Page 3 of Shadow's Edge

On the screen, Match and I were mid-mission, scanning the terrain for signs of a hostile encampment. As I banked left, the missile warning system suddenly blared, flashing bright red on the console, but the Raider had maneuverability unlike anything else. One quick shift, and the missile veered off course, missing us completely.

“Oh goody, they want to play rough!” my own voice rang out over the footage, cutting through the instrumentals ofIridescent.

The scene shifted to us confirming a hit over the radio. “Confirmed,” the clipped voice said—the coded term we used when a target had been neutralized. These days, we had to be careful with our language. Even if the men we took down were monsters, they were still lives that had been ended.

I glanced around the room, watching the expressions of the bikers as they absorbed the footage. Some looked impressed, others unreadable. But one thing was certain—none of them were underestimating me anymore.

The beat shifted, and suddenly, Jay-Z and Linkin Park’sNumb/Encorefilled the room, pulsing through the speakers like a heartbeat. The footage playing on the screen had to be from one of the tail-end guys in our unit because I was further up ahead, sweeping the area on foot for recent signs of movement.

Dressed in a fitted gray t-shirt, camouflaged Kevlar vest, and matching combat pants, I moved with precision, my assault rifle gripped in front of me while my sidearm was holstered against my thigh. My pack, modified to carry my sniper rifle without it knocking against my legs, sat snugly against my back just in case. Typically, we’d be decked out in full camouflage, but sometimes, conditions forced us to strip down to essentials. This had been one of those moments.

As I focused on the footage, the chorus of the song hit, and the entire room erupted in laughter. At the exact moment the lyrics rang out—What the hell are you waiting for?—I turned to the screen and shouted the words along with it. It was perfect timing, a brilliant catch by Data, who was always a pain in the ass but had a knack for pulling these kinds of gems from our footage.

Then, the next clip rolled in—the one that had made my name legendary.

Two years ago, we had been deployed to retrieve two soldiers captured by Islamic State fighters. As we’d fast-roped from the helicopter, the mission went sideways. Hostile fire rained down, forcing us to scramble for cover behind a mud embankment. I barely had a second to set up my rifle before I caught movement through my scope—a militant aiming an RPG directly at our helo, which was still dropping guys into the kill zone.

It was instinct. A split-second decision. The wind was right, the angle perfect, so I squeezed the trigger.

The bullet met its mark at the exact moment he fired, detonating the RPG in mid-air and taking out the cluster of fighters near him.

Apparently, a shot like that was one in a billion.

Since then, I had pulled off better. I wasn’t the type to brag, but I’d tested out a Canadian military-issued McMillan TAC-50 and taken out a hostile at just under three thousand meters. That record was eventually shattered by a sniper in the Canadian Special Forces, and I had nothing but respect for the guy. That was pure fucking skill.

The room buzzed with conversation, the low murmur of voices blending together. I tuned it all out, my attention locked on the faces around the table. Some were familiar, old comrades from past missions, men who had fought beside me, bled beside me. A few smirked at me, others offered small nods or winks, silent acknowledgments of our shared history from the footage.

But no matter how much I tried to focus on the room as a whole, my gaze kept drifting back to one person. Jagger.

He sat across from me, posture relaxed but his presence was anything but. He hadn’t shown much emotion since I first saw him outside with Preacher earlier, but now, sitting at the table, his expression was unreadable, his eyes sharp and unwavering. There was something about him, something quiet but charged, like a storm on the horizon.

I let my gaze drop, taking him in. His cut was worn but well-kept, a clear testament to time spent in the club. And there it was, the VP patch stitched across his chest, a silent declaration of his rank and his authority. That alone should have told me enough, but I wanted to know more.

Slowly, I lifted my eyes back to his face and our gazes locked. For a moment, the noise of the room disappeared entirely, fading into nothing but the space between us. It was a silent challenge, an unspoken question neither of us was willing to put into words. I didn’t back down, and neither did he. The air between us felt charged, thick with something unnamable.

Then someone at the table shattered the silence, and the spell broke. But even as the noise of the room rushed back in, I knew one thing for certain, this wasn’t over.

“Fuck me! You’re Kai Ghost.”

The reaction was nothing new. People never expectedmeto bethatKai Ghost. With my blonde hair and curves that didn’t exactly scream “elite sniper,” I didn’t fit the stereotype. Most assumed I was some bimbo tagging along, a girl playing dress-up. It was always amusing to watch their assumptions shatter.

JAGGER

Kai Ghost.

The name rattled something in my memory, a fragment of recognition I couldn’t quite pin down. But looking at her blank expression, I couldn’t tell if she even knew the weight her own name carried for Gauge who’d said it.

“You didn’t realize that?” The guy who had arrived with her leaned back with an easy grin, draping his arm over the back of her chair. His hand curled around her neck, giving it a casual shake—an action that, for reasons I couldn’t explain, irritated the hell out of me.

“I mean, you just watched her in action,” he continued. “That’s barely scratching the surface. You even saw the rifle she walked in with, and the name still didn’t click?”

“I thought it was a man,” Gauge admitted, still sounding floored. A chorus of agreement rippled through the table, but my mind was racing, piecing it together.

Then it hit me.

“Back the fuck up—you’re the one who took out Ramirez and his entire crew.”

The realization landed like a punch. The woman sitting here, watching us with cool detachment, wasn’t just another operator.She was a ghost in the truest sense—feared by the enemy, revered by those lucky enough to fight alongside her.

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