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worse.
    When she opened her bedroom door, she heard male voices coming from downstairs. Caleb had company and it definitely wasn’t Gabby. For a minute her pulse kicked up. What if she couldn’t trust Caleb? What if he was just like the police officer in charge she’d dealt with in Florida?
    She walked slowly down the stairs and entered the kitchen to find a man talking to Caleb. She relaxed because she knew instantly that this had to be his twin. They shared the same build and facial structure. But Mac Winters’s hair was almost black and his eyes were brown instead of blue.
    “Annie,” Caleb said. “This is my brother Mac.”
    She stretched her arm out to Mac to shake his hand.
    “Sounds like you’ve had quite a roller coaster of events over the past few days. How are you holding up?” His eyes immediately honed in on her bruises.
    “It’s been challenging. First seeing my boss get murdered, then having Phil attack me, and now this.” She paused. “But I just thank God that I’m alive. I don’t even want to think about what would’ve happened to me if Caleb hadn’t shown up at the diner today.” She touched her neck reminding her of just how real it all had been.
    Mac’s dark eyes narrowed. “Unfortunately, the news I have from my end isn’t going to be good.”
    “What’s wrong?” she asked. Whatever Mac was about to say, Annie assumed the worst.
    “I was just telling Caleb this when you came down.” Mac looked at his brother and then back toward her. “You should have a seat.”
    She did as he said and sat down at the kitchen table. The men sat down too. She also noticed that Buddy the lab had decided to lie under her feet. She couldn’t help but reach down and give Buddy a pat. “All right. Just give it to me straight. I can handle it.”
    “At the FBI, we’ve been working the Silva case for a while. But no matter how close we get, there’s always been an issue with getting the evidence we needed against him to build a solid case. And now I think I’ve figured out the answer to that.”
    “And what is that?”
    “I believe that Silva has someone on the inside at the FBI. I don’t know who, but it explains why we get so close and then always manage to come up empty.”
    “What does this mean for me?”
    Caleb looked at her. “Annie, normally in circumstances like this, where you had become a target of an organized crime group, you’d be taken to an FBI safe house. Especially until the threat was neutralized and a further security assessment conducted. But in this instance, it’s not safe because we don’t know who we can trust. Since the FBI may be compromised, they can’t be brought into the equation. There’s only one other FBI agent we could trust. But he’s on his honeymoon right now. Which means, we’re on our own for the next couple of days until he gets back.”
    “Caleb has volunteered to take on your personal security,” Mac said. “You’re safer here in Maxwell under Caleb’s care, than anywhere else. Because as long as there is an insider working at the FBI, we can’t go down the route of involving the Bureau. It’s far too risky.”
    Caleb nodded. “This is the best security alternative right now. We can’t trust the FBI. I’d much rather keep you here. I trust the officers I work with. And we have a couple of other backup options if needed. I’ve let my deputy chief know the situation. He is on board to assist.”
    “Okay,” she said. Although she didn’t automatically trust this deputy that she hadn’t met. She was having a hard enough time relying on Caleb and his family.
    “And we’ve got Silva’s hit man in holding at the Maxwell jail,” Caleb said. “He received medical care for his flesh wound which wasn’t serious enough to put him in the hospital, so he’s on lockdown. I’m going to interrogate him first thing in the morning and try to get as much information out of him as I can. Guys like him rarely turn on their bosses for fear of