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over Sara, and since Sara’s parents’ deaths, Beth had kept her word. “I’ll call her.”
    “Anybody phone home?”
    The team. “Sam’s neck-deep in the annual Civil War battle reenactment.” Mark would know that was in Alabama. “Tim’s down in the Keys.”
    “Still nursing a broken heart?”
    “Oh yeah.” Joe frowned and swatted a mosquito buzzing his face. “Mandy was supposed to marry the guy she dumped Tim for today.”
    “Did she do it?”
    All the guys had hoped she’d come to her senses. “I haven’t heard, so I guess she did.”
    “Tim’ll be a wreck for a while then.”
    “Yeah.” Tim and Mandy had been engaged for nearly a year when she met Mr. Wonderful and kicked Tim to the curb like a piece of trash. Foolish move she’d one day regret. Tim had it all: looks, personality, money, and class. Joe didn’t get it—and he liked women and understood most of them better than they understood themselves. But he’d never understood Mandy. The woman had secrets; Joe would bank on it.
    He swiped at the sweat on his forehead with his shirt-sleeve and glanced over. Light from a pole splayed over Karl Masson’s RV and the rear windshield of his car. Nothing stirring. “I haven’t talked to Nick.”
    “Special assignment. Madagascar, I think.”
    Joe deciphered the code. Middle East. One of the oil-producing countries .
    “Where are you?”
    “Following up a lead on Karl Masson.”
    “Without backup?” Mark’s voice elevated a full octave.
    “Just some recon, bro. No interdiction.”
    After the human-trafficking incident, the FBI put out word that Masson had died in a fishing camp explosion in Louisiana. As long as NINA continued to think that, Masson would live. Yet something was going on, or headquarters wouldn’t have requested Joe take on a special assignment monitoring Masson’s RV.
    “Watch your back.”
    “Will do.” Joe checked again. Still no activity. It’d been nearly forty-eight hours. Where was he? Had to be on an extended rafting trip. That’s the only thing that made sense. “When’s Clyde’s funeral?”
    “Tuesday. But don’t come. Like I said, things are too hot here right now.”
    Typical Mark. Always trying to protect everyone else. But if things were that hot, someone needed to watch his back and Beth’s. “Understood.”
    “I mean it, Joe. NINA would love to kill us both. Lay low.”
    “Got it, bro.” Joe would radio in the RV’s GPS coordinates and leave immediately for Seagrove Village. Mark knew Joe would; had known it when he called. One of those strings had been tied to Lisa’s finger. No way would Mark stay out of it—officially or unofficially—and for the same reason, neither would Joe.
    Beth Dawson might not yet realize she mattered much to Joe, but he realized it. She was sporting one of those strings and looking into the incident? Wild horses couldn’t keep him away.
    “Get creative.”
    Very creative . “Yeah.”
    “And check with your sources on Robert Tayton III. Something’s off with that guy.”
    Of the team, Joe had the broadest reach on connections. His team depended on that to survive. “Any idea what?”
    “No. But it’s something.”
    Mark’s instincts were legend. “All over it.” Joe locked in the GPS coordinates and crawled on his belly and elbows through the woods to his bike. He’dcall Sam on his way down to the village and have him run a background on Tayton. Nick was sharper on computers, but Sam had a bloodhound’s nose. If there was anything to find, Sam would find it. “Karl Masson’s been MIA from his gear for forty-eight hours. He could be your man.”
    “You think NINA knows he’s alive and brought him back into the organization?”
    “Do we have proof NINA ever considered him dead?”
    Mark grunted. “Valid point.”
    Joe slid over an oak’s protruding roots, scraping his stomach and thighs. “Get me a secure line to talk to Beth.”
    “I need a couple hours.”
    “Fine.” A rock dug into