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The lights were more visible now. Three separate flashlights or headlamps wavered in the dark as they drew closer.

She grabbed another log off the porch and Andy's clothes, then ducked back inside the cabin. She slammed and locked the door.

Andy was still watching to see who it was when he saw three men in the blowing snow, one in forest camouflage, wearing ski clothes, ski masks, and goggles, none of whom were in law enforcement gear. They could be hikers who had gotten lost and seen the lights on inside the cabin.

Then one of the men called out, "Hey, Denny, it's just us."

All three men were carrying backpacks. Andy wondered if they had picked up the ransom money from Pierre. Then again, maybe they weren’t even aware of the kidnapping plot. But why would they be trekking to the cabin in a blizzard that wasn’t Denny’s if they weren’t involved in all this?

He assumed they were not the good guys if they were meeting up with Denny. Andy feared Denny would warn them that they were walking right into trouble.

Monica droppedthe log and Andy's clothes on the floor inside the cabin and locked the door. She immediately grabbed her scarf that Andy had been wearing around his foot and wrapped it around Denny's mouth to keep him from calling out if the guys approaching the cabin were bad news.

She had done it just in time before one of the men approaching the cabin called out Denny's name. This was so notgood. There were three of them, and Andy was still outside in his polar bear coat.

She grabbed a hat and stuffed it in Helen's mouth, then raced to the bedroom at the end of the house. Once there, she unlocked the window, but when she tried to push it open, it was frozen shut and wouldn't budge. Frustrated and anxious, she had to go out the back door and take Andy’s clothes to him.

She didn't want to leave the house when both she and Andy would be outside in more danger. But she needed Andy inside, wielding a gun.

She grabbed his clothes beside the front door and raced to the back door. She opened it and headed outside and around the back of the house to where she'd seen Andy go. He approached the corner as he heard her, but he shook his bear head at her. Did he want to stay outside and fight the men?

All right. She headed back inside and dropped his clothes off near the fire. Then she locked the door and grabbed both her gun and his. She holstered his and kept hers in her good hand.

Through the curtains on one of the living room windows, she surreptitiously watched the three men grow closer. She sure hoped Andy didn’t get himself shot!

The men’s faces were covered with ski masks and goggles to protect them from the blowing snow, so she had no idea what they looked like. She sure wished she could notify her fellow agents about their predicament and get more backup.

The three men ended up on the porch.

The one who had called out before yelled, “Hey, it’s me, Wendell.” He tried the door but found it locked. “Hey! Denny!”

Monica was standing with her gun readied. If they broke in, she wouldn’t have a choice but to shoot at their lower extremities. She couldn’t allow them to take control of the situation.

“Go, try the windows. Look and see if you can locate them,” Wendell said.

“Where the hell would they be if not in the cabin?” one of the other men said. He wore a purple hat, which seemed incongruent with his camo clothes.

“Drunk and sleeping it off? Just go look,” Wendell said.

The other two men left the front porch and began trudging through the path toward the woodpile. “It looks like he was headed in that direction,” the one man said.

“Yeah, around the end of the house,” the other said.

“If he got hypothermia and died out here, the money is ours,” Wendell said.

The others laughed. The two men moved around the end of the house and suddenly cried out in fright.

Perfect,Andy thought as the men about shit their pants when they saw one big polar bear coming at them. Both men wore heavy ski gloves to stay warm, and they weren’t prepared to shoot at him if they were armed, thankfully.

He lunged at the closest man, knocking him down. Andy closed in on the second man before he could backtrack and get out of there, though he had nowhere to go unless he could get into the house. Andy struck him on the back of the head, and the man fell to the ground.

Andy glanced at the other man, but he was out cold too. Andy dragged the last one he took down to the back door. Thankfully, Denny and Helen couldn’t see him from where they were secured to the bar poles. But he wanted to get the unconscious men to the back door. He and Monica would secure him as soon as possible.

Wendell was still an issue. He yelled from the front porch, sounding stressed. “What’s wrong, Teague? Lionel? Shit!”

Your buddies won’t be able to help you, Wendell.

Andy returned to the end of the house to move the other guy. He grabbed him by his parka collar, pulled him around to the back side of the house with his teeth, and left him on the deck.