I turned my head to look at him. In the starlight, his profile was sharp, all angles and shadows, but there was a softness in his expression that he rarely let people see. "What's the point of that story?"
"The point is that nothing ever goes according to plan. The job is to adapt, survive, make it back." His arm came around my shoulders, pulling me closer until I could feel the steady thrum of his heartbeat through his shirt. "Whatever happens in Reno—trap,ambush, the whole thing going sideways—we adapt. We survive. We come back."
"Together."
"Together."
The word was becoming a talisman between us, a promise we kept making and remaking. I leaned into his warmth, let my eyes drift closed. The desert was silent around us, not even a coyote breaking the stillness, and for just a moment, everything felt possible. Like the future was out there waiting for us, we just had to reach for it.
"Tank?"
"Yeah?"
"I'm glad it's you." The words came out before I could second-guess them. "Whatever happens. I'm glad I'm here with you. Not just for the mission—for all of it. The riding lessons. The garage. Everything."
His arm tightened around me. When he spoke, his voice was rough with something I felt more than heard—the same thing that was building in my own chest, too big to name, too important to ignore.
"Me too. You make me..." He trailed off, searching for words. "You make me feel like there's a point to all of this. Like everything that happened—Danny, the club, the years of just... surviving—like it was all leading somewhere. To this. To you."
I tilted my head up and kissed him. It was soft, almost chaste, just a press of lips in the darkness. A seal on a promise neither of us had fully spoken.
"Get some sleep," he murmured against my mouth. "Long ride tomorrow."
My eyes drifted closed, his heartbeat steadybeneath my ear, and the desert wrapped around us like a blanket of stars.
We rolled back into the compound late the next afternoon, dust-covered and exhausted. The clubhouse was buzzing with activity—members checking weapons, loading vehicles, moving with the focused energy of men preparing for battle. Irish sat on the porch with his leg propped up, frustration written across his face. Ghost was beside him, crutches leaning against the railing, equally sidelined.
"Recon team's back!" someone shouted, and suddenly we were surrounded—Axel asking about security, Blade wanting to know about approaches, half a dozen voices overlapping with questions.
"Church." Hawk's voice cut through the noise. "Now."
The chapel filled fast. Tank and I took our places near the head of the table, and I spread out the rough map I'd sketched during our observation—the warehouse layout, guard positions, camera coverage, everything we'd noted.
"Two visible guards," I began, pointing to their positions. "One at the main entrance, one on roving patrol. Fifteen-minute circuit. Camera coverage is minimal—main entrance, loading dock, south fence corner. North and west sides are blind."
"Too easy." Blade echoed my earlier assessment.
"That's what we thought." Tank took over, his voice steady. "Tyler's analysis is that Cross is keeping his real security inside. Probably a full assault team ready to spring the trap the moment we breach."
"So we're walking into a kill box." Axel's expression was grim.
"We would be, if we did what Cross expects." I straightened, meeting the eyes around the table. "Cross knows me. He knows how I think, how I'd approach a tactical problem. He's planned for every standard assault vector."
"Then what do you suggest?"
I looked at Tank, who nodded almost imperceptibly. "We give him what he expects—a team hitting the obvious entry points, drawing his hidden forces out to engage. But that's just the distraction. The real strike comes from somewhere he won't see coming."
"Where?"
I pointed to a section of the map I'd marked with a question mark. "There's a storm drain about two hundred yards east of the warehouse. Old, probably from whatever this property was before—mining operation, maybe, or agriculture. It might lead underneath the building. We didn't have time to explore it without risking exposure, but if it does..."
"A team comes up inside while Cross is focused on the frontal assault." Hawk's eyes narrowed, calculating. "Catch him between two forces."
"It's risky," Tank admitted. "We don't know for certain where that drain leads. Could be a dead end,could be flooded, could dump us somewhere useless."
"But if it works?—"
"If it works, we bypass his kill box entirely." I let that settle. "Cross is arrogant. He believes he's smarter than everyone in this room, that he's anticipated every move we might make. That arrogance is his weakness. He won't have planned for something he doesn't know exists."
