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My eyes flicked to the feed of the kid’s room, which was on the other side of the second floor. The guards never entered that room, but we were about to wake up a five-year-old and sneak him out his window and into the woods. There was a better than decent chance he’d scream and alert the guards.
“Go.” I barked the order more harshly than I intended. If there was one thing I hated, it was when our meticulously planned missions got shot to hell.
Static came through my headphones. “Targets A and B, secure.”
Another life saved from a dangerous situation. But getting them out of the house was only step one in the process. There was still a lot to be done—relocation, new identities, finding them the resources to start the healing process.
At least we were giving them the opportunity to live, a chance so many others didn’t get.
The timer went off, and I let go of the breath I wasn’t aware I’d been holding as my team moved through the woods. My drones hovered over the area, allowing me to ensure no surprises popped up.
“Not every mission is going to go off without a hitch,” Betty, our boss, said.
“I know. That’s why I had us create plans B through D,” I shot back.
“I’m just saying. If you let go of that perfectionist mindset, you wouldn’t stress out so much when something doesn’t go right and you have to pivot.” Betty leaned back in her chair, not that there was much room in the van. I was surprised that all my equipment fit, let alone an additional chair.
Betty pointed at one of the screens, redirecting my focus to where it belonged. I typed out the code to switch the camera feeds back to normal. “Mind your business,” I said, with no heat behind the words. I loved Betty. She was more like an aunt than a boss.
She was Uncle Wolf’s best friend and she’d pretty much always been a fixture in my life. I don’t know what I would have done if she hadn’t approached Ghost Unit with job offers for all of us.
I looked over at her. Eyes closed, head tipped back, her short hair hanging over the back of the chair. Next to Aunt Jeannie and Scarlette, she was my favorite woman on the planet. She’d brought me home, given my family a place to go.
“It’s hard to mind my own when you ladies want to play superhero for free all the time. Someone has to keep you levelheaded and me in the green,” she said, opening a granola bar.
“Whatever. We do paid work too.” I rolled my eyes. We’d made her so much money since she hired us two years ago that she could’ve retired and bought a vacation home in Maui. Betty wasn’t that type though.
“I’m aware. It just pisses me off more because you bring in too much dough for me to complain about the rest.” She huffed. “Savannah told me I had to be nice since we can finally go on that trip to Bora Bora she’s been begging me for.”
I rolled my eyes but stayed focused on the monitors. My favorite part of the entire mission was coming up. The guards would go to check on the woman and find her missing, along with the kid. And after they’d searched every nook and cranny of the ostentatious twenty acres, they’d get the joy of calling their boss and telling him his wife and child had disappeared.
I loved watching them squirm. We just needed to prepare for how the husband handled it. Would he go to the police, or would he hire his own investigators to find her? Probably the latter; Lyle had more money than he could spend in three lifetimes. But our team had zero concerns that he’d find his human punching bags.
They spent less time searching than I would have thought. Less than ten minutes after they discovered their snafu, the guards dialed their boss. Filled with glee, I watched Lyle throw a temper tantrum like a two-year-old who was told he couldn’t have any ice cream.
ChapterThree
PEYTON
Birds rustled branches;animals skittered across the ground. A cool breeze rustled my hair. It was perfect. Everything I’d ever wanted in a home. A place where I could simplybe. I sat in my Adirondack chair with my eyes closed and allowed the tranquility of the forest to settle over me.
The simplest moments were often the ones that took away all the stress of my job. Helped my mind decompress from work.
Once we’d decided to join Betty at Bridge City Security, we all searched for houses. Aunt Jeannie sent me the listing for this place, and I fell in love. It was run-down, but it wasn’tcondemnedlike Uncle Wolf had claimed during his walkthrough. After I’d already bought the place.
I’m pretty sure he named a few gray hairs after me. Then he went to work on making my home habitable. He got my vision, but I think my excitement was what finally broke him down. He was never good at denying me what I wanted.
I finally got to move in a few months ago, two years after he started. With how much I’ve been working, I hadn’t had the chance to paint any of the rooms or set up more extensive security. I had the basics done, at least. The only rooms I’d gotten around to setting up were the main bedroom and bathroom. The living room had a couch, but the TV was still on the floor. And that was next on my list of things to tackle.
Tires crunching down the dirt road had me sitting up straighter and reaching for my gun on the small side table next to me.
Car doors opened and closed. Whoever it was either thought I wasn’t home or didn’t care if I heard them coming. Feet stomped up the front steps, and I waited.
“Open up, Peyton,” a voice I knew said, followed by fast, hard knocks on the front door.
“Either you let us in or we break the door down,” another one shouted.
“Dude, they just installed that door like a few weeks ago,” a third voice joined in. If three of them were here, I knew the other two were with them.
