Chapter Sixteen
The chapel was standing room only.
Kristin had never been inside during church—old ladies didn't sit in on club business, and she wasn't technically an old lady yet.
But Legion had asked for her by name, and when the president of the Black Ops Brotherhood asked you to brief his officers on aviation infrastructure, you didn't argue about protocol.
She stood at the head of the table with a sectional chart spread across the wood, every eye in the room on her.
Ripcord was to her left—close enough that his shoulder brushed hers, a possessive proximity that said mine louder than words.
Ghost flanked Legion on the right. Forge, Trooper, Static, Recon, and a dozen other brothers filled the chairs and lined the walls.
"Stanton's airstrip is here." Kristin tapped the chart.
"Forty-two miles west, outside a town called Linden that's barely a gas station and a church.
Private field, registered under a shell company.
Single paved runway, twenty-eight hundred feet.
One main hangar, two support buildings, and a fuel depot on the north side. "
"How do you know the layout?" Recon's voice was flat, the warlord's expression giving nothing.
"Because every private airstrip in the region files with the FAA.
Runway dimensions, obstacle clearances, approach procedures—it's all public record if you know where to look.
" She met his gaze without flinching. "I pulled the facility diagram this morning.
Cross-referenced it with satellite imagery Cargo found. "
Recon looked at Ripcord. "Your woman's thorough."
"My woman's a pilot." Ripcord's hand settled on the small of her back. "Let her finish."
Kristin felt the warmth of his palm through her shirt and kept talking.
"The runway runs northeast-southwest. Prevailing winds favor a southwest approach, which means Stanton's escape route is northeast—he'll taxi to the far end, turn around, and take off into the wind.
" She traced the path with her finger. "If he gets airborne, you lose him.
A Cessna at full power can be wheels-up in eight hundred feet.
Once he's in the air, he disappears into uncontrolled airspace and lands at any strip between here and Florida. "
"So we don't let him get airborne," Trooper said.
"You block the runway." Kristin looked at him. "Park vehicles across both ends. He can't take off if there's a truck in his path."
"What if he tries anyway?" Forge asked.
"Then he crashes and dies, which solves your problem differently."
A rumble of dark laughter circled the table. Kristin caught the edge of a grin on Ghost's otherwise blank face.
"The hangar is the target," she continued.
"That's where he stages flights, stores product, runs the operation.
If Peck was right about the skeleton crew, Stanton's got maybe a dozen hired guns in there—spread across three buildings, no military training, no defensive positions worth worrying about. "
"Peck said hired muscle." Ripcord's voice was low. "But Stanton was DEA for fifteen years. He knows how operators think. He'll have planned for an assault even if his people can't execute a real defense."
"Booby traps?" Static asked.
"Possible. Trip wires, maybe improvised devices on the doors." Ripcord looked at Forge. "We clear every entry point before we breach."
"Copy." Forge nodded. "I'll take point on the hangar."
Legion had been silent through the briefing, his silver-haired presence anchoring the room. Now he leaned forward.
"Approach vectors. How do we get forty-two miles into rural Carolina without Stanton knowing we're coming?"
Kristin was ready for this one.
"The access road to his strip runs through six miles of timber company land.
One way in, one way out—he'll have it watched.
" She flipped to a second chart. "But there's a fire road that cuts through the national forest two miles north.
It connects to a logging trail that comes out behind his fuel depot.
No cameras, no gates, no reason for anyone to monitor it. "
"You've driven this road?"
"I've flown over it. Danny used Stanton's strip for overflow landings when weather pushed us off our own field." Her jaw tightened at Danny's name—it still stung, every time. "I didn't know what Stanton was running out of there. But I know the terrain."
Legion studied the chart for a long moment. Then he looked up at his brothers.
"Plan is this. Two teams. Trooper leads the blocking force—four trucks, positioned on both ends of the runway before the assault begins. Nobody lands, nobody takes off. Recon leads the assault team through the fire road to the fuel depot, then sweeps south toward the hangar."
His eyes found Ripcord.
"You take the hangar itself. Stanton's in there, and he's yours. But I want him cornered, not martyred. If he draws, you put him down. If he runs, the blocking force catches him. Either way, he doesn't leave that airstrip."
Ripcord nodded once. "Understood."
"Timeline?"
"We roll at sunset. Hit the blocking positions at full dark. Assault team moves at 2200." Legion's gaze swept the room. "Questions?"
"Rules of engagement?" Ghost asked, though the question sounded more like a formality than genuine uncertainty.
"Stanton's crew chose their side. Anyone with a weapon is a target." Legion paused. "But Stanton himself—if he surrenders, we take him alive long enough to find out where Danny's records are. After that, use your judgment."
The silence that followed was heavy with understanding.
"Gear up," Legion said. "We roll in four hours."
The chapel emptied fast. Brothers moving with purpose—checking weapons, loading vehicles, making the quiet preparations of men who'd done this enough times to skip the drama. Kristin rolled up her charts as the room cleared, her hands steady despite the electricity running through her veins.
Ripcord hadn't moved.
He stood beside her, watching the last brothers file out, waiting until the chapel was empty and the door swung shut behind them.
Then he turned to her.
"You just briefed a room full of Special Forces veterans on tactical approach vectors."
"I briefed them on aviation infrastructure." She tucked the charts under her arm. "There's a difference."
"Not from where I was standing." He stepped closer. "You had Recon's attention. Recon doesn't give attention to anyone who hasn't earned it."
"I know airfields. That's not impressive—it's just my job."
"Your job might save every life in this room tonight.
" His hand found her hip, pulling her against him with the casual possessiveness that had become as natural as breathing.
"You know that, right? The approach route, the runway blocking, the escape vector—that's your intel.
If this works, it works because of you."
"And if it doesn't work?"
"Then it doesn't work because Stanton got lucky, not because you got it wrong."
She looked up at him. In the chapel's dim light, his face was all sharp angles and quiet intensity. The man who jumped from impossible heights, who'd killed three of Stanton's lieutenants, who'd promised her a future and meant it like a flight plan.
"Come back to me." She fisted the front of his cut, pulling him down until their foreheads touched. "I don't care how it ends for Stanton. I don't care about Danny's records or the airfield or any of it. Just come back."
"Kristin—"
"I'm serious." Her voice cracked, the fear she'd been holding at bay since the briefing started finally breaking through. "I've already lost a business partner. I've already watched my life burn down. I am not losing you to a former DEA agent with a God complex and an escape plane."
His hands found her face. Held her steady. Made her look at him.
"I've jumped from thirty thousand feet into places that shot at parachutes.
I've survived malfunctions that killed men better than me.
I've walked through firefights that should have ended me a dozen times over.
" His thumbs brushed her cheeks. "And none of that scared me as much as the thought of not making it back to you tonight. "
"That's not comforting."
"It's not supposed to be comforting. It's supposed to be honest." He kissed her—hard, claiming, the kind of kiss that left bruises on the soul. "I'm coming back. And when I do, you owe me a flight lesson."
She laughed despite everything. Despite the fear and the stakes and the four hours ticking down before the man she loved rode into a war.
"Deal." She kissed him back, matching his intensity. "First lesson: takeoffs are optional. Landings are mandatory."
"Sounds like a life philosophy."
"It is." She released his cut, smoothing the leather where her fists had wrinkled it. "Now go. Do whatever it is you do before you ride out. Clean your guns, check your gear, brood attractively against a wall. I'll be here when you get back."
Something warm cut through the intensity in his expression.
"Brood attractively?"
"Don't pretend you don't know what you look like leaning against things." She pushed him toward the door. "Go."
He went. But at the door, he paused.
"When this is over," he said without turning around. "When Stanton's done and the airfield's yours again and we're not fighting for our lives every other day—I'm going to ask you something."
Her heart stuttered. "Ask me what?"
He looked over his shoulder. The expression on his face was the one she'd seen on the rooftop, in the storage closet, in his bed—stripped bare, no walls, no armor. Just the man.
"You'll find out when we're not about to go to war."
Then he was gone.
Kristin stood alone in the chapel, surrounded by empty chairs and the ghost of cigarette smoke and the particular weight of a room where hard men made hard decisions.
Four hours.
She walked out into the compound, where the late afternoon sun was already angling toward the tree line. Brothers moved around her—loading trucks, checking communications equipment, the choreographed preparation of men who'd trained for this their entire adult lives.
Rebecca found her by the main building.
"You okay?"
"No." Kristin watched a prospect carry ammunition cases toward the staging area. "But I will be. When he's back."
"They always come back." Rebecca's voice carried conviction. "These men don't know how to do anything else."
"That's what I'm counting on."
The hours passed like they were being dragged through sand. Kristin helped where she could—loading gear, running messages, doing the support work that kept her hands busy and her mind from spiraling. Allison brought coffee. Rebecca brought food neither of them ate.
At sunset, the engines fired.
Kristin stood on the compound porch and watched them roll out—a column of trucks and bikes and armed men, cutting through the golden Carolina light like a blade.
Ripcord was near the front, his bike growling beneath him, his posture carrying the coiled readiness of a man about to do what he was built for.
He looked at her as he passed.
She didn't wave. Didn't blow a kiss. Didn't do any of the things that movies said women did when their men rode to war.
She just held his gaze and nodded once.
Come back.
He nodded back.
Always.
Then the column disappeared down the access road, and the compound went quiet, and Kristin was left standing on the porch with her arms crossed and her heart in her throat.
Somewhere forty-two miles west, Boyd Stanton was sitting in a hangar, surrounded by the wreckage of an empire he'd spent eight years building.
He didn't know it yet, but his runway was about to get very crowded.