Chapter 4
NOAH
T hey stuffed me into the back of a patrol car like I was some punk caught shoplifting, not a man who’d just painted a courtyard with a bastard’s brains.
The deputy driving—a kid barely old enough to shave—kept glancing at me in the rearview, eyes twitchy, like he thought I might kick through the partition and snap his neck. I smirked at him, leaned back against the cracked vinyl, and let the rain-soaked night blur past the window.
Didn’t bother me. I’d been in worse cages—sand-crusted Humvees in Iraq, mud-slick pits in Sudan, a rusted shipping container in the Philippines that stank of piss and diesel.
This? This was a goddamn vacation.
The station smelled like stale coffee and desperation when they hauled me in. Fluorescents buzzed overhead, casting a sickly yellow glow on the chipped linoleum.
Two uniforms led me to an interrogation room—bare concrete walls, a steel table bolted to the floor, a one-way mirror that didn’t fool anyone.
One of them, a stocky guy with a buzz cut and a mustache that screamed midlife crisis, shackled my left wrist to the table.
The metal bit into my skin, cold and tight.
I laughed—a low, rough sound that made his jaw twitch.
“Got any coffee?” I asked, slouching back in the chair. “Cold.”
He squinted at me, like I’d spoken in tongues. “You mean iced coffee? We don’t have that shit here.”
“Nah,” I said, grinning wider. “Cold. Like it’s been sitting on the counter for an hour. Stale. Thick.”
Another funny look—his mustache practically bristled—and he muttered something under his breath before stepping out. I didn’t care if he got it or not.
Didn’t care about much, really. My mind was already drifting, pulling me back to places that made sense. Iraq—a hellhole of dust and blood, where I’d lain prone on a rooftop for three days straight, waiting for an insurgent commander to poke his head out of a mud hut.
Sudan—a shitstorm of chaos, picking off militia leaders who’d turned villages into slaughterhouses.
The Philippines—an adventure gone sideways, hunting a pirate king through jungle so thick it swallowed the sun.
Those were my places. Not here, with their stupid rules—rules that said a man pulling a gun couldn’t be shot, that talking back to a cop couldn’t get you cuffed, that a piece of shit beating his wife shouldn’t get his balls cut off and shoved down his throat.
I’d racked up a tally overseas that’d make most men piss themselves.
Afghan warlords with harems of little boys—sick fucks who’d scream for mercy right before my round punched through their skulls.
Mexican drug lords running sex slave cities, their compounds rigged with enough coke to choke a cartel—I’d dropped them from a mile out, watched their empires burn from the shadows.
Congolese medicine men who’d mutilated a camp full of girls, claiming it was some twisted ritual—I’d taken my time with those bastards, made sure they saw me coming before the lights went out.
That was my resume. My pride wasn’t in the kills; it was in the why. Scumbags who’d begged for death got it, gift-wrapped with a bullet.
But here? In America? They wanted my gun in a locker, my fists in my pockets, my rage on a leash. Fuck that.
When Byron Dane—my father—died, me and my brothers came home. Took up the surprise family billions like it was some sacred duty, scoured the globe for any sign he might still be breathing.
For a while, I’d held out hope. Thought maybe he’d faked it, gone dark, pulled a vanishing act like Mom did when I was a kid. But that hope dried up fast. Same story, different ghost.
I’d stopped looking years ago. Stopped caring, too.
Hope wasn’t real—it was a fairy tale for kids with souls still soft enough to believe in it. Mine had hardened a long time ago, forged in blood and sand and the kind of silence that follows a kill shot.
So I sat there, shackled to that table, stewing in it. Not the arrest—didn’t give a damn about that. I wanted to stew. Wanted the weight of it, the grit. Maybe they’d toss me in a cell. Part of me hoped they would.
I’d done the right thing tonight—put down a rabid dog before he tore that courtyard apart—but the law didn’t see it that way.
Fine by me. Let them lock me up. I deserved it, according to their bullshit rules. Didn’t mean I regretted a thing. I’d seen that dead man’s eyes through my scope—wild, unhinged, ready to kill. I knew the look. I’d ended it. Saved lives. Saved her.
That kiss. Why the hell had I kissed her?
The question gnawed at me, sharp and insistent, as I stared at the smudged mirror across the room.
Respect, maybe—she’d stood there, unflinching, staring down a gun like it was nothing.
Something in that hit me square in the chest, like I’d seen a piece of myself reflected back.
Or maybe it was simpler—those big blue eyes, wide and steady, like the sky after a storm clears. The way she’d looked up at me, confused, shaken, but not scared. Not of me. I couldn’t read it, couldn’t pin it down, and that pissed me off more than the cuffs.
The door banged open, snapping me out of it.
The lieutenant stormed in, face red and veins bulging like he’d been chewing nails.
Deputy Mendez trailed behind, quieter, her eyes flicking between us like she was waiting for the explosion.
The lieutenant didn’t sit—just loomed over the table, hands braced on the edge, glaring down at me.
“You shouldn’t have done it, Dane,” he spat. “This isn’t a goddamn war zone. You don’t get to play judge and jury out there.”
I laughed—right in his face, loud and sharp. “You have no fucking idea what’s lurking in the shadows, officer. I did you a favor. Took out your trash before it bit you in the ass.”
His eyes narrowed, lips curling into a sneer. “A favor? You killed a man in my jurisdiction without authorization. That’s not a favor—that’s a crime.”
“Go ahead,” I said, leaning forward as far as the cuff would let me, grinning wider. “Charge me. Lock me up. I don’t give a shit. At least I had the balls to do something while you were twiddling your thumbs waiting for SWAT to show up in twenty.”
Mendez stepped in then, voice calm but firm. “Mr. Dane, call your lawyer. Let’s get this sorted.”
“Don’t need a lawyer,” I said, not breaking eye contact with Hargrove. “I’m one of the good guys. You know it. She knows it.” I nodded at Mendez. “Hell, even the wife and kid know it.”
The lieutenant’s sneer deepened. “Good guys don’t shoot a man in the head without a badge. This’ll come down to witnesses, drone footage, forensics. If there’s one shred of evidence that killing could’ve been avoided, I’ll see you do hard time. Count on it.”
I laughed again, leaning back in the chair, the chain rattling against the table.
“Go for it, Lieutenant. You’re part of the fucking problem—sitting there with your rulebook while women and kids get terrorized. Maybe you should ask that wife what she thinks about her dead husband. Ask the kid if she’s crying over him tonight. Go on. I’ll wait.”
His face went purple, a vein throbbing in his temple.
“Take him to a cell,” he barked at Mendez. “He can wait for arraignment. See how cocky he is then.”
I grinned—full teeth, all edge.
“Make sure it’s with the hardasses, lieutenant. I could use the workout.”
Mendez sighed, unhooking the cuff from the table and guiding me up by the arm. She didn’t say anything—just gave me that look, the one that said she knew I was digging my own grave and didn’t care because obviously I didn’t.
She was right. I didn’t. I wanted it. Wanted the fight, the chaos, the chance to let the aggression boiling in my veins spill out.
Maybe a cell full of tatted-up thugs would give me an excuse to crack some skulls.
Maybe it’d feel good—like the old days, when survival was the only rule that mattered.
They marched me down a hallway—flickering lights, scuffed walls, the faint echo of some drunk yelling from a holding pen. Mendez kept a hand on my elbow, not tight, just steady. The lieutenant stomped ahead, muttering about procedure and vigilantes. I didn’t listen.
My mind was back on her—Hallie Mae, though I didn’t know her name yet.
Those blue eyes burned into me, sharp and unyielding, even as I’d kissed her.
She’d let me. Hadn’t pushed me off. Hadn’t run.
Her hands had gripped my shirt like she needed it, like I’d woken something in her she didn’t know was there.
Why’d I do it? I still didn’t have an answer. Respect, sure—she’d faced that bastard down like a soldier, not a saint.
But it was more than that. Something in the way she’d looked at me—like I was a puzzle she couldn’t solve, like I scared her and pulled her in all at once.
I’d felt it, too, that pull. Didn’t like it. Didn’t trust it. But it was there, gnawing at me, making me want to find her again, see if she’d break or bend under the weight of what I was.
The cell block smelled like sweat and metal.
Mendez led me into a six-by-eight with a rusted bunk and a toilet that looked like it hadn’t been cleaned since Reagan was president.
Three other guys were already in there—big, mean-looking sons of bitches with ink crawling up their necks and knuckles scarred from too many fights. Perfect.
“Play nice,” Mendez said, locking the bars behind me.
I smirked at her. “No promises.”
She shook her head and walked off, leaving me with the welcoming committee.
One of them—a bald guy with a swastika on his forearm—sized me up, cracking his knuckles like he thought it’d impress me.
Another, leaner, with a busted nose and a grin full of missing teeth, leaned against the wall, watching.
The third just sat on the bunk, staring at the floor, probably too high to care.
“Who the fuck’re you?” Swastika asked, stepping closer.
“Guy who doesn’t give a shit,” I said, dropping my shoulders, letting my stance loosen. “You?”
He sneered. “Guy who’s gonna make you wish you’d stayed home.”
I laughed—low, dark, inviting. “Good. Been a while since I broke something.”
He swung first, predictable as hell—a wild haymaker aimed at my jaw.
I ducked it easy, stepped in, and drove my elbow into his throat. He choked, staggered back, and I didn’t wait—slammed my fist into his gut, doubling him over.
Busted Nose moved next, faster, coming at me with a shank pulled from God-knows-where. I caught his wrist, twisted hard until I heard the snap, and kicked his legs out from under him. He hit the concrete face-first, howling.
The third guy didn’t even look up—just kept staring at the floor like it was a movie.
Swastika recovered, lunging at me again, but I sidestepped, grabbed the back of his head, and smashed his face into the bars. Blood sprayed, hot and wet, and he crumpled, groaning.
Busted Nose was still down, clutching his wrist, cursing through gritted teeth. I stood over them, breathing steady, knuckles stinging just enough to feel good.
“Next time,” I said, wiping blood off my lip where Swastika had grazed me, “bring friends who can fight.” Then I stomped Busted Nose’s other wrist and heard it snap.
The cell went quiet—except for the junkie on the bunk, who finally glanced up, muttered, “Fuckin’ psycho,” and went back to staring at nothing.
I leaned against the bars, adrenaline buzzing under my skin, and let my mind drift again.
Back to her. That kiss. The way her lips had parted, soft and stunned, like she hadn’t known she could feel that alive.
I hadn’t either—not in years. Maybe never.
Didn’t matter. I’d done it, and now it was in me, an itch I couldn’t scratch from a cell.
The cops wanted me to rot here? Fine. Let them try. I’d sit in this shithole, break every asshole they threw at me, and wait it out.
My brothers would come eventually—Marcus with his plans, Atlas with his quiet fury, Ryker with his chaos.
They’d bring the lawyer, the money, the pull to make this disappear.
But I wasn’t calling them. Not yet. I wanted the weight of it—the cuffs, the bars, the blood on my hands.
Wanted to feel it settle into my bones, remind me who I was.
Because out there, in that courtyard, I’d saved her. Ended a threat. And then I’d kissed her like she was mine.
Maybe she was.
Maybe I’d find out.
But for now, I’d stew. Let the law do its dance. Let the hardasses come at me again. I didn’t care. I’d take it all—every punch, every charge, every second of this bullshit—and walk out grinning when it was done.
Because I’d seen her eyes.
And I wasn’t letting that go.
Not for a fucking second.