“Tomorrow,” Wraith said, kissing her forehead. “Tonight’s prep.”
She nodded, but her eyes slid back to me with a silent command/request: bring him home. I gave her a short nod. Promise made.
When she went back inside, Wraith let out a slow breath. “She hates when I run ops.”
“She’s supposed to,” I said. “Means she wants you alive.”
“Yeah,” he said. “That’s the problem.”
He checked his watch. “We’ve got all night.”
I headed for Slate. He didn’t look up until I stopped in front of him.
“How bad?” I asked.
“Patrol patterns are tighter than last month,” Slate said, tapping the map. “They’re running two bikes past the clinic road every thirty minutes. If they bump that to twenty, we’re cutting it close on the in-and-out. We’re already threading a needle.”
“We adjust,” I said. “We slip in between runs. Keep the timing clean.”
Slate nodded. “I’ve got three exit routes ready. If one goes to hell, we jump to the next.”
Fuse came out of the clubhouse then, carrying a pair of insulated gloves and a set of heavy-duty cutters. He dropped the gloves onto the table and snapped the cutters open and shut with a grin.
“Tested them on that old scrap fence near the trucking yard,” he said. “They went through like butter.” He squeezed again and a little spark jumped near the hinge. Fuse frowned, adjusted a screw, and smacked the tool against his palm. “Okay, like slightly haunted butter. I’ll tune it tonight.”
“Try not to fry yourself,” I said. “I don’t feel like hiring another tech.”
“Please,” Fuse snorted. “I’m the best thing that ever happened to your wiring.”
He headed off to help Grim, muttering under his breath.
I sat on the edge of my bike, gloves hanging from my fingers, staring across the yard. The plan was solid. Clean. No unnecessary force unless they pushed first. Wraith would take the guards from a distance. Grim would run comms and timing. Fuse would handle any breach problems. Slate would run the escape.
Which left me.
Get in. Take Kellan Roe. Get out.
My jaw clenched.
He wasn’t the one who swung that tire iron. He wasn’t even at the race. But Rowan had turned him into a weakness—kept him close, sheltered, guarded like a treasure.
Rowan needed to feel something. Fear. Loss. The kind of hollow that Saint’s brother was living with right now.
If Kellan hated me for it?
That was a problem for tomorrow.
Thunder rolled somewhere far off, low and distant.
A warning.
Or a promise.
Tomorrow, we’d move. Tonight, I needed to see Saint. All the men in this club were my brothers, but Saint, Wraith, and I… that was different. We’d met on the first day of basic, survived more shit than I could count, came home and built Crimson Havoc from nothing.
He was the closest thing to blood I had.
I hadn’t planned on going to the hospital. I’d just gotten on the bike to clear my head and ended up there.
