“And where did you hear this talk?”

“I was outside at the bar one night, snortin’ a little somethin’—somethin’,” he said nervously.

“I don’t care what you were doing,” Brogan stated softly. “What did you hear?”

“Some dude was takin’ a call.” Donny’s voice lowered as though he were afraid others might hear him. “I don’t know who it was. He was pissed; he said Brogan had to be behind it because they were searching for the same thing. He said he knew it was Brogan Campbell. That only Campbell had a reason to want those files or the information in them.”

Sandi was still crying, though not as hard.

“What’s Brogan Campbell searching for?” he asked as though he didn’t know.

Desperation filled Donny’s gaze now. “I don’t know,” he rasped. “I swear to God, I don’t know.”

“What have you heard, then?” Brogan asked.

Donny licked his lips nervously, his gaze seeking Sandi’s again. Sandi gave the barest nod.

“Come on, Donny; don’t make my friend over there hurt her, okay? Neither you nor Sandi would like it.”

Donny’s gaze flickered nervously. “When Brogan showed up he got real interested in this motorcycle touring club we have. The dude said who they were lookin’ for was there. They just don’t know who he is. But he can read some files they have, and they think Brogan has the other files. He said Brogan was the only one with the background and experience to steal them, too. He said this dude they want can read them. Then, when I was in Fort Knox a few weeks later, there were these dudes at the bar I went to, they was talkin’ ’bout Dawg and Eve’s daddy. They said there was talk circulatin’ heavy that there were files their daddy worked on while he was in some federal agency he worked for that hid the location on somethin’, and those files were stolen. Talk was maybe Dawg would know what that somethin’ was, and the only way to find out would be to use his sisters to scare him, but no one can go after a Mackay, ’cause if they did, then whoever that dude is that can read those files also has lots of information on that Freedom League and if any Mackay, or anyone that any Mackay loves is threatened, then he’s gonna talk. And he’s gonna tell all these secrets he has on that Freedom League. And they don’t want him talkin’ ’cause word is, he knows everything. Who wasn’t caught, who’s still hidin’, and lots of other stuff.”

Bingo. So that’s why Doogan wants Eve.

“Anything else, Donny?” he questioned softly. “Come on, anything else?”

“I swear that’s all.” He whimpered. “I swear that’s all. I swear.”

Brogan lifted the knife from Donny’s neck and released him slowly.

Donny stepped back quickly, his gaze seeking his lover’s.

“You hear anything else, Donny, use the number,” Brogan growled. “Don’t make me come back.”

Donny gave a quick, short nod.

Hell, Brogan expected both of them to be gone within hours.

“One more thing, Donny.”

“No one will know you were here,” he promised, then gave a bitter, mirthless laugh. “Trust me; I don’t want anyone to know.”

Brogan strode quickly from the room, Eli and Jed following close behind as they left the house and disappeared into the trees.

The four-wheelers they’d used to get into the mountains were still waiting where they’d left them. Brogan mounted the rugged machine as Eli and Jed did the same, and they started the engines and headed for the enclosed trailer several miles down the mountain and the pickup it was attached to.

The night—or morning, he should say—had yielded far more information than he had ever expected.

Pulling the four-wheeler into the covered trailer as Eli and Jed pulled in behind him, Brogan knew he finally had a direction to move in. Something other than just a list of files currently under review by the military for destruction. Brogan hadn’t seen a location for anything when he’d gone through the files, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t there. It meant he was going to have to go over them much more closely. According to the information Donny had, the files were evidently encrypted, if whoever he’d overheard talking that night, was right. So it made sense Brogan hadn’t found it. What he needed was someone with the ability to read and crack military code.

Otherwise, there would be no keeping Eve out of this.

His director thought they had one asset no one else could touch.

That asset was Eve.

Because whoever cared enough for Eve that they would only come out if Eve needed them or would only trust whoever she was with, evidently had the ability to not just decode the encryption, but also had information on a militia that Homeland Security believed had been disbanded more than five years before.

He’d been trying to find someone Eve was close to in his search for this informant. Maybe the way to go about this was to see whom Eve and her father, Chandler Mackay, now had in common.

That was where the answers lay.

To get those answers he would have to make Eve break a promise and betray the brother she loved.

He would be risking his soul, but he knew the plans the Freedom League had when it had been disbanded. They had been only months away from assassinating the president and ensuring the vice president, who had been a part of the militia, took his place. From there, they would have ensured the government officials they’d been amassing information on, would fall in with their plans. If they succeeded, the world as he knew it would be over forever. The Freedom League’s ultimate plan was the destruction of free enterprise, freedom of speech, and race equality. The nation would have been broken apart from the inside out, and before the American citizens even realized the danger they were in, it would have been too late.

According to Donny, the League was still in place, and that meant their plans were still in place as well.

And that, he couldn’t accept.

EIGHT

Eve often helped not just at the bar, but also at Janey Mackay Jansen’s restaurant, Mackay’s Fine Dining. She helped Natches at the garage and in the office, and sometimes at Dawg’s lumber and building supplies store, or, if needed, on the farm he had bought.

When she wasn’t working for various cousins or their friends, then she worked for her mother.

Fortunately, John and Sierra had hired two experienced waitresses within a few nights of her confrontation with Sandi Mikels. Unfortunately, that left Eve at loose ends for a few days—until her sisters learned she was currently jobless.

They saw that as extra time off from the inn to enjoy their summers more. Before she knew it Eve found herself working two straight twelve-hour days until she managed to put the skids on Piper and Lyrica.

Eight hours she didn’t mind. Twelve hours she had a bit more of a problem with.

On the third day she found herself on cleaning duty after Zoey disappeared to “paint” again. Piper and Lyrica had made plans, leaving her mother without the extra help at the same time that dinner preparation began.

There were eight guest suites, four to each wing at the side of the converted two-story farmhouse. The suites weren’t overly large, though Eve’s was smaller than the others. Each suite consisted of a bedroom, bathroom, and small sitting room with a reasonable-size flat screened television.

That morning after the guests left, she went through each room that had the service tag hanging on the outside of the door to clean or just refresh the rooms. On the back of each tag the guest had written what services were required. Changing the bed, extra towels, or a variety of other services listed to check off on the back of the card.