Page 1 of Fang

Chapter 1: Fang

I park my bike between a row of black SUVs outside the West Texas warehouse. The blazing afternoon sun burns through my disguise. Back at the motel, I stuffed myself into a suit and dress shoes, but threw on a rival club’s cut over everything. Don’t ask me how I got it. I still can’t believe I’m wearing another club’s colors, but that was the only way I could safely infiltrate Los Serpientes de Cristal’s black market auction.

Everyone in the cartel would love to take a shot at someone from my club, especially after we took out their leader back in New Orleans, but I’m not going to make it easy by announcing my affiliation. They think I’m representing Rough Hog Riders MC, not Underground Vengeance MC, but they’re wrong. I’m not even here on behalf of my club. If Vapor—my pres, the NOLA club’s pres—knew I was here, he’d kick my ass himself.

No. That’s not why I’m here. It’s personal. Someone’s been hacking my system and whoever it is will be here tonight. All I know is that it’s a hacker that goes by the alias Loba. Probably a chick, but who the hell knows these days. That’s just one little piece of a much bigger puzzle. I can’t figure out what Loba’s after, but she’s going to tell me. One way or another.

My mission’s simple. Get in. Find the bitch. Get out.

Armed guards stand at every exit, their assault rifles glinting in the fading desert sunlight. I count twelve men before I stop. Being vastly outnumbered isn’t making me feel any betterabout this. But it’s not like I could tell anyone in my club. I’d have to admit some hacker, possibly some chick, was good enough to get into my system. There’s no fucking way I’m letting anyone know about that. Not until I find out who’s behind it. And figure out why she’s poking around in my network.

The guard holding a clipboard checks my fake ID against his list of approved customers. Getting onto the cartel’s list wasn’t too hard; I hacked my way onto it. As long as there isn’t someone here from NOLA, I’ll be fine. There are much closer cartel auctions to NOLA, but this is the only one where I might find Loba. That’s why I rode over nine hundred miles to get here.

Inside the building, red floodlights turn everything the color of dried blood. I push deeper into the crowd, scanning for anyone else wearing Rough Hog Riders colors. According to the cartel’s invite list, I’m the only one representing that particular MC. I checked again when I left the motel this morning. As far as I know, I’m still safe.

A bunch of plastic folding tables covered with cheap plastic tablecloths line one wall. They’re covered with snacks. Nice. The coffee I drank two hours ago gurgles in my belly. I could go for aconchaor two.

Surveying the options, I feign intense interest in the variousconchas, but I’m looking for the person running the techie side of the auction. I spot a thick bundle of wires leading up the wall to the second floor of the warehouse. She’s got to be upstairs.

I snag one of the half-pink, half-chocolate-colored brioche-like sweet doughs and bite into it. Sweet. The pink’s strawberry. I assume the other side’s chocolate and not false advertising. As I skirt the perimeter of the crowd, I bite into it. Yep—chocolate. Damn, I love these things.

After casually circling the auction space, which is basically rows and rows of folding chairs already partially filled with people, I spot a staircase. It’s the only way up, so that’s the play.

No one’s guarding the stairs. I wait until the speakers crackle to life and use the distraction to swiftly make my way up to the second floor.

When I reach the top, I spin, ready to take on anyone coming up behind me. The stairs are empty. The second floor is filled with cardboard boxes. There’s no sign of movement, but I’m cautious, nonetheless.

Making my way through the stacked boxes, I walk toward the spot where the cables ran up the wall. I find them snaking deeper into the gloomy darkness.

I glance back at the stairs and then over the railing to the auction below. The crowd moves with the restless energy of predators at feeding time. Cartel dealers in expensive suits mingle with arms buyers, whose eyes scan constantly for threats. A few tech brokers huddle near the back, their nervous energy betraying them as the weakest links in this particular food chain.

The air is charged with nervousness and a hint of fear. Everyone here knows they’re one wrong move from being dumped in a shallow grave.

The auctioneer, a thin man with gold teeth and nervous hands, gestures toward a table at the front of the room. It’s laden with devices that probably shouldn’t exist. Hard drives, encrypted phones, data storage units that look military grade. Some really cool shit I’d love to get my hands on. But that’s not why I’m here.

I’m hunting a ghost who’s been making me look like a script kiddie for three weeks running. The first time I encountered her code I thought someone had slipped me bad coffee. I was running a routine data sweep on a cartel money-laundering operation when my screens suddenly filled with themost elegant penetration sequence I’d ever seen. Clean lines of code that moved like poetry, with variable names in Spanish that made me reach for a translation app. She didn’t just crack the system—she made it look beautiful while she did it.

Then she wiped the entire cartel ledger from under my nose and left a single message in my root directory: “Mejor suerte la próxima vez, chico.” Better luck next time, boy.

The gall. Unbelievable.

I spent the next seventy-two hours straight trying to trace her digital footprints, following phantom signals and ghost protocols that led me in circles until I admitted what I’d known from the start: she was better than me. Not just better. She was an artist, and I was still finger-painting with ones and zeros.

But here’s the thing about being good with computers—you learn to be patient, methodical, and obsessive. The same qualities that make me excellent at finding vulnerabilities in firewall systems also make me very, very good at finding people who don’t want to be found. And Loba made one mistake, she kept the Spanish flourishes in her code. Elegant, personal touches that were as distinctive as a signature.

Three weeks of tracking led me here, to this blood-red warehouse where the auctioneer holds up what looks like a standard FBI encrypted drive. “Ladies and gentlemen, direct from a federal raid in Houston, we have the largest photo collection of children we’ve ever offered for auction. Huge resale value to the right customer. Shall we start the bidding at fifty thousand? Do I hear—”

Blood rushes through my eardrums, drowning out the auctioneer. All I can think about is Tommy. Guilt floods my chest, pressing down until my heart feels like it’s about to burst. I struggle to take a breath, but all that does is replace the guilt with rage. A rage so wild I’m ready to burn this place to the fucking ground. It takes everything in me to regain control.

Every missing person case I’ve cracked, every trafficking ring I’ve helped the club dismantle, it all traces back to that ten-year-old boy who wanted to play one more game of basketball while his little brother rode home alone.

Tommy never came home. He’s never been found. I’ll probably never know who took him, but someone did. And I’m going to kill everyone who has anything to do with abusing kids. Vengeance is the only thing that keeps me sane.

The auctioneer’s voice fades as I move back into the maze of boxes. Somewhere in this warehouse of thieves and killers is the person who’s been making me question my own skills.

I follow the cables until I spot a hallway that looks like an administrative area. The red floodlights give way to standard fluorescents, and the constant hum of the overhead fans fades to something more manageable. My footsteps echo differently here. Instead of walking on a metal floor, this one’s polished tile. This is where the real business happens, away from the theater of the auction floor.

I follow the corridor’s gentle curve, noting security cameras positioned at every junction. Standard placement, nothing creative. Whoever designed this system thinks like a textbook, which makes my job easier. I quickly link one of the cameras into a bypass loop so whoever’s watching won’t see me coming.

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