Chapter 11 Wrecker
WRECKER
The engines rolled low under the moonlight, disciplined and restrained. No revving. No wasted noise. Just motion and intent.
We rode the same way we always did on recon. Ghost out front in the blacked-out truck, Smoke riding shotgun, ears twitching at shadows I couldn’t see. Ranger followed close, posture loose but coiled, eyes tracking everything. Brutus and I held the rear, steady and silent.
The formation didn’t change.
I did.
Every mile pulled me farther from the compound. From Amanda. From the last place I knew she was breathing easy.
This wasn’t a show of force.
This was confirmation.
Quiet. Sharp. And already personal.
The cold wind cut through my cut, but I barely felt it.
My mind wasn’t on the weather. It was back in the clubhouse, in my room, on Amanda.
I could still feel the heat of her skin, the way she trembled under my hands.
The kiss she left on my jaw was still burning.
It grounded me and lit a fire in me all at once.
I wanted to finish this mission and get back before that look in her eyes faded.
Ghost’s voice cracked through comms. “First stop—warehouse near the trucking depot. East perimeter.”
“Copy,” Ranger replied. “Taking rear flank.”
Brutus nodded once beside me, silent as ever. That man didn’t need words to kill.
We reached the outskirts in under ten. Ghost pulled the truck to the side, killing the headlights and cutting the engine like a ghost slipping into a shadow.
Smoke jumped out before the door even clicked open, nose twitching, body rigid.
Ranger rolled to a stop beside the truck, glanced over his shoulder, then dismounted without a word.
“Dog’s already on edge,” he muttered, grabbing his flashlight from the saddlebag.
“Yeah, well,” I said, stretching my neck. “Wouldn’t be the first time Smoke caught shit before we did.”
We split up without needing to be told. Ghost moved left with Smoke, scanning the building’s outline with that quiet, methodical gaze of his.
Brutus was already halfway around the side before I even saw him move.
Ranger headed toward the loading bay, crouched low, scanning the ground. I followed, keeping my steps light.
The warehouse was a mess of peeling siding and rusted metal, with one flickering light above a side door. Looked abandoned at a glance, but we knew better.
“Boot prints,” Ranger muttered. “Fresh. Deep tread. Big guy.”
I crouched beside him, fingers brushing the edge of the print. Mud still wet. “Not more than a few hours old.”
“Movement,” Ghost whispered in comms. “Northwest corner. Two… maybe three.”
Brutus responded with a single, sharp sign: trap.
We regrouped at the back. The door was cracked open an inch. No creaks. No alarms. Someone had left it that way on purpose.
“I’ll take point,” I said, sliding my knife free just in case.
The inside smelled like old oil and stale coffee. Rows of rusted shelving and stacked pallets lined the walls. Dust clung to everything. But there, on the far end, two folding chairs sat side by side. One had a Styrofoam cup resting in the seat.
I stepped forward, pressed two fingers to the side of the cup. Still warm.
“They were just here,” I said.
Ghost was already scanning the floor. He knelt, picked something up. A small, busted burner phone.
“Same model Scout used,” he muttered, turning it over in his gloved hands.
“Shit,” I breathed, moving closer. “Why leave it behind?”
“It’s deliberate,” Ghost said. “Smashed just enough to break it, not destroy it. Someone wanted us to find it.”
Brutus stepped forward, voice low. “Means he was here.”
Ranger rubbed a hand down his jaw. “Or someone wants us to think he was.”
I looked around. The chairs. The open door. The footprints. All of it perfectly staged. A message.
“The ring’s toying with us,” I said.
Ghost nodded slowly. “Playing cat and mouse.”
“Well, they picked the wrong fucking cats,” I muttered, gripping my vest tighter.
We swept the rest of the warehouse, but there was nothing else. Just dust, silence, and the buzz of adrenaline under our skin.
Ghost finally stood, tucking the broken burner into his vest. “Next stop—charity distro center. Ten minutes out.”
“Mount up,” I said, already moving.
We left the same way we came in. Quiet. Controlled. Ready for whatever the hell came next.
The ride to the next location was short, but my head wouldn’t stop spinning.
I should’ve been hyper-focused on the mission, on terrain, on timing, but Amanda kept bleeding through. The image of her tangled in my sheets, bare skin flushed, that desperate little sound she made when I buried myself in her. I swore I could still feel her nails in my back.
I hadn’t meant for it to go that far. Not that fast. But I didn’t regret a damn second of it.
She trusted me last night. Let herself fall apart in my arms. I’d seen her wrecked. Raw. Real. And now that I had, I didn’t want to go back. I wanted to hold that version of her again.
Brutus rode beside me, close enough to catch the twitch in my jaw.
“You good?” he asked, voice gravel.
“Yeah.”
“You sure?”
“I said yeah.”
He didn’t push. Just nodded once and kept riding. That’s what I liked about Brutus. He didn’t need explanations. He just needed to know I was ready to handle shit if it went sideways.
The charity center was tucked behind a string of warehouses, its faded mural of smiling hands and cartoon food baskets peeling from the brick wall. It looked clean from the outside. Real clean. Too clean.
Ghost pulled the truck around back while we parked our bikes under the shadows of a collapsed awning. He gave a short whistle and Smoke leapt out again, immediately sniffing the base of the back door.
Ranger knelt, brushing his fingers over the lock. “Brand new.”
“Yeah,” Ghost murmured, stepping up beside him. “Bolt was replaced this week. Paint’s still fresh around the frame.”
I circled the side and peered through the slats of a boarded window. Inside, rows of empty shelves and folded tables. Not a single box. No staff. No lights on.
“This place supposed to be operating?”
“According to the website,” Brutus rumbled, “they serve meals three days a week.”
“Well, they’re not serving shit right now.”
Ghost moved past us and picked the lock in under thirty seconds. We followed him in—tight formation, eyes sharp.
It wasn’t just empty. It was too empty. Shelves wiped clean. No dust. No wrappers. No evidence of anything ever being there. The walls had patches of fresh paint covering what looked like old water damage, or maybe worse.
“This is a front,” I muttered. “Was probably never open to begin with.”
Ranger ran his light along the baseboards, then crouched. “Tire tracks inside. Someone rolled a dolly or a cart straight to that back exit. No footprints.”
“Security cams?” Ghost asked.
“None out front,” I said. “I clocked it on the ride in. Just one fake dome above the entrance.”
“They’re hiding something,” Ranger said. “But they’re good at covering their tracks.”
Brutus moved silently toward the back wall, then pointed. A single scuff on the paint near a sealed door. It wasn’t big, but it was fresh.
“Whoever used this place didn’t expect company,” Ghost said, already snapping photos.
We didn’t linger. There was nothing else to find. But the cold pit in my stomach didn’t ease as we rode out.
That made two locations with evidence of activity, but nothing solid. Just more games.
By the time we reached the old storage units on the outskirts of the county, I was itching for something real. Something that didn’t feel like another breadcrumb in someone else’s twisted scavenger hunt.
Ghost stayed back in the truck, looping around the outer fence line while we rolled our bikes straight up the gravel path.
Ranger dismounted first, Smoke padding quietly at his side.
The dog froze near one of the units. His head cocked and nose working overtime.
Then suddenly he just sat and looked at Ranger.
“He’s got something,” Ranger said.
We slowed our approach, fanning out as Ghost’s voice crackled through the comms.
“Far right corner, the chain bolt is loose. Proceed with caution.”
I drew my Glock, eyes sweeping the shadows. Brutus moved in first, yanked the door open. The unit was mostly empty, except for two folding chairs and a tiny table.
A coffee cup sat in the center.
Steam still rose from it.
“Goddamn,” I muttered. “They were just here.”
That’s when Ghost appeared beside us, holding something small between his fingers.
A burner phone. Again.
But this time… it was intact.
He held it out to me. “Scout’s model. Same encryption.”
“Shit.” My throat tightened. “Then this was his. Or someone wants us to think it was.”
Ranger’s eyes narrowed. “Still doesn’t explain why they’d leave it behind unbroken this time.”
I turned the phone over, checking for bugs. “Because they wanted us to take it.”
“They’re watching us,” Ghost said flatly. “Somewhere nearby.”
Brutus scanned the trees. “Eyes in the dark.”
We backed out fast, regrouped at the bikes, all of us tense.
The signs were clear now. This wasn’t just recon.
It was bait.
And we’d taken it.
The ride back was silent.
Not in the engines, those still rumbled beneath us like the pulse of something alive. But in everything else. No banter. No side-eyes. No jabs about being rusty or slow.
We all felt it.
The phone. The warm coffee. The chairs perfectly placed like some twisted welcome mat.
They wanted us to know they were close. That they were watching. That they were in control.
And I fucking hated it.
I kept one hand tight on the throttle, the other brushing the spot on my jaw where Amanda kissed me. Her voice echoed in my head.
“Come back safe.”
I would. But not just for me.
For her.
For Scout.
For every woman this sick-ass ring had taken and branded and used like she was nothing.
We weren’t dealing with amateurs. They had resources, surveillance, intel. They knew our patterns and were feeding us just enough to keep us hungry. Just enough to mess with our heads.
Ghost peeled off first, his truck kicking up gravel as he disappeared down the east road with Smoke panting in the passenger seat. Ranger nodded to me before turning toward the back gate. Brutus rode up alongside me one last time, his expression unreadable behind his helmet.
“We need to hit back,” he said. “Soon.”
I nodded once. “We will.”
At the clubhouse, we parked and dismounted in a tight line, engines still warm. Cap was already waiting on the front steps, arms crossed.
“Well?” he asked, eyes sweeping over our faces.
“Warehouse was staged. Charity center was too clean. And the storage unit…” I held up the phone. “They knew we were coming.”
Cap’s eyes narrowed. “That Scout’s?”
“Could be. Or a plant.”
“Either way, they’re fucking with us.”
Ghost stepped forward. “They want us chasing ghosts while they move the real pieces.”
Cap nodded slowly. “Then we change the game.”
He turned to Brutus. “Get with Brick. I want security tripled on the northern line. I don’t care how quiet it’s been.”
“On it.”
“Ranger—grid the tire marks from the charity spot. We need to match them with distribution routes.”
Ranger gave a quick salute and disappeared into the garage.
Cap looked to me last. “You good?”
“Yeah.”
“You sure?”
“Not even a little,” I said. “But I will be.”
He nodded. “Gear down. Decompress. Debrief at midnight.”
I headed for my room, the weight of the burner phone still heavy in my palm. The moment the door shut behind me, I let out a slow breath.
Amanda’s scent still lingered in the sheets. Her outline barely pressed into the pillow. My throat tightened, and I let my hand drift over the space she’d been just hours before.
I wasn’t done with her. Not even close.
But the ring wasn’t slowing down, and I’d made myself a promise: she would never be touched by them again. Not while I breathed. Not while I could fight.
I plugged the burner into my decrypt rig and waited for the first files to load.
And as they did, a thought lodged sharp in my chest.
What if Scout left this behind on purpose?
What if this wasn’t a trap?
What if this was his way of saying: I’m alive.
I stared at the screen, every muscle tight with hope and dread.
Let them come.
We were ready.