Page 14 of The Shape of my Scar (The Unbroken #1)

I t took six hours to get there.

They drove in the battered, mud-spattered Land Rover that Lirian claimed was “low-profile.” Zel hated the thing. It rattled like bones in a box and smelled faintly of wet dog and gun oil, but it handled the terrain like a dream.

They drove in silence most of the way, the battered Land Rover bumping down country lanes like it owed the road money. By the time they passed the third cattle grid and lost signal completely, no one had said a word in over an hour.

Then Maro grunted, “Still looks like murder weather, this. Never bloody changes.”

Zel leaned forward, squinting out the windshield. “Aye, proper grim. You sure this rust bucket’ll make it the last stretch?”

“She’s sound. Ol Nancy Drew here has a long way to go before she croaks,” Maro replied, fondly patting the dash. “You city pricks are just soft.”

Lirian muttered from the back, nose still in his tablet, “Don’t mean I’ve gotta enjoy ridin’ in a tin coffin that stinks of wet socks.”

Thane snorted. “Least it’s not your turn drivin’. You nearly put us in a ditch last time.”

“It was not a ditch,” Lirian corrected, not looking up. “I was only executing a controlled slide.”

Zel smirked. “That what we’re callin’ it now?”

They hit the tree line, and the road vanished completely, becoming a mud path more than anything.

They wound through tight forest until they reached the hidden gate.

They passed the rusted old gate that led nowhere, and then a second one with a coded lock hidden in a stone marker.

Lirian reached forward and tapped in the sequence.

The gate swung open with a soft hydraulic hiss.

Fencing high, barbed, electrified—ran along the inner perimeter, hidden beneath dense brush.

Drones buzzed overhead, invisible unless you knew where to look.

Motion-activated cameras blinked inside tree hollows.

Every hundred yards or so, a tripwire sensor was disguised as loose vines or fallen branches.

The property was called Hollow Acres, though none of them remembered why.

The title deeds were buried beneath a nest of umbrella corporations, holding companies, shell trusts, and offshore accounts.

Lirian had layered it like an onion. Even if someone got curious, they’d never peel back enough to find four broken boys turned weaponised men.

Maro spat out the window. “Welcome back, lads. Home sweet fuckin’ home.”

The gate creaked open. Ahead, the path split.

To the right, the old warehouse looked like a crumbling relic of another era from the outside, but they knew better. It was layered up tighter than a crime boss’s alibi, with traps, cameras, and reinforced walls.

They pulled up outside the farmhouse, where they stayed when they were in deep. Rustic and solid, Maro lived there full- time, preferring the silence. He said it helped him “stay mean while not committing murder.”

The farmhouse was converted from an 1800s ruin into something out of a fairytale, complete with stone walls, blackened timbers, and slate roof.

Inside, it was warm, worn, and livable. They each had rooms there, in addition to the kitchen, a fireplace, and enough bedrooms for whoever else was staying over.

It was the only softness they allowed themselves.

The moment Zel stepped out, he shivered. “Christ, it’s cold enough to freeze yer knickers off.”

Maro was already unloading gear. “You moan like a pensioner, Zel.”

“I feel like one. Me back’s gone.”

“From what? All that sittin’ in meetings pretendin’ you’re important?”

Zel flipped him the bird.

Lirian strode off toward the farmhouse without a word.

Zel watched him go. “Swear down, he talks more to his bloody laptop than to us.”

To the right, past a gravel rise and through another false fence, sat the warehouse.

That was the real base.

It looked like a storage barn from a distance—corrugated metal, sloped roof, paint flaking.

But beneath the facade was the compound: reinforced, tech-heavy, deadly.

A palm-scan door and retina-lock vaults.

Faraday shielding and lead-lined walls. Rooms for weapons, gear, surveillance, and of course, the basement.

Maro’s room. The one that smelled of antiseptic and bleach and echoed with old, buried screams.

The cold was sharp and biting, curling through seams and stitching.

Zel stretched, groaning. “I need a beer and a fucking warm shower.”

Maro was already hauling bags out of the boot. “Definitely do. You smell of three-day-old canned farts that they sell on OnlyFans.”

“Part of your spankbank, eh?” spat Zel.

Lirian was already back after doing a sweep of the farmhouse. He ignored them both, striding toward the warehouse entrance, already talking into his earpiece. “We’ve got three days. I want eyes on every heat signature within a five-mile radius by dawn.”

Thane lagged behind. Always the last out. Always looking back.

Zel clapped him on the shoulder. “You’ll feel better once we put a bullet in someone.”

Thane didn’t answer; he just walked toward the farmhouse, his thoughts already chasing ghosts.

***

An hour later, they made their way to the derelict warehouse. Moss crawled up cracked stone walls and the windows were blacked out. The roof sagged like it had given up the ghost.

Until you found the keypad.

Embedded in an old brick facade, almost invisible unless you knew where to look. Just a small square panel that flickered to life when a palm hovered over it. Handprint recognition. Then a click and the hum of a door opening.

And then the world changed.

The door swung open to reveal steel, glass, and light.

A fortress hidden inside a corpse. Inside, every surface gleamed.

Motion sensors tracked silently. Walls were reinforced and rooms soundproofed.

This was their true headquarters. Manchester was for suits and contracts, but this… this was for war.

Maro’s favourite room was down the stairs in the basement.

Cold, tiled, surgical. He called it “the Prep Room,” But everyone else called it the Morgue.

Fluorescent lights flickered above stainless-steel tables, bone saws on one side, anaesthetics and chemicals on the other.

Meat hooks hung off the ceiling. Everything was pristine.

A wall of fridges buzzed softly. Maro, a former field medic, had a talent for pain and precision.

He once said a man’s silence could be cut out like a tumour, you just had to know where to cut.

They gathered in the glass-walled central room, dubbed the “Fishbowl.” Surveillance feeds blinked across one wall.

Outside the glass, the rest of the compound was quiet, like a predator waiting to spring.

An automated drone did sweeps of the property.

Everything was always watching. Everything was always armed.

Lirian was already there, eyes locked on a screen. His fingers danced over the keyboard, fast and fluid.

“We’ve got names,” he said, not looking up while the printer spat out data.

“Malcolm. Mid-level scum. Bit-part dealer. Keeps his hands clean, lets his boys do the dirty work. Then this dame, Trish Malcy. Romanian import, exact role unknown. Smart. Cold. Ex-special border force. Probably ex-KGB connections.”

“Site?” Thane asked.

Lirian shook his head. “Still digging. They’ve split them. Shell companies. Burn phones. Could be any industrial estate from here to Croatia. But we’ve narrowed their meeting point down to a coastal warehouse, three nights from now.”

Zel crossed his arms. “We swoop and grab who we can. Call the cops once we’ve got proof and bodies.”

“And the kids?” Maro asked. “Where the fuck are they?”

Silence.

Thane leaned forward, elbows on the table, his voice rough. “We find Trish. Let me get inside her head and I’ll figure it out.”

Zel gave him a hard look. “You gonna have a problem fucking her?”

Thane didn’t blink. “She looks decent. I’ll think of blow-up dolls. And I’ll enjoy putting a bullet in her skull once we’re done. It’s not like I have a girlfriend who will complain.”

A grim smile passed between them.

They’d found five of the bastards from the old network so far. None had survived the encounter. None had left a trace that could be followed back to the Horsemen. Only whispers of fear remained.

“Alright. Lirian, put some feelers out and set up a meeting with Malcolm,” Zel said, standing. “We go dark. Two days. Get your heads on straight. Then we move.”

One by one, they filtered out.

Later, Zel stood alone outside, the cold air biting as he lit a cigarette. He needed the burn. The job was fucking with his head.

Behind him, the door creaked, and Thane stepped out, hands in his jacket pockets.

“Still don’t smoke,” he said dryly when Zel offered him the cigarette.

“Still don’t live,” Zel muttered, taking a drag.

“At least I fuck.” Thane stared into the woods. There was silence until he asked the question they had asked themselves a hundred times

“Do you think Dory’s alive somewhere?”

Zel didn’t answer immediately. Then, without turning, he asked, “You want the truth? Or the answer that’ll help you sleep?”

Thane exhaled sharply, rubbing at his chest. He stopped halfway, suddenly aware of the motion, as if it betrayed something.

“I don’t know,” he said quietly.

Zel glanced at him, flicked ash onto the wind. “Lirian’s stalking the doc again.”

Thane snorted. “Still?”

“Yeah. Blames her for saving him. For touching him. For looking at him like he was worth saving.”

Thane looked away. “He is.”

“I don’t think so.” Zel took another drag, eyes fixed on the trees. “I think none of us are.”