Chapter 32 Chapter thirty two
The bullet didn’t hit the tire. It struck the asphalt inches behind the Norton, a white-hot spark that hissed as it bit into the road. My father wasn't aiming for a kill shot; he was ranging us. As we banked into a hard left toward the expressway, I looked back one last time. Chen Wei stood on the rooftop, his silhouette framed by the flashing red and blue strobe lights of the federal blockade. He lowered his rifle, not because he had missed, but because his job was done.
The perimeter of the Unified Nations had held just long enough. We burst through the final gap in the blockade, the roar of a thousand bikes acting as a sonic shield against the orders being barked from the helicopters.
"Dax, we have to move!" I screamed over the wind. "The ledger won't hold them forever if they realize it's a bluff!"
"We’re not going to wait for them to find out," Dax replied, his voice a grim frequency in my helmet.
We hit the open road, the city lights fading into a blur of neon streaks. The ride back to Coldwater was a six-hour gauntlet through the blackest part of the night. We bypassed the major tolls, sticking to the old industrial arteries where the shadows were deep and the law was thin. Tank and Reaper held our flanks, their bikes forming a tight protective diamond around the Norton.
But as the sun began to bleed over the horizon, painting the sky in bruised shades of purple, the vibration in the road changed. It wasn't the steady hum of a pack. It was a rhythmic, mechanical throb that felt too perfect, too synchronized.
"Dax, do you feel that?" I asked, my grip tightening on the handlebars.
"I feel it," he grumbled. He checked his rearview. "Reaper, fall back and scout. Something’s coming up the rear, and it’s moving faster than a Harley."
Reaper dropped back, his bike a receding shadow. Seconds later, his voice crackled through the comms, filled with a raw, jagged panic. "Dax! Pull up! It’s not the feds! It’s "
The transmission cut out in a static-filled scream.
I looked back. Out of the morning mist emerged four bikes sleek, aerodynamic machines that lacked any branding. They were matte black, their engines silent except for a high-frequency whistle that mimicked the Norton’s prototype. These were the Wraiths, the final iteration of the project my mother and Marcus had started.
And they were being ridden by Iron Wolves.
"Traitors!" Tank roared, his hand reaching for his sidearm.
The lead Wraith didn't fire a gun. It launched a tether a high-tensile carbon-fiber line that snared Tank’s rear axle. In a horrific display of mechanical torque, the Wraith braked, and Tank’s bike was ripped out from under him, cartwheeling across the highway in a spray of sparks and debris.
"Tank!" I shrieked.
"Don't look back, Mia!" Dax commanded, though his voice was thick with a suppressed agony. "They’re using the Engine’s own harmonics against us. They’ve been waiting in the club for the moment we brought the prototype home."
We were three miles from the ruins of the Coldwater clubhouse. The scorched remains of the gate loomed ahead, a jagged skeleton of iron against the dawn. We tore through the entrance, the Norton’s tires screaming on the gravel.
Dax skidded to a halt in the center of the charred lot, his bike kicking up a cloud of ash. He dismounted, pulling me behind him as the four Wraiths glided through the gate, circling us like sharks in shallow water.
The riders dismounted and pulled off their helmets. My heart shattered. These weren't strangers. They were the lieutenants Dax had trusted to guard the clubhouse while we were in Daytona.
"Why?" Dax asked, his voice low and hollow. He looked at the men he had called brothers. "How much did they pay you to sell out the patch?"
"It wasn't about the money, Dax," the lead rider said. It was Miller, the man who had been the club’s treasurer for a decade. "It was about the lie. You led us into a war against our own blood. The Old Guard is right the Wolves were built to serve the Engine, not the other way around."
The sound of a heavy engine approached. A black SUV rolled through the gate, stopping ten feet from us. The door opened, and a man stepped out. He was dressed in a pristine suit, but he wore a heavy gold ring with the Iron Wolf crest.
It was Marcus Steele’s lawyer. The man who had handled the "inheritance" that had started this entire nightmare.
"Mr. Steele," the lawyer said, looking at Dax with a cold, professional pity. "The board has reviewed your performance. Your leadership has resulted in the destruction of ninety percent of the club’s assets. Under the terms of the original charter, your presidency is terminated."
He turned to me, his smile as sharp as a razor. "And Miss Chen. We’ll be taking the Norton now. The government contracts have been signed. The variable-compression cycle is officially state property."
"You'll have to take it from the ashes," I said, my hand moving toward the Engine's emergency purge valve.
"I wouldn't do that, Mia," a new voice said.
From the shadows of the burned-out infirmary, a figure emerged. It was Reaper. He held a detonator in his hand, his thumb resting on the trigger.
"Reaper... you too?" I whispered.
"I saw what they were building in the vault, Mia," Reaper said, his eyes full of a haunted, desperate light. "I saw the missile specs. If the Wolves don't control the Engine, the world burns anyway. I’m not selling out. I’m making sure the right people hold the leash."
He looked at Dax. "I'm sorry, Pres. But the Ghost has to die for the Wolf to survive."
He pressed the button.