the school year. She said she had just moved here not long before that.”