25. Chapter 25
Colt
The convoy left at dawn.
Three vehicles. Caroline in the middle one with Sweet driving and Prime riding shotgun.
Ahead of us, Ghost's vehicle with two Lords members.
Behind us, another club vehicle with Doc and three prospects.
The route was predetermined. The location was secure.
All threat assessments suggested minimal risk.
I'd done this calculation a hundred times over the past three weeks. Run the numbers. Evaluate variables. Determine probability. Every analysis suggested we had adequate security for the movement.
I was wrong.
The first sign of trouble came when Ghost's vehicle suddenly accelerated beyond normal highway speed. The radio crackled with his voice: "Contact. Multiple vehicles inbound."
Then the world exploded.
Gunfire erupted from multiple positions—elevated positions on both sides of the highway. Professional positioning. Coordinated fire. This wasn't some opportunistic ambush. This was military-grade tactical execution.
"Contact front and sides," Sweet's voice came through the radio. "Engaging."
I was already moving. My hands shifted into combat mode without conscious thought. The training that had been beaten into me, refined by years of MC operations and black-site interrogation and the absolute knowledge that hesitation meant death.
"Return fire," I commanded. "Sweet, maintain position. Ghost, suppress left flank. Rear vehicle, watch six o'clock."
The highway became a warzone.
Sweet was already pulling to the shoulder while Prime hung out the window with a rifle, laying down covering fire at the elevated position on the left. I had my own weapon ready, and I was scanning for the shooter positions that Ghost's team was targeting.
The first shooter I identified was on a ridge about two hundred meters northeast. I could see the muzzle flash, could calculate trajectory and distance and adjust for wind.
My body moved with the precision of someone who'd trained to be lethal.
I aimed and I fired, and I watched through the scope as the shooter fell backward.
One down.
"Incoming vehicle," Doc's voice came through. "Right rear, closing fast."
The rear vehicle was already engaging. Gunfire echoed as the prospects inside opened up on the approaching threat. Through the back window, I could see a van swerving around disabled vehicles, trying to approach from an angle where the convoy's fire was compromised.
I made a decision that had no tactical justification except that it bought time for Caroline to get clear.
"I'm heading to the rear vehicle," I said to Sweet. "Maintain position until I signal."
"Negative," he started, but I was already moving.
I kicked out of the side door, and I rolled toward the rear vehicle, using the disabled cars as cover. The shooter on the ridge was still operational—I could see the flash of return fire—but my focus narrowed to a single objective: eliminate the immediate threat to Caroline.
The van was thirty meters out when I got positioning. I fired at the driver. Saw the windshield crack. Saw the vehicle swerve. Fired again, and this time the van went off the road entirely, crashing into the median barrier.
Gunfire was still coming from multiple angles. The elevated position on the right flank. A shooter I'd missed on the left. The ambush was coordinated and relentless, designed to pin us down while something larger unfolded.
I moved toward the elevated position on the right, using cars as cover, moving the way I'd been trained—fast, low, utilizing terrain.
The shooter saw me coming and attempted to shift targeting, but I was already closing distance.
I climbed the ridge while returning fire, kept moving forward because stopping meant giving him a stable target.
Thirty meters. Twenty. Ten.
I closed the final distance and I used efficiency. No hesitation. No mercy. Just the clean elimination of a threat.
One more down.
"Rear left, new contact," Ghost's voice came through. "Vehicle approaching fast."
I was already moving back toward the convoy when the new vehicle hit. Another van, same formation, trying to approach from a different angle. But this time I had the high ground. I fired from the ridge, targeted the tires, watched as the vehicle lost control and crashed into the highway barrier.
The gunfire was slowing. The coordinated fire pattern was degrading. Whoever had planned this operation was retreating.
I ran back to the convoy, and that's when I saw the casualty count. One prospect from the rear vehicle had taken a round to the shoulder. One of Ghost's Lords members was down. Sweet had a graze wound to his ribs that was bleeding but not life-threatening.
And Caroline was conscious. Alert. Terrified but alive.
"Status," I said, moving toward her vehicle.
"We're secure," Prime confirmed. "Threats are retreating."
The highway was littered with disabled vehicles. Three of them belonged to the ambush team. The other casualties were theirs—three shooters confirmed down, two vehicles disabled, unknown number of personnel retreating in the intact vehicle that was now disappearing down the highway.
"Ditch," I said into the radio. "We've been hit. Multiple contacts. They're pulling back. Send medical and recovery."
Ditch's response was immediate and calm. "Backup en route. Get the injured to safety and do a headcount."
I pulled Caroline out of the vehicle and I checked her for injuries. No bullet wounds. No trauma beyond the psychological impact of being actively engaged in combat. Her hands were shaking, but her eyes were focused.
"You're okay," I said, and I meant it. She was alive. That was the only metric that mattered.
"Someone's hurt," she said, pointing at the prospect bleeding from his shoulder. "We need medical."
She went into therapist mode while I went into tactical mode. I established a secure perimeter. Made sure all threats were neutralized. Directed the injured to the safest location while we waited for Ditch's backup to arrive.
Forty-five minutes later, a club convoy showed up with Doc and his medical kit. The injured were stabilized. The scene was secured. And I finally had a moment to process what had happened.
We'd been ambushed by a coordinated military-grade tactical team. Multiple positions. Professional execution. The kind of operation that required planning, resources, and intimate knowledge of our security procedures.
"We need to question the survivor," I said to Ghost. One of the shooters had been captured alive when his vehicle crashed. He was currently being held in the rear vehicle, zip-tied and bleeding from a head wound.
The drive back to the club was tense. Caroline stayed close to me, her hand gripping my arm like I might disappear. I let her hold on. Needed her to know that I was there. That she was safe.
By the time we arrived at the club, Ditch had mobilized the entire leadership. Prez was waiting in the garage. Sweet was already receiving proper medical attention from Doc. The captured shooter was being moved to a secure location for interrogation.
I went directly to that secure location.
The man was conscious. Mid-fifties. Military bearing. Scar across his left eye that suggested he'd been in operations before. The second I saw him, I recognized the type. Professional contractor. Someone who did this for money, not ideology.
"Who hired you?" I asked.
He didn't answer. Just stared at me with the kind of hatred that came from someone who'd lost friends today.
"Who hired you?" I asked again, and this time I let him see the version of me that had emerged during the ambush. The Killer. The man who'd executed three people today without hesitation.
"Xtinction," he said finally. "What's left of them. They're operating out of Mexico now. Reorganizing. And the woman—Caroline—she's tied to someone they want leverage over."
"Who?"
"Delacroix. He's funding the operation. He wants the woman back. Says she's his, and he's willing to pay good money to retrieve her."
I felt something cold settle in my chest. Marcus wasn't just connected to Xtinction. He was funding them. He wasn't just using them as leverage. He was actively participating in the hunt.
The war hadn't returned. It had evolved.
"How many people does Xtinction have?" I asked.
"Full strength? Twenty-five to thirty. Operating out of a compound south of the border. They've been rebuilding since Don went down. And they're not stopping with the woman. They're planning a full offensive against the Serpent Sinners and the Lords. The woman is just the opening move."
I looked at Ghost, who'd been standing behind me. His expression was grim.
"Get Ditch and Prez," I said. "We need to call an emergency leadership meeting. Xtinction isn't just a threat anymore. They're active and they're planning something larger."
That night, I took Caroline to the safe house myself.
I didn’t trust anyone else to do it.
That wasn’t rational. Sweet could have handled it. Prime would have guarded her with his life. Ditch had already assigned two men to the exterior perimeter and another to the rear access road before we even left the clubhouse.
But logic had taken a round to the chest somewhere on that highway.
Caroline sat beside me in the passenger seat, one hand wrapped around the seat belt where it crossed her body. She had been quiet since the interrogation started. Too quiet. Not fragile. Not broken. Just folded inward around whatever she had seen when gunfire split the morning open.
Every few minutes, her gaze moved to the side mirror.
Every time, I noticed.
Every time, I forced myself not to tell her to stop looking.
The safe house sat back from a narrow county road behind a line of trees and a locked gate. One story. Reinforced doors. Blackout curtains. Cameras covering every angle. Not perfect, because perfect didn’t exist, but good enough to breathe inside.
I parked near the side entrance.
Caroline didn’t move.
I killed the engine and turned toward her. “Do you want a minute?”
Her throat moved.
Then she nodded.
I waited.
The old me would have opened her door, taken her inside, cleared the rooms, and told myself I was helping. The man I was trying to become sat with both hands visible and let her decide when she was ready to move.
After a while, she whispered, “I heard the bullets hit the car.”
My chest tightened.
“I know.”
“I kept thinking about all the things Ghost taught me. Exits. Cover. Distance. Time.” She gave a small, humorless laugh. “And none of it mattered because I was trapped in the middle vehicle while everyone else fought around me.”
“It mattered.”
Her eyes cut to mine.
“It kept you focused,” I said. “You didn’t freeze. You stayed down. You followed Sweet’s commands. You clocked the wounded before half the men did.”
Her fingers tightened around the seat belt.
“I was scared.”
“So was I.”
That got her attention.
I swallowed, because saying it still felt like dragging glass up my throat.
“I was scared the whole time.”
Caroline stared at me for a long moment.
Then she released the seat belt.
“Okay.”
I got out first and scanned the tree line, the porch, the windows, the vehicles already staged near the back. Then I opened her door.
This time, when I offered my hand, she took it.
Inside, I cleared each room while she stood in the living room with her arms wrapped around herself. She watched me check windows, locks, closets, blind spots. I kept expecting her to tell me I was overdoing it.
She didn’t.
When I finished, I found her in the small bedroom at the end of the hall, staring at the bed like she had no idea what came next.
“There are clothes in the dresser,” I said. “Sweet had someone stock the bathroom. Food’s in the kitchen. Ditch has two men outside, and I’ll be back as soon as the leadership meeting ends.”
Her head turned. “You’re leaving?”
The question sliced through me.
“For a few hours.”
Her face went still too fast.
I stepped closer, then stopped before touching her. “I have to brief Ditch and Prez on what the shooter said.”
“I know.”
“I don’t want to leave you.”
“I know that too.”
Silence pressed between us.
Then Caroline crossed the room and wrapped her arms around my waist.
I held her carefully at first.
Then not carefully at all.
She pressed her face into my chest, and I lowered my mouth to her hair, breathing her in because she was alive and warm and here.
“I hate this,” she whispered.
“Me too.”
“I hate that he can still reach me.”
Marcus.
The name didn’t need to be spoken for me to feel it like a blade sliding beneath my ribs.
“He doesn’t have you.”
Her fingers tightened in my shirt.
“No,” she said, voice steadier now. “He doesn’t.”
I pulled back enough to see her face. “I’ll call as soon as I’m out of the meeting.”
“You better.”
The edge in her voice almost made me smile.
Almost.
“And Colt?”
“Yeah?”
“Don’t disappear into whatever today did to you.”
The words landed too close to the thing I had not said.
I looked away.
Her hand touched my cheek, turning me back.
“I saw you out there,” she said quietly. “I know what it cost. I also know some part of you thinks violence is easier than fear.”
My throat tightened.
“I’m coming back,” I said.
“To the safe house?”
“To you.”
Her eyes softened.
I kissed her then. Slow. Hard enough to promise what I couldn’t say in front of the men outside and the cameras on the walls.
When I pulled away, she kept one hand fisted in my shirt for another second before letting go.
“Go,” she said. “Then come back.”
So I did.
I'd tasted blood today. Had felt that surge of purpose and clarity that came from being in combat with a clear objective. And part of me—the part that had been trained since childhood to view violence as the only reliable solution—had come alive in a way that terrified me.
Because I'd liked it. Had felt more like myself in those moments of lethal precision than I'd felt in months of therapy and healing.
The difference was that now, the violence served something beyond survival. It served protection. It served love.
And that made the violence both more justified and more dangerous.