Chapter 24 #2
I watched the Peugeot bounce through the street market, dodging a delivery truck and narrowly missing a bakery cart, all with Harper and Brie crammed in the back seat like cargo.
My chest twisted in on itself—I could almost taste her fear, sharp and metallic through the frayed cord of our bond.
I was already calculating the intercept, every muscle straining for the signal to move.
That’s when Wrecker made a great shot out the passenger window.
A suppressed single, perfect shot. The rear tire of the Peugeot exploded with a yowl of shredded rubber, sending the car into a wild swerve.
For a split second, I saw hope: the rear fender clipped a bollard, the door popped, and Brie’s face appeared in the shattered window, mouth open in a silent scream.
Then hope died. A second SUV—a black Dacia with diplomatic plates—lurched from a side alley, cutting off our access to the Peugeot, spraying gravel as it blocked us.
Two more wolves, these burly and cropped close like Eastern Bloc prison guards, leaped out with silenced pistols drawn.
The Peugeot’s driver floored it, fishtailing through the broken glass, and in the chaos, both cars vanished down the service road, trailing black streaks and howls.
Wrecker barked at Papa. “Go! They’ll double back through the tunnel under the A14.”
I looked to the backseat of the van and saw Nanette huddled in the corner weeping.
“Where’s Gwen?” I shouted over the sirens.
Wrecker didn’t look back. “Paramedics got her. Doc’s with her. He put Nanette in the van and then ran back to ride with her to the hospital.”
Papa squealed the van's tires. The van was a civilian Mercedes, nothing fancy, but he drove it like a battering ram. We shot through a red light, horn blaring, and banked hard toward the underpass.
Parker chimed in on comms, breathless but laser-focused. “I have camera pings on both vehicles. Papa, if you cut through the next alley, you’ll intercept two blocks ahead.”
He grunted and yanked the wheel, sending us lurching over a curb and down a cobbled side street.
The G-forces pinned me to the seat, but the tunnel vision was worse: every heartbeat, every breath, was a flicker of Harper’s panic, the bond sparking wild in my head.
She was awake now, fighting hard, but the wolves had her boxed in.
Nanette moaned in the back seat. “Please,” she whispered. “Don’t let them take her. Don’t let them…”
The Peugeot reappeared at the next intersection, listing hard, metal grinding on pavement. Ahead, the black Dacia spun a fast U-turn, cutting off a city bus and triggering a chorus of horns. For a moment, both cars slowed in the snarl, trapped by traffic and bad luck.
Papa jammed the van into park and popped the side door. “Now!” he barked.
Wrecker and I spilled onto the street, dodging scooters and angry pedestrians.
We reached the Dacia first. The two wolves inside had already spotted us, and the passenger lunged out, brandishing a pistol.
Wrecker didn’t even break stride; he grabbed the man by the wrist, twisted, and slammed him face-first into the hood.
I heard the pop of bone and the squeal of pain.
The driver tried to gun it, but I was already there, yanking the door open and dragging him out by his lapels.
He went for my throat, but I boxed his ears, then slammed his head against the window until he sagged.
All the while, my eyes tracked the Peugeot, where Harper’s pale arm flailed in the shattered window, fighting to reach the outside.
Behind me, the Dacia’s engine screamed, then stalled. I turned in time to see Wrecker use the wolf’s own pistol to shoot out the tires—one, two, three, four, fast as a metronome.
I made for the Peugeot, but the driver had recovered.
He floored it again, swerving around the wrecked Dacia and aiming for the open road.
I gave chase, lungs burning, but after three blocks the adrenaline ran out and the car was gone, leaving nothing but a haze of exhaust and the echo of Harper’s terror.
I dropped to my knees on the curb, gasping for breath. Wrecker caught up, bruised and bleeding. A wince marred his face.
“They got away,” I said, the words sour in my mouth.
He put a hand on my shoulder. “Not for long.”
Parker buzzed through the comm again. “I’m tracking the Peugeot—last sighting near Nanterre, heading west. They’re trying to get out of the city center, probably toward a secondary safe house. I’ll keep eyes as long as I can.”
I slumped into the passenger seat of the van, wiped the blood from my face, and tried to center myself. The bond to Harper pulsed in my head, an SOS too loud to ignore. She was scared, but she was still fighting.
That was all I needed.
Papa put the van in gear. “What’s the plan, Arsenal?” he asked.
I didn’t hesitate. “We follow. We hunt. We don’t stop until we have them back.”
Wrecker grinned a feral grin. “That’s the Arsenal I know.”
We barreled west; the city blurring past, every nerve tuned to the hunt. I didn’t know what waited at the end of the road, but I knew who’d be standing when it was over.
We were wolves, and we’d just tasted blood.
The safe house was a nondescript house at the edge of Versailles: the kind of place that got rented for cash, no questions, no lease, keys waiting in a taped envelope under a chipped terra-cotta pot.
Inside, the blackout curtains filtered the noon sun to a nicotine haze, and the furniture was a random inheritance from a hundred other safe houses: a slumped corduroy sofa, a pilled rug, folding chairs around a chipped Formica table.
The smell was a chemical war between bleach and ancient cigarettes, but it was safe, and for now that was enough.
We tumbled in, bloodied and wild, and the first thing I did was check the bond.
Harper felt farther away than she ever had—a blip on the edge of perception, too faint to track by gut alone.
I knew she was alive, but there was a coldness in it, like she’d slammed every door behind her on the way out.
Rafe’s men had picked up Doc and assembled a team to help thanks to Papa making the calls. He, Marcel, and Etienne were welcome faces. “Well, amie’s you almost got away unscathed. But it seems you just got away, and you seem to have lost precious trésor.”
I shook my head. “Not for long. Now, are you fuckers going to help get that treasure back or are you just going to continue to point out the obvious?”
“Let’s hear how you’re getting her back and how we are going to help.”
Parker set up her laptop at the end of the table, eyes gone wild as she hacked into the city’s camera grid.
Wrecker prowled the perimeter, pausing at the door to sniff the air, then mapping out the nearest exits on a wrinkled city map.
Papa parked Nanette at the table, wrapped her in a blanket, and poured two fingers of vodka into a chipped mug.
She didn’t even flinch as she knocked it back.
I paced the living room, unable to sit, unable to stop moving. My shirt was a mess of dried blood and sweat, my hands still shaking from adrenaline. Wrecker stalked in, gestured with his chin toward the closed window.
“Luc’s trail ends at a warehouse near the Nanterre industrial park,” he said. “Lots of trucks, lots of noise. They’re prepping a transfer.”
“To Steiner?” I asked.
He nodded. “Or worse. We need to get there before the crate leaves the yard.”
Parker swiveled in her chair, dark circles under her eyes.
“I’m running facial on every angle from the last camera hit.
The van dumped near a loading dock at 10:17, and three people carried out two bodies.
Then the feed glitches.” She slammed the keys, teeth bared.
“Someone’s jamming the next block, or else they’re running it off the books. ”
I stopped behind her, fingers digging into my jaw. “Can you get past it?”
She snorted. “Give me thirty. I’ll be running in their veins.”
Nanette set her mug down, her voice paper-thin. “I didn’t know. I thought—” She broke off, cradling her head in her hands.
Papa hovered at her side, gentle as he could manage. “You did what you had to,” he rumbled.
She looked up, face ravaged. “But Brie—she betrayed us. She set us up. My own daughter set us up.”
The words hit me like a backhand. I wanted to argue, to tell her Brie was just a pawn, but I didn’t have the energy to lie.
Instead, I turned and drove my fist into the wall.
The plaster split with a satisfying crunch, pain radiating up my arm.
For a second, everything in the room froze. Even Parker looked up, startled.
“Sorry,” I muttered, shaking the dust from my knuckles.
Wrecker grunted. “We need that temper. Just not yet.”
We crowded around the laptop as Parker piped a feed to the flat screen.
Rows of cameras, city blocks flicking past in green-tinged night vision.
Wrecker pointed to a side street. “There. The van’s gone, but a white Sprinter picked up something at 10:30.
Tag matches to a shell company tied to the Renaults. ”
Parker zoomed in. “Warehouse is here. Satellite shows three ways in: loading bay, south gate, and the canal.”
Papa straightened, eyes on me. “What’s the move, Arsenal?”
I drew a long breath, let it out slow. “We hit it from all sides. Parker on over watch. Wrecker and I take the gate. Papa, you stay with Nanette and keep the van hot. Marcel, Etienne, your team will take every other opening.”
Marcel cracked his knuckles. “Sounds like fun.”
Doc’s phone buzzed, and he snatched it up. “Gwen,” he said, listening. His face eased a fraction. “Gwen’s out of surgery. She’s stable. Says the glamour will hold for another twelve hours, but after that, we’re all on the grid. Also—she says good luck.”
I nodded, something in my chest loosening. “Let her know we’ll bring Harper back.”
Doc set his jaw. “Damn right.”
We spent the next ten minutes mapping the warehouse on the big screen, marking entry points, sight lines, fallback routes. Every muscle in my body wanted to sprint the whole way, tear the place down brick by brick, but I held the line. Wolves didn’t get second chances, and we had to do it right.
At 12:40, a member of the French team checked in: “Six guards at the canal lock. Light armament, local pack. No demons, but Steiner just arrived. Be quick.”
Wrecker loaded up, checking his sidearm with practiced ease. “Remember what Bronc said. Let the French team take out Steiner. Or at least incapacitate him so he can be brought back to Rafe.”
I wanted his head. But I had to honor my Alpha’s wishes. “Understood.”
I took one last look at Nanette, slumped at the table, blanket wrapped tight. Her eyes met mine, hollow and pleading.
“Bring them home,” she whispered.
I promised, though I didn’t know if I could keep it.
We rolled out, black windbreakers and city hats, every inch of us ghosts. The drive was short, silent. Parker tracked the feeds on her phone, murmuring updates as we neared the target.
At the warehouse, the air was sharp with the stench of evil. Big Papa idled the van a block out, ready to run if we called. Wrecker and I circled the perimeter, clocking the guards: three at the front, one smoking at the dock, another two pacing the side gate with a bored slouch.
The French team moved silent as the dead, checking in a larger grid.