"Then let's clear them." I checked my weapon, looked at Irish. "You're with me."
He nodded once, jaw tight. Whatever jokes he usually had, they'd died in this room. "Get them out," I told Kai. "I'll be back." Then I left him there, surrounded by broken people, and went to kill the man who'd done the breaking.
I've killed a lot of men. In Afghanistan, it was duty. Orders and objectives and the cold calculus of war. In the MC, it was protection—defending my brothers, my territory, the only family I had left. I'd made peace with the blood on my hands years ago.
But climbing those stairs, leaving Kai behind with the victims, I realized I'd never wanted to kill anyone as much as I wanted to kill Viper. The images wouldn't leave me. The cages. The hollow eyes. The boy who wouldn't look up.
That could have been Kai.The thought came unbidden, sickening.Different circumstances, different luck. That could have been him.
"Reaper." Hawk's voice in my ear. "Status?"
"Moving to the third floor. Irish is with me. Four hostiles down. At least six more ahead."
"Viper?"
"Intel says he's in the main office. Top floor."
"End this." Two words. All the permission I needed. I moved through the warehouse like a ghost. The training never left you—the way to clear a corner, the rhythm of breath and motion, the cold focus that turned fear into fuel. Three Devil's Dust came around a corridor junction. My gun barked three times. They dropped. Irish followed in tight formation, covering my six with the quiet competence of a man who'd done this before. No jokes now. Just the grim efficiency of soldiers at work.
"Contact ahead." Irish's whisper cut through my thoughts. I refocused. Doorway at the end of the hall, light spilling out, shadows moving inside. Multiple targets.
"Flash and clear," I ordered. "I want Viper alive if possible. The rest are expendable."
Irish pulled the pin. Threw. I counted—one, two—then moved.
The flashbang detonated in a burst of light and sound. I was through the door before the echoes faded, gun up, targets acquired. Two men by the window, disoriented, reaching for weapons. I dropped them both. A third came from behind a desk, knife in hand—Irish put him down with a clean headshot.
And there, cowering in the corner behind an overturned chair, was Viper.
He was smaller than I expected. Lean, wiry, with a face like a rat and eyes that darted constantly, looking for escape. Theman who'd built an empire on human suffering, reduced to a trembling animal when the hunters finally caught up.
"Reaper." He tried to smile, tried to find that oily charm I'd heard about. "Let's talk about this. Whatever Phoenix wants—money, territory—we can make a deal."
"A deal." I moved closer, gun trained on his forehead. "Like the deals you made with those people in the cages downstairs?" His smile flickered. "That's business. Supply and demand. I'm just?—"
"You're just a man who sells children." I grabbed him by the throat, lifted him off the ground. He weighed nothing. All that evil in such a small package. "You sent your men to hurt someone I love. You threatened my family. My home."
"Chen—" He gasped, clawing at my hand. "Chen will destroy you. She's got resources you can't imagine?—"
"Chen's next."
I thought about making it slow. Thought about the boy in the cage who wouldn't look up. Thought about every victim we'd found, every life Viper had bought and sold like cattle. He deserved slow.
But Kai was waiting. And I'd already spent too long in the dark.
I snapped his neck. The sound was small. Anticlimactic. He dropped, and it was over.
"Compound secure," I said into the comm. "Viper's dead."
Hawk's response was immediate. "Copy that. Chen?"
"Not here."
"Then we're not done. Regroup at the cages. We've got civilians to evacuate." I stepped over Viper's body without looking back.
Time to find Kai.
KAI
