Page 85 of Rebel
His smile is small, real. “About damn time.”
We stay like that until dawn creeps across the blinds, turning the walls gold. For a few fragile hours, there’s peace.
But peace never lasts.
By the fourth day, I’m moving again. The bruises have turned from purple to yellow, and the ache in my ribs has dulled to something manageable. The clubhouse hums with movement. Guns cleaned, ammo loaded, engines tuned for war.
Bones showed up two nights ago, silent as a ghost. He didn’t say where he’d been, only that Syvannah’s safe at the Royal Bastards’ compound. Every instinct in me screams not to trust him, but Carter insists he’s earned a sliver of faith.
Still, I watch him from across the table now as Allura lays out the plan, my hand wrapped around a mug of coffee gone cold.
“Vultures have three major laundering hubs left,” Divine reports, tapping her screen. “One in East L.A., one outside Barstow, one in the basin. We hit all three. Same hour. No warning.”
Allura nods. “The goal isn’t just to burn them. It’s to take back what’s ours.”
Sloane grins, cracking her knuckles. “Always did like fireworks.”
“Just make sure the show counts,” Allura warns.
Bones leans back in his chair. “I’ve got blueprints on the Barstow site. It’s built like a fortress, but it’s vulnerable from underneath with drainage tunnels that lead straight to the vault room.”
“Funny how you know that,” I retort.
He meets my stare evenly. “Because I built the route when I was laundering for them. Thought you’d rather have intel than explanations.”
Carter’s hand slides to mine under the table, grounding me before I do something stupid.
Allura cuts in, voice like a blade. “We’ll use it. Raven, Sloane, and Bones, you take Barstow. French, Iris, and I will handle East L.A. Rebel, Carter, and Calypso, you’re with Divine on the basin hub. We strike at midnight.”
“Copy,” I answer, already tasting smoke.
The desert hums electric at midnight. Engines idle low, headlights off. The basin compound squats against the horizon, a maze of shipping containers and steel offices. Every light inside burns dirty yellow.
“Divine, you in position?” I whisper into comms.
“Copy. Cameras looped. Thirty seconds before the alarm notices.”
“Let’s make it count.”
Carter cuts through the lock with a silenced saw, and we slip inside. The air reeks of chemicals and cash. Racks of servers hum beside crates marked with false logos. Imove straight to the central terminal. Divine’s code floods the screen.
“Got eyes,”she says. “You’ve got five minutes before their failsafe fries the data.”
“Plenty,” I mutter.
The files spill open like veins. Bank routes, shell corporations, names. And there, at the bottom, buried in encrypted text, a familiar tag:ASlade.
Alex’s signature.
My pulse stutters. “Carter.”
He’s beside me in a second. I point. “He found this first. That’s why they killed him.”
Carter’s eyes narrow. “You sure?”
“Positive. They buried his work inside their own files. He tried to expose them.”
Divine’s voice crackles.“Rebel, we’ve got incoming. You need to pull the plug.”
