Having her job back, having her access returned, Frankie hesitantly made her way through the first few days. If she retrieved the wrong file or made the wrong call, everything could come crashing down on her. Again. The bitter taste of that defeat hung fresh in her mind, a strong warning. Tomorrow, she would go back to work and throw herself into the job. Prove to her father and her boss that she could play by the rules.
Oh, she wasn’t quitting. That wasn’t in her genes.
She just had to be more careful. Play by their rules—and not get caught. She’d grown up with three brothers who treated her like their father’s fourth son. She could play with the big boys and not get hurt.
Tucking her legs up under her, she sat down on her sofa. After a quick glance around the living room she’d spent too much time fixing back up, she tugged her laptop over the cushion. She thumbed through the file from the accident and searched for the report from the EMT. Scanning, she dropped her gaze to the bottom. The signature was about as legible as a doctor’s. “Okay, so not much help yet.”
Frankie went to the laptop. Typed in Luckett’s Volunteer Fire Department. She found a handful of results and images but no EMTs. At least, not the one she was looking for.
Wait. . .wait. . . She forced herself to recall the lettering on the side of the ambulance. Loudoun County. She typed that in along with EMT.
“And voilà!” Frankie smiled down at the image of the EMT with a group of others. A feature from Leesburg Today with a picture of the men—and a caption. “God loves me,” Frankie muttered as she read the names. “. . .and one Landon Ramage.”
Ramage. According to the article, the Ramages were fixtures in Loudoun County since the early 1800s, having owned land and horses dating back to almost as late.
Frankie’s grin widened as she typed in his name and city. A half-dozen pictures from local events erupted. Including one with Landon and his older brother, former Army Special Forces sniper—sniper? The back of her neck prickled—“Boone Ramage.”
A wild tendril of an idea rushed through her. She went to land records. Searched.
No Matches Found.
Frankie frowned. “How can there be no matches?” The article had explicitly stated the family owned land there in Loudoun, had for nearly two hundred years. Maybe she typed it wrong. She tried again.
No Matches Found.
Despite attempts to locate other records, she came up empty. Frustration tightened a noose around her neck. If she kept pushing—this is what got her in trouble last time.
“I am not easily scared off,” she murmured.
But she hated losing.
Curiosity caught her by the throat. She accessed her work login and navigated into the secure databases. A strange squirreling wormed through her belly. He had to have a driver’s license. Did he even own a vehicle? Or have a credit card?
If she didn’t know better, she’d say Boone Ramage and his family didn’t exist. But she’d met the man. She’d seen him. There were photos on the Internet of him and his younger brother. Frankie glanced at the screen from the local paper. She had to admit—the Ramages bred well. Both sons were striking, handsome. “Well built, too,” she murmured around a smile. “And not married.”
The page automatically refreshed—and Frankie froze. She tilted her head. “Wha. . .?” She hit the manual refresh icon. But the page was blank. “I was just there, how can it be blank?” After verifying she still had Internet access, she refreshed again. This time, a single line of text vaulted her stomach into her throat.
The page you have requested has been removed.
Nausea swirled. Fingertips to her temples, she tried to weigh what this meant. It wasn’t a coincidence that she’d just looked up Ramage and suddenly he disappears from the face of the planet.
When her phone rang, she yelped. Glanced at it as if it had the plague. Carefully, as if they could remotely see her through it somehow—she peered at the caller ID.
Unknown Name.
Right. No way would she answer that.
It went to voice mail. A few minutes later, her phone signaled a message had been received. Frankie played it.
“Contact Leland Marlowe. He can help.” It’d come from Varden. No wonder the identity didn’t show up.
Frankie’s breath rushed out of her. Leland Marlowe? As in General Leland “Freeland” Marlowe, the firebrand general who’d swept the military clean as one of the joint chiefs last year?