It was a promise.
“They said she froze once,” Scout said. “Said she’d do it again.”
I was on my feet before I realized I’d moved.
“Enough,” I growled.
Scout met my eyes, steady. “I told them they were wrong.”
Cap lifted a hand, grounding us both. “Continue.”
“They’re organized,” Scout said. “Not sloppy. Not street-level. They have logistics. Schedules. Safe routes. They move fast when heat shows up.”
“Trafficking ring with discipline,” Cap said. “Military-adjacent.”
Ghost finally spoke.
“They used military comm structure,” he said. His voice was flat, but there was something under it now. “Call signs. Rotations. The way they clear rooms.”
Every head turned toward him.
“I saw it in the footage,” Ghost continued. “Didn’t want to believe it. But Scout’s confirming it.”
Cap leaned back slightly. “You’re saying ex-military?”
“Or trained by them,” Ghost replied. “Either way, they’re not amateurs.”
Scout nodded. “They talked about you,” he said, looking at Ghost now. “About how you see everything. Said you were a problem.”
Ghost’s mouth tightened.
“They mentioned your sister,” Scout added.
The room went still.
Ghost’s head snapped up. “What.”
Scout cleared his throat. “They used her name.”
I felt the shift then. The way the air changed when something deeply buried got dragged into the light.
“What did they say,” Ghost asked quietly.
“That she wasn’t the only one,” Scout said. “That there were more like her. That there always would be.”
Ghost stood so fast his chair scraped loudly against the floor.
No one moved to stop him.
Not because we couldn’t.
Because we knew better.
“Sit,” Cap ordered.
Ghost didn’t.
He paced once, then stopped, hands braced on the table like he needed the physical resistance to keep himself upright.
