Page 53 of Crossfire Creek Siege

“Fence is hot,” he whispered. “Motion sensors and a live alarm circuit.”

Rena’s pulse jumped, but Garrett was already flipping open a panel on his jammer, fingers quick and sure. “Give me ten seconds.”

The device gave a soft electronic hum, then a green blink. “Sensors jammed. You’re clear.”

Cal nodded, then moved forward with his wire cutters. The sound was barely audible, a slow, methodical snip, snip, until a man-sized opening gaped in the fence. He pushed the section aside, glancing back at the team.

“Move,” he whispered.

Rena went through last, the metal edges brushing against her sleeve. They advanced in silence, the kind of silence that made her pulse sound too loud in her own ears. The ground here was gravel and hard-packed dirt. No grass, no brush to muffle their steps. Every movement was deliberate, calculated.

The hangars loomed ahead, two hulking shapes in the darkness, their metal siding dull under the moon. A windsock flapped lazily near the helipad. No light. No motion. Too quiet.

“Twenty yards out,” Cal murmured into comms. “Garrett, give me another scan.”

“Still cold,” Garrett whispered back, glancing at his handheld device. “No heat. Nothing moving.”

Rena’s gut didn’t buy it. The air felt wrong, too still, too heavy. The kind of stillness that came before chaos.

Then Isla’s voice came through the comms, sharp and a little too fast. “Hold up. I’ve got something.”

Everyone froze mid-step. Even the night seemed to pause.

“Talk to me, Isla,” Cal whispered.

Her voice crackled through their earpieces, tense now. “Drone just picked up heat signatures. Multiple. They weren’t there ten seconds ago.”

Rena turned her head slightly, scanning the trees to their flank. Nothing but darkness. The hair on her arms stood up.

“How many?” Cal asked.

“Can’t tell. At least four…” Isla’s tone spiked, and a second later her voice came through again, louder now, strained. “Oh, hell—” a pause, a quick intake of breath—“they’re behind you.”

Chapter Sixteen

Behind you. Isla’s words echoed like a live wire in Gage’s ears.

Hell. Someone was right on their asses, and Gage figured these guys weren’t here to make nice.

Cal’s voice came next, low and steady through the comm. “Silent takeout if possible. Move quiet. Confirm targets.”

Gage didn’t hesitate. He slipped backward through the line, keeping his body low, eyes sweeping the dark. Rena had rear watch. If there was trouble coming from behind, she’d see it first.

He found her crouched by a scrub line, weapon up, her gaze slicing through the shadows. When she spotted him, she shook her head once. No movement. No sound.

Gage dropped beside her, every sense stretched tight. He could feel the tremor of tension in the air, the kind that came before a firefight. But the woods behind them were nothing but shifting darkness and the faint whisper of wind through the branches.

Too quiet.

He adjusted his grip on his gun, the metal cool against his palm. Maybe Isla’s drone had picked up residual heat. Something mechanical, something old. But his gut said otherwise.

A darker thought crept in. What if the jamming signal wasn’t clean? If their enemy knew their playbook, they could’ve sent a false return, making it look as if the system was down when it wasn’t. Maybe those heat sources weren’t appearing out of nowhere. Maybe they’d been there the whole damn time.

And maybe those sons of bitches had been waiting for Crossfire Ops to walk right into their trap.

Gage’s pulse thudded even harder in his throat. They waited, seconds dragging out like hours, every breath measured, every muscle locked tight. The night was a living thing now, breathing around them, thick with the promise of violence.

Then, movement.