Page 45 of Ghost

Dot pushed a third mug toward an empty stool with a warm smile for my pretty girl.

Tamsin looked at me before joining them, and I squeezed the back of her neck and left her with the women before returning to Stryker’s office.

The meeting stayed brief because we had spent the day learning the ground. Stryker laid out the approach, and the brothers refined it. Road teams would close the main drive and the rear service route, breach groups would hit from opposite sides, and no one would touch a Bellamy case until I cleared it.

“If they try to burn the place, stop the fire before you chase the asshole holding the match.” I looked around the room. “We need the material intact, and I’d rather not spend tonight picking pieces of you out of a hillside.”

Smoke leaned back in his chair. “You say the sweetest shit before a raid.”

“Trying to keep morale up.”

Hawkeye pointed at the rear service road on the map. “Nomad’s people close this first. Once it’s shut, vehicles stay inside the fence.”

Stryker looked around the table. “Nobody plays hero, breaks formation, or gets greedy. We take the site, the material, and every bastard we can keep breathing long enough to answer questions.”

We answered with low acknowledgments. Men checked weapons, comms, armor, and the gear required for the parts they would handle. I changed into a clean shirt over the bandage, settled my cut across my shoulders, and secured the equipment I would need if the damaged case held more than stolen material.

Darkness had settled over the compound when I returned to the lounge. Tamsin sat on the arm of one couch while Jacqueline and Bex argued over the final pool score, but she stood the moment she saw me. Worry tightened her face, and she crossed straight into my arms without caring how many brothers watched.

I caught the back of her neck and brought her close. “What do you need, pretty girl?”

“Come back,” she ordered fiercely, her fingers clutching the front of my cut.

“You’re in my bed.” I lowered my mouth near hers. “Where else would I go?”

Her gaze dropped to my bandaged side before rising again. “Then come back with fewer holes than last time.”

“Bossy.”

“You like it.”

I kissed her hard, and her body pressed closer, the soft sound she made against my tongue sending a brutal pulse through my cock. I broke the kiss before I forgot the property full of armed men waiting for me.

“Love it,” I growled against her swollen lips.

I rested my forehead against hers for one moment while her hands stayed fisted in my cut. She was scared, but she didn’t ask me to stay. She trusted the brothers riding with me, and I intended to reward her faith by returning to her before the night ended.

“Move out,” Stryker called from the clubhouse entrance.

I released Tamsin, crossed the lounge, and joined the brothers heading outside. My last look found her standing between Jacqueline and Bex, worried but steady, her eyes following me all the way through the door. She would still be there when I returned, and I would be in my bed with her before she had time to get used to the empty space.

18

GHOST

The Black Crowns rolled out after dark, splitting across the canyon roads before converging around the remote storage property from three directions. Nobody was riding blind or guessing where the assholes inside might run. Stryker held overall command, Hawkeye controlled the outer containment, Nomad had the rear service road, and the rest of us moved into positions that matched the work we had done before we ever wore a Black Crowns cut.

Cipher remained at the compound with Tamsin, watching the property’s cameras and communications. Wraith and Breach rode with the side-entry group, Trigger and Smoke would hit the front, and Skyfall held the eastern ridge. I carried the surveillance photograph of the damaged Bellamy case folded inside my cut.

We left the vehicles out of hearing range and moved through dry brush while Cipher fed updates through our comms. The exterior cameras still showed an empty road, and the men inside were shifting cases toward two trucks parked nose-out in the yard. Stryker waited until every brother reported ready, then his voice came through my earpiece in a low tone.

“Take it.”

Nomad’s truck surged across the rear service road at the same time Hawkeye closed the main drive. Wraith and Breach cut through the side gate, Trigger and Smoke hit the front, and Skyfall’s first shot shattered the yard light above the roll-up door before anyone inside understood the dark no longer belonged to them. Men shouted, weapons came up, but the Black Crowns were already through the openings they had believed were covered.

The first gunman stepped from behind a pickup and fired toward Wraith. Breach drove him back behind the engine block while Smoke crossed the open yard, grabbed a second man by the back of his jacket, and slammed him face-first into the side of the building. Trigger kicked a dropped pistol away and hauled the bastard to the ground as I cleared the side entrance with Wraith at my shoulder.

A truck engine roared outside, followed by the violent grind of tires biting into loose gravel. The sound tore through the yard toward the narrow road behind the building. Nomad’s voice cut across the comm.