Page 21 of Redemption in the Dark (The Righteous 5)
Maeve looked up at him, and at that moment, he knew that whatever was going on was far bigger than he could handle alone. But he didn’t know who he could trust at this point that could actually help.
“Do you have a phone on you,” she asked.
He nodded and pulled it out of his pocket.
“That’s the how. They followed your signal right to me or us. Maybe they figured out you were helping me. Or they figured out that if they followed you, they’d eventually find me, and obviously, killing me is more important than your life. Nice boss you have there at the U.S. Marshals,” she said sarcastically and crossed her arms.
“No, that wasn’t the Marshals. That was a special ops group that was after us. The U.S. Marshals don’t show up and jump out of helicopters on whisper mode. That shit is well above what they can offer for the capture of one single female fugitive. No offense, but it’s not exactly like you’re a terrorist or a spy.”
Pulling out a protein bar from his pack, he bit off a piece and handed her the bar.
“Or are you?” He cocked a brow at her.
“Don’t be stupid. Of course, I’m not. You need to get rid of your phone and any other electronics. They’ll continue to follow your signal. Oh, and are you bugged? Like, did they put a tracking device under your skin or in your blood? They can do that, you know.”
Wolf glanced up from his phone to stare at the worried expression on Maeve’s face. Her eyes were wide, and she looked ridiculously tiny as she wrapped herself up in the large Ranger’s shirt and chewed at her nails.
“I think you’ve been watching too many Sci-fi movies,” he said as he dug around in the saddle bag for his phone from The Righteous. He held the two phones out and switched his glare between the two phones as he thought. It was The Righteous contract that said they wanted her dead.
Could it have been a kill order sent to more members than just him?
No, that’s not how the organization worked, and they wouldn’t put him at risk. Would they? Shit, he really didn’t know. Then there were the Marshals and how insistent his boss had been. ‘Personally asking’ for a favor to bring this girl in as quickly as possible was big. So yes, both organizations were acting strange. It wasn’t like The Righteous to want to kill random targets like Maeve, and it wasn’t like the Marshals to worry this much about one fugitive without good reason.
He had no idea what to do, but one thing was clear he needed to analyze the packages he’d been sent closer. Opening each phone, he sent them to his encrypted email account that would bounce the files around before landing on his laptop at home. He hated to do it, but Maeve was right. He needed to get rid of these. He placed them on the ground, lifted his boot, and smashed the two devices into pieces. Then tossed the pieces into the small pool of water that Viho had been standing near.
“The only safe place I know is my home,” he said as he looked around at the trees for any signs of life.
“Your house? Isn’t that a little obvious?”
“You would think so, but I don’t have my real home on paper anywhere. All the safe houses I’d normally take you to are most likely compromised. Maeve, are you willing to go with me?” She bit her lip, chewing on it like it was a meal.
When she didn’t answer, he continued. “I don’t know where you were heading, but my guess is that these people knew what direction you were going, and we need to do something different if we’re going to lose them. Do you trust me?”
“Yeah, I do.”
He called Viho over and mounted up.
“Alright then, that settles it. You’ll come home with me, and we’ll make a plan from there. I doubt they’ll be expecting us to ride all the way to Texas.”
“Texas,” Maeve’s mouth fell open. “That’s like a two-week ride from here,” she said.
“That was a good guess, but since we’re almost at the border to Arizona, it will be less. Besides, I’m not sure why you’re upset. I thought you wanted me rubbing all up on you for hours,” he teased and loved that her face flamed red, but her eyes…they danced with a challenge.
“I didn’t picture that happening with saddle sores on my ass,” she said, and he laughed hard.
“Yeah, I can’t guarantee that won’t happen. Come on, if we have to steal a car at some point, we will, but my guess is they will be setting up roadblocks if they haven’t already. We need to get out of this red zone.”
“Can we just go to Arizona instead? That gets us out of the state,” Maeve asked as she held up her hand to be helped up into the saddle.
“What’s in Arizona?”
There was a long enough pause to let him know that her next words were going to be a lie, but he’d let it go for now.
“Nothing, just thought it would save us days of riding.” She looked over her shoulder at him and, spirits help him, his cock twitched as she rubbed herself into his lap. “Is that close enough?”
He had to bite the inside of his cheek to keep from groaning as she circled her hips again, effectively massaging his dick through the jeans he was wearing. He deserved that for teasing her.
“All good here,” he lied and gave Viho a nudge to walk on, forcing her to look forward. He prayed she didn’t notice the bulge forming under her ass. He had a feeling she would take full advantage of that situation. The worst part was that he wasn’t entirely convinced that would be bad. The idea of her riding him for real as they rode along had way too many appealing thoughts skipping through his brain. It all made him feel twitchy.
