A/N: Here's another chapter. Thank you so much for your reviews and enjoyment of the story. Not much to say here. Thank you to my prereaders; BitterHarpy, LaMoMo, Maplestyle, and aGoodWitch. Thank you to Alice's white rabbit for her beta skills. Love you all, and on to the story.
Edward stalked over to me and grabbed the plushy rainbow I had in my hands and looked at it closer.
"I hope she didn't like this."
I stopped him. "Wait, Edward. Do you really want to be the person who destroys her things in the middle of the night without her there?"
"This is a little more important."
"No, it's not. They already know where we are. We're gonna have to move again."
"Maybe not. If we take this out and take it somewhere, then crush it, it may keep them from coming here."
I thought that sounded a bit iffy, but he was the one who had been doing this for longer so whatever. We still needed to wake up Katiya. I was more curious as to how she had a stuffed animal with a tracker in it. I went down the hall and woke her up gently. "Hey, sleepy girl. Can you come with me to your room for a minute? Edward and I have a question for you."
She nodded and followed me to her bedroom. When she saw Edward standing there with the stuffed rainbow, she got that little frown on her face, the same one she had earlier when she bypassed this stuffed toy and grabbed the one Alice gave her. I noticed it.
"Hey, why do you keep frowning at that, Katiya?" I said, gesturing to it with my head.
"The bad man gave that to me."
"The ones at your house that night?" Edward asked, looking surprised.
Katiya shook her head. "No, the man at the police station. Before they put me in protective custody. It was some guy from the … I forget the name. Emmett works for them."
"The FBI?" I asked, looking at Edward with fear.
"Yeah. He said that a pretty girl like me should have cute things like this. I liked him. Then when the safe house was broken into, that guy was there, and I knew he wasn't a good guy. So, I ran, but I took that with me."
Katiya and I jumped when Edward turned and punched the wall. "Fuck!"
I looked at him in surprise, and he started pacing. I picked up the plushy that he dropped on the floor. "Okay, Katiya. This isn't safe anymore. There's something inside this that is letting them know where we are. Are you okay with us getting rid of it?"
She nodded her head, but I noticed she was looking at Edward with worry. "Bella, is he okay?"
"Yeah, honey, he's just kinda worried. The bad guy is Emmett's boss."
"But you told me Emmett is a good guy."
"He is, pretty girl. He's a really good guy, so he might be sad to find out that his boss isn't on the same side as him."
"Will he hurt Emmett? I like Emmett."
"No, honey, I don't think so. Edward will talk to Emmett, okay."
Katiya nodded. She walked over to Edward, and I was a little shocked—that little girl was brave, or she just cared about Edward a lot, maybe both. She tugged on his pant leg. He looked down at her and kneeled down to her.
"I'm sorry that your friend is in trouble, Edward. We'll protect him, right?"
Edward smiled that crooked grin I adored. "I'll tell him what I know, but I think Emmett is better at protecting himself than I think we would."
"Speaking of Emmett. He needs to know, right now, and we gotta get that tracker away from here. Everyone in the car; I'm not leaving you guys here."
I nodded and grabbed another pillow and blanket from Katiya's bed and handed it to her. Edward picked up the stuffed rainbow from the floor. I ran to the bedroom and put on a light hoodie and lounge pants, instead of the shorts and tank top I was sporting. We moved all of our stuff out to the shed and locked the padlock. We wanted to make it look like we had left if anyone came looking. I met Edward and Katiya at the car, and soon, we were off.
"Where are we going?"
"Somewhere in Montana. Then we're going to rent a new car."
"How?"
"I have a fake ID and a fake credit card. That was another reason we came to Esme's house; that's where I hid them last."
"But you said we can't get groceries."
"Yeah, because I don't want anyone to have the address."
"Oh, that makes sense."
We made small talk on the drive to Montana. It was two states and four hours away, so we assumed they would know that we knew we had been found and we were running again. "So, where are we gonna go after this?"
"We're going back to the house."
"I know. We left all our stuff there, but where after that?"
"I honestly don't know, Bella. We're gonna have to stay there and figure some things out. That's why we're doing this. By the time they figure out it's a ruse, we may have some things figured out by then," he explained. I nodded.
Once Katiya fell asleep, he pulled his cell phone out and put it on speakerphone. The call went through and there was some rustling and a very sleepy voice. "'Lo?"
"Emmett, man, it's Edward. I'm sorry to call you so late."
"What's going on?"
"Well, I got some info. First of all, we found out that Katiya had a stuffed animal that was bugged. That was how they found us in Oregon, and there was someone at the house tonight"
"Fuck."
"We're getting rid of it, man. The second thing is how Katiya got the thing in the first place. The night that all of this shit started, there was a man at the police station that Katiya met. That man was with the FBI, and he was there when the bad guys found the safe house."
"What? Edward, are you positive?" Emmett asked, sounding panicked.
"Yeah. You haven't been giving all our info to your boss, have you?"
"No, but he is the one who got Bella's family set up with the safe house. I set up Riley to guard them myself, but he knows where they are. Plus, he's an admin, so he could tap into any info he needs to. Luckily, I've been keeping a lot of what I've been doing on the down-low, but I think we need to find out where Bella's family is. Can you look it up with your marshal access?" My blood ran cold as Emmett told him. Edward saw the look on my face, and he grabbed my hand and squeezed it.
"I don't have access to that stuff right now. I don't do that hacker shit, and I can't exactly waltz into any PD and ask for their computer system."
"Okay. I'll call Riley. Are you sure that he can be trusted, Edward?"
"I'm positive. He's clean, and he has no family to hang over his head. You need to stay put though, Emmett. You can't let your boss know or even suspect that you know. Don't become a liability or a loose string they need to cut."
"Shit, yeah, I know you're right. It's just hard having them all out of sight. I'll call you guys when I know what Riley is gonna do. Don't worry, Bells. If they were gonna hurt your family, they would have done something. Once you guys fall off their radar, then they'll act, but we're already ahead of them. Okay?"
"Okay. Thank you, Emmett. Please be careful. My sister would kick my ass if anything happened to you."
Emmett laughed. "Now, that sounds like my Rosie. I'll be in touch."
The line went dead, and I knew that he'd hung up. I looked out the window, thinking. I needed to stay positive and believe that they would be okay. My dad was with them, so I knew they would be all right. My dad was smart, levelheaded, and he was a cop. He tended to only get angry or worked up when it came to Rose's and my safety, other than that, he had a calm that I sometimes envied. I was a little more impulsive than him—I got that from my mom—but until recently, I was able to show a calm front most of the time.
"Bell, can you ease up?" I heard Edward asked.
I looked over at him, and he looked like he was in pain. That was when I realized I was squeezing his hand really hard. I immediately let go. "I'm so sorry, Edward. Are you okay?"
He shook his hand and made a fist a couple times. "Yeah, I'm fine. Bella, your family is going to be okay."
"I know. I was just thinking. I really am sorry."
"No blood, no foul, Bells." He flashed his adorable smile and chuckled.
I knew he was purposely using the name Emmett always called me. If it wasn't Baby Belle or little one, he called me Bells. "Yeah, laugh it up, sir," I said, knowing that it was torture when I called him that and he couldn't do anything about it.
He groaned and gave me a hungry look. "Watch it because I'm not above pulling this car over."
"Go ahead. I'll remind you there's a child asleep in the backseat."
"Spoilsport."
"She may still need therapy when she's older but seeing either of our naked asses will not be a reason why."
I fell asleep for part of the ride after we had talked a little bit. I was woken up by Edward. We were in a well-lit parking lot. I looked up and saw we were at a car rental place near an airport.
"Come on, B. I got a new car rented for us."
It was then I noticed that he had a tired-looking Katiya in his arms. He led us to a new silver Dodge van. "This is what you got. Out of all these cars in this lot, this is the one we get?" I said, looking at the van in disdain.
"Really? Did you want something cooler? I thought you wanted to be a soccer mom."
"Ha. Even if I did, I wouldn't drive this nerd mobile."
"I figured it was inconspicuous, and when we have to leave again at a moment's notice, it would be nice to have the extra cargo space, plus, larger reclining seats so if you or Katiya need to sleep you could be comfortable."
My face softened at his explanation. He actually thought of us and wanted to make sure we would be comfortable. I pulled him closer to me by his belt loops and kissed him long and deep. "Thank you, Edward. That's actually really sweet. I'm sorry I made fun of your choice."
He smiled and gave me a quick peck on the lips before he showed Katiya how to work the seat recliner. Then he tucked her in and kissed the tip of her nose, causing her to giggle. I stroked her hair and kissed her on the forehead. Edward and I got in the van after he moved all our stuff over, and he did a bug sweep of the car.
"Wait, where is the stuffed animal?"
"I left it in a field in the middle of nowhere by an abandoned house."
"You didn't crush it."
"No, I want to make them think we haven't found it yet. I figure it will only buy us a few days, but it will be enough to relax and figure out where to go from here."
"What if they come back to Esme's house?"
"I'm sure they've already gone to her house and realized we weren't there and saw the tracker leading away, so they'll think we're gone."
I looked back and it looked like Katiya was asleep. I turned on the DVD player they had in the van, which was super fancy but convenient, and then switched the sound to the back. "What is the game they're playing? Surely, they just aren't waiting to chase us all over the US."
"What worries me most is that they're just keeping track of us until her dad gets here, or one of his direct underlings. It would take some time for him to get things set in motion so he can enter the US, whether legally or not. He also would need time to get his affairs in order before he could leave things over there. That's the worst-case scenario."
"Okay, I'm not up on this mafia shit, but I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that is going to be really bad. What's gonna happen now? They won't be able to find us, right?"
"They are going to try like hell to draw us out of hiding."
"How? If my parents move without them knowing, they won't have much."
"I don't know, Bella. I didn't deal with the mafia/mob shit much. I did US Marshal stuff, but it was still mostly small-time things. This is Emmett's wheelhouse, but he still hasn't done something this big. The Bratva is a whole other ball game than the mob in the US."
I decided to get some more sleep on the way back to Utah so I could stay up with Katiya and he could get some sleep. I knew that he still needed to run to the store, and we needed to figure out our next step.
When we got back home, that is exactly what he did. He went to the store, leaving me and Katiya there. I was armed, of course, and on edge the entire time, but nothing happened. Katiya really wanted to play outside, and she wanted to have hair like me, so she readily agreed to us dying her hair dark. It took some getting used to, seeing her with dark hair, but she was still beautiful and adorable. The morning we got back, Emmett let us know that my dad had taken him, Rose, and my mom deep into hiding. He gave Riley a message that only I could decode. I knew where to find them when this was all over, though I told no one. Riley had lied to his boss and told him that he had been doing a perimeter check and that my family had been grabbed before he got back. He was put on suspension, but his superiors bought it. We had no idea how far this went, but Emmett and Edward both had strong suspicions that Edward and Riley's boss was being leaned on by some bad people. Looking into his history and activities, this guy wasn't dirty, but he was in bed with some shady people. We spent a few more days at Esme's, but Edward had an idea for our next house, and I was willing to follow him. Three days after we got back from our midnight run to Montana, we had packed up the van and were ready to leave again.
We got into the van and I got Katiya set up with a DVD, some coloring books that Edward had picked up for her, and a book out of the few he grabbed for her too.
"So, where to now?"
"My sister's fiancé owns a house in McCall, Idaho. It's a really small mountain town but there are restaurants and stores. There's also some really big, beautiful houses there too. It's still in his great aunt's name, so it's not in any name that will come up in a search for my associates, though they don't even know I'm with you."
"Are you sure of that?"
"Yeah, Emmett never told his boss who your marshal contact was, and Riley didn't know for sure that I was with you. He assumed I was calling in a favor because we were friends, but no one knows that I'm with you except Emmett and my marshal contact, who doesn't report to my boss. It's the protocol, so confidentiality doesn't become an issue."
"Then what happened in Seattle?"
"That was my misstep. I asked the wrong person, and it threw up the wrong red flag to the captain at the precinct. I don't know if they even knew exactly what I was doing or who I was protecting, but someone got scared. Someone will figure it out once they put two and two together, but they haven't yet."
"And when they do, then that's when we need to make a decision about WITSEC?"
"No, Bella. That is out the window. We can't be sure of who to trust, so WITSEC really isn't an option for us."
"So, we could be running for the rest of our lives."
"We will need to neutralize the problem."
"We're gonna have to take down the mob? That's not even possible."
"There are many ways to make them take themselves down from the inside. Why do you think the mob has dwindled so much since the days of Al Capone, Gotti, Dillinger, and Genevese? They got smart about staying quiet, and the families fought between themselves for territory and power when Dons were taken out of the running. Needless to say, it can be done. So, no, the mob will never be gone, but you can take down the higher-ups, and there will be people more than happy to take over and won't come after us."
I exhaled deeply. "This is all really overwhelming."
"Breathe, Bella. We aren't even there yet. We need to figure out who her dad is and how far up he is. We need to wait for Emmett's contact to give him an update. He told us it can take up to two weeks, and we are just coming up on five days, so we may still be waiting for a bit."
I nodded and tried to distract myself with the movie we were playing on the DVD player and started to read a book that Edward had gotten for me at the store. I don't know how Emmett did it, but he was able to get a computer whiz to get into my bank account and wire the money to Edward. It was done without a trace, and it kinda scared me that someone was able to get in the back door and take my money without any evidence so we could buy groceries and gas.
We soon settled into the house in McCall, and Katiya was slowly becoming a completely different child. Excited, rambunctious, chattering with me and Edward constantly, she was turning into a normal eight-year-old child. Edward and I continued to grow closer, telling each other things we had only told our closest friends and family. It was easy to get complacent. I knew we were waiting on word from Emmett's contact, and then a decision about how to move forward would need to be made. Some days, it was easy to get distracted from what we were up against, but I never forgot. I knew something big was coming, but it was only a matter of when.
A/N: So, how do we feel? Leave me some love and let me know. The story is ramping up so join me next time. Thank you and stay safe!
