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We drive for nearly three hours until the van takes an exit off of I-35, just north of Laredo. The area is remote. There’s nothing here—no businesses, no homes. Not even a fucking tumbleweed. It’s the perfect place to hide, and the worst place possible for us not to be spotted. I hadn’t planned for that.

“Isn’t there a border crossing in Laredo?” Shelby questions.

“There’s one going into Juárez, but we’re a good twenty miles from that.” Too close for comfort as far as I’m concerned.

“You don’t think he’s planning to take them across the border, do you?”

“I think that’s exactly where he’s taking them, but he won’t get that far, Shel.” I keep my voice as even as possible, but there’s a part of me that’s just as skeptical as she is. If we fail, the chances of getting Hayden back are slim to none. She’ll be moved around until there’s no trace of her left for us to find. We can’t let that happen.

Her eyes stay on the road ahead of us, but I can feel the tension like a storm surge on the banks of the ocean.

“Ease up on the distance,” I say, realizing just how close we’re getting. GP slows down, adding several car lengths between our van and Kevin's uncle’s. Grabbing the radio off the dash, I call back to the rest of the club following behind us.

“Pull off somewhere,” I order. “It’s so open out here, he’ll spot us a mile away. We’ll keep on him and radio back when he stops.”

“Ten-four,” Priest responds. “We passed a hotel a few miles back. I’ll swing in there and await your call. Stay safe, brother.”

I put the radio back into place and keep my eyes trained on the piece of shit van. Desert flatlands surround us, and even though he’s not close, the plumes of dust behind him give him away.

About twenty minutes later, he suddenly turns off onto a dirt road and floors it, kicking up dust behind him.

“Do you want me to follow him?” GP asks.

I consider it. Even with the dust, he’ll see us, taking away the element of surprise. I don’t want any more distance between us and the van, but it’s too risky. We have to hang back. I peer down to the tracker’s signal on my satellite laptop. The signal is still going strong.

“He’s slowing down. Pull off over there by that line of trees. There looks to be some kind of house out there, which might be his hidey-hole.”

GP maneuvers our van as I ask, and nestles us close behind the trees, obscuring us from view. Checking the mirrors, I see no one around us and exit the vehicle, leaving the door open wide. I shift the laptop to the van seat with the tracking software and a map of the area side by side on the screen.

“Hop out of there, and bring the radio and binoculars with you,” I tell Shelby. “You stay in the van, GP, in case we need to make a clean getaway.”

I push through some of the thicker parts of the brush until I find a good spot. Shelby slips in behind me and shoves the binoculars over my shoulder. Bringing them up to my eyes, I look for the van through the thick dust. It takes a few minutes before I can spot it. The van comes to a stop near the house I’d seen from the road, and Randall comes around to the side door.

Kevin jumps from the passenger seat and stands next to him. The side door of the van opens, and he reaches inside. I don’t recognize the first girl he pulls out, but her body is nearly limp as she falls against him. Kevin helps the girl inside the house while Randall waits outside. Reaching in a second time, he drags Lindsey out, and just like the first girl, she’s unsteady on her feet. He’s drugged them.

“Give me the radio.” She hands it to me, and I press it up close to my mouth.

“Got eyes on Lindsey. She’s okay, but she’s clearly out of it.”

Karma mutters a string of curses in the background.

“Calm your ass down, K, I’m trying to hear,” Judge growls. “Any sign of Hayden?”

“Not yet, but he just took Lindsey inside. He’s got a little house out here in the boonies.”

Kevin comes back out, and Hayden steps out of the van. She’s steadier on her feet, but she looks exhausted, covered in dirt from head to toe.

“She’s there,” I relay back to Judge. Shelby shoves me over and snatches the binoculars from me. “She was the last girl out of the van. He’s got another girl with them.”

“Oh, my baby,” Shelby cries when she sees her. “That’s the same outfit she had on the day she disappeared. She looks like she’s lost weight.”

Grabbing the binoculars back, I take another look. It’s hard to make out from this distance, but she looks unharmed outside of the filth. I watch until she disappears from view, and the door slams shut behind her. Stepping out from the trees, I hand the binoculars to Shelby and head back to the van to watch the tracker. The beacon flashes. He hasn’t found it yet.

“What’s going on?” Karma demands over the radio.

“Everyone’s inside the house. Tracker is still active.”

“So we go in. It’s one guy against ten of us. There’s no need to wait.”

“No,” I snap. “Kevin will signal us when the time is right. If we bum-rush our way in there, he’ll kill the girls before we can even get close.”

Karma growls into the radio, “I don’t fucking like this, man. We’re putting too much faith in this kid.”

“I’ve got eyes on the place. He makes a move, I’ll see him. I’m sending Priest our location now. The sun’s going down fast, so it’ll be dark by the time you get here.” Pulling my phone from my pocket, I fire off the text with our coordinates.

“How the fuck are you going to see in the dark? He could move them and you’d never know,” Karma argues back.

“Night vision, dumbass. I had Priest pick up some new toys for us. They’re in the van.”

Silence comes from the other end.

“We’re on our way.”

Laying the radio on the ground next to my laptop, I turn to Shelby, who still stands in the brush with her gaze locked on the house that holds our daughter. She leans against me when I move behind her.

“She’s alive,” she whispers. “I thought…” A sob snatches her breath away.

“Shh, Shel. I told you I’d find her. Just a little longer until she’s back and safe with us.”

“What if they’ve done something to her?”

“Then we deal with it as a family.” I wrap my arms around her neck, holding her tight. We stand like that, watching together, for thirty minutes before the rumble of another vehicle pulls up behind our van.

“Stay here, and keep watch,” I whisper to her. With my hand on the gun, I step out of the tree line and sigh in relief. The cavalry is here.

Karma charges headlong into the trees with Shelby, leaving the rest of us outside.

“Any movement?” Priest asks as he exits the van, dressed all in black.

“None. It’s been quiet.”

“Quiet is good.” Reaching back into the van, he tosses me a bag. I unzip it, and find my own set of dark clothing. Pulling out the long-sleeved T-shirt, I take the one I have on off and slip it over my head.

“You weren’t kidding about being out in the open here,” Burnt remarks when he joins us. “The only thing we have going for us is the darkness.”

“There’s been no traffic since we’ve been out here. It’s just us and them. The odds are in our favor.”

“Let’s keep it that way.”

Karma stomps out of the tree line and beelines for the back of the van.

“He still pissed?”

“Pissed ain’t the word I would use to describe his mood,” Twat Knot declares. “He bitched the entire drive down here. Thank fuck for headphones, man, or I’d have thrown his ass out on the interstate.”

A laugh escapes my lips, but lasts only seconds when my laptop begins to beep, and I feel as if the ground has been yanked out from under me.

“The fuck is that?” Karma questions.

“The tracker’s offline!” I yell, rushing toward my laptop. A red bar flashes above the screen. Disconnected. He’s found it. The fucker found it on Lindsey. Fuck, fuck, fuck!

“He’s outside,” Shelby calls out to us. I burst into a run and fly into the brush, snatching the binoculars from her.

The uncle is outside the house, gun in hand. He knows we’re here. There’s no time to waste now. We have to move in.