“OK,” she said. “But don’t forget. You promised. If I have to head down alone? You two have to be right behind me.”
“Count on it,” Mac assured her.
Mac was beginning to like the mountains. The plants were amazing, lush with huge leaves, or delicate like the trilliums Angie stopped to photograph: three petals to the flowers, three leaves to the stalk. Rand knew where he was going, and he knew how to pace himself and them. And Mac could feel some of the tension seeping out of his muscles. These were people worth being with, he thought. Partners. Peers.
Squad.
Didn’t mean he didn’t need to be wary. He did. That’s why he was at the back. Didn’t mean he might not have to fight to protect them, he expected he would. But he also realized he trusted these two to be fighting there with him. To guard his back — not people he had guarding his back in Afghanistan, even while fighting alongside them. And he’d had some teams like that. Squirrelly fuckers who couldn’t be counted on. Couldn’t be trusted.
Rand held up his hand and they stopped. He motioned them up beside him, and he crouched down. Mac crouched beside him. Angie stood at his shoulder, her camera out.
“They’re hauling the body out,” Rand said softly. Mac looked at the two deputies who were loading up the body. He heard the soft click of Angie’s camera, and hoped it wouldn’t carry. Not that these deputy reserves were paying any attention to their surroundings.
He frowned. What were they up to?
“Shit,” he said, remembering in time to keep his voice soft. “They’re going to blame us for the deaths.”
Rand frowned. “How will that work? Their word against ours?”
“Dead men tell no tales,” Mac reminded him. He shrugged. “And maybe they figure their word against a couple of reporters and a part-time crew member, would be believed.”
Rand’s smile grew slowly, and he choked back laughter. “They don’t know who I am.” He said. “You think Norton never ran background checks on Ken’s people?”
“Nope.”
“Still, dead men tell no tales seems more likely.”
“Depends on how pragmatic Ken is,” Mac said. “If we’re dead, and we take the fall, would he try to clear our names? Or would he keep his head down and stay quiet?”
“Pragmatic,” Rand said slowly. “If we get out? He’d back us. If we don’t? He’ll do whatever keeps him alive and in business.”
“And I don’t fault him for that,” Mac said. “I’m just saying, Norton may be counting on it.”
“Mac,” Rand hesitated. “I count Ken a friend. If it wasn’t for Angie here, I’d be in the caravan out of here to guard his back. I want to see him make it out of here alive, you know?”
Mac nodded. “And I suspect Ken knows exactly why you stayed behind. So, we’ve got to clean up this mess, and catch up with them before Norton loses the rest of his God-damn mind and takes out everyone — even his own.”
He looked at Angie. “You take the photos?”
She nodded.
“Then let’s go. You’ve got the compass,” he said. “Can you get us to their camp from here without using any known trails?”
She hesitated, pulled out the map from yesterday, and looked at it. She frowned. “Need to go around that ravine Mark got himself trapped in,” she muttered. She traced a route on the map with her finger. Rand looked at where she pointed.
“Stream in there,” he said briefly. “Be pretty wild these days. Too wild to get across, I’m afraid.”
She found the thin blue line that indicated the stream and traced it. Mac liked watching her. It was as if she used touch to help her convert the map into a 3-D version. “We’re going to have to go almost all the way back to camp,” she said with a shake of her head. “Or follow them back.”
Mac considered that. Looked at Rand. “There’s just the two of them,” he said. “We could take them.”
“And do what with them?” Rand asked. “I’m not going to be party to killing them.”
Mac rolled his eyes. “I was thinking zip-ties,” he said.
“Sorry. It would be nicer to ride in than to walk,” Rand conceded. “Fine. Let’s do it.”
“What are you going to do?” Angie asked anxiously.
“You stay here,” Mac said. “Photograph and watch. If you see anyone else? Sing out. You’re our spotter.”
Rand had already headed out to get around the two men who were loading the dead man into the SUV. Really, they’d caught them at just the right time, Mac thought. He watched for Rand, and when Rand gave him the high sign, he stepped into the road and pulled his pistol out of his sweatshirt pocket. He aimed, nodded at Rand, and waited.
“Stop what you’re doing, put your hands up,” Rand said authoritatively.
“Who are you to give us orders?” One of the men said, looking over his shoulder. He saw Rand, and frowned. “You’re one of Ken’s men,” he said. “I’m a deputy sheriff. I’ll give the orders.”
“Deputy reserve,” Mac said. His voice coming from the other side of them made the two men freeze. “You don’t have any police powers. So just do what he says.”
“Shit,” the second deputy reserve muttered to his buddy. “That’s the one Norton is looking for.”
“And you’re the ones who found him,” Mac said dryly. “Congratulations. “Now do what Agent Rand said. Hands in the air.”
“Agent?” Deputy Reserve 1 spluttered. “Agent of what? He’s a part-time trek guide!”
Rand kept his pistol trained on them with one hand, and pulled an FBI shield out of the cargo pocket on his pant leg. “And this tells you what I do the other part of the time,” he said with amusement in his voice.
Mac grinned. It was kind of funny, he admitted. The two men looked at each other, and put their hands up. Mac cuffed them using the zip-ties. Should have waited until they got the man loaded, he thought sourly. He put the two
