“Don’t you think this is kind of running away from your problems?” Jessie had asked, realizing the question would likely put her friend on the defensive.

Kat looked at her quizzically. Even before she replied, Jessie knew she’d made a mistake. After all, Katherine Gentry was a former Marine who still bore the shrapnel scars from an IED explosion on her face. She had maintained a lockdown facility housing some of society’s worst until her most trusted lieutenant, Ernie Cortez, had betrayed her, enabling the escape. She was tough as nails and Jessie knew it.

“I think I’m entitled to a little personal time,” Kat said, refusing to defend herself beyond that. “If I thought the marshals would let you, I’d suggest you come with me.”

“Believe me, I’d love that,” Jessie replied, relieved her friend hadn’t been more defensive. “But the truth is, until my father and Crutchfield are caught, I’m not going to sleep easy, no matter what continent I’m on. Once we come up with a plan to catch these guys, I’m all over it. I need to finish this so I can have some kind of life.”

“It doesn’t seem like there’s much of a plan in place,” Kat noted wryly.

“Nope,” Jessie agreed. “And don’t think that hasn’t been on my mind. The only saving grace is that I know my father is too injured to come after me just yet. When I last saw him, he was jumping out a fourth-floor window, and that was before he was injured already in the stomach, shoulder, and head. He’s going to be out of commission for a little while.”

“But Bolton Crutchfield won’t be,” Kat reminded her. “He’s perfectly healthy and raring to go. And he has…assets at his disposal.”

Kat didn’t elaborate beyond that but she didn’t need to. They both knew what she meant. In addition to the two escapees he might have at his disposal, there was also Ernie, Kat’s former second-in-command at NRD.

While Kat was attending the funeral ceremony for Jessie’s adoptive parents, Ernie, an imposing physical specimen at six foot six and 250 pounds, murdered multiple NRD security officers, then released Crutchfield and the others. It was days afterward that the FBI was able to uncover what never showed up in the background check Kat had conducted when hiring him.

When Ernie was eleven years old, he’d spent a year in a juvenile psychiatric facility after stabbing another kid multiple times in the abdomen with a screwdriver. Luckily for him, the other boy survived.

Ernie served his time without incident. After his release and a family move, he had no further problems. His juvenile records were sealed when he turned eighteen. With no other red flags on his record, all that remained was a sterling resume in the US Army, followed by stints as a private security contractor and a prison guard at a supermax prison in Colorado.

If Kat had access to his psychiatric records from the juvenile detention center, she would have learned that the medical personnel viewed him as a sociopath with an amazing facility to control and hide his violent predilections.