The final few customers of the evening have just left Callahan’s. Our holiday extended hours were a big success; a score of Adamo cousins helped out, and my sisters and I worked split shifts to keep a fresh supply of goodies going. It’s been exhausting, but gratifying.

I haven’t had any contact with Matteo since the day he brought me home. Not a visit, not a call, not even a text. I’ve gone from anger to grief to numbness.

His cousins assure me that Matteo’s busy dealing with Santiago. Their excuses only make me feel worse. If he wanted to talk to me, he could find five minutes to do it.

I’ve only got myself to blame. I knew what I was taking on when I let myself get tangled up with him. It was foolish, and I did it anyway.

That day at the campground, I promised myself I wouldn’t regret our time together. It’s a vow I intend to keep. Right now, though, it’s hard because we have unfinished business.

I should have told him goodbye that day, but I wasn’t ready. So I need to see him one more time, and say the things I have to say. Then I’ll have closure, and I can let him go and move on with my life.

He’ll always be in my heart. It’ll be a long, long time before I can look at another man, if I ever do. But at least I’ll have some measure of peace.

Lando should be here any minute with a few of Carlo’s guys to pick us up. Right now, it’s just the three of us, taking a moment to relax and enjoy how far we’ve come.

“Six months ago,” Bree muses, “we were struggling to get through one day at a time. Look at us now.”

She and Jade exchange glances. They’ve both been very protective of me since I got back and Matteo disappeared again. I think they wanted him to show up for me even more than I did.

“It’s okay,” I say. “You know how happy I am for you two; you don’t have to pretend to be single for my sake.”

I’ve met Matteo’s parents, Alma and Nario. They came by Elina’s house one night, along with Matteo’s twin brother Brando and his wife, Sasha. All of them were very kind and welcoming, as though I were already part of their family.

That was difficult for me. I didn’t know how to tell them that if they’re harboring hopes for me and Matteo, they shouldn’t be. All I could do was be as polite in return as possible.

As they were leaving, Alma drew me aside. “Be patient with my son,” she said, laying a hand on my cheek. “He needs you.”

My throat thickened with unshed tears. “Alma …”

She deserved the truth, but I was too cowardly to give it to her. I let her draw me into an embrace, one so warm and maternal that I wanted to bawl like a baby. It was all too easy to imagine her becoming the mother I’ve never had.

After a long moment, she let me go, kissed my cheek, and left. I went to bed and cried, irrationally angry at Matteo for having a wonderful family. If they were awful to me, it would have made things easier.

But that doesn’t seem to be the Adamo way.

“Quinn,” Jade says now. “You know the man for you is out there somewhere.”

I give her a bittersweet smile. “Yeah, he is. I already met him.”

Bree mutters, “I’m gonna kill him.” At first, she kept trying to reassure me that Matteo wasn’t deliberately ignoring me, and surely he’d be back soon. As day after day passed with no sign of him, she got more and more angry.

“I’d just as soon you didn’t kill him,” I say softly.

She waves a hand. “I’ll bring him back after I kill him so he can go on suffering. But I get to kill him at least once.”

I can’t help smiling. “I love you, Bree.”

Before she can answer, the back door beeps to signal that someone’s entered the code on the security panel there. “Finally,” Bree says. “Not like Lando to be late.”

“I’m afraid he has been unavoidably delayed,” a voice says. A tall, dark-haired man appears in the kitchen. He’s holding a gun in his hand.

None of us has ever actually seen him before, but there’s no doubt as to his identity. How do you talk to a sociopath? “Good evening, Mr. Santiago,” I say.

His eyes come to me. “Good evening, Miss Callahan. I must say that you and your sisters have caused me a great deal of … inconvenience.”

“Well. We could say the same for you.”

Something that might almost be humor glimmers in his dark eyes. “So here we are. After so many delays, it seemed best to deal with you myself. Tell me, Miss Callahan: where is Mr. Mathiesen?”

I try, but I can’t keep the puzzlement off my face. His eyes narrow. “Don’t feign ignorance with me; I know he took you that day.”

Holy crap. Matteo never told me his undercover alter ego’s name. “I haven’t seen him since that day,” I say with total honesty. “You haven’t either?”

Santiago stares at me. “I’ve had you under surveillance, and there has indeed been no sign of him. But then his actions make no sense. What reason did he give for abducting you?”

Wow. Abducting me? There’s a good reminder of how twisted Santiago’s brain is. “He didn’t, really. He was … reticent about his thinking, whatever it might have been.”

“He often is,” Santiago murmurs to himself. Then to me, “And you haven’t heard from him since.”

“Not a word.” Again, absolute truth.

“That’s unfortunate.”

Fear wraps its clammy fingers around the back of my neck. “Why?”

“I need to deal with him. You might have served as adequate bait. But if he has no interest in you …” Santiago shrugs. “I might as well just shoot you now.”

* * *

Three weeks.

Three weeks to the day since I’ve seen Quinn.

Three weeks when I could have been courting her, fucking her, holding her while she slept.

Goddamn Santiago.

I’m in the town where I meet with Garcia, poised to ride in either direction as needed. I text him: Anything?

No movement, comes the answer.

The FBI, my fellow cops, and I have been waging a war of attrition. One by one, Santiago’s associates have been picked up on various charges, state or federal or both. Human trafficking, drug trafficking and distribution, money laundering, and more.

We’ve whittled away at his organization until there’s no one left. Interpol has gotten into the act too, rounding up criminals in various countries with close ties to Santiago.

I called Kelleher, president of the Devil’s Kin MC, and explained that Santiago was going down, and they could go down with him … or not. They made the smart choice and abandoned him.

In response to his increasing isolation, he’s stayed holed up in his compound with his family. The kids haven’t even been allowed out to go to school. He’s been sending his driver out to buy groceries.

Yesterday, he got desperate. The driver called a known hitman and tried to hire him – over the phone, no less. A phone that we’d long since tapped. When he went out on his grocery run, we picked the driver up for conspiracy to commit murder.

So now Bruno Santiago is completely alone.

While all this has been going on, I’ve been giving sworn depositions about key crimes for which my first-hand witness testimony is the primary evidence. When I’m not doing that, I’m doing drive-bys of the compound. Close enough to show up on the security cameras, but no closer, not at first. Santiago didn’t used to have any snipers on staff, but no point taking chances.

As more and more of his men have been picked up, I’ve gotten bolder. Driven right by the main gate, stopping long enough to stare at the house. Taunting him.

The itching between my shoulder blades is getting worse. I text Garcia again: Are we sure they haven’t missed something? “They” being the various cops and agents surveilling the compound.

I’ll check with them, Garcia responds. But it looks like he’s given up any plans to do anything tonight.

I don’t buy it. I know Santiago, dammit. The man’s obsessive and never gives up once he’s locked on an idea.

Leaving Santiago physically and psychologically cut off from all his usual avenues of help is not the only goal of all this. It should also prevent him, not only from carrying out his planned massacre against the Adamos, but from mounting an armed assault on law enforcement should we find it necessary to apprehend him at the compound.

Finally, I hope it’ll lure him out of his hidey hole to come after me.

So far as we can tell, Santiago’s wife has nothing to do with his various criminal activities and may not even be aware of them. I never saw any signs of her knowledge or involvement, though admittedly we didn’t interact very often. And of course, his kids didn’t ask to have him for a dad.

But given the precarious state of the man’s mental health, we can’t be sure he wouldn’t use his family as human shields if we tried to take him there, or worse, go for a murder-suicide conclusion to the whole mess.

Back in his early days, Santiago didn’t hesitate to get his hands dirty. With no one left to do his bidding, and me constantly reminding him that I’m alive and free and metaphorically thumbing my nose at him, I’m hoping he’ll snap – and aim his aggression at me, not his family.

My phone rings. It’s Garcia. “I just got word that only three heat signatures have been detected inside the compound for at least the last hour. Based on their size, they’re confident that it’s Santiago who’s missing.”

“An hour? For fuck’s sake. Who’s watching the tunnel?” There’s a wine cellar under the main house that leads to a tunnel, which in turn exits outside the compound.

“Couple of Feebs. Either he’s still in the tunnel, or they missed him.”

“Fuck.” Santiago understands the value of a lure; he’d much rather force me into meeting on his terms than come after me directly. “I gotta go.”

Garcia’s still talking as I end the call. I dial Lando, but he doesn’t answer. “Fuck!” I try Carlo next. “Status,” I demand as soon as he answers.

“Bastard’s still got a few tricks up his sleeve. Buncha assholes rode into town about an hour ago, bikes and cars, dozens of ‘em working in pairs. We been chasing ‘em all over, keeping them away from target-rich environments.”

“Where are the Callahans? Lando’s not answering his phone.”

“Hang on.” He’s back in seconds, his voice grim. “Unaccounted for.”

“Fuck. Listen, Carlo. If you find Santiago with them, be careful. He’ll kill them just for fun. It’s me he wants.”

“Hurry,” he says, and ends the call.

I roar onto the freeway like a jet plane on steroids.