Dan was at a loss to figure out what was going on. Then Bridget called him while he and Addie were at the clinic and he was hopeful it would be good news.

“Okay, we have some news. We dug up some information about what Addie’s mom, Cecilia, had been working on. Now, if we could find the evidence wherever she might have hidden it, or Addie’s dad had hidden it, maybe we could get somewhere with this,” Bridget said. “Does Addie have any idea where he might have had the information she’d gathered and then stored it that no one would know of?”

“Everything was sold off. I didn’t keep any of it. Not when I was moving around so much.”

“Except you used the storage facility to retrieve things that you used to vanish the first time you disappeared after you were shot,” Dan reminded her.

“Yes, but other than some of my dad’s things—weapons, another protective vest, a safe house of sorts, well, just stuff, I don’t remember anything else that would have been evidence of an incrimination.”

“No one knew of it, right?” Dan asked.

“No. That’s why it was still there when I went to it.”

“Was there any secret hiding place in the storage unit? Was it part of a storage facility, or on private grounds?” Dan asked.

“It’s privately held land, but it’s mine.”

“Then anyone could have found it,” Bridget said. “And gone over it with a fine-tooth comb, looking for it.”

“It was under a company name that we used. Remember, it was our way out, to vanish, so that no one would discover it. No one. It even has a kitchen, bathroom, and loft bed, if I needed to really hide out. We just called it a storage facility, but it’s more like a combo storage and safe house.”

“Where is it? We need to search it, just in case,” Bridget said.

“Cheyenne, Wyoming. It’s not a place where my family ever lived and we never told anyone. We would go through there on our family vacations—after Alicia was gone, and my dad would tell me every time what supplies he had and what they were for. He never said anything about having any evidence of wrongdoing at the FBI. It requires numerous passcodes to get in.”

“Then when are we going?” Bridget asked.

“I’m coming,” Carl said, as if he would be invited to tag along.

“We’re seeing Ricky in a minute and then we’re heading out of here,” Dan said.

“You’re not going alone,” Bridget said.

“No. We’ll take a guard force with us,” Dan said.

“And I’m coming. Leyton and Travis are off on a mission. I’m not going to sit here and do nothing,” Bridget said.

“All right, you’re coming,” Dan said.

“And me,” Carl said. “If we find evidence of wrongdoing, I can give it to the press. I might not work for one of the newspapers now, but I still have a lot of contacts. I can reach them, and we can turn the evidence over to them and they can run the story.”

“All right,” Dan said, hoping he wasn’t making a grave mistake in bringing him with them. “We’re going in to see Ricky at the clinic, and then we’ll make arrangements to leave.”

Addie was carrying the pastries into the clinic and then they entered Ricky’s room. Kolby was sitting there with him, talking away. “Whoa, what’s this?” Kolby said, taking the box of treats and looking them over.

“For the two of you,” Addie said. “How are you doing, Ricky?”

“Much better, thanks.” Ricky picked a chocolate pastry from the box. “These look great. When can we go back to investigating things?”

“No time soon,” Dan said. “You’re staying in bed for another couple of days, and some more time after that when you return to the ranch with Hal and Tracey.”

“What about that reporter? Did you lock him up and throw away the key?” Kolby asked, grabbing a blueberry pastry.

“He’s at the jailhouse,” Addie said.

After they spent a little time with Ricky, Dan told him to behave himself and then they left. Dan started organizing some people to come with them in another vehicle, just in case they needed the backup.

“What if we find nothing there that will prove what my mother had discovered?” Addie asked.

“Then we don’t. If we do find something there, maybe we can stop this now.”

“What about Carl? Won’t he be a problem? He won’t have a lot of control over his shifting. What if he decides he wants to sell the story to the highest bidder?”

“He won’t be able to. We’ll be with him at all times. Someone will always have an eye on him.” Dan got a call from Mrs. Fitz, and said, “Yes, have you got any news?”

“No, but I heard about that reporter.”

“Yeah, he’s now one of us and we have to find him a foster home until he has more control over his shifting.”

“I’ll take him in. If he doesn’t know how to bake, I’ll teach him. I have all the weapons training I need to keep him in line, and if push comes to shove, I can take him down as a cat,” Mrs. Fitz said.

“Are you sure?” Dan was really surprised she’d want to take him on.

“Yeah, I can use another baker, and in the business I was in, I was often the handler. I’m trained for it, and it’ll be fun for me. I’ll have someone to talk to. Maybe later, he can work for the newspaper, if the Havertons wouldn’t mind hiring him. In the meantime, I’ll take him in.”

“Okay, right now he’s going with us on another mission, but when we return, I’ll turn him over to your care. And thanks, Mrs. Fitz. We sure appreciate you stepping up to the plate to help out.” Dan hoped it wouldn’t be a mistake. He could see her teaching him to bake and him burning all her pastries. Or turning into a cougar in the middle of the kitchen while he was supposed to be baking treats.

“You’re welcome, Dan. Anything I can do to help.”

Dr. Kate’s receptionist, April Hightower, told Dan before they left the clinic, “You told us to be on the lookout for those FBI agents. It looks like they’re here—dark suits, black SUV, side arms under their jackets. I was just in the breakroom, and saw them getting out of the vehicle.”

Dan got on his cell and called Chase. “I need you and Bridget here at the clinic pronto. I’ll need you to watch over Addie. The feds are here to pick up the bodies at the morgue.” Dan didn’t want Addie to go down to the morgue in case the men had plans to eliminate her if they saw her.

“We’re on our way.”

Dan escorted Addie to the breakroom. “Stay here until Chase gets here.”

“If these guys are trouble…” Addie said.

“If you hear shooting down in the morgue, you can come down and rescue us.”

Addie shook her head and hugged and kissed him.

Dan heard April talking to the men and telling them where to reach the elevator to the morgue. “Stay here. I don’t want Kate down there, just in case.”

He needed to wait for backup, but he wasn’t risking Kate’s life if these guys weren’t legit. Dan headed for the stairs and saw Bridget and Chase rushing into the clinic. “Addie’s in the breakroom, Chase. Stay with her, all right? Bridget, with me.”

He and she raced down the stairs to the basement, but Kate was already there. Damn it.

Kate greeted them and they saw the two men in black suits waiting for her to release the bodies. One of the bodies was lying on the autopsy table.

Dan recognized one of the men as the agent who had suddenly vanished while supposedly guarding Addie’s room. Dan said under his breath, “Leipheimer.”

“What’s the trouble?” the other man asked Kate, eyeing Dan in his sheriff’s uniform.

“What the hell happened to you?” Dan asked Leipheimer, pulling out his gun. “You were supposed to be protecting Addie at the hospital.”

Leipheimer held up his hands in truce. “Hey, Sheriff, I’m one of the good guys, all right? My relief came and I left.”

Even though that could have been a reasonable explanation and his replacement was a bad guy, and Leipheimer was perfectly innocent, Dan thought both men looked and smelled nervous. Why be nervous around a local sheriff, when they were FBI agents? Unless the men really weren’t federal agents, or they were so new on the job that they were just worried they’d screw up their assignment. Why send two men who were both new?

Then he recalled what Briggs had said—he didn’t know Addie was in the hospital so he hadn’t sent anyone to watch over her room.

“I need to see your credentials.” Dan motioned to the bodies. “These guys posed as FBI agents and we need to make sure you guys are the real deal.”

They showed him their ID and it looked legit. “Now give me the name of your boss so I can verify he sent the two of you and you can take the bodies. Can’t be too cautious you know.”

The men looked at each and Bridget pulled out her gun and yelled, “They’re not federal agents!”

Kate ducked for cover behind the autopsy table. Dan hadn’t wanted to shoot the men, certainly not with Kate in the morgue. “Let me see both your hands!”

Both men reached into their suit coats and they drew their weapons. Dan and Bridget dove for cover behind the autopsy table, not a whole lot of cover, but more than the men had. He thought about shoving it at them, but the wheels were locked in place, and they’d lose what little cover they had, even if he ran the table into the men. They fired at the men from the sides of the table, taking them both down as the pretend agents’ rounds ricocheted off the metal tables. A couple of their rounds struck the corpse on top of the autopsy table.

“Is everyone all right?” Dan asked Kate and Bridget, pissed that this business would continue and put his whole town at risk.

“I’m fine.” Bridget ran to check out the men, kicking their weapons aside. Then she knelt, and pronounced, “They’re dead.”

At the same time, Dan went to help Kate, who looked a little pale, lying close to the floor, out of harm’s way. “Yeah, I’m fine,” Kate said, “as long as the corpses don’t start shooting back.”

Smiling, Dan helped her up from the floor. “Glad everyone’s fine. Except for those two.” He helped Bridget find any more weapons on the two men, another gun a piece, knives. “Fake badges, fake IDs.”

“The man who called you about these men coming, is he involved in this?” Bridget asked. “Or did these men arrive—”

“What the hell,” Chase said, barreling into the room with his gun out.

Addie was right behind him ready to shoot someone. She frowned at the two dead men. “Don’t tell me—they’re not really FBI agents.”

Kate was already getting DNA samples from them, and Bridget took pictures of their faces.

“Hey,” Calvin said, coming into the morgue, then spied the dead men on the floor. “Hell. Who are they? There are two men upstairs who say they came for the bodies. April wanted me to check out the situation because she heard all the shooting right before the new ‘feds’ arrived.”

“Send them down.” Dan hoped the hell these guys were legit. “Can you run by the sheriff’s office and ask Amy to give you the fingerprint kit and bring it back here?”

“Yeah, sure,” Calvin said.

Dan wanted to make sure they could identify these men once the feds took them away.