My jaw tightens inside the helmet, but I shove it down because there will be time to feel later. Right now I need to be sharp, and I need to be controlled, because I need to be the man Mason trusts to finish this without burning everything to the ground in the process.
We peel off in smaller groups once we get closer to downtown, because a full pack rolling into a gated neighborhood is how you get cops, cameras, and a whole mess we do not need.
Tank and Piston break off with the van, while Dagger and a couple of the others take perimeter positions around the neighborhood. Blade, Switch, and I stay tight, heading straight for the gate.
Riot’s voice crackles in my ear through the comm. “Cameras are looping now. You’ve got about seven minutes before anyone notices anything weird.”
“Copy,” Mason replies. “Move.”
The gate opens smooth and quiet like it was always meant to let us in, revealing perfect lawns, fancy lights, and big houses sitting smug and peaceful like nothing bad ever happens in places like this. Men like Whitaker think they’re untouchable behind their money and their security systems and their shiny front doors.
Yeah. Okay.
We cut our engines half a block down and coast the rest of the way, rolling silent until we stop in front of a modern, glass-heavy house that probably costs more than most people will make in their lifetime.
Riot’s voice comes through again. “That’s him. Lights on inside. No movement at the windows. The front door alarm is off. You’re clear to move.”
Blade slips off his bike first and starts checking angles and windows, his posture screaming combat even when he’s quiet, while Switch takes the side path and disappears around the house without a sound.
I head for the front, and my heart is beating slow and steady now, like it knows exactly what it’s here to do. I don’t knock. I test the handle and find it unlocked, which doesn’t surprise me at all.
Of course it is.
We slip inside like ghosts, and the place smells like money and cologne and something citrusy that makes my jaw tighten, because it feels wrong that a place this clean is about to get violent. Everything is white and steel and expensive glass, with shoes lined up neatly by the door and a jacket tossed over the back of a chair like he came home comfortable and not worried, not thinking about what he did less than an hour ago.
The TV is on in the living room, muted sports highlights flashing across a giant screen, and we hear him before we see him. Footsteps upstairs, his voice talking to someone on the phone, laughing.
That sound hits wrong, too easy and too relaxed, and my hands curl into fists.
Blade gestures, signaling that two of us go up the stairs while one stays low, so Switch takes the bottom without a word and Blade and I move up, slow and quiet, boots barely touching the carpet, breathing controlled and bodies locked into instinct.
We reach the landing just as Grant Whitaker steps out of his bedroom with his phone still in his hand and a smile on his face like he’s living his best life.
He freezes when he sees us, confusion flashing first and then fear.
“What the hell—”
Blade hits him before he can finish the sentence, driving him back into the wall with a forearm to the chest that knocks the air straight out of him, and his phone goes flying, skidding across the floor and cracking when it hits the banister.
I grab him by the collar and slam him forward hard enough that his head cracks against the drywall, and he goes limp for half a second before panic finally punches through and he starts struggling.
“Don’t… don’t touch me,” he chokes. “Do you know who I am?”
I laugh, and it comes out low and ugly. “Yeah. You’re the piece of shit who touched our family.”
He swings wild and desperate, but Blade blocks it and drives a sharp, precise punch into his ribs that knocks him sideways.
Switch is suddenly there too, having come up silent as death, and he wrenches Whitaker’s arm behind his back until he screams.
“Too loud,” Switch mutters, and then he slams him face-first into the floor.
We don’t let him get a breath after that. Zip ties snap tight around his wrists, his ankles are bound, and the hood is over his head before he can get his bearings.
I haul him up by the back of his shirt. “Time to go,” I growl in his ear.
He starts begging on the stairs, actual begging, swearing we have the wrong guy and that he didn’t do anything, but Blade shoves him forward and tells him if he keeps talking he’s going to lose his teeth on the staircase.
We drag him out the front door, down the driveway, and straight into the waiting van, and when Tank slams the doors shut, the fancy house goes back to quiet like nothing ever happened.
