And I know just the place.
Chapter2
Beckett
I’m halfway through a bottle of whiskey when my phone buzzes.
I’m staying in a cheap motel room that stinks of cigarette smoke and regret. Not mine. I don’t smoke. The regret? That’s another story.
I’ve been holed up in this shithole for a week, waiting for the next job. Security. Extraction. A little off-the-books “problem-solving” for people who don’t ask questions.
It’s not ethical work.
Not by civilian standards, anyway. I move in shadows that most people pretend don't exist. The skills that made me valuable as a SEAL—tracking, surveillance, calculated intimidation, the ability to cross lines when necessary—are in high demand by people who need results without the red tape. I don't break kneecaps for loan sharks, but I don't always play by the rules, either. There's a line I won't cross, but that line shifts depending on who deserves what's coming to them.
It pays well enough to numb my conscience and keeps me busy enough to outrun my demons.
Sometimes, in the quiet moments between jobs—moments like this one—I wonder what the hell I'm doing with my life. Drifting from one motel to the next, one job to another. No roots. No connections. Just me, my skills, and a growing bank account I barely touch. But then I remember why this life suits me. Why I chose it. Or maybe it chose me.
I stare at the screen for a beat before answering. “This better be good.”
Angus’s low chuckle reaches me down the line. “Still an asshole, Shadow.”
A blast from the past. Angus Sutton. Former brother-in-arms and one of the few people I trust with my life.
“Not much else to be. Long time no speak. What’s up?”
A pause. “I need a favor.”
I don’t answer right away. Haven't heard his voice in what? Four years? Not since that last mission in Afghanistan, the one that left the rest of our team in body bags.
The one that left me a different man than I was before.
“You still got that ranch? What was it called? Happyridge?”
“Havenridge,” Angus corrects.
“I hear beef prices are fluctuating, and the weather isn’t helping.”
“We diversified.”
“Diversified, how?”
“Goats.”
“You’re a damn goat farmer?”
Angus's laugh rumbles through the phone—the same laugh that once kept our spirits up during thirty-six hours pinned down behind enemy lines. “It’s a ranch, Beckett. We run cattle, breed horses, and yes, we also have goats.”
I take another sip of whiskey. “I leave you alone for a few years and you turn into a goddamn goat herder.”
“They’re useful.”
“For what? Satanic rituals?”
He sighs. “For eating weeds.”
“I’m picturing it now.” I lean against the motel headboard, stretching my legs out. “Big, tough ex-SEAL, standing in a field at sunrise, playing the flute, serenading his little goat army.”
