Page 21 of Nate Hayes

“Dead serious,” I said, meeting her wide-eyed stare. “You’re not going to the vineyard. You’re in a potential abduction setup. Your job is to stay down and listen to me. Can you do that?”

She nodded, pale now, and tugged Ethan down with her. He looked like he was about to argue, but I didn’t give him a chance.

“Down, now!”

Gunfire cracked behind us, a shot pinging off the rear fender. Axel swore and floored the gas.

The kids screamed. I reached over the seat and shoved them down flat as Axel veered off the main road and down a narrow dirt path.

“Hold on!” he barked.

I grabbed the handle above my window, bracing myself as the SUV hit a patch of uneven gravel. The trees on either side grew thicker, the path bumpier, the shadows deeper. Dust kicked up behind us in a swirling cloud. The Audi stayed right on our tail.

We burst out of the tree line and into the back entrance of what looked like an abandoned vineyard. Ivy-covered stone buildings loomed in the distance, their windows long boarded up. The gate was hanging off its hinges. A perfect hideout—or a perfect trap.

Axel jerked the wheel hard, swerving around a fallen tree, and brought the vehicle to a skidding stop behind one of the crumbling barns.

“Out, now!” I barked. I grabbed Ethan’s arm and hauled him up, Chloe right behind.

“We need to move, get inside before they get eyes on us. Go! Axel, cover them!”

Axel hopped out, gun raised, sweeping the area as I ushered the kids into the barn. The place reeked of mildew and old grapes, but it had a loft, a few rusty tools, and a door that locked from the inside. We could work with this.

“I want you two in that corner, behind the barrels. Stay low. No sound unless I say otherwise,” I ordered.

Chloe and Ethan nodded, still shaking.

Axel came in, shut the door, and dropped his voice. “They stopped just outside the trees. Two men got out—light body armor, probably ex-military. Professional. But they don’t know exactly where we went.”

“Which buys us maybe five minutes.”

I checked my gun to make sure it was loaded, then looked out through a sliver in the boarded-up window. Sure enough, I spotted the Audi parked crooked under the trees. Two shadows moved around it, scanning the area.

“Think they’re after ransom?” Axel asked quietly beside me.

“Could be,” I said. “Or something worse. It could be that they were never supposed to make it to the grandparents. Maybe someone paid for a disappearance.”

Axel grimaced. “Damn.”

A long creak sounded behind us—floorboards above.

I spun, gun raised.

There was no one there. But something shifted in the shadows.

I motioned for Axel to follow and crept up the narrow staircase to the barn’s loft. My boots barely made a sound on the rotting wood. The air smelled like old straw and damp wood, and the silence was thick.

Then I heard it again. Another creak.

We weren’t alone in this barn.

I stepped forward, heart pounding, every nerve in my body coiled tight.

And that’s when I saw it.

A figure crouched low in the corner held something that glinted in the pale light leaking through a cracked window.

I leveled my weapon. “Don’t move.”

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