LITMIR.BIZ

       ONE

      Canyon Air Force Base was silent. Houses shuttered, lights off. Streets quiet. Just the way it should be in the darkest hours of the morning. Captain Justin Blackwood didn’t let the quiet make him complacent. Seven months ago, an enemy had infiltrated the base. Boyd Sullivan, aka the Red Rose Killer—a man who’d murdered five people in his hometown before he’d been caught—had escaped from prison and continued his crime spree, murdering several more people and wreaking havoc on the base. He’d released two hundred highly trained military dogs from the base kennel and created a feeling of unease among the community. Sullivan wanted to destroy everyone and everything that he blamed for his failures.

      Justin planned to stop him.

      “What are your thoughts, Captain?” Captain Gretchen Hill asked as he sped through the quiet community. A temporary transfer from Minot Air Force Base, Gretchen had been in Texas for several months, observing the way Justin, himself a K-9 handler, commanded the Security Forces. When she returned to her post, she’d help set up a K-9 unit there.

      “I don’t think we’re going to find him at the house,” he responded. “But when it comes to Boyd Sullivan, I believe in checking out every lead.”

      “The witness reported lights? She didn’t actually see Boyd?”

      “She didn’t see him, but the family that lived in the house left for a new post two days ago. Lots of moving trucks and activity. She’s worried Sullivan might have noticed and decided to squat in the empty property. Since she lives on the same court, she’s terrified.”

      “Based on how easily Boyd has slipped through our fingers these past few months, I’d say he’s too smart to squat in base housing,” Gretchen said.

      “I agree,” Justin responded. He’d been surprised at how much he enjoyed working with Gretchen. He’d expected her presence to feel like a burden, one more person to worry about and protect. But she had razor-sharp intellect and a calm, focused demeanor that had been an asset to the team. She didn’t shirk duties, didn’t complain about long hours, didn’t stand back and take notes while others did the job. She’d thrown herself into her temporary assignment wholeheartedly.

      As much as Justin had dreaded her arrival, he was going to miss her when she was gone.

      “Even if he decided to spend a few nights in an empty house, why turn on the lights? He knows this base. He knows that everyone on it is on high alert and searching for him.”

      “If he’s there, he wants us to know it,” Justin responded. It was the only explanation that made sense. And it was the kind of game Sullivan liked to play—taunting his intended victims, letting them know that he was closing in. He left red roses and notes before he struck. I’m coming for you. He loved to kill, but terrorizing people was his drug of choice.

      He needed to be stopped.

      Tonight. Not in another month or two or three.

      For the sake of the people on base and for Portia’s sake.

      Just thinking about his sixteen-year-old daughter being targeted by Sullivan made Justin’s blood run cold. A year and a half ago, Portia had come to live with him unexpectedly and reluctantly, forced to give up her school and friends after her mother died in a car accident. The loss had hit her hard. A shy teenager who seemed to have trouble connecting with her peers, she’d turned to the internet for comfort and amused herself by blogging. Unfortunately, she’d chosen the wrong topic, and had been unmasked as the anonymous blogger on the Red Rose Killer.

      She’d had no idea, of course, that Justin and Boyd had crossed paths long before Boyd’s escape from prison. She’d had no idea just how much danger she was putting herself in.

      While Justin and his team had struggled to find Boyd and identify the anonymous blogger, Portia had been quietly listening to their conversations and gathering information that she’d posted online. Worse, she’d mocked Boyd—a man who was as arrogant as he was dangerous. That, along with being Justin’s

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