Forge's Purpose (Black Ops Brotherhood MC #4)

Chapter One

The vet clinic sat at the end of a dirt road that had seen better decades, a converted farmhouse with peeling white paint and a hand-lettered sign that read WESTON VETERINARY - ALL CREATURES WELCOME.

Malcolm Stone killed his bike's engine and listened to the Carolina pines settle into silence around him.

His German Shepherd, Ranger, whined from the sidecar.

"Easy, boy." Forge swung off the Harley and unclipped the dog's harness. "Let's get that leg looked at."

Ranger had been favoring his left rear for three weeks now.

Legion's wife Hannah had recommended this place—said the vet out here treated military working dogs, knew how to handle animals that had seen combat.

Forge trusted Hannah's judgment, even if driving forty minutes into the sandhills felt like overkill for a limp.

He pushed through the clinic's screen door and stopped dead.

The waiting room was empty except for a woman behind the counter, and she was stitching her own arm.

One-handed. No anesthesia. Crimson soaking through a shirt that might have been blue before it turned rust-brown. She didn't look up when he entered, just kept pulling the needle through her own flesh with steady, practiced movements that said this wasn't her first rodeo.

"Be with you in a minute," she said. "Have a seat."

Forge didn't sit. He cataloged the room instead—habit from seventeen years of checking weapons and positions before anything else.

Single exit behind him. Windows on two sides, no curtains.

Medical supplies on open shelving, accessible.

And through the barn window visible past the woman's shoulder, a shape that made his jaw tighten.

Dead horse. Bay mare, from the coloring. Flies already gathering.

"Ma'am." His voice came out harder than he intended. "You need help with that arm."

"What I need is to finish this suture before my nine o'clock gets impatient." She glanced up for the first time, and pale green eyes assessed him with the same clinical efficiency he'd just used on her space. "You're the German Shepherd with the limp?"

"The dog's the one with the limp. I'm just the transportation."

Something flickered across her face—not quite a smile, but close. She tied off the thread, snipped it with her teeth, and stood. Five-eight, rancher's build under that bloody shirt, callused hands that had clearly done harder work than stitching skin.

"Caroline Weston." She didn't offer to shake, just nodded toward the exam room. "Bring him in."

Forge followed, Ranger limping at his heel.

The exam room was cleaner than the waiting area suggested—stainless steel table, organized cabinets, the sharp smell of antiseptic cutting through the summer heat.

Caroline washed up without acknowledging the fresh wound on her forearm, grabbed a clean towel, and crouched to Ranger's level.

"Hey there, handsome." Her voice dropped to something soft and steady. "Let's see what's bothering you."

The dog, who trusted maybe four people in the world, let her run hands down his flank like they were old friends. Forge watched her work—the gentle pressure along the hip joint, the careful manipulation of the leg, the way she read Ranger's responses like a language she'd spoken her whole life.

"Mild hip dysplasia," she said after a minute. "Common in Shepherds his age. I can give you supplements that'll help, and some exercises to strengthen the supporting muscles. Surgery's an option if it gets worse, but we're not there yet."

"How much?"

"Sixty for the visit, forty for the first round of supplements." She stood, brushing off her knees. "I'll write up the exercise protocol. Shouldn't take more than fifteen minutes a day."

Professional. Competent. Acting like she wasn't wounded and dripping and there wasn't a dead horse rotting fifty feet away.

Forge had seen that kind of compartmentalization before. In operators who kept fighting with bullets in them. In medics who treated casualties while their own wounds went ignored.

In people who'd learned that breaking down wasn't an option.

"The arm," he said. "And the horse."

Her expression shuttered. "The arm's handled. The horse is none of your business."

"Lady, you're one-handing sutures on yourself and there's a dead mare in your barn. That's not 'handled.'"

"That's my problem, not yours." She turned to the cabinet, pulling bottles with movements that were just slightly too controlled. "Your dog's problem is joint inflammation. Let's focus on that."

Forge stepped closer. Not threatening—he didn't crowd women, ever—but close enough that she'd have to look at him.

"Who shot your horse?"

The question hung in the humid air. Caroline went still, bottles frozen in her hands.

"I didn't say anyone shot her."

"You didn't have to." He'd seen enough gunshot wounds to recognize the entry pattern, even from a distance. "That mare took two rounds, center mass. Whoever did it knew what they were doing. And based on that arm, they knew you'd be home to see it."

Silence stretched between them. Outside, a mockingbird called through the Carolina morning, obscenely cheerful.

"Four men." Her voice came out flat, stripped of emotion.

"Showed up yesterday evening. I've been documenting some...

activities in the area. Dumped dogs, mostly.

Fighting dogs that don't survive, or get thrown out when they stop winning.

I've been treating the ones I find, photographing injuries, building a case. "

"Dogfighting."

"Big operation, from what I can tell. Been going on for years, but they got sloppy.

Started dumping bodies closer to populated areas.

" Her hands tightened on the bottles. "I made calls.

Asked questions. Apparently asked the wrong people, because four good old boys showed up with guns and opinions about curious women. "

"They cut your arm?"

"Warning shot. The mare was the real message.

" Finally, she turned to face him, and the fire underneath her exhaustion blazed through.

"They wanted me to know what happens to things I care about if I keep asking questions.

So I stopped asking questions and started stitching myself up, because I've got a practice to run and animals that need me and I don't have time to fall apart over a horse I raised from a foal. "

Her voice cracked on the last word. Just barely, just enough to show the fractures underneath the professional facade.

Forge thought about the dead mare. About the sutures this woman had put in her own arm rather than drive to a hospital and explain what happened. About the kind of men who shot horses and cut women to make points about silence.

He pulled out his phone.

"Who are you calling?" Caroline demanded.

"Someone who handles problems like yours." He held her gaze while the line connected. "Legion. It's Forge. I'm at that vet clinic Hannah recommended. We've got a situation."

He gave the details in clipped sentences—dogfighting operation, four men, intimidation tactics, the dead mare and the wounded vet who hadn't stopped working despite bleeding through her shirt. Legion listened without interrupting, the way he always did when he was already planning.

"Bring her in," Legion said when Forge finished. "We'll handle it from here."

Forge ended the call and looked at Caroline, who was staring at him like he'd lost his mind.

"I don't know who you think you are—"

"Malcolm Stone. They call me Forge." He pocketed the phone. "I'm with a club out of Fayetteville. We handle problems the system won't touch, and we protect people the system won't help. Right now, that's you."

"I don't need protection. I need to bury my horse and run my clinic and—"

"The men who did this are coming back." He kept his voice level, but the steel underneath was impossible to miss. "They made a point yesterday. When you don't break, they make a bigger one. That's how operations like this work. You're a threat now, Dr. Weston, and threats get eliminated."

"You don't know that."

"I've spent seventeen years knowing exactly that." He stepped toward the door, then turned back. "I'm going to help you bury your horse. Then you're coming with me to the compound, where we can keep you safe while we figure out who these men are and how to stop them."

"I have patients—"

"Call someone to cover them."

"I have a practice to run—"

"You won't run anything if you're dead." He held her gaze, letting her see the certainty in his eyes. "You can argue with me the whole way if you want. But you're coming, Dr. Weston. One way or another."

Her jaw clenched. Fire and fury battled across her face, the stubbornness of a woman who'd handled everything herself for years colliding with the reality of a threat she couldn't treat with sutures and willpower.

"You're a real piece of work," she finally said.

"So I've been told."

"I don't even know you."

"You will." He grabbed a shovel from beside the barn door. "Now let's bury your horse before the scavengers do it for us."