“We don’t have the manpower,” Blaze counters. “Jax’s forces outnumber ours.”
“Then we have to move fast between them.” I look up, meeting their eyes one by one. “I won’t force any of you to follow me into this. Jax will hunt down anyone who stands against him.”
The room falls silent. These men are calculating odds, weighing their survival against their loyalty.
Ari speaks first. “I’m in, whatever it takes.”
“I’m with you,” Grayson states.
Blaze nods once, decisive. “We helped him build The Vipers. I didn’t build this to bow to a paranoid tyrant.”
Penn doesn’t even bother with words. He simply checks his weapon and raises an eyebrow at me.
“We’ll need to move quickly,” I say. “Jax will be expecting us to hit the most obvious locations first.”
“So, we do the unexpected,” Grayson suggests.
Seven locations. Four loyal brothers-in-arms. And somewhere, Aurora waits.
I stare at the map spread across the table, each red dot representing a lifetime of careful planning, strategic alliances, and calculated violence. The Vipers—my creation as much as Jax’s—a shadow empire that took fifteen years to build.
Everything I’ve worked for is about to burn.
When this war ends, the Vipers will collapse. Political allies will distance themselves. Business partners will vanish. Thecarefully constructed web of influence we’ve woven across this city will unravel thread by bloody thread.
My empire is about to fall, and the strangest thing is that I don’t give a damn.
“Hunter?” Grayson’s voice breaks through my thoughts. “Are you with us?”
I look up at the men watching me, men who’ve been by my side for years, who are now risking their lives because I fell for a woman I was never supposed to want.
“I’m here.”
A single image burns in my mind: Aurora, her blue eyes flashing with defiance even as she surrendered to me. Aurora, who saw the monster behind my mask and didn’t run. Who challenged me when others would cower.
Two weeks ago, I would have killed anyone who threatened what I’d built. I would have eliminated any vulnerability without hesitation.
Now I’m dismantling it all for her.
“You understand what this means,” Blaze says quietly. “After tonight, there’s no Vipers anymore. Not as we knew it.”
I nod, feeling an unexpected lightness. “I know.”
My phone vibrates with an incoming message from one of our surveillance teams. Another dead end. I clench my jaw but feel no panic, only cold, focused determination.
When did she become my entire world? Was it on that cliff edge, rain soaking her hair? In my office, her face flushed with desire and shame? Or against that oak tree, when she fought me and then surrendered so completely?
I don’t know exactly when Aurora Harrison rewired my priorities, my very existence. But she did.
“Tell the teams to prep for the raids,” I order, already moving toward the door. “We leave in twenty.”
I’ll tear down everything I’ve built with my bare hands if that’s what it takes to get her back. And I won’t regret a single brick.
8
AURORA
Idrift in and out of a heavy sleep, my limbs feeling like they’re filled with cement. Something’s wrong. The soup. The soup they brought us earlier—it tasted bitter. I didn’t finish mine, but I had enough.
