He lunges.
The tall one grabs my wrist. I scream, but it cuts off when a hand clamps over my mouth. Flour explodes into the air as I struggle, white clouds blinding me. My mind screams Havoc’s name.
“Get the fuck away from her.”
Ghost’s voice slices through the chaos.
Everything happens at once. One moment I’m being dragged toward the back door. The next there’s a deafening bang and the hand over my mouth loosens.
Ghost moves like smoke. Fast. Precise.
The tall man drops with a grunt, clutching his knee. The other two scramble, reaching for guns I hadn’t even noticed.
I freeze.
Ghost doesn’t.
He disarms one with a brutal twist and drops him with a punch to the throat. He kicks the other man’s gun under a table.
“Out,” he snaps at me, jerking his chin toward the door. “Now.”
I bolt into the alley, lungs burning, heart pounding. Tires screech as a black SUV slides to a stop.
Viper.
“Get in,” he shouts.
I scramble into the back seat. Ghost dives in after me and slams the door. Viper floors it, the alley blurring past.
“Where is he?” My voice cracks. “Where’s Havoc?”
“On his way,” Viper says, eyes flicking to the mirror. “Hold on, cupcake. Things are about to get real.”
Chapter 8
Havoc
I’vebeeninmyshare of pursuits — tailing cartel shipments through mountain passes, gunning it away from ambushes, dragging bleeding brothers to safety — but nothing spikes my pulse like Ghost saying her name.
“She’s in trouble.”
His voice is flat. Controlled. Which means it’s bad.
“Three suits showed up at the community center. Asked for her by name. One of them dropped Judge Flores.”
My blood turns to ice.
Flores.
The judge from the hotel suite. The one Sage walked in on, taking cartel money to throw a murder trial. The man who turned her life into something she had to abandon overnight.
The reason she ran.
The reason Naomi Sage Bartlett disappeared.
The reason Sage Meyer was born.
“She triggered the panic call,” Ghost continues. “We intervened, but it turned into a chase.”
