Chapter 6
They hit the tree line thirty seconds before Shale's crew reached the cabin.
Tourniquet moved through the pines with Paige at his six, her footsteps quiet on the frozen ground. She'd grabbed her duffel but dropped it at the forest's edge without being told—gear slowed you down when contact was imminent. Another sign she'd done this before.
His earpiece crackled. Whiteout's voice, calm as a sniper on overwatch: "Four tangos approaching the cabin. Shale on point. Three Duluth muscle fanning left."
"Hold," Tourniquet murmured. "Let them commit."
Through the trees, he watched Shale's crew move toward the cabin's front door.
The foreman walked like a man who'd done this before—confident, unhurried, a sledgehammer swinging loose in his grip.
The three behind him carried crowbars and the easy posture of men expecting an empty building or a terrified woman.
They were about to be disappointed.
"Tundra, Ironside—status."
"South ridge. Ready to collapse their exit." Tundra's Finnish accent was flat with focus.
"Whiteout?"
"East tree line. Clean sight on the access road. Nobody's driving out of here."
Tourniquet checked his weapon. Fifteen rounds, one in the chamber. More than enough for four men who thought they were hunting a florist.
Paige crouched beside him, breathing controlled. Her eyes tracked the crew's movement with the practiced assessment of someone who'd watched convoys approach checkpoints for two years.
"They're going to breach," she said quietly. "Shale first. He wants to be the one who finds me."
"He's going to find something."
"When they realize we're not inside—"
"They'll sweep the perimeter. Fan out. Look for tracks." Tourniquet's jaw tightened. "That's when we take them."
She nodded once. No fear in her face. Just focus.
Mine to protect, he thought. And she's going to make me work for it.
Shale reached the cabin door. Tested the handle. Locked.
The sledgehammer came up.
Wood splintered. The door crashed inward. Shale disappeared inside, two of his men following. The fourth stayed on the porch, watching the tree line—but watching the wrong section.
Whiteout's voice: "Porch guard is mine. Say when."
"Hold."
Seconds stretched. Tourniquet counted heartbeats.
A shout from inside the cabin. Shale's voice, muffled by walls: "She's not here! Check the back!"
The back door banged open. One of the Duluth crew stumbled out, crowbar raised, scanning the forest.
"Now."
The world exploded.
Whiteout's rifle cracked from the east tree line—a single shot that dropped the porch guard before he could turn toward the sound. The man crumpled, gone before he hit the deck.
Tourniquet broke from cover.
The Duluth muscle at the back door spun toward the rifle shot, presenting his profile. Tourniquet put two rounds center mass before the man's brain caught up to what was happening. He went down hard, crowbar clattering on frozen ground.
Inside, shouting. Shale's voice, barking orders. The last Duluth guy scrambling for position.
Ironside came through the tree line like a freight train—six-three, two-sixty, Swedish miner fury compressed into a human battering ram. He hit the back door at full speed, taking it off the hinges and carrying it into the cabin with him.
Crash. Scream. The wet sound of violence finding purchase.
Tourniquet moved to the front, weapon up. The doorway Shale had breached gaped open, morning light cutting through dust and chaos.
Movement inside. A shadow rising.
Danny Shale came through the front door with his sledgehammer raised and murder in his eyes.
Tourniquet met him with the calm assessment of a man who'd spent four deployments deciding in fractions of seconds what lived and what didn't.
Shale swung. The hammer whistled through empty air—Tourniquet was already moving, sidestepping the arc, putting himself inside the foreman's guard.
Three shots. Close range. Clinical.
The first took Shale in the chest, stopping his momentum. The second punched through his shoulder, spinning him. The third—
The third was mercy. Quick. Final.
Danny Shale dropped, and he didn't get back up.
Silence.
Then Tundra's voice in his ear: "Access road clear. Both vehicles disabled. No runners."
"Inside?" Tourniquet stepped over Shale's body, weapon still raised.
Ironside's reply came from within the cabin: "One down. Building's clear."
Four men. Four down. Less than sixty seconds.
Tourniquet exhaled slowly, letting the combat focus fade. His hands were steady—they always were during. The tremor came later, when the work was done and his body remembered it was supposed to be afraid.
"Paige."
She emerged from the tree line, moving toward him with purpose. Her gaze swept the scene—Shale's body, the blood pooling on the frozen ground, the chaos of a fight ended—and her expression didn't waver.
"You good?" he asked.
"I've seen worse." She stopped beside him, close enough that he could feel the warmth of her through his cut. "Kandahar. IED took out the truck ahead of mine. I spent twenty minutes pulling wounded from wreckage that was still on fire."
"That's not the same as—"
"It's exactly the same." She looked down at Shale's body. "Violence is violence. Death is death. The packaging changes; the reality doesn't."
Ironside appeared in the cabin doorway, blood on his knuckles, barely winded. His gaze found Paige, assessed, dismissed the threat, and moved to Tourniquet.
"Greer's going to know within the hour. Shale was probably checking in regular."
"Let him know." Tourniquet holstered his weapon. "That's the point."
Tundra emerged from the tree line, rifle slung, moving with the mountain warfare efficiency that made him lethal in any terrain. He stopped beside Ironside, and his cold eyes found Paige.
"The florist?"
"Paige Kirkland," Tourniquet said. "Two deployments. Silver Star. Don't underestimate her."
Tundra's expression didn't change, but something shifted in his posture. Acknowledgment.
"She armed?"
"I can be," Paige said before Tourniquet could answer. "Give me something that fits my hand and I'll show you how I qualified expert on the M9."
Tundra's mouth twitched. Almost a smile.
"I like her," he said to Tourniquet. "Don't fuck this up."
"Nobody's fucking anything up." Tourniquet turned to survey the scene. Four bodies. Two vehicles disabled on the access road. A message delivered in blood and cordite. "We need to clean this and move. Greer's next wave won't be construction workers playing soldier."
"Compound?" Ironside asked.
"Compound. She's exposed out here, and Greer knows we're playing for keeps now." Tourniquet looked at Paige. "You ready for that?"
"For what? The motorcycle club compound?" She raised an eyebrow. "I've slept in FOBs with worse security."
"FOBs don't have old ladies asking questions and brothers who haven't seen a woman in too long."
"I've handled worse than bikers, Tourniquet." Something glinted in her eyes—challenge, maybe, or amusement. "I handled you, didn't I?"
Tundra snorted. Ironside's stone face cracked into something that might have been a grin.
"She handled you," Tundra said. "Three days in and she's already got your number."
"Everyone's got jokes." Tourniquet moved toward the access road. "Let's get the vehicles clear before someone drives by and asks questions we don't want to answer."
The brothers moved with practiced efficiency. Whiteout appeared from the east, already on his phone reporting status to Permafrost. Tundra and Ironside handled the bodies with the grim professionalism of men who'd done this before.
Tourniquet found himself watching Paige.
She'd moved to the cabin, retrieving the bucket of flowers she'd left behind. Most were crushed now—casualties of Ironside's breach—but she sorted through them anyway, salvaging what survived.
"You don't have to do that now."
"I know." She pulled a single white rose from the wreckage, stem bent but bloom intact. "But something should live through this."
He didn't have an answer for that.
Twenty minutes later, the scene was clear. Bodies loaded, vehicles torched, evidence scattered to the forest and the cold. Greer would know what happened—that was the point—but he wouldn't have proof that would hold up to official questions.
Not that official questions were coming. The Iron Range handled its own problems.
Paige climbed into the truck beside Tourniquet, the duffel at her feet, the single white rose tucked into the cup holder like a flag planted in conquered ground.
"The compound," she said. "What should I expect?"
"Brothers who'll respect you because you didn't run. Old ladies who'll test you because that's what old ladies do." He started the engine. "And me."
"You?"
"I'm going to be very close for the foreseeable future." He pulled onto the access road, leaving the safehouse behind. "Greer just lost his foreman and three hired guns. He's going to escalate, and when he does, I intend to be between you and whatever he sends."
"That's a lot of proximity."
"It is."
She was quiet for a moment. Then: "You always this intense with women you're protecting?"
"I've never protected someone like you."
The words came out before he could stop them. Honest. Raw.
Paige turned to look at him, and something in her expression shifted. Softened, maybe. Or sharpened—with her, it was hard to tell the difference.
"That sounds like the start of a problem."
"Probably is."
"Good thing I like problems."
The road stretched ahead, pine trees pressing close on both sides. Behind them, smoke rose from the torched vehicles—a signal fire announcing that the rules had changed.
Danny Shale was dead. Three Duluth professionals were dead with him. And Mitchell Greer was about to learn that his contractor's playbook didn't work against men who'd buried better enemies than him.
Paige sat beside Tourniquet with her hands steady and her breathing even.
Neither of them needed to explain why the shaking would come later.
They'd both learned that lesson in different deserts, on different roads.
The war never really ended. It just changed terrain.