Few men show up at our gates after lockdown expecting to leave breathing. I stand slowly. The chair wheels squeak behind me. “Who is it?”
The prospect hesitates. His Adam’s apple bobs. “Gunny November.”
The name drops into the room like a grenade. Ghost’s eyes shift sharp. Mace goes completely still. I keep my face blank but recognition hits deep. Buried years surface fast.
November.
A ghost from before chapters and borders carved up the Keys. Before most men in this clubhouse earned their patches in blood and loyalty. He doesn’t come around unless something’s already shattered.
“Bring him in,” I say.
Mace turns toward me. “You sure about that?”
“No,” I answer honestly. “But I want to know why he crawled out of whatever hole he’s been hiding in.”
Minutes drag. The office air grows heavier. Old paper and gun oil press against my senses. Footsteps approach outside. The door opens again.
Gunny November steps inside. He looks worn down. Years heavier than I remember. Deep lines cut across his face. Exhaustion sits in his shoulders like weights he can’t set down. His clothes carry the faint scent of salt and cheap motel soap. He doesn’t belong in a room full of Royal Bastards anymore. But here he stands.
We don’t shake hands. We never did.
“You’re still standing,” he says. His voice sounds rough.
“So are you,” I reply.
A faint humorless smile ghosts across his mouth. Then it dies. “I need a favor,” he says.
The room shifts behind him. Mace straightens taller. Ghost watches him like prey that might still have teeth.
I stay on my feet. “You don’t get favors for showing up after years of silence.”
“I know,” he answers.
That honesty makes me listen.
He exhales slowly. The sound carries years of regret. “It’s my daughter.”
The word drops heavier than the dead driver on the bridge. Daughter. It changes the shape of everything in the room without a single man moving.
I study him closely, searching his face for lies. “What about her?” I’ve never met his daughter as he’s kept that part of his world away from this life. Don’t blame him really. As soon as his old lady got pregnant, he left. Left it all to raise a family. Can’t say if that’s a good thing or a bad thing, but it’s the thing he did.
His jaw tightens. Muscle jumps under stubble. “Someone’s been watching her.”
Silence swallows the office whole. I glance at Mace. Then at Ghost. Neither speaks. “We’re already in a pile of shit here,” I tell him honestly. The missing shipment. Odin dead. And nowthis. Another problem to stack on top of an already impossible situation.
“I get that,” he says. “Wouldn’t be here if there was any other option.”
I already know I won’t like where this road leads. But in my world roads only go one direction once blood starts flowing. Forward. Through whoever stands in the way.
Gunny stands there. Tired eyes locked on mine. Waiting for the king of these islands to decide if his daughter becomes another piece on the board.
My fists stay clenched at my sides. The war’s already started. Now it has a new shadow stretching across it. And I protect what belongs to my territory. Even when that territory includes ghosts from the past asking for mercy I rarely give.
3
Tia
The fluorescent lights in my tiny Marathon apartment buzz like angry bees overhead. I stand at the kitchen counter in my mismatched socks. One has tiny pineapples. The other has dancing tacos. My hair sticks up in seventeen directions because I keep running my fingers through it while staring at the same page in my notebook for twenty minutes. The notebook holds sketches of signal patterns I shouldn’t be noticing. Weird little blips in the data streams I monitor for my boring tech job. Blips that feel like eyes on the back of my neck.
