"I already have a federal contact," Darla replied. "Sandra Cho. She's been investigating the logistics company for nearly two years. She knows there's a witness and records I can deliver, though she doesn't know all the details yet. Once she does, the case changes."
"How quickly?"
"Hours to transfer and review, longer to obtain whatever legal authorization she needs. I'm not going to pretend a senator and a government contractor can be investigated in a morning simply because we want them to be."
Cole considered the answer. He had spent years around men who believed certainty was a substitute for preparation. Darla was not one of them. "Then we give Cho the evidence as soon as possible. And if Cain wants to talk tomorrow, he can talk while the investigator works."
"You're thinking of meeting him anyway," Mara said.
"I'm thinking the safest conversation is one where Cain understands there are people outside his club who know what we're discussing."
Darla looked at Cole with weary recognition. "You always believed a problem was easier if you walked straight toward it."
"Not always," Cole said. "I spent eight years proving the opposite."
He glanced toward the kitchen, where Eli was finishing his soup. The boy's backpack lay beside his chair, the old photograph tucked safely inside. Cole thought about that small hand reaching toward the compass in the diner. He had spent so long wishing for another chance to stand beside Evan that he had failed to imagine what that chance would actually require. It would require staying when things became uncomfortable, and telling the truth even when the truth did not make anyone feel better.
Darla's phone vibrated. She looked at the screen and answered in another room. When she returned, her eyes were bright with restrained emotion. "Evan's coming," she said. "He should be here within the hour."
Mara went still. "Does he know Eli is here?"
"Yes."
"And he agreed?"
Darla's voice softened. "He didn't need to be asked twice."
Cole looked toward the yard. Somewhere out there, men he did not know were keeping watch and making quiet preparations to help a family they had never met. He had once believed that loyalty belonged to a patch and a chapter. Now he was beginning to understand that loyalty was something people demonstrated, and that sometimes the most faithful person in a room wore no insignia at all.
The next hour passed with a slowness Cole had rarely experienced outside hospital waiting rooms. Darla made calls. Voss checked in with the riders on the property and quietly brought several trusted people closer, not to invite a confrontation but to make clear that the household was not isolated. The men who had been following the road did not enter the property. They remained somewhere beyond the trees, and when they finally drove north the sound of their engines receded without incident.