“Anything else from Vanessa?” Mary asked quietly as she came up behind me.

It had been a couple hours since my latest vision of Vanessa, and the sun was already behind the western mountains that our targets were sitting. From the front gallery, there was no the rhythmic sound of a hammer driving nails into plywood as Zeke Rogers boarded up the front window. He’d come over to check on his niece Rebecca, but had left quickly after to get supplies to start repairing the shop. Zeke was good like that. He always had to be doing something.

I was doing a final check of all our gear before we made our run up to Burton’s Folly.  You could never be too sure things had been checked, double-checked, triple-checked, or quadruple…well, you get the idea. In my book, it was better to be safe than it was to be sorry. Especially when you were about to go on a mission like this, and people you cared about would be in the line of fire.

I paused my count of ammo in the clip I was holding. “Nothing.”

“Think she’s all right?” she asked after a moment’s consideration.

“Yeah,” I lied. “I think so.”

When she’d first returned to my life, it hadn’t felt like anything changed inside of me. I mean, she was back and I was happy about that. But there had been so many issues between us, so many things unsaid, and subtle mistrust caused by the absence in each other’s lives. I realized now, though, that the moment she’d returned to my life, I had felt a certain kind of comfort in my chest, comfort at the fact that she was near me. A connection, almost, that was so subtle you’d only recognize it if it was gone.

Moments after we’d heard her howl echoing down from the mountains, though, that feeling had somehow vacated from my chest. And nothing had taken its place. There was just an empty hole there, an absence like I’d felt before she’d shown up at the wedding three months ago.

On the one hand, I was glad I wasn’t going crazy, and I was ecstatic she was in one piece. But on the other, I was torn at this new feeling of emptiness in my chest, and couldn’t keep my thoughts from returning to it and mulling it over.

Had something happened to her? Something that had been triggered by her signal to me? Was this my fault?

But I couldn’t say any of this to the kid.

None of it.

“Why are you lying?” she asked, seeing right through me.

I sighed. “I’m not. I’m just trying to be optimistic.”

“You’re never optimistic, though, Pete. You’re a realist.”

I didn’t reply, just kept counting bullets. What could I say? The kid had me pegged.

“What do we do now?” she asked.

“We wait. Same as we’ve been doing. When the sun goes down, we make our move. You stay here, protect the women.”

“But I want to go with you.”

“Mary,” I said, setting the magazine aside. I turned to her, grabbed her by the shoulders, and leaned down to look her in the eye. “You know that’s not going to happen. We discussed this earlier. I need you here.”

Trying to avoid my eyes, she looked down, then to the side. Anywhere but my face. “For what? So I can sit with the women? With the mates?”

“No, so you can listen for our howls in case people start heading your way. You know the plan: we can’t use walkie-talkies or cellphones right now, so we have to communicate some other way. And we need someone to stay down here who can understand them and help everyone get to safety. There’s no other way.”

She broke away from my grip, saying, “It’s still bullshit.”

“Hey, hey,” I said, frowning. “Language. You know how I feel about that.”

“Is that what you want to really bitch at me about right now? How much I say bullshit or fuck?”

I sighed and turned back to the desk. “It's not just about how much you swear or don't swear. It's about discipline and being able to control yourself in bad situations. If you start to let the little things slip, the big things go right alongside with them. Language here, grooming there, groups tactics. You lose a war one encounter at a time, not all in one swoop. Life's like that, too.”

She gave an exasperated sigh and stomped off to the door. She stopped just before she left. “Yeah, well, you know what? I’m not a soldier, Peter. I'm just a girl, remember?”

And then she was out the door.

I rubbed my tired eyes. I didn't know if I should go after her or not, and right then I couldn't decide one way or the other. There were too many variables up in the air. Clearly, there was a trap waiting for us up on that mountain. But wouldn’t the soldiers of Jaeger-Tech also be looking to swoop in and scoop up our mates as leverage over us?

Given the situation, I would if I were in their shoes. Especially considering the fact that they still had the town locked off from the outside world. Where else could we send the women while we tried to rescue the ones they already had?

No, the best bet we could make was for the women to stay in town. But just because we weren’t going to be down here didn’t mean we couldn’t get some help protecting them.

I went over to the door and leaned my head out. “Jones!” I called into the hallway. “Head on back here for a minute?”

“Sure thing!”

“Bring Zeke with you, too?”

“Uh, sure,” Zeke called back, followed soon after by the sound of footsteps on an aluminum stepladder.

“What’s up, boss?” Matt asked as he came into the little office that had somehow become my inner sanctum.

“Matthew, I’m running into a problem when it comes to protecting the people we’ve got down here. Any chance you could impose on Chief Beckett to help with protection?”

Matthew winced, then seemed to consider the request for a moment. “I don’t know, Pete. He’s got a lot going on with coordinating everything. But you know who might be willing to help? Roy down at the Elk. We could hole everyone up there.”

“Mary, even?”

“Ain’t exactly like the sheriff’s going to be there bitching about Roy not checking ID.”

I made a face. “Really, Matt?”

He just shrugged. “It’s true, isn’t it? Look, he owes us one for getting those Denver guys off his back.”

“What about me?” Zeke asked.

“Here,” I said, going over to one of the tables and grabbing a pump-action tactical shotgun, its barrel sawed down to just about the legal requirement. “You can shoot, right?” I asked as I offered him the gun.

He took it and, without his eyes leaving my face, cleared the chamber to make sure it was free of shells, flicked on the safety switch, and hung it down across his body in a near tactical position. “Two tours in Nam, Mr. Frost, spent most on point. Anything comes at my goddaughter or your people, they’re gonna have me to deal with. Promise it.”

That was a relief. I’d never really spoken to Zeke about his past, but he’d been a lifesaver when it came to all the various rebuilds we’d had to do on the safe house and on our office. I’d never really wondered why he didn’t ask questions about why we had so many bullet holes in the wood we stripped out, but now I kind of did. I gave him a nod. “Good to know. Think Roy will let you hold up there?”

“Reckon he will,” Zeke said. “He owes me one from back in the day, same as he owes y’all. Probably will be better to keep them there in a public place, as it is.”

“Agreed,” I said. I tapped a finger on the box of shotgun shells we had. “Solid slugs. Anything that comes at you is going to get a nasty surprise.”

“I like surprises,” Zeke growled, clearly still upset about the fact that a janitor at Rebecca’s school had already tried to kidnap her.

“Anything else, boss?” Matthew asked as Zeke disappeared out the door.

I waved him off. “No, nothing for you to be concerned with.”

“You all right?” he asked, a concerned look on his face.

“Yeah. Just worried, that’s all.”

Matthew nodded. “Yeah, you and me both.”

If only Vanessa would reach out and contact me, though, I probably wouldn’t have this sinking feeling in my gut.

Unfortunately, as I would later find out, she couldn’t.