Chapter 6 - DANIEL’S TRAIL
Eli stared at the blinking red dot.
“Is that live?”
Harlan checked the metadata.
“No. File was created five days ago.”
“Then he was there five days ago.”
“Maybe.”
“We’re going.”
“No.”
Eli turned.
“What?”
“We don’t know what’s waiting there.”
“My father is waiting there.”
“Or Knox is.”
“I’m going.”
“You’re fifteen.”
“And?”
“And you’re not running into a mountain ambush.”
Eli stepped closer.
“You met me two hours ago. Don’t start acting like you’re my grandfather.”
The words landed exactly where Eli intended.
Thomas’s jaw tightened.
“No. I met you two hours ago. But I lost twelve years with my son, fifteen years with you, and I’m not losing another Harlan because he’s too damn stubborn to think.”
Eli blinked.
Then, despite everything, almost smiled.
“My last name is Carter.”
“Not today it isn’t.”
A knock hit the compound door.
Both of them froze.
Three knocks.
Pause.
Two knocks.
Harlan relaxed slightly.
He opened the door.
A broad-shouldered Latino man in his sixties stepped inside.
His left hand was missing two fingers.
“Thomas.”
“Luis.”
Eli stared.
Sergeant Luis Ortega.
The man who had pulled Daniel from the burning convoy.
Luis saw the boy and stopped.
“My God.”
Eli shifted uncomfortably.
“What?”
“You look just like him.”
“That’s getting old.”
Luis smiled sadly.
“So did your father.”
They briefed him.
Luis studied the map.
“I know that place.”
Harlan leaned closer.
“Where?”
“Old mining town called Red Hollow. Been abandoned for twenty years.”
“Why would Daniel go there?”
Luis shook his head.
“He wouldn’t.”
Eli frowned.
“What?”
“Daniel hated enclosed terrain. Too many choke points.”
Harlan looked at the coordinates again.
“So the map is bait.”
Luis nodded.
“Unless Daniel wanted us to know it was bait.”
Eli remembered something.
“When Dad taught me chess, he always said sometimes you move where the other guy expects because you know he’ll overcommit.”
Harlan looked at him.
“You play chess?”
“Yeah.”
“Your father ever let you win?”
“No.”
“Good.”
Luis unfolded a topographic map.
“If Knox has Daniel, Red Hollow is where he’d make the exchange.”
“What exchange?” Eli asked.
Luis and Harlan looked at each other.
Then Luis said, “The laptop.”
Eli crossed his arms.
“So we give it to him?”
“No,” Harlan said.
“We give him what he thinks is the laptop.”
Three hours later, they headed toward Red Hollow with a duplicate computer loaded with useless files.
The real drive was taped inside Harlan’s jacket.
As the mountain road narrowed, Eli looked through the windshield.
Dark clouds rolled over the ridgeline.
Luis checked his side mirror.
“Thomas.”
“What?”
“We’ve got company.”
Two black SUVs appeared behind them.
Then headlights turned on ahead.
Another vehicle blocked the road.
Harlan hit the brakes.
May you like
Armed men stepped out on both sides.
And standing between them was Marcus Dale.
