24. Ryker
Chapter 24
Ryker
The thing about catastrophe—it always starts with something small. A scent out of place. A pattern disrupted. A silence where there should be sound.
This time, it’s Theo bursting into my office at 5 AM, heat-scent twisted with panic. “She’s gone.”
Two words. Just two words to bring my carefully ordered world crashing down.
“What do you mean, gone?” But I already know. Have known since I slipped that drive back into her room. Since I gave her the choice that wasn’t really a choice at all.
“Her room...” Theo’s voice cracks. “Everything’s perfect. Too perfect. Like a scene staged for maximum impact.”
Like I taught her.
Finn appears in the doorway, glasses slightly askew—the only tell that he’s as rattled as the rest of us. “Security footage shows nothing. No breaches, no anomalies. Just...” His lips twist. “Just perfectly timed gaps between camera sweeps.”
Like he taught her.
A crash from below makes the foundation shudder. Jinx, finding her go-bag exactly where she knew we’d look first. His rage floods our pack bonds, but there’s something else beneath it. Something darker.
Pride.
Because she used his parkour routes. His shadow paths. His lessons in controlled chaos.
“She played us.” Finn’s voice carries equal parts admiration and devastation. “Used everything we taught her to?—”
“To protect us.” The words taste like ash. Like guilt. Like the drive I gave her burning a hole in my conscience. “She’s not running away. She’s running toward something.”
Theo’s heat-scent spikes with distress. “Sterling.”
The name hangs between us like a death sentence. Like a challenge. Like everything we’ve been preparing for without realizing it.
Jinx appears then, deadly silent—his most dangerous state. “I’m going to kill him.”
“No.” I stand, letting alpha power fill my voice. “We’re going to do something much worse.” My eyes meet each of theirs in turn. “We’re going to show Sterling exactly why they call us the psycho squad.”
Finn’s glasses catch light as he tilts his head. “Quinn will shut us down.”
“Let him try.”
“Call him,” Jinx says, voice carrying that edge of mania that earned him his reputation. “Tell him what we’re about to do. Give him the chance to stop us.”
I already have my phone out, Quinn’s number dialing. Because they need to know—need to understand that what comes next might cost us everything.
But she’s worth it.
Worth our jobs. Worth our freedom. Worth watching the world burn if that’s what it takes to bring her home.
Quinn answers on the first ring. “Ryker?—”
“The psycho squad is going hunting.” I meet Jinx’s feral grin with my own. “You can either help us or get the fuck out of our way.”
Silence stretches. Then, “Jesus Christ, what are you about to do?”
“Show Sterling why you should never touch a pack’s beta.” My voice drops lower, colder. “You might want to look away for this part.”
I hang up before he can argue. Before he can remind me of protocols and consequences and all the reasons this is a terrible idea.
“Jinx.” His head snaps up at my tone. “Take point. Show us how you tracked Emma’s killers.”
His laugh holds no humor. “You sure about that, boss? Last time I tracked someone this personal, there weren’t many pieces left to find.”
“Good.”
“Plans?” Finn asks, already pulling up building schematics on his tablet. Always our strategist, even in crisis.
“We hunt.” The words come out in that space between alpha and animal. “But not like they expect. Not like last time.”
“Last time?” Theo’s heat-scent carries confusion beneath the panic.
“Sterling Labs.” My hands clench, remembering. “When we went in through the front. Making noise, causing chaos.” I meet Jinx’s eyes, watch that familiar mania sharpen into something precise. “This time we do it right.”
“We go quiet,” Jinx says, that deadly calm settling over him. “We go dark.”
“We go hunting,” Finn finishes, understanding dawning. “The real psycho squad way.”
Because that’s the thing about our reputation—everyone thinks it’s about the chaos. About Jinx’s feral nature or my tactical aggression. They expect explosions, violence, things that break.
They never expect the silence.
“Coordinates coming in.” Finn’s fingers fly over his tablet. “Quinn’s tracking her through the city’s cameras. She’s heading toward?—”
“Sterling Labs.” The words taste like failure. Like the drive I gave her coming back to haunt us all.
Theo’s breath catches. “You don’t think she’d...”
“She would.” Jinx’s laugh holds no humor. “Because that’s exactly what any of us would do. Go straight for the throat.”
My phone buzzes—Quinn again. Probably trying to talk sense into us. Trying to remind us of protocols and consequences and everything we’re about to burn.
I silence it without looking.
“Gear up.” The alpha command rolls through our bonds. “Light, silent, lethal. We’re not going in as PCA this time.”
“We’re going in as pack,” Theo whispers, and something in my chest clenches at the fierce pride in his voice.
“For her,” Finn adds, shutting down his tablet.
Jinx’s smile shows teeth. “For family.”
The word should hurt. Should remind us of what we’re risking—our positions, our freedom, everything we’ve built. But all I feel is that cold certainty that comes with hunting something that dared touch what’s ours.
Time to show Sterling why some reputations are earned in blood.