“What about ‘em?” I shoot back.
“The whole batch came in pre-activated. I was gonna deploy them this week. They’re keyed to our system.”
“What are you saying, brother?”
“We can track ‘em. That’s assuming they haven’t deactivated the tracking system.”
“Let’s hope they’re smart, but not that smart,” I mutter.
He turns the laptop around so I can see the screen. He has a map of the county pulled up with a grid overlay. There are active pings blinking. Most are clustered around the compound, the salvage yard, and our other club businesses, but several are clustered together and on the move. “See? These are the trackers we’re missing. They’re currently moving south on County Road Fourteen.”
“Fuckin’ hell, brother. You have got to be joking. Finding our missing equipment can’t be this easy.”
“Today it is. It’s about time we caught a fuckin’ break.”
I pull out my keys. “Let’s catch up with Jasper and the others before they leave.”
We both tear out of the shop and catch the other officers before they’re on their bikes. I bring them up to speed. Getting our stolen equipment back and dealing some pain to the Hyenas is too damn tempting to pass up.
The five of us ride out, with Jasper on point, Slate and Onyx flanking him, and me and Striker bringing up the rear. Jasper has his phone locked into a cradle on his handlebars with the map open. He’s leading the charge.
The morning air still has a bit of a bite to it, whipping past my cut. Riding with my club brothers on a mission is the best feeling in the entire fucking world. We’re gonna run thesefuckers down, get Striker’s gear back, and knock a few Hyenas on their asses while we’re at it.
“Talk to me,” Rock barks into the comms.
“Still southbound,” Jasper tells his old man. Rock founded our club, so nobody questions why he gets updates straight from his son. “We’ll be on them in minutes. They don’t know we’re comin’.”
Our tires are eating the road. The scenery blurs past, but my mind stays on finding and retrieving that equipment.
We’re coming up on the fork where County Road Fourteen splits off towards Old Mill Road and the interstate. If they take the interstate, we lose the advantage. If they take Old Mill Road, we can box ‘em in.
The closer we get, the more my adrenaline surges. I lean into the moment, my grin finally coming back.
“Three miles. No wait.” Striker’s voice is panicked.
Jasper’s voice comes through the comms. “What happened? Talk to me, Striker.”
“I don’t know what the fuck just happened,” he says.
“Do your best to explain,” Rock demands.
“The trackers split.” His voice goes flat. “They’re all splittin’ off and going in different directions.”
“How is that even possible?” I ask.
I thumb the app open, like I should have done in the first place. Then I see what Striker’s seeing. The cluster of pingsthat was one tight knot a second ago is moving apart rapidly. Inside of a few seconds they’ve gone from one target to a dozen, all racing off in six directions. And then, one by one, they start blinking out altogether.
Jasper throws up a fist indicating for us all to stop and pull over. We roll off the throttle and pull over onto the gravel shoulder in a loose row.
“What am I lookin’ at?” Jasper says, killing his engine.
Striker’s already off his bike, staring at the screen. His expression is grim. “They scattered the trackers. Pulled ‘em off whatever they were on and put ‘em in different vehicles.”
“Why did they all go dark that way?” I ask.
Striker’s head goes back and he closes his eyes. After a couple of seconds, he says quietly, “They had someone at home base hacking our system. That wasn’t signal loss. Someone shut us out.”
Jasper’s hand tightens around his phone. “They’re smarter and more coordinated this time around. We’re gonna have to move twice as fast to stay ahead of them and run a tight game if we want to hang onto our territory.”
