“Born afterward.”
Bear looked at the photographs.
“So Michael has a family.”
“Yes.”
“Had.”
Chen caught the word.
“We don’t know that anything happened to Michael.”
“You said he was photographed eleven days ago.”
“Yes.”
“Where is he now?”
Silence.
Bear stood again.
This time no one told him to sit.
“You lost him.”
Chen’s face confirmed it before her answer.
“Contact with Michael was interrupted nine days ago.”
Bear stared.
“Nine?”
“Yes.”
“And Rachel disappeared last night.”
“Yes.”
“Someone knows about Lily.”
“Yes.”
Bear looked toward Delaney.
“How many people inside your system knew where they lived?”
Delaney stiffened.
“Careful.”
Bear’s eyes narrowed.
“That answer bothers you?”
Chen stepped in.
“We are investigating a possible compromise.”
Bear laughed without humor.
“Possible?”
A dark SUV had followed Rachel.
The same security contractor connected to Michael’s false death record owned it.
Someone had photographed Michael eleven days ago.
A text said move tonight.
Rachel vanished.
Bear slammed his hand flat against the table.
“You have a leak.”
Nobody answered.
That was answer enough.
Lily refused to leave Bear’s side after that.
Child protective services technically should have taken temporary custody.
Federal agents technically wanted her moved to a secure facility.
Bear technically had no legal authority.
Then Lily began crying so hard when Delaney suggested transporting her that she could barely stand.
Bear knelt.
“Hey.”
She wrapped both arms around his neck.
Her metal braces clicked as she shifted.
“Don’t let them take me.”
The room became silent.
Bear held her.
“I’m here.”
“Mom said find you.”
“I know.”
“She said you’d keep me safe.”
Bear closed his eyes.
Rachel Bennett had placed an impossible amount of trust in a man she had apparently never met.
Or maybe she knew more about him than he knew about her.
Bear looked at Agent Chen.
“She stays with me.”
Chen shook her head.
“Not possible.”
“Make it possible.”
“Mr. Callahan—”
“You have a compromised security system.”
Delaney bristled.
“You don’t know that.”
Bear looked at him.
“Then put her in your SUV.”
That shut him up.
Harper stepped forward.
“There may be an option.”
Everyone turned.
Emergency kinship placement.
If Lily’s father was confirmed biologically related to Bear and no safer immediate guardian existed, child services could approve temporary placement with supervision.
It took hours.
Fingerprints.
Background check.
Home inspection.
Interviews.
Bear had expected the day to involve pancakes, coffee, and maybe rebuilding Dave’s carburetor.
By six that evening, he had an eight-year-old great-niece sitting at his kitchen table coloring motorcycles.
The eleven bikers were outside.
All of them.
Nobody had asked them to stay.
They simply did.
Dave brought groceries.
Tommy installed a temporary camera above Bear’s front door.
Luis Ramirez checked every ground-floor window.
Bear stepped onto the porch.
“You people planning to move in?”
Dave handed him coffee.
“Maybe.”
“You’re too ugly.”
“Kid likes us.”
Bear looked through the window.
Lily was laughing at something Tommy’s wife had said.
His chest hurt.
“She’s Michael’s.”
Dave nodded.
“You can see it.”