THE SOLDIER’S RECKONING: 31 FRACTURES AND THE WOLFE BLOODLINE

I had precisely two minutes before Miller’s team breached the reinforced ICU door with a master key or a tactical ram.

I reached into my go-bag and pulled out my secure satellite transponder, keying in a twelve-digit authentication code that connected directly to a private line at the Joint Special Operations Command.

The call connected on the first ring.

"Specter Actual," a gravelly, familiar voice answered. It was Master Sergeant Ray Vance, my team leader who had retired six months prior and now ran an elite private tactical logistics firm out of Northern Virginia.

"Ray. It's Jack," I said, speaking in rapid, clipped military cadence. "Broken Arrow on my home position. Tessa is in critical condition at St. Jude Memorial, Room 412. Local law enforcement is compromised up to the chief of detectives. Hostile syndicate has active kill orders on my wife. I need extraction, air-evac, and an armed perimeter ten minutes ago."

There was no hesitation. No questions about authorization. When Delta blood is spilled, the Brotherhood doesn't debate policy.

"Bird is five minutes out from our regional airfield in Charlotte," Ray growled. "I have six operators on the ground in your sector armed with Level IV plates and sub-MOA rifles. We will lock down the hospital. You hold that room, Jack. Kill anyone who crosses the threshold without our callsign: Ironclad."

"Understood."

I snapped the transponder shut. Outside, the heavy mechanical lock on Room 412 clicked. The door swung open three inches before catching on the steel foot-brake I had wedged beneath the frame.

"Jack Dalton!" Detective Miller shouted through the crack, his service weapon drawn. "Drop your weapon and put your hands on your head! We have you on hospital security footage assaulting Dominic Wolfe and hospital staff! Step out now or we open fire!"

"Miller," I yelled back, keeping my body tucked behind the concrete door jamb. "I just watched the 4K recording from my living room smoke detector. I saw you bring the bleach. I saw you take Victor's envelope of hundred-dollar bills while my wife was bleeding on the floor."

The corridor fell dead silent.

Even through the heavy wood, I could hear Miller’s breath catch. A man who thinks he’s an untouchable kingpin suddenly realizing his noose has already been tied is a dangerous animal.

"He's delusional! He's experiencing combat-induced psychosis!" Miller barked to his deputies. "Breach the door! Deadly force authorized!"

Two heavy tactical boots slammed against the door, shearing the upper hinge. The door bucked inward. Through the opening, a tear-gas canister rolled across the linoleum, spewing thick white chemical smoke.

I pulled my tactical respirator over my face, stepped into the smoke cloud, and engaged.

The first deputy through the door came in low with a riot shotgun. I sidestepped his barrel, seized the receiver, twisted it out of his grip, and delivered a short, brutal palm-strike to his carotid sinus. He dropped instantly. The second deputy hesitated in the doorway, blinded by his own smoke. I stepped forward, drove the butt of the captured shotgun into his solar plexus, and threw him backward into the corridor like a bowling ball, knocking down Miller and another uniformed officer.

I stepped out into the hallway, standing in the center of the corridor with the shotgun leveled at Miller’s forehead.

Miller was scrambling backward on his elbows, his service weapon skittering away across the tiles. "You're a dead man, Dalton! Victor has three hundred men in this county! You won't make it past the lobby!"

"They're going to need all three hundred," I said.

At that moment, the heavy double doors at the end of the intensive care wing blew open with an ear-splitting crash.

Six men in full black tactical kits, carrying suppressed HK416 carbines and wearing night-vision mounts, moved into the corridor in perfect bounding overwatch.

"Ironclad!" the lead operator barked.

"Delta clear!" I responded.

Ray Vance lowered his rifle, stepping over the groaning deputies on the floor, and looked at me with cold, slate-gray eyes. "Transport helicopter is hovering over the trauma roof pad right now. Medical team has mobile life-support ready. We're moving Tessa to our secure compound in the Blue Ridge mountains."

"What about the Wolfe family?" Ray asked, nodding toward Miller who was wetting himself on the floor.

I looked down at Miller, then at Julian who was groaning inside the bathroom.