Chapter 6
Parker
The outskirts of Greenbriar territory looked abandoned, half the buildings shuttered with plywood or missing windows altogether.
In the daylight, you’d mistake it for one of those fake towns the government built for bomb tests.
At night, it looked exactly like what it was: a graveyard for the unlucky, the dumb, or the doomed. I was a little bit of all three.
It stood to reason that Greenbriar hid their wealth.
They didn’t want to bring attention to the fact that they made the kind of money they did on all of their enterprises.
The fact that they were likely worth close to a million dollars or more would surprise every pack in the country.
They wouldn’t reveal their wealth until they wanted to use it for some nefarious purpose I’m sure.
I braked at the turnoff for the pack territory entrance, the front gate a welded latticework of razor wire and repurposed Harley parts, more art than architecture.
There was no sign, but the security cameras were newer than anything within twenty miles.
I flashed my headlights three times and waited for the metal gates to part.
They did, slowly, like a mouth opening for a very small snack.
I parked in the visitor slot, doors angled away from the main building—two stories, no windows except for slits you could barely fit a crowbar through, much less a body.
I almost turned back, but then I thought about Axel.
About what Silas would do to him if I flaked, and about what he’d do to me also.
I killed the engine and forced myself to sit there a full minute, rehearsing the speech I’d patched together on the drive.
The bank’s fail-safes are evolving. I’m in, but they may be on to me.
I’m searching for a different approach. Iron Valor will bleed out, I’d make sure.
I just needed another week. I repeated it until it was as real as the frost building up along the bottom edge of the windshield.
Inside, the air reeked of hot metal, sweat, and the kind of mildew you get from never once opening a window.
The secretary was a guy in a Greenbriar crewneck, missing two fingers on his left hand and all the joy on his face.
He grunted when I said my name, then thumbed a button under his desk.
For a pack that I knew had amassed over a million dollars in ill-gotten gains, this place was a dump.
Maybe it was made to look that way, so pack members wouldn’t want to know where their fair share was.
“Silas is waiting,” he said, and didn’t look up again.
The inner office was all cinderblock and fluorescent lights, the hum of the ballast louder than the heater running at full tilt.
Silas sat behind a large metal desk, hands steepled, his shaved skull glinting under the blue-white glare.
He might have been handsome at one time, but years of hate and hard living had destroyed anything attractive about him.
He wore a black t-shirt, sleeves straining against muscled biceps that showed off his heavily tattooed arms—lines and angles that coiled down his veined forearms. His barrel chest showed from under the V-neck of his shirt, tattoos disappearing into the solid, tar-black beard that ate half his face.
His eyes were so dark they barely registered as having pupils.
He didn’t stand. He didn’t need to.
“Sit,” he said, pointing to the lone wooden chair in front of his desk. The word had the finality of a coffin lid.
I took the chair across from him and scooted it up to close the distance.
The desk between us was neat but had spots of what could have been motor oil or blood, but I put my hands on it anyway, palms flat, nails bitten to nothing.
I put on the best air of confidence I could muster.
Never let ‘em see you sweat and all that.
“I don’t like it when people don’t take my calls, little girl.” His voice was like sandpaper.
The term “little girl” was not said in a manner that was playful. He was dressing me down. Putting me in my place. I grit my teeth.
“No sir. I would imagine you don’t. I apologize.
” I was trying to sound contrite and not like the smart ass I felt like being.
“I was just in the zone trying to work out the code needed to get your job done as efficiently and quickly as you require.” I swallowed hard, hoping he would buy that.
The real reason was I hated his fucking ass and would rather have my nose hairs plucked than have to hear it.
He relaxed a fraction. “I appreciate your commitment to excellence. Your reputation said you were the wolf for this job. I trust you won’t let me down.”
“I’m doing my best.”
“So, you got something for me?” Silas asked, one eyebrow ticking up.
I met his eyes. “The bank’s got new protocols. Some kind of anomaly sensor. They flagged the first two transfers as internal errors, but now they’re watching the servers every night. I’m having to write new code every time. It’s slow, but it’s working. Iron Valor has to be feeling it by now.”
He laced his fingers, and the tattoo on his right hand—a wolf’s eye, inked into the webbing between thumb and forefinger—seemed to stare straight through me.
“How slow?”
I swallowed, then lied: “I can try to move ten grand tonight. I cannot guarantee that it will go through. I can try for more if I risk exposure, but—”
“You’re not here to tell me about risk, little girl. You’re here to solve problems. I understood you were the person who could do this.” His jaw tightened.
“I can,” I said, and hated how fast the words came. “But with new protocols, security is adapting more quickly than in the past. If I push harder, they’ll see me.”
He grunted, a sound that might have been a laugh if you were generous. He took a pen from the desk, spun it around his knuckles like a magician, then pointed it at me.
“I’ve got men to handle exposure,” he said. “What I need is someone who doesn’t cry wolf the second shit gets real.”
I kept my face still. “I’m not crying anything. I’m telling you what’s happening.”
He stood. It wasn’t a big movement, but it put him over me, a wall of flesh and ink and hard-earned rage. “You’re telling me you can’t do it?”
“No, I’m telling you, if you want this done to get the maximum amount of money from those accounts, you have to give me more time.”
He leaned in, hands on either side of the desk, eyes inches from mine. His beard was so thick it caught the light like velvet, every hair a threat. “You want more time, you better make it count. Because if this thing tanks, Axel’s not the only one who’s going to pay for it.”
I stared at him. His breath smelled of coffee and cinnamon. His hands were so big that his fingers seemed to cover half the desk’s width. His fingernails were painted black.
My heart hammered in my chest, but my voice held steady. “It won’t tank. I just need a few more days.”
He was so close I could see the pockmarks of old acne scars on his scalp. He smiled, but it wasn’t sincere. “That’s more like it.”
Then, just as suddenly, he backed off, dropping into his chair. The metal shrieked under his weight.
I fished in my hoodie pocket for the note I’d written out, the new protocol for the next phase of the job. I slid it across the desk, watching as he flicked it open and scanned it. He grunted again, less annoyed this time. “In case you were curious, that’s the new protocol I’m running.”
He flipped the note back at me, then said: “What about Skeeter? You hear from him?”
I shook my head, honestly this time. “Not in a while. He went dark after that last run.”
Silas’s face didn’t change, but the air in the room did. He tapped the pen on the desk, the click loud as a pistol shot.
“Find him,” he said. “He’s not smart enough to run, but if Iron Valor finally made him, I need to know.”
“I’ll do what I can to track him,” I said, because saying no wasn’t an option.
He studied me for a long second, then did something I wasn’t ready for. He smiled. His teeth were so white they looked almost fake.
“You’re good at your job,” he said, his voice softening. “But I need you to remember who you work for.”
He slid his hand across the desk and let it rest on my forearm. The grip was gentle, but the heat of it radiated up to my shoulder. He dragged his index finger up my sleeve, all the way to my bicep, then back down.
“I don’t want to lose you, little girl,” he said. “You’re too valuable.”
The way he said it, I couldn’t tell if it was a threat or something worse.
He let go and sat back. The silence stretched, and the only sound was the fluorescent ballast humming overhead.
“You can go,” he said.
I nodded and stood, my legs a little unsteady. He watched me the whole time, eyes half-lidded, like a predator bored with the chase. At the door I paused, but he didn’t say anything else.
I made it all the way back to the car before I let myself breathe again. When I closed the door, I had to sit there for a couple of minutes just to keep from throwing up. My wolf was frantic, smashing itself against the inside of my chest, desperate for open air.
I started the car, cranked the heat, and stared out through the windshield as the ice defrosted. The gate was still open. I could see the security camera still watching me.
I took a long, slow breath, then put the car in drive.
He said I was valuable. I believed him.
But I also believed what he’d said would happen if something went wrong.
I felt like crying, but I wouldn’t. What good would it do? I was still alive, and that was all that mattered.
It was past noon by the time I hit the Plainview city limits.
I knew I should just go home, lock the doors, grab Rocket and crawl under a blanket with a bottle of whatever, but something in me was buzzing—hungry, unsettled.
My stomach still rolled since I left Silas’s office, but it wasn’t fear now; it was something closer to anticipation.