Author Note: This story follows the events that happened in the final chapter of The Guilty Are Always Caught.

After getting off the phone with her cousins and informing them about what had happened at her house, Katlain called the homicide squad of the precinct where she worked so they could send detectives to inspect her place. While she waits for them to show up, she lays Katherine down in her crib until she can drive over to her cousin’s house.

Afterwards, Katlain checks some of the secret cameras inside the house to see if any of them caught anything. She had them put in years ago after a stalker broke into her house and ambushed her. She also checks the Ring footage to see if someone entered through the front door.

Several of the internal cameras caught a person dressed all in black moving through the house. From the footage's angle, Katlain manages to backtrack to where the intruder entered her home. The intruder came in through the back door and noticed they had disarmed the security system on the door.

Two police cars, the forensics team, and detectives William Knight and his partner Joyce Collins arrive at her house. While the detectives talk to her, the forensics specialist goes about determining how the intruder entered Katlain’s house.

Detective Knight looks at Katlain. “Katlain, do you know of anyone who might have a grudge against you or your husband?”

“Me, sure. But not my husband. He’s an independent trucker and a nice guy. A lot of the truckers he associates with are nice people.” Katlain has met some of the other truckers when she went on short runs with her husband.

“Katlain, I know you and your partner just got back from Washington, but do you think this has anything to do with that case?” Detective Collins knew Katlain and her partner had just gotten back from a case they had been working on.

“I doubt it. No one knew we busted knew anything about me. Here’s all the footage from all the concealed cameras I have hidden about my place.” Katlain had recorded everything to a flash drive to give to the detectives. She transferred a second copy to her cloud account for later review.

“Katlain, do you have some place you can stay tonight?” Detective Knight knew the forensic team would be busy.

“Yeah, I’m going to stay at my cousin’s place tonight.” Katlain had already packed her overnight bag and was ready to go. She did the same for her daughter as well.

“Alright, you know the boss isn’t going to let you investigate this yourself, don’t you?” Detective Collins looks at Katlain with a serious look on her face.

“Just try and stop me.” Katlain walks away from the detectives and grabs her overnight bag, as well as Katherine's.

Katlain walks out to the maverick in the garage and gets in it. She sends a text to her cousin letting them know she's on the way.

She knew the two detectives would lock her place up after they were done. She tries to keep her emotions under control as she calls a cleaner, whom she knows and trusts, to visit her place once the police and forensic team have finished. She gives them the entry code to the Ring so they can enter her place.

After forty minutes of driving, Katlain arrives at her cousin's mansion. The place was an old plantation home that her cousins bought. The house and the property came as a package deal. She pulls her maverick up to the old carriage house and parks it there. She gets out and carries Katherine and her bags up to the main house.

By the time she reached the front door, Taylor had opened the front door for her. He looks at her, “Come on in, cousin.”

“Thanks, Taylor.” Katlain enters the house and drops her bags.

“I’m sorry about your husband. He was a nice guy.” Taylor was still getting over the shock that Katlain’s husband was dead. He liked Declan and was surprised when she shared with him what had happened.

“Thanks. Also, thanks for letting me and the munchkin stay here.”

“Hey, after what happened at your place, it’s the least we can do for you. Your standard room has been made up for you. I also put the family crib in there as well.”

“Thanks, Taylor.” Katlain heads towards the bedroom she usually slept in whenever she stayed over.

Taylor followed behind his cousin as she went to the bedroom that had been made up for her. He’ll do some digging tomorrow to see who the shooter was who went after Katlain’s husband. He walks into the bedroom and drops Katlain’s bags down.

“If you’re hungry, there some luncheon meat in the frig.”

“Thanks. Now, if you’ll excuse me.” Tears were already leaking down Katlain’s cheeks.

Taylor takes Katherine and places her in the crib. He turns around and wraps his arms around Katlain and holds her against his body while she cries. He could feel his shirt being soaked from her crying against his shoulder. He holds her and lets her get it out of her system.

After a while, he can feel Katlain leaning more against his body. He walks her over to the bed and makes her lie down, after folding the sheets down. He tucks Katlain in and places a kiss on her forehead. He makes sure there is a box of tissues on the nightstand next to her bed.

He walks out of the bedroom, shutting the door behind him. He turns and starts walking towards his home office, where he spots his twin Traver sitting at his desk.

“How is she?” Traver knew how much Katlain loved Declan.

“Right now, I would give her some time to cope. She’s broken up.” Taylor walks over to his desk and sits down.

“We need to find out who put a hit out on Declan.” Taylor looks towards his twin.

“I’m already on it. I’ve already contacted several of our people, and hopefully we’ll know something by tomorrow.” Traver has been on the phone calling all their sources for information on who put the hit out on Katlain’s husband.

“God help whoever did, because when Katlain finds out, she’s going to go nuts.” Taylor knew what Katlain would do to the person who killed her husband.

Katlain is woken up the following day by Katherine crying. Katlain didn’t want to get out of bed, but forced herself to get up and tend to Katherine.
Her poor daughter had peed her diaper and needed it changed. She goes about changing her diaper and ensuring Katherine’s bottom is dry before applying baby powder and a fresh diaper.

Katlain changes the onesie her daughter was wearing and tosses the wet onesie in the clothes hamper in the bedroom. Katlain knew the maid would be in later to tend to the bedroom. She changes out of the clothes she wore yesterday and grabs her toiletries to take a shower.

She was doing everything she could not to fall apart right now. She had so many things she needed to do today. She walks across the hall and takes a shower. She breaks down and starts crying while in the shower.

Outside:
Keli covers up a yawn as the cab she was in pulls up the long driveway leading to her uncle's place. The flight from St. Louis to Augusta, Georgia, was long and tedious. Luckily, she had a first-class ticket, thanks to her uncle’s. She was happy to escape St. Louis for a few weeks.

After all the drama surrounding her inheritance of the security company, Mr. Knight left her. Plus, the small fortune, his house, and cars had even surprised her. His relatives and children thought she had something to do with it, but she didn’t. She had been surprised that Mr. Knight had instructed his lawyer to have her come to the reading of his will.

She was even more surprised at everything he had left her. She never asked anything from him and had enjoyed taking care of him. His children, on the other hand, weren’t very nice people.

“Here we are, Ms.” The taxi driver stops in front of the main house.

Traver was alerted to the arrival of his niece when the taxi stopped at the gate. He was happy that she had finally arrived. He had stepped outside to help her with her luggage.

A smile appears on his face when Keli steps out of the cab. He could tell she had changed how she wore her hair. It was styled to look more business-like. Additionally, he noticed she was wearing business-style pants, rather than her usual blue jeans and blouse.

When the taxi pulled up to the front of the mansion, Keli noticed her uncle Traver was waiting for her. A smile appeared on her face as she was overjoyed to see her uncle. It has been almost six years since she last saw her uncles.

The last time had been when she buried her mother in St. Louis. Her uncles wanted to fly her mother’s body back to Augusta and lay her remains in the family cemetery. But her mother left instructions to have her remains buried next to her husband in St. Louis.

“Uncle Traver, it's so nice to see you.” Keli runs up to her uncle and hugs him.

She could tell the difference between her twin uncles. There were only a few people who could tell them apart.

“It’s so nice to see you as well, Kelly.” Traver never liked the way his younger sister spelled Keli’s birth name. He preferred calling her Kelly, instead of Keli. He returned her hug and could smell that she was wearing her favorite perfume. It was the same type of perfume his little sister liked wearing.

“So, how was you’re flight?” Traver pays the cab driver and gives him a hefty tip for carrying his niece’s bags into the house.

“Long and tedious. I’m so happy to be here with you and Uncle Taylor.” Keli was so glad to be back in Georgia. At least here, Mr. Knight’s relatives and children wouldn’t be bothering her.

“Are things still bad back home with Mr. Knight’s relatives?” Traver had been surprised when he received a phone call from Keli and was informed about what happened to her.

“God, yes, Uncle Traver. They have contested the will several times and seem to have no intention of stopping.” Keli was glad that each time she ended up going to court, the final judgment was always in her favor.

“Well, you don’t have to worry about anything here. I do have some bad news.” Traver shuts the front door behind him.

“What’s that, uncle?” Keli hopes it had nothing to do with her.

“You remember your cousin Katlain?”

“Yeah? Did she finally get caught stealing cars?” Keli knew her cousin was a famous car thief and had never been caught.

“No, she has gone over to the other side. She’s an Augusta police officer, and just recently her husband was found murdered in their home. She and her daughter are going to be staying here with me and Taylor for a while.”

“This is a surprise. I never knew she was married or had a daughter either.” The last Keli knew of her cousin, she was a car thief, but also worked as a model. She had no idea her cousin had gotten married or had a daughter.

“She’s only been married for about a year now, and her daughter is almost two years old.” Traver helps carry Keli’s luggage up to the other spare bedroom that had been prepared for her.

“Does the police know who killed Katlain’s husband?” Keli follows her uncle to the bedroom.

“No, but Katlain is going to be hunting the person down. She might need some help.” Traver knew Keli wasn’t in the same business as he and Katlain were.

“If I can help, I will. I just inherited a large security firm that has access to every criminal database here in the States and overseas.” Keli had been surprised by what Mr. Knight did for a living.

“That is a surprise. Mr. Knight must have liked you.” Traver was surprised by that information.

“I don’t know why he left his company to me, uncle. I didn’t do anything that would warrant such a huge gift, along with everything else I told you and Uncle Taylor about.”

“Well, you must have done something special for him to leave you all his stuff, sweetie. Now, let’s get you settled in and go out for brunch.” Traver figures Keli must be hungry.

“Okay, uncle.”

Katlain’s bedroom:
Katlain finally got done taking her shower and went back to her bedroom to get ready for the day. She still needed to feed her daughter and make arrangements to bury Declan. She’ll have to get the family's permission to bury her husband in the family plot. Which meant she’ll have to speak with her great-uncle, since her grandfather passed away a few years ago. He was the last remaining elder alive. The responsibility would pass to her cousin’s parents, since her parents were in jail on drug charges.

Katlain grabs Katherine’s baby bag and her small wallet. She texts her cousins letting them know she’ll be out and that she has Katherine with her. The first place she plans on stopping is the funeral home to pick out a coffin for her husband and make arrangements with the local burial vault company to install a burial vault once she gets permission from her aunt and uncle.

As for her own funeral arrangements, she wants to be cremated and placed with her husband.

While Katlain is out and about making funeral arrangements. Her cell phone starts alerting her that the trucking warehouse where her husband parks his eighteen wheeler, along with his backup truck is parked was being broken into.

“Hang on, Katherine.” Katlain makes a quick u turn and heads back towards the direction she came.

The warehouse was in the opposite direction she was heading. She presses down on the accelerator to give her maverick a little bit more gas. It was a good thing her maverick was souped up, because she manages to get to the warehouse in six minutes flat. She hated leaving Katherine in the car, but someone was in the warehouse.

She turns the air on, and calls the police. Katlain turns and looks at her daughter “stay put beautiful. Mommy has to go inside and catch some bad guys.”

Katlain locks the maverick, and makes way towards the warehouse. She quietly enters the warehouse. She saw the door on her husband truck cab opened. She grabs a nearby wrench and makes her way towards her husband’s truck. She could see a person inside holding a device in their hands. It looked like it was hooked into the semi’s data port. She knew the onboard computer system kept a record of every destination her husband drove. It also allowed a mechanic to diagnostic the truck as well.

“Hands up right now.” Katlain was ready to strike whoever the person was in her husband’s truck.

The figure was decked out all in black and turned their head to look towards the voice. The figure saw the woman standing near the cab door with a truck wrench in her hand. He puts the device he was holding down and jumps out of the cab towards the woman.

Katlain didn’t expect what the person in the truck was doing and before she could swing the wrench in her hand. She lands backwards on her back, with the guy standing over her. The next thing she knows, the figure punches her in the face and knocks her out.

The figure was about to get back into the truck, but hears police sirens coming towards the warehouse. He looks back towards the cab and figures he doesn’t have time to grab his device. He looks down at the woman, he should shot her before she gets back up, but he needs to get out of here.

“Katlain, wakeup!” Officer Davenport tries waking up Katlain.

Katlain starts moaning as she starts waking up. She slowly opens her eyes and spot patrol officer Davenport looking down near her. She tries to sit up, but falls back down.

“What happened Katlain?” Davenport knew Katlain owned several warehouses and was a member of a special unit inside the Augusta police department.

Katlain looks at Davenport “I was jumped by the person who killed my husband.”

“Katherine! I got to get to Katherine.” Katlian tries to get up.

“She’s fine. Officer Colley is looking after her.” Officer Davenport extends his hand down towards Katlain.

Katlain grabs Davenport’s hand and use him to pull herself up off the ground. She was still feeling a little light headed. She steady herself, using Officer Davenport for support.

“Did you managed to see who attacked you?”

“No, because he was covered from head to toe in a black suit.” Katlain slowly start to recover.

“Why was the person here?” Officer Davenport was curious.

“He was digging around inside my husband’s truck.” Katlain walks over towards her husband’s truck and saw the device still connected to the data port of the truck.

“Why don’t you go outside and get your daughter, before you do anything else.” Officer Davenport would stand guard over the semi.

“Alright.” Katlain walks outside of the warehouse and spot Officer Colley outside with Katherine.

“Thanks for looking after Katherine for me, Officer Colley.” Katlain looks at her baby girl.

“It’s a good thing you left the car running or I would have to charge you with child endangerment.” Officer Colley knew Katlain would do anything for her daughter.

“Yeah, it was a bad idea to bring my daughter with me, but I got an alert from the alarms.”

“Well, next time think about what would happen to your daughter if you hadn’t called us.” Colley hands Katherine back to Katlain.

“Thanks for looking after her, Officer Colley.” Katlain hated that she left her daughter unattended.

She walks back inside her warehouse with Officer Colley following behind her. Both of them spotted Officer Davenport looking inside the semi.

“Why did your alarm go off.” Officer Colley was curious.

“Someone was breaking into my husband’s semi. I have concealed security system on this place.” Katlain walks over to her husband’s semi and looks into the cab.

“Officer Colley, can you hold Katherine for me, please?” Katlain wanted to know what that person was looking for on the computer system.

“Sure.” Officer Colley takes Katherine back and smile at the little girl.

“What is that, Katlain?” Officer Davenport was looking at the device Katlain was holding.

“It’s a data reader. The onboard computer system records every place my husband goes. It’s a new DOT regulation because a lot of truckers
like to be dishonest and keep a double log book of their times.” Katlain goes through the menu and reads the destination of where her husband has been.

“You seem to know a lot about this system.” Officer Davenport wonders where Katlain learned this.

“Who do you think maintains his trucks.” Katlain looks at Officer Davenport when she ask that question.

“So, what could your husband be hiding in the computer system?” Officer Davenport wonders what could be so important?

“I don’t know.” Katlain downloads everything she can.

She knew her husband had a secondary destination computer in his truck for special trips he did. However, you can’t access it from the main data port. There was a hidden data port only she and her husband knew about. She disconnects from the primary one and connects to the secondary one. She downloads the information in it.

“You are going to share that info, aren’t you?” Officer Davenport heard about Katlain’s husband being murder.

“Of course I’m going to share this information.” Katlain was going to keep the secondary information to herself.

After Katlain gets everything she needs and fill out the police report. She looks towards Officer Davenport “let me transfer this information to a thumb drive for Detective Knight and Detective Collins.”

“Alright, I’m holding you to that promise.” Officer Davenport makes sure he gets his meaning across to Katlain.

“I promise, now I’m going to lock up and disable my husband’s semi, so if that person comes back. They won’t be able to access any information.” Katlain wipes the information form the onboard computer.

Afterwards, she retrieves Katherine from Officer Collins and head back to her cousins place after locking up.

When Katlain arrives back at her cousin’s place. She parks her car in front of the garage her cousin’s keeps their Bugatti in. They don’t let anyone drive them, not even her.

She picks Katherine up out of her car seat, along with the diaper bag and walk towards the house. She wanted to look at the information she retrieved from the onboard computer system. She uses her electronic key to enter her cousin’s place.

Katlain heads upstairs to her bedroom to look at the thumb drive. She brought the data reader with her. She could tell it was a custom job. It didn’t look like any that she owned.

Katlain lays Katherine down in her crib and pull out her laptop, from her computer bag. She turns the laptop on and enter her passcode. She plugs the thumb drive in and bring up the program she uses to access the data. She scans the routes and none of them seemed to be out of the ordinary. Most of the deliveries were standard contracts her husband had with different companies.

While she is scanning the thumb drive, her cellphone beeps, alerting her to a new text. She stops what she is doing and looks at her cell phone. She notices that text was from Billy Jack. He was a friend of her husband’s. He was letting her know that Casey Knoxs and her husband were found dead at Stocker’s Truck Stop this morning.

The text had a link to a photo one of the truckers took. She clicks on the link and saw several police cars and coroner there. The photo showed the bodies covered up as they were taken out of the cab, but when she enlarged the picture. There was blood dripping out of the cab.

She knew Casey Knoxs and her husband. She met them when she traveled with her husband last spring. She took some time off from work and traveled with her husband with Katherine. She ask Billy Jack to let her know when the funeral is and that she is willing to donate money to the family.

Katlain goes back to examining the data on the thumb drive. She switches over to the secret data she downloaded. She notices there were several unauthorized routes her husband went. She checks the GPS coordinates to where the routes lead to. The places seemed to be ordinary houses, a few farms, and a few warehouses that could hide the semi inside without any problems.

All of them were out of state, so she would have to take time off from work to drive out to the nearest one. As for the assassin that attack her husband and the one, she found in her husband’s truck. She needs to track who they were and why they came after her husband and did they have anything to do with the death of Casey Knoxs and her husband.

She looks over towards Katherine and notices her little girl fell asleep. She really needs to bring her bouncy chair so her daughter can have some fun. Since Katherine was asleep, Katlain leaves her bedroom to see if her cousins were still home or if they went to their night club.

Katlain checks the house, and ask some of the maids if her cousins are home, but learn they left with her cousin. She couldn’t leave Katherine by herself in the house. There were days she hated the fact she was a mother. However, there were also days, she wouldn’t trade being a mother for all the tea in China.

She needs to find out who the assassin was. Katlain sends a text to her friend Rat. He had connections she didn’t. Normally, she would use Red, but he wasn’t available right now.

Since Katherine was upstairs asleep, she walks into the kitchen and make herself some lunch. She knew it might take Rat some time to get back to her. While Katlain is fixing some lunch, the casket company she used calls to informed her that they have to have the casket she selected brought in.

Katlain tells them that is fine, because the medical examiner wanted a little extra time. It seemed the morgue was a little backed up. She hangs up after that and hopes Rat gets back to her soon.

The Black Orchid Club:
Keli was amazed when she walked into her uncle’s club. She has never been in her uncle’s club before. She was too young to be allowed the last time she was here.

“So, what do you think of it, Keli?” Taylor and Traver look at their niece.

“It looks really nice. I bet you guys do a lot of business.” Keli looks at her uncle’s.

“We do pretty good. How are the clubs out in St. Louis?” Traver looks at his niece.

“I don’t know uncle Traver. I was so busy trying to get my nursing degree, that I didn’t have time for anything else. When Mr. Knight hired me to look after him. I spent all my time taking care of him.”

“That’s what makes you such a good person, Keli.” Traver and Taylor were proud of their niece.

“Thank you.” Keli hugs her uncle’s.

The three of them head upstairs to Traver and Taylor’s office. They show Keli their office and have drinks brought up for them. Keli liked how her uncle’s office was decorated.

She wonders if her uncles can help her with the problem of Mr. Knight’s family taking her to court again.