19. Viper
VIPER
The second the call with Blade disconnects, I grab my jacket off the chair beside me.
“We’re leaving in three hours,” I tell him. “I want to be back by bedtime for Paxton and Lena. It’s a Friday they might stay up a little later.”
Bishop pauses mid-keystroke slowly before turning his head toward me. “No.”
He goes back to typing after that, though I catch the amusement lingering around the edges of his expression.
Bishop’s the only one outside Alpha Team who actually knows who Nora is to us.
Six years ago he helped us hunt for every scrap of information we could find after the masquerade disaster burned to the ground around us.
He knows how long we searched. How many girls we found afterward. How many we didn’t. What he doesn’t know yet is how Paxton is related to us. Nobody does outside the four of us. Not until we know something concrete.
“Yes.”
“You are absolutely not rerouting an active operation because that woman asked where you were.”
I don’t even bother denying it. That immediately makes him grin in the deeply irritating way only Bishop can manage while running surveillance on potential organized crime alliances.
“Oh my God,” he mutters. “You’re serious.”
“Alright, alright. Carry on and pretend to judge me while you would do exactly the same thing in my position.” I cock an eyebrow at him. “You don’t think Eva misses you?”
He’s quiet for a minute and then mutters, “Probably.”
“That woman has your entire leadership team acting like suburban husbands.”
He rolls his eyes and huffs before muttering. “We’re gonna have to take out half their security team from sniper distance before we go in.”
I grin widely. “Sounds like exactly my brand of fun, buddy.”
Two hours and forty-three minutes until we leave.
Not that I’m counting.
We reached Warehouse Twelve in under six minutes and parked beside a loading dock partially hidden behind shipping containers.
Where we have been for the past thirty minutes while Blade has been working to crack down walls and lay connections where we could from a distance.
I’ve been eyes on every outer camera watching for movement.
This place has been locked down the entire time we’ve been here. We are taking a big risk parking in the bushes this close to the warehouse. The likelihood we are going to be caught is pretty fucking high. So my job is to at least give some heads up if they’re coming.
The whole district feels too quiet now. No music drifting from nearby bars. No casual traffic moving through the streets.
The thought of Black Rock slips through my head. Nora’s kitchen. Paxton arguing dramatically in sign language about pancakes. The half-painted walls inside his room. Nora standing barefoot in paint-stained shorts, glaring at me while trying not to laugh.
I thought I pushed too hard that night, after I told her the truth about the injury and the possibility that Paxton might be my only shot at having a biological kid.
She shut down emotionally the second I told her.
I figured I fucked the whole thing up permanently.
So I left for Vegas before I could make it worse.
Apparently that didn’t work either because now Blade’s telling me she keeps asking about me every morning.
A loud engine outside interrupts whatever other thought was coming next. Both of us go still immediately. Bishop reaches for his sidearm while muting half the monitors.
I move toward the windows again, carefully enough not to silhouette myself against the glass. Two black SUVs roll into the warehouse district below, followed by a third truck, which I don’t recognize.
Too early for the next scheduled rotation. Eight men climb out. Armed. Professional posture.
“Shit,” Bishop mutters quietly behind me.
I study the movement patterns automatically while adrenaline settles cold and clean through my system. “They’re sweeping.”
Bishop snaps his laptop shut immediately before shoving hard drives into a backpack. “We need the secondary feeds before we bounce. We need to get out and get closer.”
I hop out first while Bishop pulls the keys from the engine. He climbs out behind me, passing me a handgun with a silencer.
“We need to get to the computer central processor. It’s right at the front of the warehouse back entrance he whispers. “We’ve got five minutes”
“I could do four.”
“I’ll leave the extra minute because I’m generous.”
I flip him off before moving toward the warehouse.
The side entrance still hangs partially unsecured from last night’s infiltration.
I slip inside carefully, pistol low at my thigh while scanning the darkened interior.
Stacked crates line the floor beside forklifts and industrial shelving units.
Somewhere deeper inside machinery hums steadily.
Too active for midnight inventory work. I move quickly toward the surveillance relay Bishop indicated. Then voices echo suddenly from the far end of the warehouse. Russian. Multiple sets of footsteps.
Fuck.
Bishop and I naturally separate splitting the hallway. I duck behind stacked pallets while three armed men round the corner twenty feet away. All carry rifles. One checks his phone while the other scans the room lazily.
“Thought security sweep already cleared this floor,” the taller one mutters.
“Boss wants it double-check,” says the one in the middle.
“Well it’s a waste of time,” responds the shorter one on the outside of the group.
They’re almost past our hiding spots when the second guy stops moving suddenly and looks directly toward the pallets hiding me. For half a second nobody moves. Then he reaches for his rifle. I shoot first.
The silencer muffles the sound enough that the first body drops before the other two fully react. Bishop runs out at the second one as the taller one gets halfway through raising his weapon, before I slam him backward into the shelving unit hard enough to crack metal.
The rifle skids away. He swings once, wildly. I duck under it and drive my elbow into his throat before slamming his head against the concrete floor.
Voices erupt deeper inside the warehouse immediately afterward. So much for stealth.
“Bishop,” I bark into comms quietly while grabbing the relay device. “We’re burned.”
“No shit.” Bishop responds, before putting a bullet in the back of the guy’s head and letting the body drop with irritation. “We’re ten feet from the processor. Let’s plant this fucker and go”
“We have to go out the exist by the processor instead of doubling back. It’s riskier to go back than to go through the loading dock at this point.”
Gunfire explodes somewhere outside near where we came in. He nods.
“Let’s fucking go.”
I sprint toward the side exit where the fuse box is located, just as two more men rush through the adjoining corridor. One fires immediately, bullets tearing through shelving behind me while I dive sideways.
Concrete dust fills the air. I return fire twice while moving. One drops. The other ducks behind crates shouting something frantic in Russian. Great. Now everybody’s awake.
I cut through a side corridor instead of heading directly outside, boots slamming against concrete, while alarms suddenly begin shrieking overhead. Red emergency lights flash across the warehouse interior, bathing everything in violent color.
Three more armed men appear ahead.
Jesus Christ.
I fire once while moving and the first drops instantly. The second lunges close enough that shooting becomes useless, so I slam him into the wall hard enough to stun him before driving my knife upward beneath his ribs.
“Accomplished!” Bishop screams from somewhere to my left, where I assume he ran to tag the processor. “Head out!”
The third bolts backward immediately. Smart man. Gunfire erupts outside again. Bishop’s definitely having a worse night now too.
We both sprint for the side exit. I shove through the door and into the cold just as headlights swing violently around the loading area. Two more SUVs pull into the lot while Bishop is still firing toward pursuing guards.
“Move your ass!” he yells, heading for the woods so we can cut through and double to the van parked across the street.
I sprint after him while bullets crack across the pavement behind me. One round slams into the shipping container beside my head, showering sparks sideways.
A huge bastard suddenly rounds the far corner holding an assault rifle low against his chest. He spots me immediately and raises it.
With no time to think, I diverge and let myself collide with him.
I slam into him hard enough that both of us crash sideways against the concrete barriers lining the dock.
The rifle skids away and he grabs for my throat immediately.
He’s a strong motherfucker too.
We trade brutal hits across the wet pavement as shouting erupts around us. He nearly gets the knife from my belt, before I drive my forehead into his nose hard enough to break cartilage.
Blood pours out. Still not enough. He swings again. I catch his wrist and twist until something snaps. That finally slows him down enough for me to choke him unconscious instead of killing him outright.
Interesting tattoos along his neck. Bratva affiliated maybe. Definitely connected enough to matter. I make amential note of it.
“Viper!” Bishop yells again, already several feet away at the van.
“I got one alive! Bring the van! Bitch is heavy as fuck!”
“You are literally the most annoying person alive!”
But he’s already in the van, cranking it and swinging the thing around to me. I drag the unconscious brute toward the van while Bishop starts firing controlled shots from behind the driver door. I load the captive into the back, barely ahead of another wave of incoming vehicles.
The moment I roll into the vehicle myself, Bishop slams the accelerator hard enough to throw all of us sideways through the intersection.
I work to get the captive locked up, tranqued up, and blindfolded in the back.
Then, I scramble toward the driver’s seat and we smoothly switch off, allowing Bishop to get back to the computer and see what he got from our efforts.
As I drive the city blurs after that. Rain. Sirens somewhere distant. Bishop cursing continuously while typing one-handed into a laptop balanced against his knees. The captive groans once from the cargo area before collapsing unconscious again.
“Tell me you got something useful,” I say, turning sharply through the side streets.
“I got six encrypted contact chains, partial payment records, and evidence somebody’s coordinating shipments between Vegas and Miami through shell companies linked to the old Gallos.”
“Anything on Joquain?”
“Not yet.”
I glance into the rearview mirror again automatically. No pursuit now. Good.
Bishop keeps working silently for another few minutes while I navigate toward the interstate leading back to Black Rock. The city lights begin thinning behind us slowly as the desert opens wider around the highway.
For the first time all night, I breathe fully again. Then immediately think about Nora, because apparently my brain’s broken now.
I picture her standing in the kitchen early this morning pretending not to ask about me.
Blade saying she got flustered when they teased her about it.
Paxton sitting cross-legged near the coffee table practicing signs with Lena while cartoons flickered silently across the television.
I don’t know where these conversations took place, but that’s how I imagined it.
Jesus.
I tighten my grip slightly against the steering wheel.
Bishop finally looks up from the laptop. “You’re doing the thing again.”
“What thing?”
“The emotionally constipated staring.”
“I don’t do that.”
“You absolutely do.”
I ignore him.
Mostly because he’s right.