Page 30 of Viking (Dixie Reapers MC #24)

I stood in the control room, blood drying on my knuckles, breathing in the copper scent of death and the acrid remnants of gunfire.

My body catalogued injuries with detached precision -- split lip, a few knife wounds, bruised ribs, a dozen minor cuts and contusions that would bloom into impressive bruises by morning.

None of it mattered. What mattered was the laptop Prophet had and the information it now contained from the main system, the files Sarge was stuffing into a backpack, the evidence that would burn the corrupt senators, and any other high-ranking officials, to the ground and exonerate the innocent members.

Because once all this became known, there was a chance the media would try to paint them all with the same brush.

Men like Kris would be known as heroes. What mattered was that when I returned to the compound, I could tell Karoline it was over.

That Kris’s killers had paid their price.

“We’re clear,” Bull reported, appearing in the doorway. Blood had soaked through a makeshift bandage on his shoulder, but his eyes were sharp, focused. Had any of us made it through this without getting injured? “Flicker’s doing a final sweep of the east wing.”

I nodded, pulling my attention away from the body cooling on the floor. “And the explosives?”

“Ten-minute timer once we hit the detonator. Nothing but ash will remain,” Saint said.

“Good.” I crossed to the map wall, studying what was left of the red pins marking locations across the country. I snapped a quick photo with my phone.

“Found their communications log,” Prophet said, holding up a small notebook. “Coded, but Wire can crack it.”

“Take it all,” I ordered, wincing as I bent to check the dead leader’s pockets. His wallet yielded military ID -- Colonel James Mercer, retired. I pocketed it, along with his phone and a small USB drive from his pocket.

Sarge examined a laptop screen, his injured arm held close to his body. “They’ve got files on all of us,” he reported, voice tight with pain and anger. “Surveillance photos of the compound. Dossiers on our families.”

A cold weight settled in my stomach. “Download everything, then fry the hard drives.”

While the others worked, I moved through the room, gathering anything that looked important.

Maps, more files, a ledger with handwritten notes.

In the corner, I found a small safe, its door hanging open.

Inside was a stack of passports with different names but the same faces -- escape identities for the leadership. I took those too.

“Viking,” Flicker called from the doorway, his face pale from blood loss but his voice steady. “You need to see this.”

I followed him down a hallway to a smaller office.

Unlike the control center with its technology and maps, this room was sparse -- just a desk, a chair, and a wall of photographs.

My blood ran cold as I recognized the subjects.

Kris in civilian clothes, walking down a street.

Karoline leaving her preschool, arms full of craft supplies.

And most chilling -- Athena playing in a park, her copper curls catching sunlight, oblivious to the camera documenting her movements.

“They’ve been watching them for months,” Flicker said, disgust evident in his voice. “Before Kris was even killed.”

I stared at the photos, rage building anew in my chest. These men hadn’t just killed Kris and targeted Karoline.

They’d been stalking Athena -- an innocent child -- treating her like collateral damage in their corrupt game.

My fist slammed into the wall beside the photos, pain shooting up my arm from already damaged knuckles.

“Take them down,” I ordered. “All of them. We’ll burn them with everything else.”

Back in the main hallway, we regrouped. Everyone was upright, though the toll of the night’s violence was evident in bloodstained clothing and grim expressions.

Bull was wrapping a fresh bandage around Prophet’s neck wound.

Saint was helping Flicker with his reopened leg injury.

Sarge checked his ammunition, movements careful with his injured arm.

I checked my watch. “Plant the charges on your way out. Standard pattern, thirty-second intervals.”

They nodded, breaking off to complete their final tasks.

I returned to the control center alone, drawn back to the body of the man who’d ordered Kris’s death.

In death, Colonel Mercer looked smaller somehow, his cold eyes staring sightlessly at the ceiling.

I felt nothing looking at him -- no satisfaction, no remorse, just the hollow certainty that one threat had been eliminated.

But as Mercer himself had said, there were others.

The senators. Their operatives. The corrupt system that had allowed Operation Ghostwalk to exist in the first place.

The intelligence we’d gathered tonight would expose them all.

Kris’s evidence combined with what we’d found would be enough to bring down the entire operation.

Wire would make sure it reached the right people -- journalists, federal agents Kris had trusted, oversight committees that couldn’t be bought.

I knelt beside Mercer’s body. I thought of what this man had represented -- the faceless threat that had hung over Karoline and Athena since I’d brought them to the compound. With him gone, they were safer. Not completely safe -- never that, not in this life -- but the immediate danger had passed.

“Time to go,” Prophet called from the doorway.

I stood, taking one last look around the room where justice had been served.

Then I followed Prophet out, moving through hallways now silent except for our footsteps.

Bodies lay where they’d fallen, blood pooling on concrete floors.

The smell of death hung heavy in the air, familiar from my military days but no less disturbing.

Outside, the night air felt clean in comparison, cooling the sweat on my face and easing the tightness in my chest. My brothers waited by the tree line, charges set, weapons shouldered. In the distance, our bikes waited.

“Thirty seconds,” Saint said, holding up the detonator.

We moved away from the buildings, putting safe distance between ourselves and the charges.

When we reached the edge of the clearing, Saint pressed the button.

For a moment, nothing happened. Then the first explosion rocked the administrative building, blowing out windows in a shower of glass.

The second followed seconds later, then the third -- a chain of destruction designed to leave nothing but ashes.

I watched the flames begin to climb, eating through walls and roofs, consuming the evidence of our presence along with the last remnants of Operation Ghostwalk’s operational base.

The fire reflected in my brothers’ eyes as they stood beside me, faces grim with the weight of what we’d accomplished and what it had cost us.

“Let’s ride.” We made our way through the woods in silence, each man lost in his own thoughts, as we made our way back to our bikes. My body ached with every step, injuries making themselves known now that the adrenaline was fading. But beneath the pain was a lightness I hadn’t expected.

At our bikes, we performed quick field dressings on the worst injuries.

Prophet’s neck wound had stopped bleeding, but the skin around it was angry and red.

Flicker’s leg needed proper stitches. Sarge winced as Bull tied off a bandage around his arm.

It looked like someone had already patched up the big guy.

Saint, the least injured among us, helped me clean my knife wounds, then wrapped gauze around the one on my forearm.

“You good to ride?” he asked quietly, eyeing my various injuries.

I nodded, flexing my fingers to ensure I could still operate the throttle and brake. “I’ve ridden with worse.”

We mounted our bikes, the familiar rumble of Harley engines, and Flicker’s Indian, breaking the pre-dawn silence. I took point, leading my brothers away from the burning compound and back toward home. Toward Karoline and Athena.