Chapter 42 Gage
FORTY-TWO
GAGE
Arrow doesn’t ask if I’m ready. Instead, he just throws me the keys to his car and says, “Drive.”
Saint Pierce rips past in a smear of sodium streetlights and slick winter pavement.
My knuckles are white on the wheel, jaw locked so hard it clicks.
Knight rides shotgun feeding short updates from Render and Ozzy into our open channel.
Lark’s in the back seat with a laptop balanced on her knees, ponytail threaded through a ball cap, fingers moving like she’s trying to outrun panic.
River is out there. Somewhere cold. Somewhere dark. Somewhere I am not.
I can’t live with that.
Arrow taps his phone and puts it on speaker. “Dean. It’s Arrow. We need the lights on.”
The voice that answers could cut glass. Calm. Command threaded with steel.
“Copy. Which lights?”
“All of them.”
There’s a beat. Then: “Address?”
“I’m bringing them to HQ.”
“Door will be open.”
The line goes dead.
Knight exhales. “He didn’t ask for details.”
Arrow half-smiles, humorless. “He knows I’ll bring the important ones.”
We turn down an unmarked ramp that looks like a service entrance, follow it to a gray door with a tiny keypad that flips to green before I even roll the vehicle to a stop.
Inside is heat and concrete and the clean, quiet hum of money spent well: reinforced corridors, recessed cameras, a war-room that would make a three-letter agency take notes.
Maddox Security HQ.
We stride in like we belong—because tonight, we do.
Dean Maddox is already there, sleeves rolled to his forearms, tie gone, that particular brand of authority that makes the room settle even when no one asked it to.
Beside him stands a monster of a man who looks like he can bench press a semi. “This is my cousin, Sawyer,” Dean says. “And this,” he points to another man who’s even bigger if that’s even possible, “is Ranger. Over there,” he points to a woman seated at a computer, “is Rae. She’ll be on comms.”
“I’m just happy they’re on our side,” I say before shaking hands with Sawyer, and then Ranger.
Dean doesn’t waste a second. “Let’s head into the Aquarium where you can brief us.”
I share a glance with my sister, as we move toward a huge conference room surrounded by glass. It sits center in the command center, and is a bit intimidating.
Dean shuts the glass door once we’re all inside. “And go,” he says, getting right to it.
Arrow nods at me. My mouth is already moving.
“Her name is River Quinn,” I say. “Mid-twenties. Developer at NovaPlay Studios. She’s been the focus of a coordinated harassment campaign tied to Cathedral.
We have reason to believe Cathedral’s admin ‘Regent’ is Helena Lune—head of HR at NovaPlay.
We pulled up security cams at her place and saw that she was taken around nine-forty, and shoved into a black van. No plates.”
Sawyer glances at Rae. “Casualty risk?”
“Unknown,” I say, too fast. I force myself to slow down. “She was taken alive. Juno—” I point to her. “—was with her. Concussed. Said they referenced ‘finishing what Regent started.’”
Ranger’s jaw ticks. “They want you to come after them.”
“Good,” I say. “I’m already here.”
“It might be a set up.” Dean motions to the screens. “What do we have?”
Rae drags in camera grids like she’s playing piano.
“We scraped every intersection within a four-mile radius of River’s building from twenty-one-thirty to twenty-two hundred.
Two black vans within the capture window.
One was a florist—confirmed GPS, tag, and stop-to-stop nav.
The other… ran three lights and hugged blind spots like it had the route memorized. ”
She zooms on a pixelated rectangle. Knight leans in. “There—driver’s side mirror rig. After-market.”
Rae nods. “Cargo lock replaced, too. That door’ll open quiet.”
Sawyer raps a knuckle softly on the glass. “You got a street trail?”
“Yeah.” Rae toggles lines that snake along the map—down Harker, across Ninth, then south along the docks. “They went dead here.” A square blinks along the waterfront: warehouses, most empty, some not.
Ranger says, “Dead because no cameras… or dead because someone cut their trail?”
Rae’s mouth is grim. “Both. These eight blocks are a surveillance desert. City grid’s old. Private cams are fake or fried. Half the buildings are owned by layered LLCs that all resolve to a PO box in Delaware.”
Dean’s gaze slides to Arrow. “Cathedral money.”
“Or Helena’s,” Arrow says. “Company discretionary slush, re-tithed through cathedral shells.”
“Either way,” Ranger says, “they’re not hiding cheap.”
My throat is raw. “So we hit every door.”
Dean looks at me like I’m a live wire. Not unkind. Just measuring if I’ll shock myself to death. “We will,” he says evenly. “But not like kids playing SWAT. We do this the way it gets her home.”
I nod, swallow the urge to run out the door and start tearing steel with my hands. “Tell me how.”
He turns to Rae. “Build me a heat map.”
She’s already on it—blueprints, parcel records, utility pulls. “If we assume they need power, water, and ingress large enough for a panel van, we cull to twelve possibles. If we assume they need load-out to water…” She drags two more away. “Down to ten.”
Sawyer points at three clustered near the east pier. “What’s the thermal?”
Rae chews her lip. “City thermals are on a six-minute delay. But—” She switches feeds.
“The marina’s private lot shares a fence with this warehouse.
Motion sensors go off every time raccoons party on the dumpster.
But here?” She tags a dark rectangle behind a roll-up door.
“Two triggers tonight. Twenty-one fifty-three and twenty-one fifty-five. Then nothing.”
Ranger says, “Roll-up door by a dead zone, motion trips and stops. Someone brought something in and stayed.”
“Or someone cut the sensor after entry,” Knight says.
Dean’s already building shapes in the air with his finger. “Stack one, stack two. Lateral entry points. Rooftop?”
Rae pulls a tax photo. “Angled corrugated with a skylight. Fiberglass, not glass.”
Sawyer shifts his stance. “We can silent-cut that.”
His eyes meet mine like the decision’s already made. The decision is already made.
Dean glances at Arrow. “You called me because you knew I’d say yes.”
Arrow’s mouth twitches. “Yes, sir.”
“Then here’s the plan.” Dean faces the room, and the room tilts toward him.
“We split into three elements. Knight, Sawyer, and Ozzy with me on Entry One—rear roll-up. Ranger leads Entry Two—side personnel door under the stairwell. Poe and Render with Ranger. Gage, you’re with me on One.
Remember boys, let us clear your path before you engage.
” He lifts a brow, like he expects me to argue.
I don’t. “Arrow floats as rover and coordination with Rae. Lark and Juno stay on deck with Rae to keep eyes on heat and cams, cycle locks as needed, spoof alarms, and open our door when we need it opened.”
Rae’s fingers dance. “I’ll spoof a rodent parade on the marina side to keep the security guard bored. Also pulling a false fire panel failure two blocks down so patrol cars pivot off the grid.”
Ranger nods. “Noise away from us.”
Knight taps the screen where the skylight sits. “You want a top-side contingency?”
Dean cuts me a glance. “Gage?”
I know what he’s asking without him saying it. Do I need to be the first face River sees? Yes. Do I trust myself not to blow the op if I am? Also yes, but I understand what happens if I’m wrong. I breathe around the barbed wire in my chest.
“Put me where I get to her fastest,” I say. “But don’t let me ruin it if I lose my head.”
Sawyer’s mouth curves, sympathy without condescension. “We’ve all got a person,” he says. “We’ll keep you aimed.”
Dean keeps going. “Rules of contact. Minimal flashbangs—unknown hostiles, unknown hostages. If Helena’s there, she’s mine. Gage, Arrow, and Knight… this is new for you, so we’ll make sure we hit and you follow behind.” Dean stares at me. “I’ll deal with Helena.”
That cuts through the static in my skull. “She took River—” I start.
“And she’ll face charges that stick,” Dean says, calm as winter. “You want River back and Helena in a cage. Let’s do the one that makes the second possible.”
I bite down. Nod once.
Rae raises a hand. “Heads up. Cathedral just spun up chatter.” One of her screens fills with a dark forum thread—handles, timestamps, nested replies. “User Vainglory posted ‘Psalm88 closes tonight.’”
Knight goes still. “That handle hit our sandbox last week.”
Ozzy leans to his mic. “Pulling IP… bouncing… gotcha. It resolves to a VPN endpoint in—” She blinks. “NovaPlay HQ.”
I choke out a laugh with no humor in it. “Of course it does.”
Rae keeps reading. “There’s also a DM chain between Vainglory and an admin-level handle. Timestamped five minutes ago.” She flicks the text on the central screen.
Vainglory: van delivered. she’s secure.
Regent: accelerate protocol.
Vainglory: confirmed.
My hands curl. “They’ve got her in there.”
Dean: “We move.”
The gear-up is daunting, and needed. I’m not military, so this is new to me, but I’ll do anything for River.
Ranger throws me a plate carrier and a comm bud, Sawyer a breaching kit shaped like a backpack but heavier with purpose.
Arrow checks my straps and smacks my shoulder plate—a ritual more than correction. “Breathe, Dawson.”
“I’ll breathe when she’s in my arms.”
He doesn’t argue.
We roll out in two vehicles: Dean up front with Knight, Ozzy and Sawyer, Ranger driving me, Poe, and Render with a trunk full of toys. Rae’s voice fills our ears—cool, professional, threaded with something like care.
“Units, be advised—marina guard just sat down to watch a baseball replay. Fire panel false failure in progress. Two patrol units heading north to investigate a ghost alarm.”
“Copy,” Dean says. “Time to door?”
“Four minutes,” Rae answers. “Lark, you’ve got the grid?”