Chapter 32 The Ghost Team
The Ghost Team
They left under moonlight, three shadows on two bikes—Ren, Smoke, and Billy—riding south to the old warehouse Sac had marked red on the feed.
The road there smelled of rain. No traffic. No witnesses.
The building loomed from the dark like a tired beast: rusted ribs, corrugated skin, the faint hum of generators inside. The dragon stirred beneath Ren’s ribs, not in rage but in recognition. Fire sleeps here, it seemed to whisper.
They cut the engines half a mile out and walked the rest. The night was thick, breath turning to smoke in the cold.
Inside, the warehouse pulsed with quiet industry—low voices, metal clinks, the hiss of something being sealed. They crept between stacks of crates stamped with languages Ren couldn’t read and smelled the fumes of solvent.
A camera swept the aisle. Smoke froze mid-step. Billy’s hand darted up, clipped the feed with a tiny loop of wire. The red light blinked twice, then died.
“Two minutes,” he whispered.
Ren found the crate Sac had flagged—its label matched the manifest: Horizon-17. A lock. A sticker. Her knife made short work of both. Inside lay layers of paper and plastic sleeves full of numbers, signatures, and destinations that linked Idaho to Cleveland to ports farther south.
“That’s our proof,” she said. “Bag it.”
They did.
Then came the shouts.
The camera feed must’ve jumped live again. Boots hit concrete, heavy, fast.
“Move!”
Smoke laid a small charge on a forklift to distract, light flashing white in the dark. They slipped through smoke and noise, hearts in their throats, Ren’s pocket heavy with the papers and the old chain that never stopped reminding her of what waited back home.
Outside, the air tasted clean again. For a heartbeat they thought they’d made it.
Then gunfire cracked the night.
Eagle and Brick were already in position when the shots started.
They saw the van roll from the side gate—black, unmarked, plates gleaming in the floodlight.
“Transit,” Eagle muttered, reading the license plate number into his mic. “That’s our ride.”
Brick laid the strip across the gravel road. The van hit it hard, tires blowing in twin bursts. Metal screamed. The vehicle lurched sideways and stopped dead.
Men spilled out—unpatched, armed, efficient. Not Hades Hellhounds Hounds, not street. Cartel muscle.
Eagle fired a warning round; Brick moved wide, flanking.
Through the noise, Ren’s team emerged from the dark carrying the rucksack. Her eyes met Eagle’s—brief, sharp, just enough.
Then everything erupted: muzzle flashes, the stink of gunpowder, the whine of a ricochet off steel. Ren stayed low, returning fire only when she had a clean mark. Smoke dragged Billy behind a crate.
The dragon wanted loose. She felt its breath under her skin, hot and demanding. She kept it caged. Not tonight. Not for this.
When the echo finally died, three cartel men were down, and two others cuffed. The van’s cargo was intact, its GPS blinking coordinates.
Eagle kicked a weapon away and nodded to Brick. “Get the plates. Get the faces.”
They did—photos, serials, proof.
Ren looked down at her hands, streaked with someone else’s blood, and whispered to herself, “This isn’t over. It’s just started.”