“This is the only way, Roxy. This is all your fault. Did you know they cleared everything out? All the files, all the servers.”
He pushes me back, and I yelp, sure that a wad of hair came out.
“I didn’t know,” I grit out, honestly. Makari didn’t tell me anything about clearing out the compound, and why would he? Why should he? I wasn’t supposed to be here.
Eric’s eyes narrow as he surveys me. The scales tip one way, then the other.Please don’t do something stupid,I beg, trying to take slow, even breaths.
But then he lifts the gun and points it at me.
“You’re my best bet, Roxy. Who would’ve thought? If I have you, he’ll give me anything. I know it.”
It’s a mistake. It’s abigmistake, but Eric doesn’t listen to my protests. He points the gun toward the front door, and I walk out of it with him.
Chapter 30
Makari
Icome out of the woods just after dawn, the light pale and unforgiving. Mud cakes my boots and climbs my legs in stiff, drying layers. Blood darkens my sleeves where it isn’t my own, where it soaked through fabric and skin and memory alike.
Every muscle in my body hums with exhaustion, but my spine stays straight as I cross the last stretch of ground between the trees and the waiting vehicles. This is not the posture of a man who has won something. It’s the posture of a man who has survived it.
Behind me, my men emerge in silence.
They don’t speak. They don’t look at one another. They move with the heavy coordination of soldiers who know exactly what they’ve done and what it costs. Two fewer sets of footsteps break from the tree line than went in last night, and that absence presses against my back like a hand. Two more families to draw into my protection, to provide for and pay penance to.
We found the den in the hours before sunrise.
The rival syndicate had carved themselves into the land with a confidence that bordered on arrogance, hollowing out a ravine where smoke couldn’t be seen from above. They had supplies, weapons, radios, and the kind of discipline that comes fromworking under someone ruthless enough to demand perfection. It was impressive. But they underestimated me—and my men.
They expected time. They expected to bleed us slowly.
They didn’t expect The Bear.
The fight was ugly. Close. Personal. There was no room for speeches or hesitation. I remember the crack of bone under my fist, the way the forest swallowed gunfire and screams alike. I remember thinking that the earth would remember this long after we were gone.
We lost two men. Both of them earned their deaths standing.
I stop near the trucks as Jesse approaches, his face drawn, eyes rimmed red from smoke and fatigue. There’s blood smeared across his jawline where he didn’t bother to clean himself yet.
“It’s done,” he says quietly. “No survivors.”
I nod once. The confirmation settles something grim and final inside my chest.
“Get cleanup teams in,” I tell him. “Burn anything we can’t move. Strip everything else. I want the supply line operational again by tonight.”
“And Canada?”
“Tell them the mess is handled,” I say. “We’re back on schedule.”
He studies me for a moment, then nods and turns away, already barking orders into his radio.
The men disperse with mechanical efficiency. There’s no celebration, no relief. Just the steady forward motion of people who understand that stopping means feeling too much.
I climb into the waiting vehicle and let my head rest briefly against the seat. The engine hums beneath me, steady and reassuring, but the sense of unease that’s been riding my spine since before dawn doesn’t ease.
Something is wrong.
The compound rises out of the trees as we approach, stone and steel catching the early light. It looks exactly as it should—untouched, fortified, secure.
