Chapter 30
Grim
The night pressed in around them like a living thing. Cold. Heavy. Watching.
The Saints moved across the Reapers’ compound on foot, not as bikers or outlaws but as the men they used to be.
They advanced in a staggered formation, each man covering a different angle, each step silent, controlled, lethal. Their cuts were soot-stained, their faces grim, their bodies coiled with purpose.
Find Sophia. Kill Spider. Make the Reapers bleed for Switchblade.
Grim led the line, Stone at his shoulder, Havoc and Rook flanking them like wolves guarding a wounded alpha. Fish moved ahead, low and fluid, scanning shadows with the sharp, predatory focus of a sniper on overwatch.
Ledger’s voice crackled softly in their comms, steady and focused, the calm center of the storm. “Movement on thermal. East side of the yard. Three heat signatures. One matches Spider’s build.”
Grim’s pulse detonated.
Stone raised a fist. The entire line froze instantly.
No words. No noise. Just the soft rustle of gear and the distant hum of a generator somewhere deeper in the compound.
Rook inhaled, nostrils flaring. “They’re close.”
Havoc rolled his shoulders, muscles bunching. “Let’s finish this.”
Stone nodded once. “Masks on. No survivors except the one who talks.”
Grim didn’t reach for a mask. He wanted Spider to see his face.
They approached the far warehouse, a squat and rotting structure crouched beside a scrapyard, metal siding warped like old scars. A single bulb flickered above the loading dock, casting a sickly yellow glow across the cracked pavement.
Fish lifted two fingers, then pointed left. Two guards.
Stone tapped Havoc and Rook. Go.
The two men peeled off, moving like shadows. Two muffled impacts. Two bodies down.
Silence reclaimed the yard.
Stone pointed to Grim, then to the door. You’re on me.
They stacked up, Stone at the hinge, Grim at the breach point, Havoc and Rook covering rear angles, Fish watching the perimeter. Their movements were smooth and practiced, the kind of coordination that came from years of surviving things no one talked about.
Stone tapped Grim’s shoulder twice. Ready.
Grim nodded. Go.
Stone eased the door open. They slipped inside.
The stench hit immediately, sweat and blood and stale beer and the copper tang of old violence. A radio crackled low in the corner, static hissing between half-heard words. Footsteps echoed deeper inside, uneven and careless.
Grim felt Spider before he saw him. A sickness in the air. A stain.
Stone held up three fingers. Three Reapers in the next room.
Grim didn’t wait.
He kicked the door in.
Chaos detonated.
A knife flashed, Grim caught the wrist mid-swing, twisted, and drove his elbow into the man’s throat.
The crack echoed off concrete. Another swung a bat, and Stone shot him in the knee, dropping him screaming.
The third reached for a gun, and Grim slammed his head into the wall until he stopped moving.
Stone grabbed Grim’s arm. “We need one alive.”
Grim hauled the last Reaper up by his vest. “Where is Spider?”
The man spat blood. “Go to hell.”
Grim slammed him again. “Where?!”
The Reaper laughed, wet and broken. “He’s long gone. Took the girl with him.”
Grim’s vision tunneled.
Stone stepped in. “Grim—”
But the Reaper kept talking.
“Begged like a bitch. Screaming for you—”
Grim snapped.
His knife was in the man’s throat before Stone could stop him.
The body slid down the wall.
Stone exhaled. “We needed him alive.”
Grim wiped the blade on the man’s vest. “He wasn’t Spider.”
Fish’s voice crackled through comms. “Movement! Back exit! One runner!”
Grim was already moving.
He burst through the rear door into the night, just in time to see a figure sprinting across the yard, weaving between stacks of rusted scrap.
A spiderweb tattoo flashed on his hand as he vaulted a crate.
Spider.
Grim roared and took off after him.
Spider darted through the scrapyard, knocking over debris, trying to slow him down. Grim barreled through it, boots pounding, breath burning, rage propelling him forward.
Ledger’s voice cut in, sharp and urgent. “He’s heading toward the service gate. Grim, you’re twenty yards behind. Rook and Havoc are flanking left.”
Spider cut left, slipping between two shipping containers. Grim followed, closing the distance. Spider vaulted a fence panel, Grim grabbed the top and swung over it, landing hard but never breaking stride.
Spider glanced back, saw Grim, and panicked.
He sprinted toward the service gate.
Grim tackled him before he reached it.
They hit the ground hard, rolling through dirt and gravel. Spider clawed for a knife, and Grim slammed his wrist into the ground until the blade skittered away.
Spider gasped, coughing blood. “Wait. Wait.”
Grim grabbed him by the throat and slammed him against the fence.
“You killed Switchblade.”
Spider choked. “He—he got in the way—”
“You took Sophia.”
Spider’s lips twisted into a bloody grin. “She begged.”
Grim drove his fist into Spider’s jaw, bone cracking under his knuckles.
Spider laughed through the blood. “Too late.”
Grim drove the knife into his chest, slow and deliberate, twisting until the scream died in his throat.
Spider’s body sagged. Lifeless.
Grim stood over him, chest heaving, blood dripping from his blade.
Stone and the others arrived seconds later, weapons raised, eyes scanning.
Havoc stared at the body. “Good.”
Rook nodded. “Switchblade can rest now.”
Fish looked at Grim. “You okay?”
Grim didn’t answer.
Stone stepped beside him, jaw tight. “Ledger found something in the safehouse. A sector marker. Part of the layout for this place.”
Grim turned slowly.
Stone held his gaze. “It points to another building on the compound. Far side. Looks like they’ve been moving people through it.”
Grim’s pulse kicked hard. “Sophia.”
“We don’t know which room,” Stone said quietly. “But we know the right building.”
Grim’s breath shuddered. “Take me there.”
Stone nodded once. “On foot. Tight formation.”
Grim wiped the blood from his knife, slid it back into its sheath, and whispered:
“I’m coming, Sophia.”
And the Saints moved into the compound’s shadows, silent, lethal, and unified, following Grim’s fury toward the building that held her.