“Found them!”he yells before he can even temper it.The laptop chirps, and a live feed pops up—grainy, cracked like old film, but clear enough.
A small cluster of heat signatures at a lone rest stop ten minutes ahead.
One blob is double the size of the others.All bikes, but there’s someone hunched over on that one.
It’s her.
My stomach flips, and a new engine revs in my chest.The hunt lights me up from the inside.
For a second, the world narrows to tire and taillight and the sound of our breath.
Then another feeling slides in under the adrenaline.
It’s something darker and meaner, a hunger that’s less about rescue and more about retribution.
It bubbles up like oil and hot coals.I don’t like that part of me, but I don’t deny it either.
“She’s there?”Benji repeats.
His eyes are dangerous in that way I’ve seen a hundred times.
A soldier’s focus turned inward for one thing only.
“She’s there,” Micah confirms.“Roach’s bike cluster is on the north side of the gas station.Two extras.No transport rigs.Looks like this is an impromptu pit stop.”
I take that in like a man taking aim.Ten minutes.That’s all.
Ten minutes to close, ten minutes to plan and steady and not fuck this up.
“You want us to call it in?”Benji asks, the civvies in him peeking through.
“No.”
I don’t want sirens or uniforms or a bunch of paperwork that gets her back in pieces.
“Too much noise.We can do this better alone.We move fast, clean.We get her out—and we make the rest of them look like an unfortunate fucking accident.”
Benji nods.“Got it.”
Micah kills a stream, then keys the drone feed to my phone.A tiny window appears over my HUD—heads-up display.It’s a grainy, thermal view of the rest stop.I can pick out the shapes—the bikes, the truck, the spot where she’s been corralled.
She’s inside the bathroom.Smart girl.Brave girl.
Seeing her small and hunched under the fluorescence does something to me I don’t want to admit out loud.
My throat tightens.
For a second I let myself see her smiling in that sweet way she does when she thinks I don’t notice.
Then the dark thread winds up again.
I don’t need anyone to tell me what to do next.Muscle memory and a dozen rehearsed moves take over.
I map the approach route in my head—where the bikes block sight lines, where I can tuck the SUV out of view, where Benji and Micah will cut off escape.
I can taste the plan like copper on my tongue.
“Alright,” I say, voice flat and low.“We move on my mark.Micah, tuck the drone away.Recon is over.Benji, you’re point with me.We hit these motherfuckers hard and fast.No bullshit.”
