"Print everything," I told Tanner. "Make copies. Get Ana here. Every angle. Every timestamp."
Mia's lips trembled. She pressed her forehead to mine. I felt the heat between us, the pull that had drawn us across a thousand small decisions. "Don't take the ritual route," she whispered. "Not yet."
I nodded. I didn't know if I could keep that promise forever. But I'd already made a choice in front of men who counted votes and honor. I had chosen her.
The footage blinked again, then cut to black. On a paused frame the rival's hand was still at his chest, fingers curled around whatever he'd taken from the ex. In the corner of the screen a reflection flickered in the window glass—another vehicle. Another meeting.
Tanner looked at me. "They're meeting more than we knew."
My throat went tight in a way that had nothing to do with heat. The next move mattered. The next step could cost everything or save them all.
I tightened my grip on Mia's hand and felt her answer, fiercer now. "Tomorrow," I said. "Tomorrow we take this where it belongs."
Behind us, Leo muttered in sleep and turned—the small sound a world I had promised to protect.
The file on the screen blinked, then rolled. The footage resolved and the image that made my blood run cold stared back—a familiar profile, the ex, leaning close to the rival in a parking lot they'd used three times. This time the ex handed him a paper with a name on it: the name of the family court judge Mia was about to face.
My breath left me like a struck bell.
8
CALEB STONE
We moved before the sun had fully learned the shape of the warehouses.
No fanfare. No bragging. Just boots on gravel, clipped radios, and the soft clink of keys and cuffs—the little noises that meant someone had thought this through. I liked to think in lists: who watched which door, who held the lot, who had the van keyed and ready. Lists kept people alive.
Ana rode with Tanner. Mateo took point with the two city officers we trusted. I had three men on interior sweeps and two watching the alley exits. Detective Rivera had our warrant. Mia’s folder was in my jacket. Her handwriting stuck out of the pages—receipts, timestamps, the precise anger of someone who doesn’t want surprises. If anyone should feel the weight of this, it should be me.
We hit the door on my signal.
The first two went as they’d practiced—fast, quiet. I braced a shoulder against the metal and felt the world open: concrete, crates, a haze of cigarette smoke. Men moved like they didn’t know they were being watched until cuffs closed around wrists.
It was ugly, efficient, necessary.
Mia’s files made it surgical. Her ex’s habit of sloppy cash drops and burner phones lined up with motel receipts and comm pings. The courier’s name matched a receipt with a burnt leather token. Tanner queued clips on his phone and Rivera watched, steady.
“They’re on a secure channel,” she said. “This is enough for probable cause across the chain.”
Relief hummed low in my chest—relief that we weren’t walking in blind, wary pride that we’d kept it tight, and hot anger that anyone had thought to touch Leo.
We secured the perimeter. My men stripped the place with practiced hands—no blood, no theatrics. Pack-trained precision; all the violence foregone for the sake of clean evidence. They found crates of comms, a duffel of burner phones and cash, a box of receipts—paper trails that belong in courtrooms, not alleyways.
And then we found him.
The rival alpha stood under a naked bulb, sleeves pushed up, hands empty. He smiled slow, like he had time to waste. He hadn’t expected the police. He hadn’t expected the detective’s badge. He’d expected something darker.
Mate or not, he was a problem. He’d been watching Mia, using her ex like a crooked pawn to force the pack into rules he favored. He’d think he could blackmail tradition into a claim. He’d misread me.
I could have let the pack take him.
I could have done the old things Kruger whispered behind closed doors—solve an unclean problem and leave no fingerprints. The thought rose, hot and ready. I shut it down like slamming a gate.
This was Mia’s life. Not mine to throw away. Not a bargaining chip. Not something I sacrificed for the pack’s honor.
So I moved in.
Up close he smelled of smoke, cheap cologne, and animal arrogance. He lunged for a corner—reckless, a man who thought a fist could buy him the world. Tanner and I were already on him. I felt the surge behind me; men wanted violence. I felt it in my blood too. But I kept my hands careful. I twisted and pinned him with a joint lock, felt tendon and muscle and the wrongness of his pride under my palm. I could have crushed his wind. Instead I held until the cuffs arrived.
