Ghost Warrior III - Sins of the Father - Chapter 13

 

Chapter 13

By 0500 the cabin was as quiet as a grave.

Tucker stood alone in the main room, boots planted on the scuffed plank floor, cooling mug of coffee in his hand. A single lamp burned low on the counter, throwing a cone of yellow light over the battered table and the freshly scrubbed boards where the worst of the blood had been. The air still carried a faint mix of bleach, pine cleaner, and something darker that no amount of soap could fully erase.

He turned slowly, eyes tracing every corner. The chalk outlines were gone. The worst of the stains had been lifted. He’d spent most of the night on his hands and knees with a bucket and rags, working the seams of the floorboards until his knuckles ached and his back throbbed, pausing only when the memories pressed in too close—Minko’s body, the DVR, the first time crime scene tape had crossed this threshold. He didn’t let himself dwell on it now. The flashes came and went—just enough to sting, not enough to drag him under.

He’d done what he could. The rest would either fade with time… or it wouldn’t.

He took the last swallow of coffee, the bitter dregs lukewarm on his tongue, and set the mug down softly on the counter. His single bag sat by the door by itself—no extra gear, no creature comforts, just what he needed to move quickly and disappear into whatever came next.

He took one more long look around the room.

“This is it,” he murmured, though there was no one to hear it. Not a farewell, exactly. Just an acknowledgment.

He picked up the bag, slung the strap over his shoulder, and walked to the door. The hinges complained softly as he pulled it shut behind him. On the outside, the morning was still more night than day—sky a deep pre-dawn blue shading toward gray, breath puffing faintly in the cold.

He reached up and dropped the metal hasp over the ring of the new lock plate he’d installed the day before, the bright steel still clean against the weathered wood. He fished the padlock from his pocket, clicked it into place with a muted snick, and slid the key back into his jeans.

When he turned, headlights were already angling up the long drive, bouncing gently in the ruts and hollows. The familiar boxy silhouette of Walker’s Jeep Grand Cherokee emerged through the last of the trees—old model, dark green, paint faded at the edges but running quiet and straight.

Walker eased to a stop in the yard, engine rumbling softly. The beams swept across Tucker, then dropped as Walker shifted into park and hit the lights, leaving only the weak pink of dawn and the Jeep’s running lamps.

Tucker walked down off the porch, the bag heavy but balanced on his shoulder, and opened the passenger door. He climbed in without a word, shutting the door firmly behind him. The cabin of the Jeep smelled like old coffee, leather, and dust—like a hundred early morning patrols.

Walker glanced over, nodded once in greeting, and then ducked his head toward the center console. A second travel mug sat in the cup holder, steam feathering off the lid.

“Fresh,” Walker said. “Black, hot, stronger than a Death Star, just like you like it..”

Tucker gave him a small nod. “Thanks.”

He wrapped his hands around the mug, grateful for the heat even if he didn’t feel much like drinking. Walker shifted into reverse, backed out of the yard, and nosed the Jeep down the long gravel drive, tires crunching softly over shale and dirt.

Neither man spoke for the first few minutes. They passed between the trees, the cabin disappearing behind them as the drive curved toward the main road. The faint gray band on the eastern horizon was starting to widen, but the light was still weak, washed through low clouds.

At the end of the lane, Walker paused at the stop sign, checked both directions on the empty county road, then turned left toward Atoka. The old Cherokee settled into a low, steady hum.

“Highway 3 to Coalgate,” Walker said quietly, more to mark the path than to start a conversation. “Then on to Ada. You know the drill.”

“I know it,” Tucker said, staring out at the dark smears of pasture and tree line sliding by. “Two and a half, give or take.”

“About that,” Walker agreed.

They rolled through Atoka while the town was still waking up—lights on in a few storefronts, the diner’s sign glowing hazy in the damp air, a lone pickup trundling down the opposite lane. Then they caught OK-3 northwest, the road narrowing and straightening, threading them through miles of pasture, scrub, and scattered farmhouse lights.

For a long stretch the only sounds were the tires on asphalt, the low murmur of the engine, and the whisper of the heater blowing against the windshield.

Tucker took a few careful sips of the coffee and then set the mug back in the holder, fingers rubbing absently at a sore spot on his palm where the scrub brush had chewed the skin raw.

“I didn’t sleep much,” he said finally, breaking the quiet without looking over. “Too much cleaning.”

Walker glanced his way, hands steady on the wheel. “I figured,” he said. “Lights were still on when I passed by about midnight.”

“I wanted it done,” Tucker said. “At least what I could do. Thanks for letting me in there… letting me take the tape down.”

Walker shrugged slightly. “Wasn’t much to ‘let,’” he said. “Scene was processed. Photos taken. Bodies gone. I’d rather you be the one taking care of that place than some county contractor with no skin in the game.”

Tucker huffed softly. “Still. Regulations.”

Walker gave a small, humorless smile. “I called it ‘incidental remediation by a property stakeholder under supervised access.’”

Tucker turned his head. “That’s not a real phrase.”

“It is if I write it down enough times,” Walker said. “Look, you’re family. You were going to clean it whether I liked it or not. Better I know you’re in there and sign the log than pretend it isn’t happening and have you crawling through a window at two in the morning.”

Tucker let a quiet exhale slip through his nose. “Fair enough.”

He watched the road ahead for a few miles, the dashed centerline ticking past like a metronome.

“If you could get someone to do a deeper scrub later,” he said, “for the corners I didn’t get to… I’ll pay for it. Just… a proper crew. Walls, cushions. All of it.”

Walker nodded. “I’ll find somebody who knows what they’re doing,” he said. “Not some fly-by-night cleaning service that shows up in a white van and posts crime scene selfies on social. I know a guy out of Durant. Good reputation. Discreet.”

“Appreciate it,” Tucker said.

They fell quiet again. The Jeep ate up the miles, the land slowly changing from dense stands of trees to more open fields. As they passed through small towns—Coalgate, then the outskirts of Ada—gas stations and feed stores dotted the highway, but traffic remained thin. The world was awake now, but not fully.

At one point Walker flicked his eyes toward the rearview mirror and then back to the road.

“You want to talk about what comes next?” he asked.

Tucker shook his head once. “Not yet,” he said. “I’m still… thinking it through.”

Walker accepted that without comment.

A few minutes later, Tucker shifted in his seat, let his head rest back against the headrest, and closed his eyes.

“I’m going to shut down for a bit,” he said. “Call it asset preservation.”

“Go ahead,” Walker said quietly. “You look like hammered hell anyway.”

“Thanks,” Tucker muttered, already half-gone. “Wake me when we’re close.”

Walker drove on, alone with his thoughts, the faint glow of the dashboard casting green light on his face. He kept one eye on the road, the other occasionally flicking to the side mirrors. Old habit. Tucker’s breathing settled into a slow, even rhythm, not quite sleep but close enough for his body to take what it could get.

Outside, Oklahoma rolled by—pastureland, creeks, little clusters of houses clinging to the edges of the highway. As they approached the outer ring of Oklahoma City, the horizon brightened more, low clouds lit from beneath by the smeared glow of urban light. Traffic thickened gradually—pickups, compact cars, semis grinding along in the right lane.

Walker merged smoothly onto the broader flow, staying in the right-hand lane, letting the GPS-less muscle memory guide him toward the familiar sequence of interchanges that would lead to the airport.

About two hours and twenty minutes after they’d left the cabin, Walker cleared his throat once.

“Hey, Tucker.”

Tucker’s eyes opened immediately. Years of deployment had left him with the kind of sleep that never fell all the way. He blinked once, took in the highway signs, the line of cars ahead of them, and sat up straighter, rolling the stiffness out of his neck.

“Where are we?” he asked.

“Just about there,” Walker said. He nodded toward an overhead sign: AIRPORT EXIT – 1 MILE. “You didn’t snore. So that’s something.”

“Small mercies,” Tucker said.

A few minutes later, they were peeling off onto the airport approach, the concrete ramps curling them toward the departures levels. The glass-and-steel façade of Will Rogers World Airport rose ahead, terminal lights bright against the dull sky. Shuttle buses moved along dedicated lanes, a loop of drop-off and pickup playing on endless repeat.

Walker followed the signs for Departures, Southwest’s banner easy to spot above one of the entrance doors. He pulled into the curb lane, easing the Jeep to a smooth stop behind a minivan already disgorging overpacked luggage and undercaffeinated travelers.

He shifted into park and looked over at Tucker.

“This is you,” Walker said.

Tucker nodded. The duffel was already at his feet, his hand on the strap.

“Thanks for the lift,” he said. He reached out and offered his hand. “And for… everything else.”

Walker took it, grip firm, their eyes meeting for a brief second that carried more than words—shared history, mutual respect, the understanding that things were not finished, just paused.

“Catch you later, Walker,” Tucker said.

“You better,” Walker replied. “Try not to get shot between here and wherever you think you’re going.”

“No promises,” Tucker said.

He popped the door and stepped out into the chilled air, the sound of rolling luggage, car doors, and distant PA announcements washing over him. He swung the duffel onto his shoulder and closed the door with a solid thunk.

He didn’t look back immediately. He walked up the sidewalk and through the sliding glass doors into the terminal, the blast of conditioned air hitting him as he crossed the threshold. Inside, the light was brighter, whiter, the noise more diffuse.

He turned left automatically, in the direction of the Southwest counter. His pace was calm, unhurried, steady. Behind him, the Jeep’s engine revved lightly.

Walker sat there for a moment at the curb, watching through the windshield as Tucker moved into the flow of people. He saw him clear the first bank of glass, turn left, disappear behind a knot of travelers in winter coats.

Walker sighed softly, the breath fogging the inside of the windshield for half a heartbeat. Then he put the Jeep into drive, checked his mirrors, and pulled away from the curb, merging back into the loop traffic. Within seconds he was sliding into the outbound lane, carried away toward the exit, the dark Cherokee shrinking into the distance.

Inside, Tucker stood just beyond the glass, off to the side where the crowd thinned near a bank of large windows. He watched through the glass as Walker’s Jeep followed the curve of the roadway, taillights visible for another few seconds before the vehicle slipped behind a concrete pillar and was gone.

He waited until even the faint suggestion of the Jeep had disappeared.

Then he stepped back from the window, turned away from the Southwest counter, and walked in the opposite direction toward the signs marked GROUND TRANSPORTATION / RENTAL CAR SHUTTLES.

A shuttle bus idled at the far end of the curb outside the lower level, bright letters scrolling CONSOLIDATED RENTAL CAR CENTER across its digital display. He rode the escalator down, duffel still on his shoulder, and stepped out into the damp air as the sliding doors parted.

The driver glanced at him, gave a small nod. Tucker returned it and climbed aboard, choosing a seat near the back where he could see both the front and the side windows.

The bus doors hissed closed.

As the shuttle pulled away from the terminal and headed toward the rental car complex, the airport receded behind him—not a departure this time, but a different kind of arrival.

 

 

0530 hours
Pasadena, Texas
Vacant Warehouse – La Hermandad de la Frontera

The warehouse groaned under the weight of another cold Gulf evening, the corrugated metal walls flexing as the wind pushed against them in slow, heavy breaths. The place was mostly empty—just a cavern of shadows and the faint smell of machine oil clinging to the cracked concrete floor. Only the small office on the elevated mezzanine showed any sign of life, its single yellow bulb glowing behind dusty glass like an old lantern swinging in a storm.

Inside, Tomás “El Cura” Beltrán sat at the scarred wooden table that had served as his desk for twenty years. The surface was pitted with cigarette burns, knife scores, and the deep circular stains left by too many bottles of bourbon. A column of smoke rose from the cigar clamped between his fingers, curling toward the low ceiling before flattening out beneath the humming fluorescent light.

Across from him, Lucía “La Viuda” Serrano sat with her back straight, boots planted, and hands resting loosely in her lap—relaxed, but never unready. Her long jet-black hair was tied back into a sleek, no-nonsense ponytail, a few strands drifting loose in the draft from the warped window. Her eyes were dark, watchful, and unflinching.

Tomás watched her for a moment, something soft moving behind the hardness of his expression. Affection, yes—his version of it. Respect. Pride. He had never been a man given to sentiment, but Lucía was the single exception written into his bones.

He exhaled a thin plume of smoke and asked quietly, “¿Has oído algo? Have you heard from the three we sent to Atoka?”

Her answer was subtle, almost soundless—a small shake of her head, her ponytail shifting no more than an inch. “No, Jefe,” she whispered. “Nada.”

He gave a tight, knowing smile. Not surprised. Not yet angry. These things had a rhythm; he understood that rhythm well.

Tomás reached for the bourbon bottle on the table—an old-fashioned square decanter, half-full—and poured two fingers into her glass. Then he poured another measure for himself. He slid her glass across the table with the same ease he had practiced for years, then held out a lit cigar, the tip glowing fiercely.

Lucía accepted both with a soft nod, her fingers brushing the back of his hand for an instant—unforced, familiar, carrying the weight of a lifetime between them.

She took the cigar, tasting the smoke before settling back again. Her gaze drifted to him, sharp and observant, but not questioning. She never questioned him without cause. He had earned her loyalty in ways no one else ever had.

He’d first seen her when she was four—small, silent, sitting on the edge of a cot in a Mexico City orphanage run by nuns who worked miracles on starvation budgets. Abandoned children were nothing new to him; he’d funded dozens of such homes. But she had stared at him with those same unwavering eyes she had now—eyes that didn’t plead, didn’t flinch, didn’t break. He had placed a hand on her head, and she had leaned into it without hesitation.

He’d known then.

When she turned fourteen, he brought her into his home outside Mexico City—a sprawling hacienda framed by jacaranda trees and stone terraces, guarded by high walls and higher expectations. She studied. She watched. She listened. She learned. He’d seen her brilliance early: the way she read people, weighed their motives, dissected their lies.

He never hid what he was from her—not the business, not the violence, not the truth. She had discovered his vocation on her own, long before he intended to reveal it. Instead of fear, she showed purpose.

She followed his example into the Mexican Army. Then into CNI, the intelligence directorate—the place where the country’s most dangerous patriots were carved into weapons. Her training had been exceptional. Better than his. She became lethal, quiet, precise. And when he asked—only when he asked—she killed for him. Without hesitation. Without remorse. Without leaving a trace.

Now, at twenty-nine, she was the most efficient enforcer he had ever seen.

All of this moved through his mind as he watched her in the dim light, her profile sharp and elegant against the concrete wall.

Lucía felt his gaze and turned slightly to hold it. She saw everything behind it. Then, without a word, she stood, walked across the office to the small counter, poured a cup of strong Mexican coffee from the battered metal carafe, and set it gently in front of him.

He smiled at her—a real smile, rare and fleeting—and nodded.

She was just sitting again when the office door crashed open with a bang.

Lucía moved faster than breath.

Her Glock 17 appeared in her hand between heartbeats, raised and aligned, her stance shifting fluidly as she pivoted to face the intruder. The muzzle centered on the shadow in the doorway before Tomás even turned his head.

“¡No! ¡No dispares!” the man shouted, voice high, desperate. “No—don't shoot!”

Lucía held steady for another second, then slowly lowered the weapon as the figure stepped into the weak light.

Medina.

He looked like a man already half-dead—sweating, pale, eyes wild. His shirt was torn at the sleeve, and his hands shook as he pushed the door fully closed behind him.

Tomás leaned back in his chair, studying him with the quiet, unblinking intensity of a surgeon examining a tumor.

“¿Dónde están los otros?” he asked coldly. “Where are the others? And where is the traitor?”

Medina swallowed hard and collapsed into the chair opposite Tomás. Lucía moved behind him, silent as a shadow, taking up a position that would have been comforting if she were anyone else.

Medina began to speak in a torrent—half English, half Spanish, his words tumbling over each other in rapid fragments.

“Entramos en la cabaña—the cabin—sí, sí, we got inside, but he was waiting, Jefe, he was waiting for us—fast, fuerte, más fuerte than we thought—he moved like—like—like an animal—my God—he—” His breath hitched. “He killed them—los cortó—cut them—la cabeza—casi—almost cut—”

His eyes darted upward as if begging understanding. “I never saw—Jefe, nunca—never seen anything like it—two of them—gone—just like that—”

Tomás didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t interrupt. He didn’t blink.

“And the traitor?” he whispered.

Medina swallowed again, throat bobbing. “I shot him,” he said. “Three times. In the chest. I swear it. But—la policía—they were coming—I heard them—I had to run—”

Tomás stared at him for a long moment.

“Then where,” Tomás said softly, “is his head?”

Medina’s eyes widened, and he took a sharp breath. “Jefe, I—I had to—if I had stayed—”

Tomás lowered his gaze, examining the ash at the end of his cigar, flicking it gently into the ceramic tray. He did this for several seconds, seemingly absorbed in the small ritual.

Then he lifted his head.

He did not look at Lucía.

He didn’t have to.

He gave the barest nod—a silent command sharpened by decades of shared understanding.

Lucía moved.

She slipped her left arm suddenly and violently around Medina’s forehead, wrenching his head back with brutal precision. Medina’s scream barely formed before her right hand shot up, snake-fast, the glint of steel flashing once in the yellow overhead light.

The twelve-inch double-edged blade drove into the junction of his skull and spine at the occipital base, sliding in with a sickening, efficient crunch. Medina’s whole body convulsed, legs kicking at the floor, fingers clawing at the air. Lucía twisted the blade savagely side to side, severing brainstem and spinal cord in a single practiced motion.

The spasming stopped.

His body sagged limp in the chair.

Lucía held him for an extra second, ensuring total stillness, before withdrawing the blade in a clean, practiced pull. Blood flowed in a dark sheet down the back of the chair. She wiped the blade on Medina’s jacket shoulder, folded the cloth back over the steel, and slid the weapon away.

Tomás rose slowly, looking down at the corpse with expressionless disdain. He took one final drag from his cigar, then dropped the stub into the ashtray.

He spit on Medina’s shoes.

Without another glance, he turned toward the door. Lucía fell into step beside him, wiping the last trace of blood from her hand with a linen square she produced from her pocket.

They stepped out of the office, pulling the door shut behind them. Their footsteps echoed across the metal stairs as they descended into the cavernous warehouse below.

As they reached the bottom, Tomás leaned close to her, his voice no louder than a breath.

“Limpia este desastre,” he whispered. “Have someone clean up the mess…”

He paused, a rare note of softness in his tone.

“…mi hija.”

My daughter.

Lucía nodded once and walked into the shadows to obey.