Chapter 1
Ryan “Coop” Cooper
I checked the magazine on my Glock for the third time since we’d pulled up to the barn, counting rounds I already knew were there. Fifteen in the mag, one in the chamber. The familiar weight of it tucked against my kidney was about the only thing keeping me grounded while Diesel launched into another one of his jokes from the driver’s seat.
“So this ATF agent walks into a barn, right?” Diesel’s laugh was already building, that wheeze-grunt sound that made my skin crawl. The SUV’s interior reeked of his cigarettes and stale coffee. “Farmer’s got his sheep all lined up, and the agent says?—”
“Jesus Christ, not the sheep one again.” Snake didn’t look up from cleaning his fingernails with a butterfly knife in the passenger seat, the blade catching the late-afternoon sun streaming through the barn’s broken slats. “You told that one last week.”
“Different punch line this time, asshole.” Diesel pulled out a cigarette, his scarred fingers making the simple action lookthreatening. Everything about Diesel looked threatening—six-four, shoulders like a linebacker gone to fat, face that had lost too many bar fights to count. The kind of man who enjoyed violence the way other people enjoyed baseball. “See, this time, the farmer says?—”
“Save it.” Snake’s voice stayed flat. “We’re here.”
Tommy laughed anyway, too loud, too eager. Kid couldn’t be more than twenty-two, all nervous energy and desperation to belong. But at least he had a normal name, unlike everyone else who sounded like a villain gang from some 1980s comic.
Tommy’s hand kept drifting to the Beretta tucked in his waistband, touching it like a talisman as we got out of the vehicle. “Maybe we could hear it on the drive back? I mean, if Coop don’t mind.”
Poor bastard had no idea these men would sacrifice him in a heartbeat. Diesel would feed him to the wolves without blinking.
I forced myself to chuckle. “Sure, kid. Nothing like Diesel’s comedy hour to make three hours feel like ten.”
“Ay, fuck you too, Coop.” But Diesel was grinning, showing teeth stained yellow from decades of cigarettes. “Least I know how to have a good time. You’re wound tighter than a nun’s asshole.”
The barn stretched around us—forty feet wide, maybe sixty deep. Two exits: the main door we’d come through and a smaller door near the back corner, half hidden behind rusted farming equipment. Hayloft overhead accessed by a ladder that had seen better decades. Windows set too high to be useful as exits, but they’d make decent sniper positions if someone wanted to pin us down.
The smell hit in waves—old hay going to rot, motor oil from the equipment, mouse droppings, and underneath it all, that peculiar scent of abandonment. Places left to die always smelled the same. I’d learned that in Afghanistan, then Iraq,then a dozen other places Uncle Sam had sent me to play in the shadows.
Six weeks playing this role. Six weeks of being Coop—arms dealer, ex-military washout, man with connections and no conscience. Six weeks of laughing at jokes about dead federal agents, of talking about weapon shipments like they were produce deliveries.
The transformation was getting easier. That’s what scared me.
“This’ll work.” Snake finally looked up from his knife, those dead eyes scanning the barn with practiced assessment. Where Diesel was obvious violence, Snake was the kind that crept up silently. Never raised his voice. Never made threats. Just looked at you with those flat, reptilian eyes until you understood that arguing would be the last mistake you ever made. “Good sight lines from the loft. Multiple exit points. Far enough from the main road that nobody’s accidentally stopping by.”
“Oliver’ll like it,” Tommy said, trying to sound knowledgeable. “Fits his parameters perfectly.”
The kid didn’t realize Oliver didn’t give a shit about his opinions. Julian Oliver cared about three things: money, weapons, and his grand vision of a new America rising from the ashes of the current government. Tommy was just cannon fodder, too stupid to realize it.
“I’ll check the loft for storage space.” Tommy headed for the ladder, eager to prove his worth to men who’d sell him out for pocket change.
I pushed off from the wall. “I’ll check the back section. See how much weight those old stalls can hold.”
“Don’t take all day jerking off back there.” Diesel lit his cigarette, the flame from his Zippo casting shadows across his scarred face. “Oliver wants an answer by tonight. This place works or it doesn’t. Simple as that.”
“Everything’s simple to you, Diesel.” I kept my tone light, teasing. The kind of ballbusting these assholes expected. “That’s why God made you big instead of smart.”
Snake’s lips twitched—barely perceptible unless you were watching for it. Getting Snake to almost-smile was like getting a compliment from God. It meant you belonged. It meant you were trusted.
It made me sick to my stomach.
The stalls were darker, afternoon shadows pooling in corners where the light couldn’t reach. The floorboards creaked under my weight, but they were solid. They’d hold crates of weapons, ammunition, and whatever else Oliver was planning to stockpile for his revolution.
Footsteps whispered from behind the last stall—too light for a man, too deliberate for an animal.
My hand found my Glock without conscious thought, thumb on the safety, finger indexed along the frame. I eased around the corner, footfalls silent on the packed dirt.
A woman emerged from the shadows, camera raised to her eye, studying how the light fell through a gap in the wall. She was adjusting the lens, completely absorbed in her shot, oblivious to the danger she’d just walked into. Blonde hair twisted up in a messy bun, wisps escaping to catch the light. Green flannel shirt, sleeves rolled up to reveal delicate wrists.
She lowered the camera, and the world stopped.
